Heart of the City by Steenz for July 20, 2020

Hope there’s no suspense in this play. Got plenty of that last week.

Is that Charlotte in the back row giving Heart a thumbs up? Go get ’em kid, knock it outta the park!

I wonder why actors say “Break a leg!” It certainly does not sound too good.

Theater superstition; wishing a fellow actor good luck will give them bad luck. So, saying “Break a leg.” wishes them good luck, without “alerting” the shadows that you are doing so…The original bait and switch.

Was it ever said what play they are doing?

WIth all the self confidence you always have, this is not the moment to lose it.

You have wanted to do this all your life! You got this!

That three-minute warning was me, up in the light booth, ready to take the first cue. Ah, nostalgia…

Am I hoping beyond hope that a comic strip that has a story line about a musical will actually show somebody performing in the musical, unlike some strips I can think of COUGHluannWHEEZE?

It’s showtime

Oh, you gotta have friends, you know the feeling’s oh so strong…

There was a time way back in show business history when the audience would stamp their feet as a form of applause. A really great show would have someone stamp their feet so hard they would break their leg.

One of funny jokes in my theater company pertains to the black curtains hanging in the wings to block the audience view of where actors wait to come onstage. These curtains are called “legs”. In one production we were doing, one of the legs got caught on one of the big stage pieces we were moving on stage for the next scene and got ripped almost completely in two, so we were literally breaking a leg. :o) Fortunately we had insurance to cover the cost, as the leg belonged to the theater and not the company. And they were not cheap!

You got this, Heart. Get out out there and bowl them over.

When I was in school we always did three shows. The first show wasn’t great because we were nervous, the second show wasn’t great because we were overconfident, but by the third show we had the right balance and it would come off pretty well. Seemed to happen every time.

Oh, and we were forbidden from saying “break a leg” because we had a kid who actually did it. Twice.

Friends can lift you up when you need it most.

When you finally step out under the hot lights, and you can see all the expectant faces beaming at you with their support, that’s usually the moment when the stage fright evaporates into exhilaration.