Les Mis Tech Rehearsal-May 9, 2014

Another AWESOME tech rehearsal! All costumes are officially in! I tried my outfit on yesterday, and it consist of a burnt orange skirt, and a red long-sleeved blouse with a red vest, and of course my black tights and character shoes. When I’m a lovely lady I add a pink and yellow boa and a red hat to it. For all the other parts I’m in I have a blue shawl. Tonight wasn’t technically a dress rehearsal, but our leads were taking marquee pictures so they were in their outfits for a good portion of the run to be ready for that, and sometimes people would be in the middle of trying something on when they had to go onstage, so we did have some costume wearing going on. Tuesday will be our first full run with costumes and makeup.

In fact, we had a great deal of fun with the costumes. When our Enjolras entered the room with the xylophone vest, I legit started hypervenalating. (And he let me touch it!) We had a lot of fun taking pictures. And our Gavroche tried to photobomb all of them. I yelled/sang at him “Come back Gavroche, don’t you dare!” which earned a high-five for him. I was having a good night inserting the lyrics into conversation. Earlier somebody had said something about Javert, I don’t remember what, and I just stared at them in the eye and declared “You know NOTHING of Javert!” At that point our Feuilly (who happens to be our Javert’s son, FYI) said ti me “I’d like to ask you about Javert’s backstory, but I feel like I’d be here for several hours.” So I just gave him the short version-mom was a prostitute, grew up in jail, etc.

Speaking of our Javert, when he puts his wig and full outfit on he looks EXACTLY like the Javert in Shojo Cosette. It’s a bit frightening. I especially love his hat, although at one point he went into hug Enjolras, and the corner of his hat poked him right in the eye by mistake….which was unfortunate and also hilarious.

And then our Cosette and Eponine took pics together, and somebody yelled “LESBIANS!” and I said “Eposette?” And our Cosette said there’s fan fiction, I’m sure….”

Anyway, my added little bit in “The Robbery” is now happening, and it is awesome. Jean freaking Valjean gives me money, guys! And it was during that scene that I noticed that our Marius, who has blonde, curly hair, actually looks a LOT like Aaron Tveit as Enjolras. (Funny enough, he HAS played Link in Hairspray and Gabe in Next to Normal is one of his dream roles). He is such a great Marius, he Pontmercyed so hard during “Eponine’s Errand” by dropping all the money he was going to give her. I love it so much.

Then during “Do You Hear the People Sing?” I’ve also incorporated “Vive General Lamarque!” so that’s awesome. And once again, the barricade deaths just tore me right open. I don’t think I’ll ever be over it. Tonight they actually screamed each other’s names as they died, and it was just too much to bear.

Our first Friday show is now sold out, and a few more are getting very close to that point. I can’t wait for this show to finally see its first audience.

Les Mis Rehearsal June 2

Today’s rehearsal was fairly uneventful compared to some of the others, but it was still a good one.

The newspaper photographer came, so we did “One Day More” full out with all the lighting effects and a screen in the back with a projected image of a Paris street, as well as suggestions of what our clothing would be-and of course the red flag! It was a completely out of this world feeling, I’ll probably have a stroke when we have costumes as well!

Got a good note from our assistant director today, he said that any time I was onstage I was definitely being a character and very much committed, which he said was good to see. (Hooray!)

Then before rehearsal our Thenardier wanted to go over the words and movement for “Beggar at the Feast”, and our Madame Thenardier wasn’t there yet so I got to do it with him, which was a blast and a half.

Our little Cosette is the sweetest little girl, but also very sassy. We were in another show together last summer, and so she talks to me a lot, and it just makes my heart happy.

Speaking of Cosette, I finally got to sit down and see some of the Marius and Cosette scenes, and they are PERFECT. Our guy is Pontmercying it to the MAX, so much like the Marius in the brick and I freaking love it. When he meets Cosette the first time, he collides into Cosette and trips and drops all his books, and then she helps pick them up and they start talking while Valjean gets roughed up by Thenardier’s gang. (If that isn’t classic Pontmercy, I don’t know what is). Also, I think it’s so great that they actually do talk once before he creepily shows up at her house. (Just saying!)

