Part One _and Two _and Three: Rehearsals

"Jetlagged?"

Mark asks with a slight kick to the left foot of my vaguely animated corpse.

I peel open an eyelid and muster the strength for a mumbled "yeah."

"Sorry, but it's time to start rehearsal," Mark coyly remarks behind a Cheshire cat smile; an impish grin with which I'll become intimately familiar over the next two weeks.

I scrape myself off the floor, still reeling from 3 weeks in Scandinavia. My flight landed late last night so my energy levels are dangerously depleted.

This should go well.

Five-Six-Seven-Eight

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In the midst of our peregrinations to and fro Mark offers a tip to keep our lines straight, "make sure your steps are a little longer on the way back because you have to walk farther since it's on an angle."

At this point my brain starts calculating. I'm so tired I can barely stand up but the "Well....Actually" center of my brain is running full steam ahead. It's like the rich part of town during "rolling blackouts." (Can you tell I'm still bitter about the Houston ice storm of 2021?)

At the next break I grab my phone.

$\sqrt{65} = 8.0623$.

Which means the distance we would have to walk upstage is 0.778% longer than the distance we walk downstage*. If we assume an average stride length of 2.5 ft our downstage stroll totals 20 ft. In order to account for the angle that means we'd need to walk 20 feet 1.87 inches on the way back. Or an extra 0.23 inches per step. We're good but I don't think we're that good.

*I just learned what upstage & downstage meant during rehearsal today. I'm only 77.8% sure I'm using it correctly here.

I'm not saying there's a psychological difference in how far it feels.

I'm just saying the actual distance is pretty negligible. I'm also saying that I'm a pedantic asshat whose brain doesn't have an off switch.

But then again that might be why I'm able to understand a dance performance based on counting and trigonometry. Perhaps.

Install

During the two months between auditions and the start of rehearsals Mark sent us an email with our order in the lineup. He assigned each of us a performer from the Paris video to study. I drew Jurg:

As I watch the video I realize the gallops occur very early in the piece. Gallops come. Gallops go. And when the gallops are said and done the clock reads just a shade over 3 minutes. Which means we still have a full minute & a half till we're introduced to our friend in the orange T-shirt & light grey pants. I keep my eye out for more gallops to break out but an intoxicating wave of relief washes over me as I realize the horses are in the stables for good.

No gallops!! Be gone you vile equine ambulation!!

Honestly, based on my complete galloptrical ineptitude during the audition I'd say Mark's decision to spare me from gallop duty is wise and prudent.

⬤  ⬤  ⬤

Our first few rehearsals are spent learning the choreography of the individual segments that make up the whole of the performance. Like we learned in the audition, each has its own name that Mark has informally conferred over the years and each has its own flavor. The Claw is centered around hand movements. Mona Lisa emphasizes our facial expression. Our old friends Shirley and Lewiston express themselves through their gait.

As Mark works through the parts I get the hang of them individually. When he starts to link 2 and 3 segments together my head starts to spin. I quickly follow the lead of the more seasoned dancers and begin to write it all down in a notebook.

For example, this is what I jot down for Plastic Surgery

And that's just one pass. After just a few rehearsals the bewildering complexity overwhelms me and I retreat back to my comfort zone,

"Ok that's it, I'm gonna need to make a spreadsheet."

By the time I finish filling out my spreadsheet I count 24 passes, each with a different outfit, prop, step sequence, step direction, posture, hand movement, facial expression, or other some such choreographic flourish. Once we start full start-to-finish run-throughs I print out my sheet and cross out each pass as I complete it.

Many of the other dancers develop "musical cues," sections of a song that inform them when to emerge from behind the curtain. With my maniacal devotion to my spreadsheet and natural affinity for numbers I eschew with musical cues altogether and focus solely on my count. Everyone has their own system but the important part is that it works for you. Because we're popping out from behind the curtain blind. Brace, Hendri, and Aaron lets us know we can kinda see through the curtain from backstage but it's not worth trusting. The first few rehearsals we practiced with the curtain at waist height so we could see the onstage action. It was a little nerve-racking when we graduated to the full curtain.

