Shows # 37 & 38

Oooooh Talladega. All I knew of Talladega, before the fateful day we set foot there, was Ricky Bobby. That was, quite literally, the full extent of my knowledge about the place. And I want to start off by saying that the place itself is just fine - as a town, Talladega is about average. Certainly no worse than your average American small town.

But our experience at the Ritz was... beyond words? It can't be, though, because words are all I have to convey what it was like. I guess I'll just give you a blow-by-blow account.

We began with load-in the night before. Why the night before?
Well! Turns out our first performance the following morning was at 8.45. Yes. 8.45. Gag me.
So, the previous evening, we trucked on in to the loading-dock and took a look at the stage. It was (significantly) too small for us to build the entire set, so we cut the biggest piece (yep, the house) and sallied forth courageously anyway. After all, we've done the show sans maison before, so this really shouldn't have been the obstacle it turned out to be.
Once we had loaded in the set (which didn't take long, given that 50% of it was left in the van), we did some touch-up painting on select props and set-pieces, while our stage manager tried to set up the sound equipment together with the (un-)help of the technical director.
Basically, we're painting, running the fans, hanging out, chatting, what-have-you, when we hear an incredible crashing noise. That noise, it transpires, is the sound of our mini-disc player, falling. Off of the edge of the balcony. Down to the ground floor.
However, it played the first bit of the overture, so we weren't too panicked when we said good-bye with the promise of an early morning return.
We headed back to our Super 8, slept like the dead and awoke in time for our first show call. Warmed up, dressed up and made up, hit places and waited. And waited. And waited.
The guy who ran the theatre decided he wanted to "warm the crowd up" for us. The thing is that five year olds don't need to be warmed up for this show. They're already thrilled to be there. If anything, he warmed them down.
Regardless! He made his spiel, then Emileena said her bit about photography, then I gave the curtain-speech and FINALLY! the overture began. Max and Ruby ran out on stage to start and all seemed to be going fine, until the sound started skipping ahead and then just plain stopped. Michelle (the lady playing Ruby) did her best with the silence - though she was supposed to start a show, she stalled, ad-libbed and did what she could to fill the void and, just as she was running out of ideas, our stage manager walked down the aisle to make the following announcement:
"Ladies and gentlemen, we ask our pardon. We're experiencing technical difficulties, but hope to have them resolved in ten minutes. Actors, you may leave the stage, when we begin, we'll be starting from the top."
Yep. We started over from the top.
Turns out dropping the mini-disc player a whole story isn't good for it - who knew!? So, we waited, Emileena did what she could with the malfunctioning machine and we did our first performance. It was sloppy, sweaty and scary as hell, not knowning whether or not the sound would work and being a little overcome by the size (or lack thereof) of the stage.
Ultimately, the shows were ok. Brutally hard, but the kids loved it (thank goodness) and, because the two shows were back-to-back, the whole thing was over before early afternoon.
As soon as the second show ended, we packed up, drove the hell out of Talladega and headed for Georgia.

From Georgia, we headed on to Myrtle Beach, but I reeeaally don't want to write about it until I have my laptop back and can show you guys the pictures of where we were.

Ugh, I get tired just remembering Talladega. Not that the people weren't lovely - they were more polite than.. somebody really polite. BUT THOSE BUMPKINS BROKE OUR MINI-DISC PLAYER!
I think, from this point on, I will never speak of it again.