Wednesday 15 January 2014

No Weasels, Just Purple!

We don't need no stinkin' weasels!
After a 1 month hiatus for the Christmas holidays, we are officially back on the road! The 1st National North American Tour of Godspell began it's second leg on Monday, January 13th in sunny Florida.

After a god awful early bus call for our airport shuttle on Monday morning I discovered that my favourite kind of flight attendant is the kind that hands out free alcoholic beverages on commuter flights.  I always fly with a double jack and coke, and when its on the airline's dime, so much the better. 

After a couple of VERY CHOPPY, mostly calm flights, those of us that hadn't missed the flight (who shall remain nameless) were all happy to get our feet on solid ground, and the fact that the sun was shining made it all the better.  We must have been a sight.  Picture 15 Canadians in full January winter gear landing in West Palm Beach to immediately seek out the nearest washroom, telephone booth, or sidewalk to strip down into shorts, sandals, and tank tops.

This is just a short 2 week leg, with performances in new venues pretty much every night, but the first 10 days are all in Florida so with a little effort we should be able to soak up some sun and transform from pasty white Canadians into marginally less pasty white Canadians.

We had a brush up rehearsal at our first venue in Fort Pierce, before storming the stage for a 7pm show.  I hear through the grapevine that that first show was perhaps a bit of a shock to the system for many of the performers, but it looked and sounded great, and the audience loved it.

Oh!  I almost forgot!  We had our first live alligator sighting from the bus this afternoon!  Okay, so they were in captivity at a sketchy looking mini-putt course, but it still counts!

Tonight we are in Sarasota Florida, and just wrapped a big show at the Huge Purple Van Wezel Performing Arts Center.  The picture up above actually hangs in the star dressing room at the Van Wezel.  And it made me laugh!  I don't know what the staff have against weasels...but boy oh boy do they like purple.  The exterior of the building is PURPLE, the interior of the Theatre is PURPLE, even carpet and the sofas in every dressing room are PURPLE.

DAMN!  That is a PURPLE sofa.
All kidding aside, it was a big, beautiful venue, and the show went off without a hitch, and I'm sure that the Van Wezel's whomever they are, are very rich and possibly even lovely people...not at all Weasel-y.  Regardless, tonight's near capacity crowd loved the show.  We even had a couple from Ontario, who have been abroad with the Drayton Entertainment Travel Club hop on board the tour bus post show to tell us how much they enjoyed the show.

Tomorrow we hit the road for Bell Glade, where, just like Crockett, Texas, we may have to make some edits to the show...time will tell.

Tune in next time for more of our ongoing adventures!