We've Got One Night Only, One Night Only

I have been told by reliable sources that I was extremely lucky with my stint on The Wedding Singer tour. (By reliable sources I mean Brian) We flew everywhere, and except for one week every town we played for at least a full week. The exception was our split week in California, but it is hard to complain about splitting the week between two cities in California! The Wizard of Oz tour has been a lesson in how most non union tours operate. We have been busing almost exclusively, and have had some two day trips from city to city. (They don't call them bus and truck for nothing!) The one dreaded aspect of touring that I had not experienced until last week was the one nighter. Or in other words, arriving in a city for one performance and then turning around and leaving. Well I now have that experience!

Our first one nighter was postponed thus allowing the afore mentioned New York trip, but we could not avoid the inevitable forever. So after our two weeks in Cincinnati, we hopped on the bus and left for Williamsport, Pennsylvania. I had never been to Williamsport, and to this day I could not point it out on a map if I had to. Thankfully the town turned out to be a nice little town with a charming little downtown area. I ended up wishing that I could have had another day to explore actually. The problem was the theatre.

As I have indicated before we have a rather large production that we are schlepping around the country. It takes a long time to load the set into a theatre and then take it back out again. Now imagine doing that in a theatre without enough backstage space to hold the set meaning that some of the set pieces were either still in the truck or sitting outside the dock doors. All of that work for one performance. It seems like it would be unsatisfying. But I have to say that, despite the fact that Willamsport did not see the Gale's house and were witness to some unfortunate technical problems, the audience responded at the end with more enthusiasm than all of Cincinnati's audiences combined. It was nice to be appreciated again.

The theatre was interestingly decorated. It reminded me a little bit of either the Hirshfeld or the Wilson in New York. We also were given a free drink after the show, and some nibbles. (and no we were not given Dunkin' Donuts!) So all in all it was not such a bad introduction to the world of one nighters. Not that I want to make a habit of them!

Williamsport City Hall