As rehearsals grind on my Shirley eventually reaches a level that could generously be described as adequate. My next challenge is to master the "maxi" skip, so called because we are going to the max™. The maxi is a mix between a skip and a speed skating lunge. My initial attempts resemble a graceless cyclone of gangly appendages; the dancing equivalent a baby giraffe learning to walk. If there was ever any evidence that I have no experience this is it.

Mark, while trying to smother a watching-a-car-wreck-in-slow-motion grimace, enlists the expertise of Alexandra for some personal coaching. She does a few skips with a lithe, effortless nonchalance that implies this should be easy.

See? Just like that.

It would be like Tiger Woods striping a 2 iron then looking at me,

See? Just like that.

Well, Alexandra, I don't even own a 2 iron.

But I put my faith in the process and continue to work at it. At some point throughout our two weeks of rehearsal I receive further personal instruction from Allie, Alyce, Brace, and Hendri. Sometimes at the behest of Mark, sometimes out of pity. I learn the key is to pivot your foot and swivel your hips before launching to the other side. Each bit of incremental progress I make the other dancers smile proudly in the slightly patronizing way you do for the kid picking dandelions out in right field. You're doing great, Andy.

By the time we finish rehearsals I believe I've dragged my maxi skip to a marginally presentable level. I guess that will have to do.

Do You Prefer Andrew or Andy?

Once we graduate to props Mark instructs us to write our name on a handful of cups to keep everything organized. Since I routinely wake up in the morning and choose silliness I write ANDY like our best good pal Woody brandishes 'neath his cowboy boot.

And this is how I inadvertently adopt Andy as my stage name.

One day Alexandra asks me, "Do you prefer Andrew or Andy?"

"I don't really care, either works."

Alexandra stares at me with a look of someone who's been called "Alex", "Allie", "Alexandria", and any number of creative or otherwise head-scratching names that suggests no seriously, what do you like to be called?

But I really don't have a preference. I've been called much worse than Andy, I can assure you of that. Among my friends back home I'm almost exclusively called "Toys". This curious cognomen arose within a high school milieu where everyone was known by their last name. Curthoys soon became CarToys, which, in a display of ruthless syllabic economy simply became "Toys." The moniker was passed down like a pair of worn out sneakers to my younger brothers, who are known by my friends as Allie (Alex) Toy, Timmy Toy, & Johnny Toy. Naturally, I'm known to all their friends as Andy Toy.

This did have the concomitant effect that during rehearsals, in an effort to emphasize that the prop guns used during the performance were not real weapons, Mark encouraged us to call them "toys" instead of "guns." So every time someone referenced the prop guns my head instinctively popped up like a meerkat.

Andy Meet Aspen, Aspen Meet Zane

After a few days of rehearsals we're tasked with building our costumes. Mark gave us a few ideas of characters he typically likes to see and outfits that might work. In advance of costume day everyone rummaged through their closet and brought a menagerie of clothes, hats, bags, and accessories for consideration.

It shouldn't stretch the imagination that a roomful of dancers let loose on costumes makes for a gleeful atmosphere. The cast is buzzing, exchanging outfits, trying out looks, channeling Tim Gunn. The star of costume day is Boutique Alyce, a miniature emporium of all things fashion set up by Alyce in a corner of the studio. It's the dance equivalent of a general store selling picks and shovels during the California gold rush.

Unfortunately my sartorial selection falls at the boring end of the dance wardrobe spectrum, just this side of "dad clothes." So while everyone is flitting around exchanging outfits and trying new looks I mostly just mill about and admire their duds. After all my compatriots showcase their looks for Mark he eyes my Sunday-afternoon-middle-manager-in-a-suburban-McMansion golf attire and sarcastically pans,

"Well Andy's made my job easy, you haven't even changed!"

"I don't really have anything that fun, what angle were you thinking for me?"

