A break for Halloween.

Yesterday was our last rehearsal on land with the extremely talented Choreographer - Patti Wilcox.
We arrived in the studio at 10:30 and plans were to run through the show till 5pm. 
After some individual discussions for corrections from the previous days of runs, we all took our places and the music started..   
Today is the day "We Do Not Stop!" Patti said, the show will run as a live show.. any mistakes will be noted afterwards..   And that is exactly what happened, when unfortunately one female dancer, who is also the dance captain was injured during one of the intense dance sections.. she made her way off the mock stage and you could tell she was in pain, and although Patti and many others ran to her side.. the show kept going.  which I have to admit is the best thing to do with a new cast. sometimes when something like this happens live on stage, it can easily distract a cast member which may result in something as minor as a mistake in a dance step, or as dangerous as missing your traffic line causing you or somebody else to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.. 
And with a show like this where there is allot of fire, heavy props, moving stage elevators, and oh yeah sharp spikes!  
Being in the wrong place at the wrong time.. or simply being a moment late can result in serious injury. This is why so many rehearsals are so important, we all need to learn each other positions, traffic etc.. 
I found that a bit difficult the first day of rehearsals when we joined the cast, as Daniela & I were rehearsing on a private stage with no cast.. I learned my choreography, but not my locations.. 
so since I was rehearsing alone, I used allot of the stage.. running very fast and swinging 5' Spikes around before slamming them into the Fire Spiker etc.. 
when we got to Tampa and the first day of rehearsals started I backed up only to run into a dancer.
I found myself feeling scared to turn around since I didn't know where everybody was and didn't feel like making a Shish-Ka-Dancer ! Lol


But the more we run the show in sections the more I (and i'm sure the cast) feels more comfortable.
I will say time will always reveal all about people, but so far the cast seems great.. not only are they 
fantastic performers, who I truly enjoy watching dance, but from the few minutes we have had a chance to speak, they seem very friendly and I predict they will be fun to get to know over the next 6 months.. 


Yesterday's run through went very well, and after the run we all gathered in front of Patti & her talented assistant Vibecke Dahle, with pen & paper to take notes for the mistakes that were made.
Of course I was the butt of the jokes, as I was the only one that did not have a pen & paper, instead I had my iPad, which I stated it was because I anticipated I would need to kill a small tree to write down the amount of notes I was expecting!  LOL
Patti makes notes for every single dancer, singer & us, what amazes me,  is in our show "Extreme Vegas"  I not only have to know my choreography, but I know each lighting cue,  all sound cues, I need to know all automation cues, and the cues for both Stage Left & Stage Right backstage techs..I NEED to know this because we do not have  a production manager that travels with us to call the show.. so every rehearsal I wear a headset to communicate with each stage crew member.. 
This can get pretty intense as all cues go to a certain count in the music, or on a specific Sound effect in the music etc. But what amazes me is that Patti does the exact same thing.. BUT with all these dancers, 2 Magicians, 2 Aerial Flyers, Sound Cues, Light Cues, Stage Cues, Prop Cues.
She knows them all!  and if I walk up and ask her on the the 3rd count of 8 i am supposed to enter on 5... right?  she will look at me no longer then 1 or 2 seconds.. and say.. "YES"  immediately she will turn to 6 other people and give them their counts.. !  It's amazing how well prepared and organized she is.. by far the best choreographer we have worked with.
I also feel she knows that she can be stern and she will get exactly what she wants.. but she also gave us the space to play with our character and try new things, many things she loved and commented on them while we were taking notes, saying, Daniela that wasn't the original Chorey but i love the what you did! However when something isn't right she makes you, want to make it right.. she doesn't degrade you for getting it wrong, instead she describes the feeling behind the move so you understand not,  what your doing.. but why.. 
And many times her & her assistant get up and actually show you the chorey.. and when they do it, it's perfect! I love that, the fact they they are asking you to do something, and then they actually get up & do it themselves.. makes you feel like wow if they can do it.. i can do it.. !


Anyway this short note has turned into a small novel so im off but good news is, the rehearsals ended great, and they gave us Halloween Off!  Whoo Hoo, so off to Busch Gardens Hal-O-Scream tonight, and then back at the studio first thing monday morning!
Have a Happy Halloween everyone!  --Justino