Sunday, April 12, 2009

The Tour: better late than never...

Things about touring:

You will feel like this at first. Especially if your first venue is the Chilliwack Humdinger RV Show. You may wonder what you've gotten yourself into. Three 30-minute shows a day for people who, well, buy RVs.

2) You will eat a lot of food and most of it will be bad for you. This is a side effect of being in a van with 4 energetic man-boys who are over 10 years younger than you and metabolize way faster than you ever did. Skittles, 7-11 Taquitos, chips, Mike 'n Ikes', burgers as big as your head...


3) Your view a lot of the time will be this:

Five people in a large white van; each staking out their own nest within. You will buy fuzzy slippers and a blankey for the long drives. A power adaptor that plugs into the cigarette lighter so that you can use your laptop whenever. You will bring and buy movies but never use them because you don't want to miss any of the jokes and conversation floating around you. Why touring with boys is good: silly in-jokes, lots of laughs, adaptability, Meat Loaf on the iPod, random goofiness. Why touring with boys is bad: sweaty foot smell, nonstop junk food, messiness, FARTING!!!

4) You get to curl your hair EVERY DAY!!! And wear a fake hairpiece!!! Green eyeshadow!!! FEATHERS!!! You haven't felt this girly since grad.

5) The world narrows to a sharp, small focus: Hotel, Van, Theatre/Community Arts Centre/Legion/wherever you're performing that night, trailer (to unload and load all the gear and costumes), backstage, Van, Hotel.


6) You are reminded anew what an amazing place you live in. Even in the dead of winter there is beauty. And history. You'll see mountains, moose, snow, rivers,


7) And best of all, there are new friends to be had, good shows performed and hundreds of kilometres travelled.

Big thanks to Richard & Amy of Theatre Royal in Barkerville, BC for being great bosses/fellow cast-members. And to Aaron, Elliott, Thomas and Marcello for being awesome van-buddies, cast-members and new friends. My earlier post was totally wrong: I spent almost no time alone on this tour and I had tons of fun!

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