Moment to moment to...

I often find myself thinking about why i'm an actor. I don't have a single answer. The reasons are many. But between shows today, sitting quietly at dinner, I found another piece of the answer to that question: being an actor affords me the opportunity to live life moment to moment. I'm on stage completely alive, in a heightened state of awareness to every moment--every second of every moment that passes (at least that's what I strive for).

Too often life whisks by. We spend too much time thinking about the past, the future, that the present--'the now'--never fully affects us. It's a coping mechanism to get by without feeling too much--a tendency of our American society perhaps? Meryl Streep once said (to paraphrase), "I get paid to feel what audiences can't."

I feel truly blessed for the opportunity to appreciate life "in the moment" 8 times a week on stage. And I try to bring some of that appreciation home with me every day.

Katrina Benefit on Broadway

What a beautiful night in the theater. Tonight in front of a nearly sold out Gershwin theater audience (filled with screaming/ovating fans), many of our Broadway community came out to perform and raise money for the victims of Katrina and Rita in the gulf.

Our cast was to perform Adam's "Migratory V"--a truly beautiful, soaring piece about taking flight. It was icing on the cake to arrive and find out we'd be immediately following Liza Minelli and Ben Vereen! So there I am standing in the wings next to Liza and Ben before they go on, and then standing backstage watching Ben bring the house down with an amazing rendition of Memory. That was the highlight of my night :)

We performed well (as always Victoria and Kelli sounded glorious, and Adam's voice is just so cool) and then I snuck up to the nose bleeds to support the rest of the performers throughout the night.

A few highlights:
Brian d'Arcy James--man my boy Brian can sing just about anything and sound amazing.
Idina Menzel--phatty acoustic version of I'll Cover You from RENT. unreal.
Shoshana Bean--Sho is an old friend whose voice is not from this universe; tonight she hit notes not even on the piano. insane.
Spelling Bee's cast: a HILARIOUS comdedic performance/dance piece commenting on the incompetency of our current administration's reaction to Katrina.
An on-the-spot auction of Quilts for Kids hosted by Chirs Seiber and David Hyde-Pierce that raised over 18,000 dollars in less than 10 minutes!!!

Thank you so much to all of you who came out and gave your time and money to this cause. I hope you enjoyed the show! May we all send our hearts and prayers to all those affected by the terrible events in the gulf. ...All our love for a fast return to safety, health, and prosperity.

What to do when the voice gets tired...

This week was going great! I had a restful day off, caught up on bills, laudry, all the exciting stuff. Then it was off to the theater Tuesday evening for the start of my third week. It's been a complete joy to stand on stage during the curtain call to a consistent ovation from audiences who are clearly moved by this show and our work. To meet some of them afterwards is even more fun! Whether talking to friends in the biz from other shows (the cast of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang came out to see us Tues. night), or celebrities (I've met Jeff Goldblum, Polly Bergen, Jerry Stiller and Ann Meara...to name a few), or family/friends, or fans at the stage door--the response to Piazza seems unanimously positive. To know that we're affecting people, truly moving them with this story, gives me the greatest satisfaction.

Anyway I digress...

Wednesday night I must have done something to my voice during AIUTAMI--the big number at the top of Act II. I've been working on deepening this number with each performance (afterall I'm still in previews right? :) and on Wednesday night I was in it man...I screamed and cried my way through it. And vocally it's hard enough--multiple high B's sung in a state of rage and confusion. So the number went well I thought, & I headed to my dressing room to change (I have about 4 min. before the next scene).

Upon returning to the stage for the next scene (Clara's latin lesson--OCTET) I started to sing and my voice just disappeared into hoarseness. In 14 years of performing--This has never happened to me before. Thank G-d for technique...I was able to get my way through the number and scrap through the scene in the church to get back to my dressing room. I began to panic a bit. I thought--this is it man--I hemorraged a chord or something screaming in AIUTAMI. I was so mad at myself! I needed to change for LOVE TO ME and clean myself up and go through the song (as I do every show in my dressing room before i go on for that scene to work my falsetto, etc;) but all I could think about was my voice. Was something really wrong? Please G-d no! Why didn't i listen to Adam Guettel's advice and sing the high stuff in AIUTAMI in falsetto so as not to kill myself 8 times a week. (I still have a problem with that idea--I don't like 'cheating' the audience like that...but we'll see.)

My dresser James got me some tea, I steamed my voice for a few minutes, and then got dressed and told stage management I'd go through LOVE TO ME to see what was going on. I pushed play on my ipod and started going through the number very gently (which works for this song :)...thankfully IL MONDO is not the last song for me in the show). When I got to the high climactic stuff at the end I just couldn't open up my voice--it was completely hoarse. I found that if I thinned the chords for more of a 'Pop' sound though, I could at least get through the number, go home and get on the phone to see a doctor asap.

So that's what i did. I finished the show, went on immediate vocal rest, and headed home (where my amazing wife made a ton of phone calls for me). Today I saw my voice doctor (Dr. Sarah Stackpole--she's amazing) and prayed for good news. She scoped my chords with a static camera that slides to the back of the throat and zooms in on the vocal chords and here's what we saw on the TV monitor: thick mucus covering one end of the chords with a little inflamation, but NO hemmoraging or tears or pollups or anything. WHEW!!! Thank you G-d!

She prescriped some steroids (not the Barry Bonds kind), some new allergy meds, and a day of vocal rest. So I'm home tonight writing this instead of being at the theater. I HATE missing shows, but it's only one and I'll be back tomorrow night raring to go. Hopefully everything will be okay. I'll have a chance to play with the voice a bit tomorrow afternoon when our cast joins the other stars of Broadway for a rehearsal of a benefit concert for hurricane Katrina relief we're doing this Sunday night.

