Hunchback of Notre Dame: A Musical Adventure !

Way back when each new movie was welcomed by fan fare and a new show or parade being added to the park, there was a show based on Disney's bastardized version of Victor Hugo's Hunchback of Notre Dame Classic. The animated film was 'ehh' and was kind of out of step with most of Disney's animated movies. The show however took on a life of it's own as a thirty minute retelling of the film and had a huge fan base.

Located in the back of the park, it seemed to always be under threat of closing. We were amazed when we lasted one year, much less seven. This show was and always will be one of my favorites. It was a show about outcasts, and being an entertainer you never quiet fit the social norms of society, anyway. We had a little bit of everything in that show: seven Equity performers (anyone who has special skills, talks or sings is Equity), nine character performers (pupeteers who in another life worked with Mickey, Pluto, Chip, Dale etc.), pyro techs (they burnt down Paris five times a day), six costuming dressers (who were always ducking out of the way of props, and dodging cast members who were late for enterances), two cosmetologists (it is amazing all the uses there are for doublesided hair and makeup tape) and one preshow juggler act (who had his own fan club following after a while).

It's petty sad when you'd rather be at Work on a holiday that with your family, but the cast and crew at Hunchback was my family. . . sort of. On our first Easter sunday, we turned the court yard between the stage and the greenroom into a little outdoor French Bistro. The techs had two hot plates in the back corner making omletes. We had electric skillets and waffle irons with pitchers of batter to make pancakes and waffles. Breads and pasteries of every size and discription was on another table. You name it we had it. Costuming put together an Easter Egg hunt. I found the quickest way to turn grown adults into children again is to hide something and tell them to go find it.

Costumes were alway an issue at that show. One of our gypsies (characters) hated his hat. He called it the "Herbie the Misfit Elf" hat. In one show it fell off, as it usually did, but this time he never got it back because his precious cast members kept kicking it around the stage like a hacky-sack. After that the stage managers made the hat go away. Costuming's claim to fame was a seven second complete Esmeralda costume change. It didn't have to be seven seconds, but we wanted to prove we could do it. Esmerelda would sneeze on stage and disappear behind a curtian and a poof of smoke. One of us would unzip her red dress, drop it to the floor. The second dresser would drop the blue dress over her head. The first dresser would zip it while the second dresser would snap the sash into place. Meanwhile, cosmetology straightened her hair and she was off.

The characters took being a gypsy to heart and were the mischievous bunch of people I have ever worked with. They had themed shows like the 'Riverdance Show' where everyone moved around on stage like they were in Riverdance. In one scene the gypsies where thrown in jail. The top of the jail was a stair way where the Gargoyles stood. We had certian gypsies that loved to torment the Gargoyles by untying thier shoe laces or pulling on thier tights.

As with most theater shows, Broadway and other wise, we had understudies. Everyone knows that. One particular day, we ran out of Quasimodos and the managers had to call in the under study. . . We'll call Quasi J. The only problem was, Quasi J, being his day off, was at the Epcot WINE and Food festival. (note the emphasis on Wine) Quasi J told them he was at the WINE and Food festival, but Stage Managers said "We'll deal with that when you get here, just come in and save the shows." I happened to be dressing that track that day and had to deal with the tipsy Quasi. . . lucky me. Quasi T wanted the lead in the show so bad, but there was one minor issue, a rope swing stunt from one side of the stage to the other that he was petrified of. He almost never landed right, in fact we refered to his rope swing as 'Bowling for Guards' since he usually took out several guards each show.

Props were a big part of that show. Let me emphasize BIG. We had a life size horse puppet we lovingly refered to as Snowball. Frollo would ride out on this thing being pushed by a puppeteer. I was always amazed the Frollo never took a header off the front of the stage. After his scene, we used Snowball to preset costumes on. His right ear became The Official Spot for the stiltwalking gypsy's dew rag. Since the show went away five, six years ago, Snowball turned into a convention prop. Just the other day I actually ran into him at some holiday promotion thing. I ignored the people working the event and told Snowball how much I missed him. The people thought I was nuts.

Back stage at Hunchback was 'all about no where to stand'. In our seven year run, we only had one costuming manager who wasn't afraid to be back stage during a show. In fact we had one manager (blonde . . .enough said) that came to see us right before the show. The music started. People started running. This manager was like a deer in headlights. When the 'burning buildings' were rolled back stage (real flames), she was gone and never came back to the show again. Between flaming set pieces, Snowball the life size horse, a Madonna and child statue, various size puppet racks, stiltwalkers and just the general wierd costume/props, we were always moving out of the way of something, not the least of which was running cast members.

