Onstage Mis-haps-"The Theatrical Black Hole"

[pungster1]

I thought I'd start this thread because I know we've all had the experience of things going south onstage-someone going up on lines or a prop malfunctioning-or in the case below-simply not being there when expected.
I was a production manager on a play where the prop crew were supposed to set very large candles in a sconce before one scene. The candle was an important prop-because an actor was supposed to get furious with someone and look for a weapon to beat them with. He had a line that went something like, "A weapon! A weapon! A *candle*!" Then he would grab the candle off the sconce and advance on the other charater.
I was sitting in the audience one night during that scene and my eye was wandering over the stage and I saw that the sconce was...empty. My heart froze for the actor. As I watched, he said his line, "A weapon! A weapon!" I saw him advance on the sconce, do a 360 and after a mooment he picked up this HUGE chair and said "A chair!" I went backstage after the show and told him that I had so much admiration for him at that moment for thinking on his feet.
And the prop mistress got an earful as well.

My own onstage experience had to do with an actor I had a scene with. I adore this guy-he's the best actor I've ever worked with onstage. At his insistance, we always ran our lines before we went on. One night during a scene, he was supposed to give me line A-he didn't-he went totally blank. I gave him line B which should have led him to line C-but instead he gave me line A-and then *I* went totally blank. I call this "The Theatrical Black Hole"-the silence seems to go on forever. Finally, the next thing I could remember happening in the scene was I was to pick up the phone to call a taxi, throw a line at him and walk into the other room on the set. That did the trick-he was back where he needed to be, and the rest of the scene went off as planned. When we got offstage, he was devasted-falling all over himself apologizing because we'd lost a short section that included my best comic lines. I told him I didn't care-we righted ourselves and I didn't think that the audience ever knew the difference.
As it turned out, I was right-because that performance was taped, and looking at it, even though I knew what was happening, as a performance, it didn't lose anything for the mishap.
I love these kinds of stories-join in and tell yours-you know you have a few.

[Dan Muir]

I fallen into a few "black-holes" myself, all of which have been horrifying.

Once in Cuckoo's Nest as Billy Bibbit, it was group session time, and I was railing against some abusive old girlfriend, and when I stood to give my anguished plea to Nurse Ratched, I got to the point where the dimming lights were supposed to cut me off--and they didn't dim! OK! Improve time! As Billy was a stutterer, I had <u>no</u> trouble ad-libbing some quick stutters as I thought, "WHAT THE FUCK DO I SAY NOW?" I don't remember much of my ad-libbing, which lasted a good 30 seconds, an eternity while waiting to something to save me, but I wrapped it up with, "...b-b-b-b-because sh-sh-sh-she d-d-didn't l-l-l-like m-m-m-my m-m-m-m-m-m-m-motherrrrrr!!!" THEN the lights dimmed, and the disembodied voice of Chief Bromdem came in and let me breathe again.
WHEW! After that act, I asked the director, "What the hell happened to the lights?" to which he replied "You tell me." AARRRGH!!!

Another time, Playboy of the Western World, and Craig may be able to fill in the details with me, as he was directing. Our leading lady did her makeup at home and thought nothing of coming in 5 minutes before curtain, causing Craig to freak and rip her a new one before we went up. That, understandably rattled her, she bitched ME out for interrupting her concentration ( I think I said 'Hi'), and I was nervous because my friends were in the audience waiting to scream and howl when I entered without my shirt. The show started well enough, but as I got onstage, someone went up on his line. That threw off the rest of the cast, and the one person who tried to get us back on, in his best Swedish accent (it's a Irish show), said, "That lad is.....quite........", and it went downhill from there. Not long after that, I went up on one, receiving a panicked look from my leading lady, and again relied on improv to worm my way out of it. As most of the dialog is Irish poetry, I waxed poetic for a few seconds and finally the knock at the door got us back on track.

It wasn't long after that when Craig saw all he could stand and left the theater. If I remember correctly.

Another time, better circumstances. I was playing Max in Lend Me a Tenor. The lady playing Diana was a sexy little thing made even sexier by wearing a curly red wig. She asked me "Could you give Tito a message for me?". As I gave my line, "Sure!" she planted the longest, most arousing kiss on me that I ever got on stage! As I came to, I stood, reeling, and thought, "What the hell is my line??" She saved me by delivering her exit line, "See you later, Max." I missed my comic line of "Sure, I'll tell him, but he might misunderstand.", but it was worth it. Diana knew why I went up on that line, and she smiled coyly and winked at me after that act!

[Craig T Gustafson]

Jesus, Dan, if you're going to bring up The Playboy of the Western World, talk about the way we got Molly comfortable with kissing you onstage in front of people.

Heh heh heh heh heh heh...

And yes, I do tend to get thorny with people who walk in five minutes before the show without calling.

My main memory of Playboy is that it's the show where we all met Louise, at that time a SERIOUS theatre student who was paying her way through college by working as a stripper on weekends and a dominatrix during the week. The amount of terrific and fascinating Louise stories I have is endless...

[Dan Muir]

Jesus, Dan, if you're going to bring up The Playboy of the Western World, talk about the way we got Molly comfortable with kissing you onstage in front of people.

<font size="2" face="Times, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif">Actually, I wouldn't consider kissing Molly a theatrical black hole. Her tongue kept me from falling in. >evil grin<