I may have to alter the way I sing AIUTAMI to make it safer. I'll keep you posted.

Update on Piazza and Tarzan

I just finished my second full week of performances as Fabrizio. The experience is all consuming, completely thrilling, and basically exhausting. I have a right thigh covered with bruises, a sprained left knee, and a sprained ankle...and it's exhillarating! I find myself constantly feeling blessed and honored to be a part of this cast and a show that audiences respond so deeply to. This is a dream job and I'm just trying to soak it all in.

I only hope to restore some balance in my life. With rehearsals for Piazza continuing through this week for me (mostly working on fine tuning my songs with Adam and Kim) it will be difficult, but having a true day off tomorrow will help. (On my last day off I was swinging from a harness for the Tarzan team).

Regarding Tarzan, I was asked to come in for a final callback to sing and read for Phil Collins and found myself in a bit of a dilemma. The time of the appointment and the ONLY time Phil was seeing his final Tarzans was the morning of a two show day for me. I also had rehearsal before the matinee. So the night before, I had to make a big decision, go to the callback and risk the destinct possibility of not being able to get through my rehearsal and 2 shows (at which our director and composer were attending) or not go to the callback and know that I'll be able to honor my contractual obligation to do my best in my job at Piazza.

It was a very difficult decision--I was honored to have the opportunity to meet Phil as one of only 4 guys being considered for the role of TARZAN (in what will surely be a ground-breaking production ). Then again, I felt completely morally obligated to performing my best in my current job. Ultimately, I did not go to the Tarzan callback. My rehearsal time conflicted with my appointment time and I felt that were I to go and exhaust myself performing as an ape-man for even 20 min. I would not be being true to my responsibilities in Piazza.

I hoped that were it meant to be, the Tarzan team wouldn't find what they were looking for and would come back to me still interested; but alas the role of Tarzan was cast that day. Considering the extreme physical demands of the role, I admire whoever they chose and wish him all the best.

Whatever is meant to be always is...

Tarzan Training Camp

So I go in to sing for the creative team for Tarzan and it goes really well. I mean it's early on Monday morning, it's my day off, I haven't had enough sleep, nor enough time to really prepare the material, and yet, I go in and rock out. They then asked me to take off my shirt and read the scenes. I figured that might happen. So, I did...and things went well.

So I leave the room, proud of my work and excited from having a good audition, and a casting assistant hands me a piece of paper that reads: TARZAN MOVEMENT CALLBACK...Be prepared to stay for several hours...Wear sweat pants, a long sleeve t-shirt, and sneakers.

A few hours later I find myself in 2 hrs. of ape training with 3 other potential Tarzans, 2 young tarzans, and about 20 other actor/dancers up for various roles. We're all gathered in a small theater on the West Side equipped with 2 story high scaffolding, numerous mountain climbing guides, helmets, gear, etc; and a padded stage. After learning some ape moves and creating/performing some modern dance routines of our own (we performed one by one for the team "dancing/aping-out" to some pretty sweet jungle music), we all stood in a line across the stage and answered questions from the team (by now Phil Collins had arrived).

After that, they released everyone but the the Tarzans and young Tarzans (I was sad to see the world former karate champion and a former olympic decathalete go). Then they brought us back in for flying instructions from the team who created De La Guarda. We watched a demonstration on flying from one side of the stage to the other (scaffolding to scaffolding) and then on leaping off the scaffolding free falling to the middle of the stage before being bungeed back into the air.

5 hours later it was over. I'm not kidding. I ended up flying last...there I was, shirt/socks/shoes off, harnessed 20 feet in the air, testing out my Tarzan yell while decimating the underside of my right arm with the nastiest rope-burn/raspberry I've ever seen and ripping off a few calusses. It was SO FUN!

Life after 1 full week

Well I made it through my first full 8 show week at Piazza. It was fantastic, exhausting, and quite the endurance test (vocally, physically, and mentally). We also said good-bye to our music director Ted, our PSM Tom, and our Signor Mark. That added an emotional whallop to an already difficult week. Whew.

There's no rest for the weary though. I'm in Monday morning (early) for the creative team of Tarzan and then Tuesday is Chris Sarandon's put in rehearsal before he debuts at LTC Tuesday night as Signor--my new Papa!

I just feel so blessed and honored to be a part of this cast and production. If the rest of the run is anything like this first week--I cannot wait!!!

Opening Night

Wow. That's the only word I can think of to describe it.

After a nervous/somewhat stressed/trying to 'remain calm and breathe' morning and afternoon (with little sleep the night before of course), I made it through my "put-in" rehearsal (straight run of the show w/full cast, orchestra, lights, my costumes) taking care to give about 85% and save 15% for the evening performance. I tried to absorb the lights, how to find my way around the stage with a spot light blinding me, how to take in the orchestra through the sound monitors, how to complete my quick changes in time...so many little details...and all the while the night show is looming in the back of my mind.

The next thing was setting up a little zen environment in my dressing room to help me relax, try and eat some food and sweat out the 2 hr. break btwn rehearsal and the 8pm curtain. Whew.

Then I was on...and the crowd was HOT! I mean it was a Friday night blast of an audience. They were so responsive and into it. I think that helped me subconsciously. And there was Kelli in that blue dress and...my g-d the rest of the show took care of itself. Really, I just don't remember much else. It was FUN, it was scary, it was beautiful, it was surreal. Before I knew it, I was taking a bow in the curtain call, and standing in the hallway to the applause of my fellow actors and crew and creative team. I was in a state of complete joyous shock. The show could not have gone better.

And then my wife came running back to my dressing room in tears completely stunned. She was the only one I wanted to see my first performance. I dedicate it and the rest of this run to her--my light, my love.