Amy Lu's View

I had no idea that there is a patron saint of theater until recently (10 minutes ago, when I did some Googling).

It’s Saint Genesius, and apparently, our cast and crew of the recent production of “Uh-Oh, Here Comes Christmas” did something to piss him off. 

How else to explain all the trials and tribulations we experienced for our live streaming production? Not only did we have to cancel our Friday night show because of the first snowstorm of the season, but our Saturday night show was beset by technical problems that caused us to have to stop several times because we had no audio. Yes, two out of three shows were impacted by calamity–even I can do that math and know that sixty-six percent of our run was cursed. 

Okay, maybe I am being a little dramatic. Yes, it is more likely that weather and a faulty laptop soundcard caused our woes, rather than a moody magical being. But this is a post about theater, after all, so drama seems warranted. And given my limited understanding of meteorology, much less computer tech, I might as well blame something supernatural. 

And it’s hard not to take our misfortunates personally, especially when in the midst of having lost sound for the third or fourth time, one of the cameras (one out of two) died. 

From my perspective, our tech problems were more demoralizing than the snowstorm. Yes, it was disappointing to have to cancel because of weather, but not entirely surprising. And once we made the decision, we had plenty of time to notify ticket holders and then got to relax at home with an unsuspected night off. 

But our sound issues (simply put, we had no sound) were completely unexpected, we had no plan B, and we had to experience them in front of a live virtual audience. An audience who had to wait in suspense along with us to see if the show would be able to continue. 

Although I wasn’t sure at the time what they were or weren’t seeing, our audience members who were still tuned in could see us sitting and standing around in the midst of our audio crisis. Luckily, we all played it pretty cool and we didn’t make too many weird or angry facial expressions or gestures (although Chad did put his head in hands when the previously mentioned camera died). Hopefully, we mostly conveyed an air of Zen patience. Although, in retrospect, I think it might have been more entertaining if we had pretended to break out in a cast brawl or did some interpretive dance. Next time!

Our technical director, show director, and theater owner handled our sound tech crisis admirably. This was an issue (rather laptop or deity related) beyond their control and they were calm, gracious, knowledgeable, optimistic and resourceful as they valiantly tried different solutions. 

It was a very stressful situation for them, and also for the actors. At least for me, it was rather terrifying, and disheartening, and also, boring (at least when we were waiting for the sound to come back). When we were in the midst of performing, it was very hard to stay focused, with the dread that the sound could crash again, especially if we moved too much (apparently our back-up mic was easily overwhelmed). 

And of course, I couldn’t stop thinking about when we would get to go home so I could commence with my after-show eating and drinking extravaganza. There was a box of crackers and a bottle of bourbon calling my name. 

Also, it was hard to re-start our show after a pause–what the hell were we just doing? Is anybody still watching? Or is everyone who is still signed into our Zoom webinar just asleep or passed out in front of their computers?

I’m pretty good at staying in my lane and out of the way  and letting subject matter experts deal with a problem , but it was icky to feel so helpless and lacking control. There was absolutely nothing I could do to fix the problem. The best I could do was to keep quiet so as not to be annoying or distracting and to not to make matters worse by swearing at the exact moment the sound came back. 

It was a powerful, if painful, lesson in patience and letting go. Ultimately, deciding when to quit felt  like the hardest thing: How long could we expect any audience members to wait for us? How long could we all stay awake? When should we gracefully give up and call it? 

I’m sure none of my readers are surprised to learn that I was torn because “MY” big scene–”The Juggler”–was the very last scene. Yes, yes, yes, it is a beautiful scene that all the audience members deserved to see, BUT I really wanted to do it because this was my last chance (at least for this run) to perform in it. And I couldn’t stop thinking about the one or two friends who hadn’t seen me perform in a long time who I hoped were still logged on so they could catch me. 

It does feel meta that our script had frequent references to amateurs under pressure  encountering performance difficulties. Can we pretend that we planned our snafus in a brilliant piece of staging? 

Ultimately, I tried to quiet all my anxiety by channeling Willian Shatner. No, not by embracing my belly and donning a girdle (although that may come) but by focusing on the joy in getting to perform a beautiful work with my fellow cast mates and production team, even if there wasn’t any audience. (This lesson stems from an inspiring  talk we heard Captain Kirk give at a Con years ago about the joy of performing for its own sake). 

This was a beautiful theatrical work, and as much as I wanted to share it with an audience (and yes, bask in the literal and metaphorical spotlight) just getting to perform it at all, for anyone, even just myself, was a gift and a privilege. And I got to share it with my dear fellow cast members and crew who remained gracious and open and present and supprortive despite all our frustrations and fears. 

We did eventually (only 45ish minutes late) wrap up the show with a surprising number of folks still logged in. I am so grateful to all our audience members who watched any of our performance, and especially those who patiently waited for us to finish. We even received some kind words of appreciation and praise from some audience members. I was especially moved by the words of Tom.

The great thing about live theater (even when streamed on-line) is that it’s real. And sometimes real is not what we expect — which is one of the things I love about it.”

–Tom, wise audience member

Wow. Thanks, Tom, for reminding me of why we do theater, and that being real is more important than being perfect. 

I’m still wondering what we did to Saint Genesius, though. Perhaps he really loves–or hates–Spam?