WHEN IT RAINS

It always happens when you least expect it. You get on a roll. You have a routine. You have your checklist and are happily checking things off...and then, BAM! The unexpected. And not just the unexpected, the ridiculously unexpected. And not just THE ridiculously unexpected, THREE ridiculously unexpecteds.

I'll explain: It was the closing performance of Don Giovanni (thus the routine and checklist). Preshow duties: set the props, set the set, preset the costumes, sweep, mop, fill the blood packs, set the preshow lights and open the house, sit back and call times.

ENTER THE UNEXPECTED: 3 rented costumes are missing. The wardrobe department is in scramble to find / build a paramedic costume, white leather rock and roll pants, white puffy rock and roll shirt and a white flowing rock star shirt...not an easy trip to Target.

A few minutes before the show started I get an out of breath phone call from the costumer - he's found pieces in storage he can use as replacements and is running back to the theater this very minute.

THE NEXT UNEXPECTED: the building's cleaning crew. They dragged all the garbage bags from the house restrooms into the lobby and left them at the feet of stunned house staff who decided not to open the house until after the garbage was removed...which didn't happen until 10 minutes before downbeat. Not good. Of course, I was unaware of the garbage delay.

Sed same cleaning crew thought nothing of walking across the stage with mops and garbage bags slung over shoulders at 5 minutes before downbeat (no curtain used in this production). They were stopped at the last minute by me gesturing wildly and yelling across the stage, "Stop! Stop! Stop! How do I say 'stop' in Spanish? Stop!" I guess show dark and people standing around in costumes isn't anything unusual when it comes to cleaning.

THE FINAL UNEXPECTED: I call house-to-half and am about to cue the orchestra to tune when the maestro comes running up the stairs from the pit exclaiming, "WAIT!!! We're missing a horn player!!!" I take my hand off the cue light switch and simply stare at the maestro who's gasping from his sprint from the pit.

You have GOT to be kidding me.

We hunt down the orchestra manager who tells me he's tried to call the missing horn player and thinks he saw her onsite. He wants to wait and see if she shows up. I want him to FIND HER AND DRAG HER INTO THE THEATER.

Guess who won?

It turns out the horn player thought the matinee was an evening show. It was a fluke she was even near the theater at all.

Maestro and hornplayer in the pit, cleaners clear of the building, and singers not naked standing by in the wings, I looked around, hit the "tune" cue light and started the show for the last time. Again.