Show #8
Friday, December 27: 9 pm
Straight out of show 7 and back into
the line, I wasn't quite sure how to start the next one. I wanted
to try Lila's loop, but I wasn't sure where to find her at the start
of the show. There was a new (to me) Faye, who had joined the cast
after my September trip – but one of the spoiler group people in line kind of warned me
off of her, saying he found her much weaker than the others. Still,
I figured I would see for myself, and I continued figuring on that
right up until it was time to load the lift, when I changed my mind –
it was time to get a better sense of what Laura Harding's Alice was
all about.
I got off on the first floor and rushed
over to Studio 5, where I found her with Claude (River Carmault) and
Frankie (Carl Harrison). Timing-wise, this was where they would
normally be having their “That's an arm! That's a leg!”
dance/interaction, but instead they were huddled up, having a quiet
discussion about Frankie's future with the studio. I guess white masks rarely make it there so early, so why not run an easier,
alternate version of the scene? Soon enough, though, Alice asked
Frankie if he wanted to meet the boss, and we were off.
Last time I tried to follow Alice down,
I lost her completely due to a thick crowd, but this time it was just
me and one other. I stuck to her like glue and saw that, on arriving
in the basement, she disappeared in to her locked room just outside
of the masonic temple. I followed her in and the other white mask
tried to follow, but Alice quickly shoved the door closed after me.
I thought for a moment I might have stumbled into a 1:1, but I was
pretty sure it was supposed to happen after Frankie's initiation, not
before. Instead, Alice began to strip down, completely oblivious to
my presence. Just a tiny bit awkward. She put on the creepy old man
suit for the initiation and pulled out a script (the one they would
give Frankie after the initiation), laying it on the table. When she
turned away to retrieve her mask, I leaned in to take a closer look
at the script, and when I looked up at her, she fixed me with the
most horrible, withering glare I have ever seen. I shrank down into a puddle. So much
disgust in that look – I was sure that I was not supposed to have
followed her in, and she hated me for bursting in and watching her
change clothes uninvited. Or maybe it was just an Alice thing – it
would be perfectly in character. No way to know for sure, but I felt
pretty uneasy.
After the initiation, I followed her
back to the room, confident that this time it would be okay to go in.
I was the first one through the door after her, and she turned to
me, fixed me with another glare, put her hand on my shoulder. . . .
and pushed me back out the door, pulling the white mask behind me
inside.
Yep. She hates me. And she is still
utterly terrifying.
As usual, I didn't want to wait around,
so I switched plans when I saw Frankie walk by. I'd never done his
loop before, and he'd been a part of both scenes I had caught
already, so I was kind of de facto following him anyway. Frankie is
the most unappealing character for me in the show, outside of maybe
Dwayne – and even then, it's a close call. This isn't a criticism;
much of it seems to be by design. Carl's version in particular has
this horrible, squealing laugh that's actually quite impressive, but
also really unpleasant.
It's an interesting contrast to Faye's
story, as they are mirrored characters. Where Faye can't get anyone
to love her, Frankie spends his whole loop relentlessly pursued by
Claude, who he effortlessly wraps around his little finger. In the
end, Frankie seems to get everything he wants – but in a way that
appears to only exist in his head, Ultimately, it leads to a
breakdown, and his reset at the hands of the seamstress (Kathryn
McGarr). This part was very interesting to me – I had no idea
Frankie and the Seamstress had any sort of connection. She acted
very protective and nurturing toward him – perhaps she's his
mother? Of course, the surnames don't match (Gardner and Dove), but
I've heard talk that maybe her name isn't what it seems
to be, so who knows?
At this point, I decided to bail on
Frankie, even though I hadn't made it back around to where I picked
him up. I wasn't really connecting with him, and since it was just
after reset time, I thought it would be a good point at which to pick
up a new character and see their whole story in order, from the
start. Instead of a new character, however, I found Conrad (Adam
Burton), sitting in the seamstress's shop, changing into a black
dress, stockings, a wig, and heels. This was perfect – the same
performer from the previous show, at a point that must be only a few
minutes after I had lost him. Time to see the rest of the loop.
