Our Belle

It has taken me awhile to get to this post, because I couldn't find the time and emotional energy to sort through my memories of the highs and lows of "play week" and the huge number of pictures we took of Beauty and the Beast.  I'll just include a few pictures on the blog.  I'll make Aubrey a book soon with all of the pictures documenting her Beauty adventure.

First a little background on the goings-on prior to the play.  A warning: I am going to be detailed, since this is functioning as my journal of the events, so feel free to skip to the pictures.

The cast of the play prepared for months and Aubrey was so excited for her first leading role in the play, which was held the end of March and beginning of April 2012. One week before opening night Aubrey started sniffling.  Within a day she was pretty sick with an intense respiratory virus. And thus we began the craziness called "tech week."  That's the full week before the play, when practice is held  for four hours every night in the venue to do the final touches and practice with costumes, makeup, etc. (Unfortunately for us, the venue is 45 minutes from our home. So, every day Aubrey and I drove out to Washougal for practice and returned home very late. I don't remember even talking to the rest of the family much that week.)

Her sickness complicated the situation considerably. We did everything we could to help her recover quickly, but she lost her voice early in the week and was intensely sick and miserable.  She missed 3 1/2 days of school that week, but still had to attend the practices if at all possible. Her director told her not to even try talking/singing on stage all week, in hopes of helping her voice recover. On the night of dress rehearsal she did try to sing and wasn't able to hit anything in the upper register.  It was a challenging moment for her, but her director was amazingly good about it.  He told her that she had options. She could choose to have someone else sing her lines off stage while she lip synced, or she could just do her best, and he wouldn't be embarrassed about whatever happened.  (As for myself - sitting in the audience and watching the dress rehearsal - I was so nervous about how it was all going to work out that I ate an entire large bag of jelly beans all by myself. Sugar therapy.)

She came home that night and we greeted Grandma and Grandpa Springer, who had flown into town for the play. Dan and Grandpa gave Aubrey a blessing of healing.  The next morning I called a good friend who is a professionally trained vocalist, and she worked with Aubrey to let us know whether or not singing was going to be an option.  Amazingly, she was able to sing quite well - dramatically better than the night before.  She continued to drink lots of warm chamomile tea with lemon and honey, and we decided that the show was ON!

Oh, one more thing we had to fix the day of the first performance. The director had wanted Aubrey's hair dyed a little darker.  He had bought "Fanciful" temporary rinse and told us he was going to apply it to her hair prior to the publicity photos to test it.  That never happened and and they had to photoshop her hair darker in the newspaper photos.  

Now, the director of Aubrey's musical theater program has a lot of positive attributes including patience, great enthusiasm, and loads of musical and theatrical knowledge.  However, he is not organized and sometimes doesn't always follow through.  And yes, that is frustrating.  All "tech week" he insisted that he wanted to apply the rinse to see for himself if it was going to work, but he never did.  Finally, the night of dress rehearsal, as most of the rest of the cast was in costume and getting ready for the performance, we were still waiting for the director to show up to do the hair rinse.  It was becoming ridiculous and nightmarish.  So, another Mom and I grabbed gloves and started applying the rinse ourselves in the tiny lead's dressing room.  It was very messy, and it didn't work.  All the dye did was make Aub's hair slick and oily, but it didn't make it much darker.  We then spent 45 minutes trying to get her thick hair dry, by which time the show REALLY needed to start. So much for getting makeup and hair done for dress rehearsal.  She ran onto stage and did her best.

Getting ready after the unsuccessful hair dying experience.

So, we also called a good friend of mine who is a hairdresser, and the day of the first performance she applied a semi-permanent dye to darken Aubrey's hair somewhat.  It still wasn't really dark, but it was good enough.

Onto the performance.  I was backstage helping and the rest of the family watched the play.  Let's just say that I was a little nervous waiting for her to walk out and begin the first line . . . "A little town, full of little people . . ."

She pulled it off. Aubrey did a truly awesome job of singing and sometimes sing/talking.  It was great on-the-job experience for one of toughest situations in musical theater. She had to think ahead and choose which notes she could hit, and work around the notes she couldn't reach given her compromised vocal chords.  She did it amazingly well. And she is a great actress!  I was amazed at how she held it together emotionally during a very stressful week, even though she didn't feel her best.

Oh, another last minute thing . . . the director neglected to teach Aubrey and "The Beast" how to do their waltz for the Beauty and the Beast song until . . . the day of dress rehearsal.  Yikes!  But, they did great. Even if it was painfully uncomfortable for them to look each other in the eyes during the song.  (Oooh . . . gross!)  Aubrey managed to make eye contact better than her lead counterpart.

 

And and up close look at the ever-so-lovely Belle hairstyle!  And Bailey (who helped backstage the last day) photo bombing.
 

And another photo bomb, after the play.  Nice.

A few pics with fellow cast members.  Guess what?  The kid who played Gaston was totally like the character on the movie.  As in, a little bit surly (and Aubrey would say annoying).  Perhaps some type casting?  I had to beg him to put down his DS and pose for this picture.  Overall, though, there were so many amazing young people who were in the production. They were hard workers and did a great job!

Just for fun, after the last performance the entire cast did the Electric Slide dance to the song "What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Stronger" by Kelly Clarkson.  It was an awesome way to end the play.

 

 Aubrey greeting her adoring public after the play.

She absolutely loved meeting all the little kids who were dying to see Belle up close. Some of the kids seemed to really believe that she was the "real" Belle!  I didn't get a picture of it, but after the first night of the play a little girl ran up to her and hugged her . . . and wouldn't let go!  It was like being a Disney princess at Disneyland!

 

Grandma and Grandpa were unbelievably helpful during our crazy weekend.  I was basically never home. I had bought lots of food to prepare but then never had time to prepare it.  So, they cooked and cleaned and kept everything running.  Thanks to them, we pulled off a decent showing of Conference comfort food.

 

Aubrey will always have fond memories of her experience with Beauty and the Beast.  There was a lot of excitement, the thrill of performing before an audience, and some difficult challenges.  But she gained valuable experience in rolling with the punches through it all.  After the play the director gave out the traditional "paper plate awards."  Aubrey received the award for "Best  Leading Lady" for her professionalism, positive attitude, hard work, and persistence even when things were tough.  Congratulations Aubrey!