Barbara Benjamin
598 words
Community theater
incident
The Grease Paint Rebels
The roar of the crowd during the recent productions of Franz Lehar's "Merry Widow," by San Jose's primo
community theater group Lyric Theatre, could barely be heard above the din of
anger raging behind the curtains backstage.
Although reference to Lyric Theatre as "community theatre"
rings solidly as a misnomer when considering the elaborate sets, designed by the
genius of major motion picture and television studios' Gary Mitchell, the lush
costuming by such a notable as University of Santa Clara's Barbara Murray, and
the professional staging by well-known Bay Area directors who generally make a
fine living at their craft. And all of
this professional quality isn't glitter to dazzle the audience because of
inferior casting. Quite the contrary. Though, admittedly, performers in community theater are not members of Equity, the actors'
union, and who perform without compensation, most of the leads are no less professional
in stature and quality than their Equity counterparts. Theirs may be a conscious decision not to
officially affiliate as "professionals," however, they often receive
respectable compensation for their extraordinary talents—to wit: the preeminent
Catherine Petrek, star of "The Merry
Widow," known for her stunning lead performances with all of the major
opera companies in the San Francisco Bay Area; Cheryl Blalock, whose lush
soprano trills never fails to raise goose flesh; and tenors Todd Shwirm, Bob Bergman, and Frank Farris, all of singular, local
operatic repute.
Native talent notwithstanding, all this five-star talent doesn't just
happen, rather, congeals and energizes with years of strict attention to vocal
exercises, drama courses, and practice, practice, practice. The payback for all their dedication to
excellence comes from the roar and cheers of appreciative audiences at
curtain-call time, that short, delicate space of time when audiences unleash motivating
applause as individual leads step forward for their special bow, the rightful
recipient of the frenzied hand-clapping.
It's that special climax which the players thirst and strive for,
putting in months of sweat, joy, and agony of rehearsals in preparation for the
performances. Acknowledgment of
individual efforts gratifyingly crowns the individual efforts, which explains
the raging backstage during "The Merry Widow."
During hell week (the stress-filled week of dress rehearsals),
director Ruth Stein, inflamed a near riot when she announced that there would
be no individual curtain calls. This
meant that all cast members would grasp hands and step forward simultaneously
for the applause. After three months of
rehearsals, the leads spending extra time memorizing lines, blocking, and arias,
and all of the money spent for years of lessons, a mass curtain call sounds a
sour note to suggest that talent and efforts are equally divided—not to mention
egos. Such ludicrous socialistic ideas
fell with the iron curtain earlier this decade.
Stein's "Merry Widow" nearly turned into a Black Widow when
Catherine Petrek, playing the role of the widow,
considered dropping from the cast. This
late-date action would have indeed cast a pall over the "Widow" since
community theater productions typically do not use understudies.
Stein relented somewhat when she realized the venom she stirred
up. She backed down from her original
stubborn position and allowed the cast to bow according to their group
importance in the production (in the customary least-to-most important order,
of course). In other words, all chorus
members bow together, all compromarios bow together,
and all major leads bow together. When some of the leads persisted to press their opposition even to
this concession, Stein countered with, "Don't push your luck,"
correctly hedging on the strength of egos to go on with the show anyway.