Disney shows are live microphoned singers, so let me end with our blooper reel and Hunchback had some real doosy's.

One of the gargoyle parishoners was supposed to "ask for fame."
Instead he asked for "pain" one day.

In a touching scene, Quasi is supposed to tell Esmerelda that "I don't think I'm your type." Esmerelda replys "Nonsense, your sweet, intellegent (yada yada yada)"
However, Quasi T said one day "I don't think you're my type." Esmerelda had no response for him. Although it was interesting to watch her dig herself out of the hole.

Clopin in the opening of the show was supposed to say something about Paris "...and the cities awake."
What he said was yada yada Paris. ". . . and the titis awake." Hmmm wander who he was looking at in the audience.

Clopin in the Feast of Fools scene, he was supposed to say, "Tospy Turvy is when you shock the Prig and mock the Priest."
One day he said, no lie, "Tospy turvy is when you shock to prig and f##k the priest."

And the stories continue, but at another time.
I found a pretty good version of the old show on youtube. check it out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZrYogrA2Ao

If All The World's a Stage, Why Am I stuck in the Dress Rehearsal

For those of you who have never worked in theater, let me first of all say, "I'm sorry". There is nothing quiet like an entertaiment family. And we truly are a family. Wardrobe / Costuming is mom to everyone. We always knew when some one needed to have a shoulder to cry on or a confidential friend to talk to.

Creative Costuming, those responsible for making the stuff, always seemed to a little out of touch with reality. They could make the most beautiful garment. . . on a dress form, but put it on a living, breathing, sweating person and it would fall apart. Silks looked awesome, but when they were washed, they would bleed like a rainbow. Belle, from the Beauty and the Beast Show, her ball gown was at least thirty, forty pounds. I could never get the thing off the ground to hang it up.

The Technicians are always the dads, (male / female it didn't matter). The techs are the keepers of all things safety, all things flammable and all things that when used wrong or carelessly can injure and or maime someone.

When you hear the words "Pyro coming through..." you Move. The holidays around 2005 or 2004, (i'm keeping it intentionally vague for privacy sake) there was a holiday show that, it was said, the techs wanted the last show of the season to go off with a little extra flair, so they added extra pyro. The performers were not told this and several members of the cast were injured with minor burnes. Some costume pieces melted. I saw one of guys a short time later and he didn't have any eyebrows. They had been singed off.

Then we have our precious children 'The Cast'. I loved my cast . . . most of them. There will always be those individuals that have been seared in my mind that if maiming was legal . . . . sorry, let's move on. I always have a philosophy 'when in rome do as the romans'. Each stage has it's own ambience, it's own culture, it's own unwritten rules of order. Any show with equity dancers, tends to be a bit high maintenance. 'My gloves are not in the right place. OH, I can't go on. My life is ruined.' (disclaimer, for those dancers who will get upset when you read this, go out to the stage, check your preset, then come back and finish reading my blog.)

My favorite stage will always be the Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular, or as we call it, EPIC. The testostrone runs thick at that show. Predominately a male cast, teaching the boys to pick up after themself usually takes some unorthodox methods. When shoes, hats, etc. would get left laying around the greenroom, the offender would find his items in the freezer the next day frozen in a block of ice. My managers would always freak out when they heard that, but they were always to afraid too step foot in the Epic trailer, so they never knew about the other stuff we'd did. One of they boys newest games (before I left) was throwing hangers at the clothes rack and trying to see if it would stay there. The words "Hanger In Flight !" Usually meant "DUCK".

Parade performers and puppteers always seemed the be the children of the children. You had your old school performers that were awesome. They looked at a new costume and figured out how to make it work. Then some where along the way we aquired a new set of darlings that worked harder at getting out of doing the parade than they ever did in the parade. To watch a puppeet show like Playhouse Disney or Lion King from under the stage is pretty darn cool. From sliding on their knees from one side of stage to other at Playhouse Disney in order to make thier next enterance to learning to see in the dark at Voyage of the Little Mermaid, the puppeteers are usually pretty intense about their jobs.

Then there are the musicians, streetmosphere, face painters, convention performers, Epcot Cultural performers, the horse people, and . . . we'll get to them later.