LHOTP in Springfield and Tulsa

Well, we’ve had to detour from “The Prairie.” Helen and pneumonia collided while we were in Springfield, MO for the second half of a split week. Little House on the Prairie, the Musical, did four shows at the Juanita Hammons Hall for the Performing Arts but the illness bug hit Helen really hard after the next to last show.

She ended up in the emergency room at Mercy St. John’s Hospital in Springfield after we watched the Saturday night performance. She was in the ICU for the next 2 days and in a regular room for one day. We then drove to St. Louis for an evening non-stop flight and we’re back home in New Jersey for follow-up treatment.

Meanwhile, the LHOTP cast and crew packed up after the Sunday matinee and headed by bus for a week in Tulsa, OK. Fortunately Taylor’s family (including older sister, Maggie) had paid a surprise visit in Springfield, so Taylor’s father, Joe, was able to accompany her.

Helen had been fighting the “cold bug” for a while and coupled with the heavy and tiring travel schedule, it caught up her. Don’t know if it was the rain and snow in Minnesota or the rain in Nashville that were the culprits. Of course, we were in confined spaces on five airplanes and six different airports, so that may have contributed.

But, before the detour to the hospital, we were able to do some good things. Joe found a Japanese hibachi restaurant in Springfield and Taylor, who loves the food but hasn’t been able to partake in sometime, got her fill. The folks at the restaurant and the “in-house Dragon” surprised our daughter, Kelly, with a birthday cake. Then we all went to see Taylor perform in the evening LHOTP show.

Helen and I celebrated our 47th anniversary on Monday and the hospital personnel saw that we had a cake. We both had a slice—at least I ate all of mine. Actually, we celebrated our 45th two years earlier with friends a few miles south—in Branson. That was a much more enjoyable time.

The tour went on without us. The Tulsa Performing Arts Center was host for the eight performance week. It got the following good review from the local paper:

http://www.tulsaworld.com/scene/article.aspx?subjectid=371&articleid=20091111_371_0_Thatwa862153

You can also check out the following You Tube site for a promo made about the show:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2zoQcxoEM4

Taylor can be seen in a number of scenes in the video—she’s the little girl with the glasses and yellow dress dancing behind Melissa Gilbert in the curtain call dance.

Here are a collection of pictures that I made while in Springfield and some that Joe and others made in Tulsa:
http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/creativeapps/slideShow/Main.jsp?token=634952629703%3A1553952249&cm_mmc=site_email-_-new_site_share-_-core-_-View_photos_link

Next stop is a week in Oklahoma City (where I hope to rejoin the tour). Visits to the West Heritage /Cowboy Hall of Fame and the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building Memorial and Museum created in memory of those killed in the 1995 bombing are being planned for the school-age cast members and others who want to go too.

Little House in Little Rock

We’ve just completed the first half of a split week. Four shows in Little Rock, AR, and the cast of “Little House on the Prairie, the Musical” will have another four shows in three days in Springfield, MO following a bus ride tomorrow morning.

Sound like fun? The cast thinks so, although it’s somewhat tiring for all concerned.

The production crew and the musicians have had to set up for shows in two entirely different venues in two cities in a seven-day period. That means tearing down and loading up after tonight’s last show in Little Rock and getting to Springfield in the wee hours Friday to get ready for an 8 p.m. show. Four semi-trailer trucks are needed to hold all of the gear, costumes and scenery.

It really needs to be set up earlier in the day because the cast needs to familiarize itself with the new stage and dressing areas much earlier. The traveling orchestra (the musical director and three musicians) has to spend the entire day with the musicians they pickup in each city to familiarize them with the score.

Then there will be a cast meeting at 5:45pm, followed by a sound check, which leaves less than an hour until the curtain goes up. Two shows are scheduled on Saturday and one Sunday afternoon before we hit the trail for Tulsa by bus Sunday night. At least, we’ll be in Tulsa for a full week and some regularly in the day’s schedule/

Enough detail on the work and the downside of the musical game!

The kids (and the grown-up kids accompanying them) had a great time in Little Rock. Pictures of some of the adventures can be found at:

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/creativeapps/slideShow/Main.jsp?token=298945198703%3A1365255720&cm_mmc=site_email-_-new_site_share-_-core-_-View_photos_link

There were a couple of highlights of the time spent in Little Rock.

1. Our granddaughter, Taylor Bera, and two of her schoolmates, were named “Honorary Duck Masters” at the local Peabody Hotel. If you say you’ve never heard of such a job, you may not be alone. It seems that one of the original owners of the first Peabody Hotel thought it would be neat to have ducks (real ones) swimming in a pool in the lobby of his first hotel, but he knew they couldn’t stay inside all the time. So he needed a way to get them to and from the pool every day. The owner created a formal ceremony –one in the morning to get them to pool and another in the afternoon to return them to their overnight home.

Taylor and her classmates got to escort them on the “red carpet” after they marched out of the pool, to the elevator, and then rode with them up to the second floor. They assisted them into a cage, pushed the cage to their rooftop “home” and then escorted them into the home.

They each received a formal certificate from the “head Duck Master” designating their status. A lot of the spectators looked a little jealous. The morning and afternoon ceremonies are held 365 days a year and draw quite a crowd at each ceremony. Taylor thought it was a lot of fun.

2. The kids’ other special treat in Little Rock was being special guests for the day
at the Clinton Presidential Library. They received had dinner at the Library and then a guided tour of the facility honoring our 42nd president. After they completed tour, they were given a bag full of mementos from Ann Kamps, manager of the Volunteers and Visitor Services for the Clinton Library. The guardians and many of the cast were also given passes to visit the library.

