Green Light Moments 💚🚥
Skylight Theatre Los Feliz
In the early morning of our first “29-Hour Staged Reading” of SNIPPED! I sat at my kitchen counter with my coffee and like every other morning, I opened my iPad to play Words With Friends with my formidable opponent Kevin Cronin.
When I saw the word he played, I nearly spat my coffee. Kevin was aware I’d been working on a musical, but he knew it by its original name: “Foreskin.” I had not yet told him of the change. And even if he had known about the new name, that he had the letters to make a certain word was pretty uncanny if you ask me.
When I told my daughter, she said, “Mama, that’s a Green Light Moment.”
“Did you make that up?” I asked.
As it turns out, green lights are how Matthew Mcconaughey describes (in his book, Greenlights) moments when the Universe tell us we’re on the right path or in his words, when “life says yes.” I’d say Kevin’s Words With Friends word was a green light moment if there ever was one. Talk about a sign!
Not for a minute since we began creating SNIPPED! have I had a second thought about the endeavor. But believing the Universe is conspiring with us to make it happen is sooo gravy.
I’m sure you’ve all had your own GLMs — a random mysterious nod from the big U. Perhaps we have to be mindful that they are what they are. Pay attention to whispers. If we think we hear one we probably do.
In a 29-Hour Staged Reading actors learn the material (script and songs) and participate for a maximum of 29 hours in rehearsals and presentation. Not an hour more. Not a second wasted. Actors’ Equity rules. This means everyone has to be on time for rehearsals. And they were. Unlike a few A-Room Pop sessions I’ve experienced when an artist strolls in at their leisure. Sometimes a few hours late. And if you want ‘on’ that album you say nothing.😳
I used to think I could have been an actor. You know … High School and College Musical Fever. But witnessing these consummate professionals transform themselves into the characters we wrote, how they adjust with the slightest suggestion from an experienced director, made me feel foolish to have ever have imagined I could do the same. I expressed my respect and one of them replied, “Yes, but I could never write a song.” 😄
And speaking directors and ‘dramaturgy’ (experts in the study of musicals whose job it is to advise the cast and crew) Team SNIPPED! never had either of those before. We’ve done table readings in my living room with a few of us (including me) reading the roles. We pressed play on the demos when a song came. Now we’d have well-trained voices reaching notes with ease and grace. Not to mention 4 human musicians (on keyboard, guitar, drums, bass) who learned all the material in one rehearsal! Jeez. What a difference a live band makes.
On the night of the morning of my Green Light Moment I sat in the back row of the Skylight Theatre watching in awe these proficient performers bring our story and songs to life. I waited with bated breath to see if the audience would laugh (they did) or cry (the did.)
But seeing the show in real-time with real actors also gave us real-time perspective. We knew we’d have to cut a favorite ‘number’ that simply didn’t ‘move the story forward’ and remove 20 minutes of the script. WOW. It didn’t hurt as much as it used to. Because …. clarity.
In the morning I woke up feeling humbled, floored and a divine stretch from a bandwidth-expanding career pivot. And lifted up by that Green Light in Kevin’s word — ready to make coffee and play another game.
There must be Red Light Moments as well … when the Universe clearly tells us to STOP in no uncertain terms. And Yellow Light Moments when the Universe suggests we take a deep breath and reassess. For now, I’d like to bask in the positive light of the green.
Green Light Moments remind me of my favorite book — The Alchemist — which posits: if you believe in something so strongly and don’t waver the Universe will jump into the current and ‘conspire’ with you to make it happen.
I think it’s happening.
PS: I wish I could share pictures of these wonderful thespians but Actors’ Equity rules say I can’t. :(
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