"I'm thinking a granola, hippie co-op barista type. Birkenstocks, maybe a chunky sweater, sarong? Do you have any of that?"

"Uhhh no."

I don't admit that I don't know what a sarong is.

"Ok ask around if you can borrow something. Brace, Hendri, and I are going shopping on Friday so we'll look for something for you too."

"Okie doke."

Brace & Hendri, the newcomers to our crew, were part of the original This Land Is Your Land cast and have stepped these steps dozens of times over the years. They live in Seattle and Mark called on them to even out the number of men and presumably add a little diversity to my similarly melanin challenged male participants, Johnathan & Matt.

During the first week we often rehearsed with Brace & Hendri as "holes" in the lineup, but increasingly Aaron stepped in to fill the gaps. Aaron is another transplant who hails from San Antonio (just a few miles from my old house we later find out) working at ADF for the summer. He has also performed the piece in the past, bringing three experienced performers to help alleviate the pedagogical burden from Mark.

After the Seattle steppers return from their shopping spree I'm provisioned with a deep-V crop top sweater, a high slit sarong, and a colorful over the shoulder bag. I borrow some Birkenstocks from a friend in my building and dig up a green scuba diving headband that I stole from my brother who stole it from my mom. I decide to call this crunchy character "Aspen."

Something about this outfit really causes my Shirley strut to pop.

My final outfit, a cowboy ensemble, begins to take shape as I'm headed out for the day. Brace hollers,

"Hey, bring your cowboy hat tomorrow."

"10-4, should I bring my shitkickers too?"

"Yes."

"You got it partner."

So I show up the next day with a pair of cowboy boots, blue jeans, a pearl snap shirt from a Shinyribs concert in San Antonio, a bolo tie from Montana, and a cowboy hat I requisitioned at the Houston rodeo.

When I'm adorned in full cowboy regalia Mark looks at me, "oh we need a name for this cowboy...... I'm going to call you 'Zane'".

The Durham Herald Sun ran a story on Zane the next day,

Adagi-what Now?

"Linda Belans!!* You are going to come out during the adagio sequence."

*Mark always referred to Linda by her full name. It became a running gag with the company.

I whisper to Allie, "the what sequence?"

"Adagio"

blank stare

"It's a dance term that means..... actually you don't have to do it so don't worry about it"

Ahhhh what a wonderful phrase! The dancer's hakuna matata.

This is hardly the first or the last time I'm left plumflutterated at the use of a dance term or reference.

"We need less Limón overcurve"

"Really emphasize the contrapposto"

"Just imagine you're doing a tendu"

"The maxi starts with a turnout then slowly evolves until you end up in second position"

"I feel like Monica Bill Barnes!! During this sequence I want everyone to pretend they are Monica Bill Barnes!!"

Once again I lean over to Allie, "who?"

"Monica Bill Barnes"

"Who's Monica Bilbarns?"

She looks at me like I asked who Michael Jordan was at a basketball camp.

"She's a choreographer in New York."

Choreographer in New York. Got it. That should narrow it down. I pretend like the answer sates my curiosity but I really have no idea what Monica Bill Barnes should look like. Guess I'll just have to resort to my strategy that has gotten me this far: fake it till you make it.

Monica, if you're reading this can you send me a headshot? I need to see how accurate my impersonation was.

Speaking of headshots...

Headshot Redux

Oh no, not this again. Headshots??? Is it too late to back out?

At least this time I have the experience of a baker's dozen dancers that I can lean on. I ask the crew if they will help me write a bio and take a headshot and they of course agree. We plan to huddle up at the next rehearsal, where I summarily forget. And continue to forget each of the next three rehearsals until the deadline day. I hastily scribble something down and send it to Destinee. Headshot still pending.

At the end of week 1 we're afforded an off-day, so Dana agrees to meet me at Daily Beer Bar to punch up my bio & snap a headshot. Seeing as we're planning to sip some suds from my favorite beer bar in Durham I throw on a shirt from my favorite brewery.