The show was well attended by Little Rock residents and the mayor of the town issued a formal proclamation making November 3, 2009, Little House on the Prairie Day in the city.

The play shared the spotlight in the city with the start of the trial of a man accused of October 2008 killing of a popular Arkansas television personality, Anne Pressly. The trial was being held in at the Circuit Courthouse just across the street from the Robinson Center Music Hall.

Little House in "Music City"

“Little House on the Prairie, the Musical” fits in pretty well in Music City. Nashville has received the show and the cast very well. Too bad the weather hasn’t been so nice.

We flew out of Minneapolis-St. Paul on a dark and dreary Monday, then had to change planes at Chicago’s O’Hare moving from Terminal B to Terminal F—about a ¾ mile walk, at least. The Little House cast of 30 filled half of the plane for the Chicago to Nashville leg—that should give you some idea how big the plane was.

We were greeted in Nashville by sun!!! Our spirits were immediately buoyed after six hours of travel!

We’re staying at Sheraton in downtown Nashville and just across the street is our play’s venue, the Tennessee Performing Arts Center. It’s located just in the shadow of the State Capitol Building. TPAC seats nearly 2,500 and attendance has been great—near capacity many times.

The sun stayed behind the clouds most of the rest of the week—warm and shirtsleeve weather some of the time, but rained a couple of the days and got cool. Some Georgia Tech fans got real nervous Saturday night when they saw me with an umbrella in hand on the elevator. They were heading off for Tech’s game at Vanderbilt (just down the road) and I had to explain to them that I was just getting back from a morning affair when it had been raining. I think the Tech fans had been partying all afternoon anyway and a little rain wouldn’t have bothered them anyway.

Forget the weather—we’ve had a great time in Nashville! Helen and I were able to relive some previous memories when we visited here years ago, but we’ve found that passage of time has brought some changes in former haunts. Some years ago we “line-danced” at the Wild Horse Saloon and ate great “pulled-pork sandwiches. Now they put tables on the dance floor so more people can drink and listen to the bands (the sandwiches weren’t as good either).

We checked out the Ryman Auditorium, the original home of the Grand Ole Opry. Last time there, we just walked in the front door, wandered around the theater, walked backstage and onto the stage. Now, they’ve built a new visitors center complete with a gift shop and a $12.50 per person admission charge ($16.50, if you want a backstage tour). We were content this time to take a picture of life size bronzed Minnie Pearl and Roy Acuff statues sitting on a bench in the foyer.

I’m happy to say that Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge-just across the alley from the Ryman—is just like we remember it. It's famous! Legend has it that country stars appearing at the Ryman slipped across the alley to have a quick drink while shows were going on. I don’t know about that but it’s a great to have a beer while watching fledging country bands perform in the front window.

Of course, neither Taylor nor her school chums visited these haunts. They don’t have time with five hours of classes, Tuesday through Friday. Next week is going to be really tough for them because we’ll be in two separate cities---four shows including a matinee in Little Rock, AK, and four more in Springfield, MO, later in the week—with a bus ride at midweek. I guess they’ll do some reading too on the bus ride.

As tough as it is though, none of them are ready to call it quits. They’re having too much fun.

They attended a party in the TPAC museum on opening night Tuesday, then another on Thursday hosted by The Seeing Eye, a group that provides support services for the blind. We were very fortunate to meet at the latter party a couple of parents who brought their 10-year-old daughters to the show. Taylor had a great conversation with the girls and Helen mentioned that we were not sure how Taylor would get to dress up on Halloween and “trick or treat.”

The next thing we knew Taylor was invited to join the girls at a morning party on Saturday at their church in downtown Nashville. Taylor dressed up as “Alice in Wonderland” costume that we bought in St. Paul. It was a holiday festival with games, prizes, several inflatable slides and bouncers plus a real good magic show. There was plenty of candy, food and soft drinks for all. So Taylor got to be a kid before heading back to TPAC for two shows on Halloween. The older members of the cast also made Halloween better for the kids with candy bowls in every dressing area-although I think they enjoyed he candy as much as the kids.

Earlier in the week, Taylor’s schoolmates, Carly and Michael plus the 16-year-old in the cast, Kurt Engh, visited the Belle Meade Plantation outside of Nashville. The humble beginnings of the plantation trace to the 1820s in a small cabin. The owner became a wealthy race horse breeder and the mansion that remains today was built in 1853. In its prime, the plantation occupied 3,000 acres of land and was maintained by 132 slaves.

The owner was a Southern States sympathizer and was thought to have contributed $500,000 to the Dixie war chest prior to the war. He spent a year in Union jail at the beginning of the war, but his wife appealed to the Union Army, paid a $20,000 fine and the plantation was given an exemption for the length of the war. Fighting went on all around the plantation but only one skirmish was reported on the property during the war.

Accompanying the kids were Scott Engh, Kurt’s father; Bruce Boxleitner, Michael’s father, and myself. Don’t know who had more fun—the kids or the chaperones. Boxleitner and I found out we had a lot in common—both born in Illinois although a decade apart and he says he probably was a participant in some of the ’68 Days of Rage protests that I covered while working for the Associated Press in Chicago. He, of course, survived those days very well and went on to a continuing career in movies and TV. He is really an interesting guy. He’s also a fan of country music and is really knowledgeable about the civil war.

I got to experience one of the LHOTP shows in a whole new way during this stop—the percussionist made special arrangements with the musical director to allow me to view their work and the show itself from a different perspective –from the orchestra pit. Wow do they work really hard there during the show!

Here’s a collection of pictures from our time in Music City:

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/creativeapps/slideShow/Main.jsp?token=122166778703%3A1576417321

We head out Monday morning for our next stop—Little Rock, AR.