And then “A Heart Full of Love” is just so freaking sweet! I’m usually the person sitting there going “Screw Cosette, cozy up to Eponine”, but our actors are just so natural and cute together that I’m actually going “Awwww” and feeling warm and fuzzy while simultaneously feeling awful for Eponine. It’s quite refreshing actually. I complemented them on that during break, and Marius said he felt quite honored to hear that coming from a bona-fide “Mizzie” such as myself. And Cosette laughed and said “My goal for each performance is going to be to have at least one person leaving the theatre each night who doesn’t hate Cosette, if I can do that then I’ve done my job”.

He’s got chemistry with Eponine as well, he cries genuine tears every time she dies, including whimpering, and it just tears my heart in two ever time.

Although I did accidently make Marius crack up during “A Heart Full of Love”, because when he comes through the gate Cosette is facing the other way and turns around and jumps a bit. For some reason this made me crack up quite loudly and I threw him off by accident. Oops. Our Grantaire, who I’ve raved about before, is still making me laugh hysterically as well.

I had a sort of cool, happy accident during “Do You Hear the People Sing?” At the end, we’re all supposed to start cheering, and I started yelling “Long Live the Republic” half a second too soon, and everyone turned and started at me like I was the one starting it. At first I was all “Oops, my bad”, but then everybody said they liked it so I’m going to keep doing it like that unless I’m told otherwise.

And as some of you may know, the Facebook page for Les Mis on Broadway showcases other productions of Les Mis that are being/have been done. Once we have official show photos I’m going to submit them so we can be on their page, so I’m very excited about that!

Les Mis Rehearsal 5/22/14

Another great rehearsal. Fine-tuned large, group numbers for the most part. Earlier that day, I received signed pictures in the mail from Caissie Levy and Will Swenson. (I had written to them as well as several of the other cast members over spring break. I now have signed pictures from them, Ramin, Andy, and Nikki). Our music director declared me the “Queen of getting signed stuff from Broadway people”.

  And I was also given a very special assignment. We have one more barricade boy than we have names for, so I have to find another name in the brick that will work for our extra barricade boy. (Challenge accepted)

  Speaking of the fandom, I explained the concept of “Pontmercying” to our Marius today. And revealed some other secrets about us “Mizzies”.  He confessed that he had never read the brick and that he wasn’t as up and up on the fandom part of Les Mis as others. I clarified that I had no life, and so instead of having a life I obsessed over fictional French characters and Aaron Tveit while running a semi-successful blog, which made him laugh. We also got into a conversation about “Vlogger 24601” since he was complaining about being dragged by Jean Valjean, and I said “He should watch the episode of “Vlogger 24601” where Ramin demonstrates how to carry Marius through the sewers.

  Got to do “Master of the House” twice, which is going swimmingly. I now get to interact/flirt with this super cute guy who’s also a barricade boy during that number. (Yaaaaaay). And Madame Thenardier robs me, so there’s that. And I get to bring on the tray of “food beyond compare, food beyond belief”, etc. Although I did embarrass myself while drinking from my wine bottle filled with water, I managed to get some up my nose by accident and it burned the rest of the number. Oops.

  Cut to the end of rehearsal when the ensemble boys ran the chain gang sequence. Neither Valjean nor Javert were there since it was an ensemble rehearsal, so guess who got to sing both parts? (And nailed them if I do say so myself).

And the best part of rehearsal was our directors deciding what do with little Cosette and Eponine during the Epilogue with the other “ghosts”. One of them argued not to since we already had the adult ones out there, and said “It’s not like Eponine could die twice, and then the other one said “I don’t know, I’m watching Doctor Who, I’ve seen some shit,” and we all busted up laughing, of course.

  And I must say, that my two four six oh puns are catching on. One lady suggested I put my hair in a two four six oh bun! :)

  Next rehearsal is on Monday! Cannot freaking wait!!