Road to Opening Week 7: Matt Armet on 8 Weeks to A CHORUS LINE at Stratford

Cue to Cue is two full days of rehearsal on stage where our stage manager, Cindy Toushan, takes over and makes sure that all of the cues she has to call during the show are in her gigantic master binder. For those of you who don't know, our stage manager sits way up in the rafters at the back of the theatre in her booth and, over headset, calls cues to lighting, spotlights, sound, automation and the backstage crew. It's absolutely unbelievable how amazing Cindy is at her job. There are a couple of sections in the "Montage" that involve about 10 to 15 different spotlight and lighting cues within probably 20 seconds. She has to talk all of these cues out to the crew in time with the music so that every actor has the perfect spotlight on them for their one line. Just the thought of what she is doing makes my brain start to smoke. Not to mention the four spotlight operators that learn this material so quickly and have to cherry pick out certain actors from a group of seventeen in a show that we're all seeing for the first time that day.

Cue to Cue also is a great opportunity for Donna to work on specific bits while we are waiting for stage management to get everything sorted out on their end. We made good progress in a lot of the scene work this week, as well as cleaning up and changing some choreography along the way too.

I always feel like Sitzprobe day (the first day the orchestra plays with us) is the starting gate for the race to Opening Night. It's a long race, but seems to go in the blink of an eye. To give you all an idea of our schedule: last Friday was our Sitzprobe in the rehearsal hall; Monday and Wednesday this week were our Cue to Cue days; today (April Fool's Day) is our Sitzprobe onstage (with the orchestra in the loft); this coming Tuesday is our Tech Run onstage; and Friday is the Tech Dress.

I do have something really fun to share with you guys today. The Stratford Festival is launching a Snapchat account next week. Alexandra Herzog and I are going to be taking over the account on Friday, April 8th, to give you all a backstage look at what our Tech Dress Rehearsal Day looks like. It's one of my other favourite days, because we finally get to see everyone in costumes and wigs. So make sure to look up the Stratford Festival Snapchat account (@stratfest) next week and follow our story on Friday, April 8th.

Quote of the Week! Guys! It is so hard to get an appropriate quote for the blog lately. There are so many things that crack us all up in rehearsal, but I am totally not allowed to put them in print. The mildest of the inappropriate comments this week came in a note session. In Mark's monologue he talks about a time as a teenager he thought he had "Gonorrhea." The quote of the week was, "Good gonorrhea, with smile!"

P.S. We finally get to have the full orchestration to dance to in the Opening Number today and I can't wait for the chills that will be going up and down my spine at that moment!

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