As I stroll up to the bar Dana sees me and shouts across the street, "Oh my god, you're NOT wearing that for your headshot!"

"What?"

"That shirt!"

"What about it?"

"You can't wear that shirt in your headshot!"

"Why does my shirt matter? It's a HEADshot not a HEADANDSHIRTshot"

The look on Dana's face is a mixture of disappointment, resignation, and a heavy dose of you're an idiot.

So I guess we're not getting a head(and shirt apparently)shot today. I'm stressing out because it's already past the deadline and we're getting close to opening night. Dana assures me that the programs are all digital so my worries about getting the headshot and bio submitted before "it goes to print" are unfounded.

Seeing as we're already here we spend about a beer and a half mulling over the wording of my bio, cutting this, tightening that, rewording here. Once we're satisfied I send over the final copy to Desinee and agree to bring a plain, unmarked (boring) shirt to rehearsals tomorrow for my headshot. We each vow to not forget tomorrow.

And then forget.

Luckily I remember just as I'm walking out the door and Dana is already on her way home. I commandeer Allie to serve as photographer, who surely would prefer to do anything else after 6 hours of rehearsing. But she agrees because she's a wonderful human. We make a whirlwind tour of the studios looking for an appropriate backdrop and lighting. We find a spot in the main rehearsal space and Allie snaps a series of photos while Brace cracks me up by... just being Brace.

An artist is only as good as her tools and despite Allie's best efforts I still look like a dweeb. I wouldn't recommend a photoshoot while exhausted and sweaty from a full day of rehearsing. Whatever, I send the photo and put the whole headshot hardship behind me.

You Won't Be My Neighbor?

It's no coincidence that Allie is preferentially assaulted with my questions of questionable quality - she's drawn the short straw of slotting behind me in the line. Due to nothing other than geographic proximity I converse mostly with Allie, Cate, and Renay. Cate & Renay have the slightly less irritating position in front of me; Cate for the first half of the performance & Renay for the second after we pull a switcheroo on the audience.

But dear Allie is beside me start to finish. And since she's behind me that means she's facing right at me each time I load another shell of obtuse ordnance into my half-wit howitzer. But she's perhaps the best suited of all the performers to deal with my buffoonery, seeing as Brace described her as "effervescently direct." She's not afraid to tell me I'm a dumbass and that's whats I appreciates abouts her.

While Allie endures a disproportionate share of my neophytic interrogation she's not the sole recipient. After one particularly shambolic rehearsal I exasperatedly look at Dana,

"Is it normal to feel like you've got it one day then feel like you don't know a damn thing the next?"

"Of course, it happens every time. Rehearsals are like a roller coaster and everyone is on a different part of the ride. Then somehow it all just clicks."

"Alright I'll take your word for it. Right now it feels like I could do 1000 rehearsals and it wouldn't click."

"You'll be fine."

This is a common theme during rehearsals. Unconditional support and reassurance are seemingly inexhaustible resources at the Samuel H. Scripps Studios. I never feel reticent to ask a stupid question, I never feel ostracized for being the token non-dancer. This wonderful environment is a natural outgrowth from sharing the studio with the kindest, warmest, most generous people I have ever met. Mark told us at the start of rehearsals we'd become a family and he couldn't have been more correct. Every single one of my co-performers has a heart of gold and I would give them the shirt off my back (assuming I'm wearing a shirt and not, y'know, fully nude).

This supportive environment is championed by Mark, who exudes positivity and respect. Alyce put it best when she observed that Mark has a magnetic spirit. Even when critique is warranted it's always given with a gentle touch and a piquant smile. I ask the other dancers if this is normal from their experience and they relay that while asshole is not the norm, they have worked with plenty of assholes. Everyone feels lucky for the opportunity to work with Mark.