Fully dressed up (and surprisingly
effective in drag), Conrad wandered off to the saloon, where he
flirted with Harry (James Sobol Kelly), Dwayne (Nicola Migliorati),
and the Barman (Francois Testory). Throughout all of these
interactions, I was never quite sure whether the people of the town
were meant to think he was actually a woman, whether they were just
playing along with him, or whether the guys are just into drag
queens. I lean toward the middle option, because the vibe I get from
most of the interactions could best be described as “good-natured
fun,” but who can say for sure? Not long after that, William (Paul
Zivkovich) and Mary (Sara Black) came in and Conrad hopped onstage to
sing “You Can Never Go Home Again.” I was again struck by the
comparison to the mirrored scene – in this case, Dolores's birthday
party, which must have been going on at the same time, one floor
below. All of these structural details are really cool once you
start picking up on them.
Afterward, Conrad stripped out of his
dress and wig and went for a walk through town in his underwear and
stockings. Bold man. I, and about ten others, followed him into his
motel room, where he suddenly took on a much more authoritative air
and ordered two of the white masks to hold the doors shut. He sat on
the bed and stretched out his stockinged, high heeled foot to a woman
standing next to me. She looked at them quizzically, then stepped
back. He looked at her for a moment, then pointed his leg at me.
Now, I have a rule – I never refuse
interaction with a character. But I can't say I was super excited
about helping him undress, either. Still, a rule is a rule, and I
pulled off his shoe. Once that was done, he was kind enough to pull
the stocking down to below his knee before asking me to pull it off,
sparing me from having to reach up his thigh (much appreciated,
Adam). After the same for the other leg, he jumped to his feet, and
began a lecture (“Obedience is the first level”) while he put on
a suit. Conrad seems to be a member of some sort of odd self-help,
scientology-ish cult that is fixated on immortality, and this lecture
was all about its teachings. . . but sadly, I can't remember any of
it.
Now that Conrad was back in the form I
remembered from the earlier show, he headed into the studio.
Interestingly, he had to bribe the guard to get in – I would have
thought he was already a part of things there. Was he somehow
infiltrating them? Is that why they sent him to Studio
8? I'm still not sure. What I am sure about is that he took me in
for a very cool 1:1 in his dressing room shortly after we arrived,
which gave me some key insight into who he is. I swear, a surprising
number of these 1:1s are not optional. If you don't see them,
there's no way you'll really understand who some of these people are.
Next up was the magic act with Andrea
(Miranda Mac Letten), which essentially marked the point where I
picked him up at the start of show 7, even though the act didn't
actually occur that time. I followed them in to Studio 3 to watch,
and had a great time – it's a wonderful bit, even if I had to take
my mask off and listen to people talk in the bar. As a side note,
this was the first time I had ever seen Miranda without sleeves (she
had only played the Drugstore Girl in September), and I feel the need
to point out that she has tremendous upper arms for a woman of her size.
Not at all in a bad way – they're well toned and feminine and all that –
just, well, impressive.
After the magic act I stayed behind in
the bar while the executives (Jo Bowis and Matthew Blake) performed a
song. Now, I'm really interested in seeing what goes on in there. I know
there's character stuff, and even 1:1s, but in the end, I just couldn't do it. It felt like I was outside the show. One song and I was done – I
had to put my mask back on and get out of there.
At that point, I was adrift again, but
it didn't take long for me to find a new purpose - inside Studio 2,
the Fool (Rob McNeill) was putting together his Woyzeck script/map.
I wasn't particularly interested in doing a Fool loop at that point,
but I knew he was only one scene away from meeting up with someone I
did want to see: Lila (Kath Duggan). He met up with her in the sound
studio for the always compelling drowning scene, which I had seen
twice before - but this time I stuck with her when he left. Of
course, the only new bit of business I got out of that was watching
her change into her green dress and head the exec party/orgy, which I
had, of course, seen many times before. After that, she headed into
the office/tape recorder room for the “Lila's Discovery” scene,
which was also a repeat for me, but one that I was much more
interested in revisiting. Sadly, just as I stepped through the
doorway, right behind her, I felt something catch in my throat,
followed by an intense need to cough. I tried to do it quietly, but
no help. Had to cough again. The scene got underway. I tried to
choke it down. Stanford entered. A cough slipped out, then another
one. Still needed to cough again. Son of a bitch.