Throughout rehearsals the vibe is fun yet professional. We all realize we're here to do a job, to express Mark's creative vision to the best of our ability. He affords us plenty of leeway to goof off (which we do in spades) but we also take it upon ourselves to put in the work and continuously improve. During each rehearsal we're constantly talking among ourselves, comparing notes, ironing out steps, perfecting hand positions, trying out facial expressions. It's a delightfully collaborative and supportive environment.

A typical sample of a conversation during rehearsal,

"Ok so, Cate, you're high claw leaving pink?"

"No I'm halfway."

"Wait... then where should I be?"

"I think you should be fully high claw leaving blue."

"Leaving blue? Really? I thought it was... Well, let me see.... Ohhhhh leaving blue!... Ok now that makes sense, that way I have two laps to neutral when I get to green"

"Yes, I'll be neutral just as I'm leaving the stage."

"Got it, thanks."

Toys

Halfway through week 2 and just a few days before opening night Mark shows up to rehearsal wearing a look of exasperation.

"I just got off the phone and we have an issue. I don't know where the decision came from but as of now we're banned from using the prop guns."

"So what are we going to do?"

"I don't know, I've been on the phone with 10 different people this morning and feel like I'm going to tear my hair out. Let's just start rehearsal & we can figure it out later."

So we decamp from our seated positions 'round an arsenal of plastic guns toys that feels like it should be stacked on a powdery mountain of Colombian marching orders. The next day Mark reports that (whoever is in charge) suggested Nerf guns instead of our current lifelike facsimiles. But Nerf guns would make it seem like we were making light of the situation.

Because whatever you think of the situation the facts are that there are an estimated 400 million guns in the United States. 20 million of which are assault style weapons, or more than the population of Australia. When it comes to firearms America is the exception. Whether that's exceptionally admirable or exceptionally abominable depends on your definition of a well trained militia.

The most frustrating part of this whole ordeal is the late notice. Why are they're springing this on us now? They can't say they didn't know, this has been in the works for nearly a year. And Mark has previously staged this exact same piece in this exact same venue.

Eventually, after what must have been a thousand phone calls, Mark has secured a compromise. We will use our current armory of props but will paint them orange. As an enthusiast of Oklahoma Crimson & Cornell Big Red, I must say orange is not my favorite color.

But when we see the finished product I'm actually surprised with the result. The shade of orange actually makes the guns look more menacing than cartoonish. It's a reasonable compromise that I feel doesn't cheapen Mark's vision. It's not perfect but all things considered it's better than many of the worse alternatives.

Slap Your Grandma

In the 2005 rhapsodic ode to healthy backsides, "Honky Tonk Badonkadonk," Trace Adkins croons,

Poetry. Simple as that.

When I did a quick search of Trace Adkins I discovered that his Wikipedia page reveals a stream-of-consciousness masterpiece, littered with the wreckage of broken body parts, broken marriages, and broken sequiturs.

From the "we'll have everybody write their own sentence" department:

The "my body my corpse" corps:

And of course the "how many crazy ex-wives does it take to realize maybe you're the problem" squadron:

And finally, from the ministry of "how can we shoehorn this back into my story":

This final nonsense narrative ties back into the story at hand because the song that precedes Honky Tonk Badonkadonk in our performance was sung by none other than... Ronnie Milsap. Any Day Now, The opener to Milsap's 1982 album Inside, is a stark juxtaposition to Adkins's objectifying anthem. It's a song that touches on one of the most painful aspects of the human experience - that hollow feeling deep in your gut that looms over the dying stages of a relationship.

But you know.

You tell yourself everything is ok. You cling the idea of what once was.

But you know.

You know that any day now the hammer will drop and shatter your heart into a million pieces.

Somehow Milsap's velvety smooth treatment lulls you into its captivating trance, just like the devilish grin of your soon-to-be-former lover. If you're not paying attention you just might miss the heart-wrenching lyrics. I certainly did the first few times I heard it. It's a song I've decided to categorize, at the behest of no one, into a subgenre of Yacht Rock I just invented called Pontoon DockRock. As anyone who knows my dual obsession with pontoons and yacht rock will understand my infatuation with this song.