I finally had to bail on the scene,
rushing out to the hallway and eventually to the restrooms, where I
gulped down a bit of water from the sink and finally felt normal
again. It was kind of a low point for me – I was embarrassed that
I had stayed in there so long, potentially disrupting the show for
everyone else. I was disappointed that I had lost Lila before
managing to catch anything (besides the dress change) that I hadn't
seen yet. But there was nothing to be done about it – no time for
regrets in Temple Studios. If I didn't suck it up and press forward,
all that would come of it would be even more regrets.
So I headed upstairs to find Harry
(James Sobol Kelly) and the new Faye (Natalia de Miguel Olaso) in the
motel room. I watched about half of the scene, but it wasn't really
working for me. I had already seen two Fayes that I flat-out adored
(Sonya Cullingford and Katie Lusby), and Natalia, while not bad, just
couldn't measure up to that high standard. So again, I bailed
mid-scene. That was when I had a brainstorm. I still had no idea
where Lila started the show, but I did know where she started the
loop – in the desert, digging Miguel out of the sand. I rushed up and there she was, dancing with Miguel (Ed Warner) next to the
dune. Excellent, crisis averted!
Lila's loop is an interesting one, but
not particularly emotionally involving, at least for me. It's full
of really cool set pieces, though, and it has a wonderful sense of
motion to it, as Lila's journey into the bowels of the studio corresponds
to an actual descent through the four floors of the show. I also
have a much greater appreciation of Kath Duggan now – when I would
periodically encounter her for a scene at a time, she never made much
of an impression on me. Watching her for an extended period is
another matter, as her warmth and fragility become much more
apparent, even though there were only a handful of scenes that were
actually new to me. I love her scene with Harry and her dance at the
gates (during which her spinning flung sand all over me). The scene
with the tape recorder, right after her table dance with Lila, is
particularly chilling - although I wish the voice on the recorder
wasn't so obviously an adult woman pretending to be a child.
My final moments with Lila involved
watching her hop around the sound room, recording effects for the
movie – which was just fun to watch. I love the process of
moviemaking. When the fool arrived, however, I took my leave.
I had no real plan at that point, and
no real time to execute one if I had. I headed upstairs and stumbled
upon Andrea and Wendy (Sophie Bortolussi) in the dressing room,
talking about the exec party. I stuck around to watch Wendy do her
makeup for the party, because it was such a powerful moment when I
followed her loop back in show 6. It was still tremendous –
watching her face transform in the mirror from abject misery to
(soon-to-be-shattered) hope is both magical and heartbreaking. I
didn't want to go back to the orgy again, though, so I headed
upstairs. There, in studio 5, I found Romola (Katie McGuinness)
doing her scene with Conrad. I stuck with her through her makeup
session for the car accident and her final encounter with the Doctor
(James Finnemore), but rather than follow them down to the murder, I
decided to see what the Seamstress would do. Turns out the answer is immediately disappear behind a locked door with another white mask.
I headed back downstairs, but just as I
was about to walk into Studio 2, I noticed some commotion in the
dressing room. It was Andrea, but all I got to see was about 30
seconds of her breakdown before she composed herself and grabbed Ben from the spoiler group for the finale. Completely out of time now, I rushed after them into
Studio 2, caught the murder, then took the opportunity to position
myself in the back for the big finale. I had never seen it from that
perspective, always preferring to crowd the front of the stage –
but it's actually the sort of number that really benefits from some
distance. Such a huge tableaux, with so much going on – it was
like watching it again for the first time. All in all, not my best
show - a couple of missteps and too much time spent wandering uncertainly - but there were still
plenty of bright spots. And the best was not only yet to come, but
right around the corner. . .
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