Ol' Ronnie's version is actually a cover, the original penned by Burt Bacharach, whose organ-heavy arrangement sounds like something you'd hear at a non-denominational Sunday service in the 70s. It's a song with no shortage of cover versions, having been recorded by the likes of Elvis Presley, Percy Sledge, Frankie Valli, Luther Vandross, James Brown, and Eddie Kendricks of The Temptations. Pretty insane company for a song I had never heard before two weeks ago.

Joining Ronnie on our performance soundtrack are favorites from Eric Church, fellow Okie Toby Keith, Martina McBride, and the Indian Outlaw hisself Tim McGraw. We listen to the same songs over and over and over and over and over - so many times they worm their way into our subconsciousness. Any time I hear one of these ditties my brain instinctively starts waiting for the fade-in to the next song. A life-long gift that will forever remind me of two of the most fun weeks of my life.

Catharsis

With the amount of time we're spending together our discourse inevitably devolves into shallow, silly discussions of nonsense and frivolity. I stumble into one such discussion between Matt & Renay regarding their preferred hand holding position. After some wrangling of mitts Matt ends up in front and Renay in back. They each recall holding hands in the alternate position but for whatever reason this feels right. I reach out a paw and find that I fit best in front with both of my colleagues. Matt tries the frontward position and works out a theory of hand holding logistics: taller person goes in front.

Which makes sense to me because I think I've only assumed the forward station and can't remember holding the hand of someone taller than me. But remembering isn't science. And we're here for rigorous, fact-based science.

"Brace!"

"Yeah?"

"Come hold my hand"

pregnant pause and a pursed lips stare that if you know Brace you know

"I don't know what y'all are doing but fine"

And Brace reaches down from the heights of his 6'7" frame and confirms our hypothesis (p < 0.001). Taller person goes in front. If not the shorter person's wrist wrenches forward uncomfortably. We're answering the most world's most pressing questions here at ADF.

But the captivity does not just engender nonsense and frivolity; it can also play with your emotions in unexpected ways. During the last rehearsal of week 1 Mark introduces a brand new section of the performance as an homage to the Covid pandemic. It's simple, it's moving, it's beautiful.

After our first pandemic run-through the collective dam holding everyone's emotional reservoir bursts, releasing a tsunami of sentimental feelings that leaves nary a dry eye in the studio. Each of us experiences our own unique, personal emotional journey, expressed through the shared language of weepy hugs. For me, it's as simple as remembering riding in the car with my old man, listening to country music on 95.5 FM. It's such a simple memory that carries the weight of memories of a man whose personality was so enormous everyone called him Big Daddy.

I wipe away the tears thinking how I just wish I could hear him say, "why the hell do you want walk around naked in front of a bunch of people."

Because that's exactly what he would say.

Andy, You Shit!

As rehearsals continue we get more comfortable with each run. Less thinking and more emoting.

On the Saturday before the shows I'm feeling really comfortable.

During one pass of Lewistons I shoot Mark a little wave. Hey, how ya doin'. He gives an eye-rolley smirk and writes "Andy, you shit!" in his notebook.

And then on the first nude pass I hit Mark with a pec blast.

This results in what I have to imagine is a completely novel entry in Marks notebook,

"Andy, you fuck!"

When Mark reads his notes after this run I literally roll around on the floor laughing. I suppose a little bit of levity is warranted as we approach 60 hours of rehearsal time. As Mark said, "I didn't want anybody in this piece who took themselves too seriously."

Well, brother, you got what you asked for here.

Mark returns the favor on our last run-through of rehearsals - as we emerge for our curtain call we see fearless leader in the back corner of the studio stark naked doing a ho-down. I mean he's really getting into it, feet flying, arms flailing, junk flapping. I just wish I could have seen the reaction of the runners on the East Campus trail across the street when they saw Mark Haim's bare ass bouncing in the window.

We've reached the naked goofin' part of rehearsals. That surely means we're ready for the real thing.

Now, there's only one way to find out.