Believe it or not, this is a very well-adjusted group of performers- despite what they look like in this photo. These are the 8 men and women who reconvened for three late December performances of “I Love You- You’re Perfect- Now Change,” the summer musical at the Racine Theater Guild. Putting a show like this together is a tremendous amount of work, and while there’s a small sense of relief when that last performance is finished, there’s something really nice about being able to parlay all of that hard work into a few more performances. In a sense it works out ideally to revive it several months later rather than extending the run itself; it gives everyone a chance to miss each other and the show. And if you have as good a cast as this, it’s not much of a problem working the kinks out. In fact, the roughest kink in this revival was me; I had a devil of a time getting the pages of my score turned. I think it’s because I was working out of a spiral-bound score which hadn’t been properly broken in, and I finally had to go through page by page and make small little creases to keep the pages from sticking together. (Part of the problem with playing from a rental score is that it has to go back to the rental company in pristine form, which means I can’t fling the pages very aggressively, and when a score is sticky it just doesn’t work to turn the pages timidly.) There were very disconcerting moments when there might be two or three measures of music with no accompaniment because I was using both hands to get my $%^&*( page turned – but the actors seemed to adjust to these brief “power outages” pretty well. And the show went well- perhaps even better than it did this summer- although maybe I just missed it and was so glad to be hearing the show again.
As fun as this revival was, it was also sad because it meant saying goodbye to one of the most talented young singer-actors I’ve ever known. Nick Holub is front and center in the photo above- the only one of the four guys without his robe on- and our New Year’s Eve performance was Nick’s last at the Racine Theater Guild for the foreseeable future. He is moving to Washington state where his dad now lives and he hopes to go back to school and do some auditions. It was the weirdest thing to say goodbye to Nick because the words coming out of my mouth were “I hope things go really well for you out there, Nick” but my heart was saying “I hope you’re lonely and miserable and get cold feet and come running back to Racine right away so you can audition for “Guys and Dolls” in the spring.” Come to think of it, I sort of said that to him out loud. It’s just that he thinks I was kidding when I said it. : – )
I feel like I’ve known Nick a thousand years but it really hasn’t been that long. His first show at the RTG was a four- person Frank Sinatra revue titled “My Way.” It had one mature couple and one younger couple, and he was one half of the latter. . . and he sang that show with a remarkable sense of confidence and smooth ease that every Frank Sinatra hit calls for. Then to demonstrate just how incredibly versatile he is, he did Marcellus in “The Music Man.” That’s the part Buddy Hackett did in the movie – and it involved some really high singing and some demanding dancing. Nick, as you can see from the photo, is not exactly built like a wood nymph . . . In fact, he played football at Park High School here in town. But he is incredibly nimble, especially for someone his size, and he performed the role of Marcellus as though Meredith Willson had written it specifically for him. Nick was also exemplary in last year’s summer show, “Forever Plaid.” What a challenge that was, casting four guys who would look good and sound good together. We hit the jackpot and Nick was certainly part of the big payoff in more ways than one.
In this show we just finished, Nick hit it out of the ballpark not once, not twice, but rather three times. The first time was in a hilarious sketch called “Stud and the Babe.” The lights come up slowly on a couple sitting across from one another at a table. . . two awkward, bespectacled wall flower types. There’s a very painful pause before finally Nick’s character says haltingly “D-d-d-did I happen to mention that I just had my ph-ph-ph-phone f-f-fixed?” (pause) “Really?” (pause) “Yes.” (pause) “Oh.” (pause) “Uh huh.” (pause) “Wow.” (pause) “Yup.” And then back to the silence. Nick and his partner in this sketch, Katie, were brilliance personified, and I had to work really hard to keep from letting loose with one of my Boris Godunov guffaws from my place behind the scrim. But this scene would crack me up, night after night after night.
Home run #2 was in a charming little love scene with opposite Amber, in which the two of them play two young people who have just played tennis together- and she seems to have annihilated him 6-0 6-0 and not realized until it’s too late that she should have done something to safeguard his feelings. But he still likes her a lot and they slowly and cautiously begin to connect- although every few seconds one or the other blurts out something that they immediately regret. Nick, for instance, when she asks him if he’s free that night to come over for dinner says “Plans?!?! Of course not! I never have plans!” And after shaking his head painfully, he adds “Which is not to say that I’m a loser. It’s just that I’m generally free.” There is something so endearing about this big bear of a guy being so hesitant and so tender with this young woman he likes so much.
Home run #3 – This number was also opposite Amber, and was called “Sex and the Married Couple.” The two have clearly been married for quite some time and their chaotic home life with two small boys plus her mother living with them keeps them from enjoying you-know-what. But on this particular night, unbelievably, the boys are both in bed (the dad promised them a trip to Disney World if they would go to bed) as is his mother-in-law. . . and they begin singing a saucy song about the fun they’re about to have. But then you start to hear shrill voices from offstage yelling “Dad, my head in stuck in the head board ! ! !” and the like. Over and over, the two find their romantic moment interrupted, until finally – when both boys yell in unison “Mom, Dad, the lizard is eating the guppies” Nick and Amber scream “LET ‘EM !” just as they’re going into their clinch. What’s missing from this written-out account is the fun of what Nick and Amber looked like each time they entered the stage, having thrown on some feather boa (her) or football shoulder pads (him) in anticipation of what was – they hoped – right around the corner. They’re increasing passion and their increasing frustration really created some amazing sparks on that stage.
It only occurs to me now, as I write this, that “I love you You’re Perfect Now Change” was an absolutely perfect send off vehicle for Nick because he had to be so many different things in it and did them all so well. (As did everyone in the cast, by the way.) And this is also very much an ensemble show in which no one person is the star and where working well with others / or should we say playing well with others?/ is of paramount importance. And Nick, for as brilliantly talented as he is, has been a terrific colleague in every single show he’s been in. He’s fun – but he works hard – and he has a knack for bringing out the best work in others. I’m hoping that all those traits and more will serve him well in this next chapter of his life.
One more Nick Holub moment. . . When Kathy and I went several years ago to see a show at Park High School (it was either Oklahoma or a Gershwin show, I can’t remember which) we noticed Nick and a couple of his guy friends strolling through the auditorium in their letter jackets, taking their seats right before the start of the show. And as he walked by (he didn’t see us but we saw him) we turned to each other and said almost simultaneously “big man on campus.” Nick walked through there with this wonderful air of confidence and pride, not in an arrogant “I’m a bigshot” sort of way – but more like a “I’m part of this” sort of way. . . just the right kind of swagger that someone should have when they have been a star up on that stage. It was a fun moment. . . and we wish him many more moments like that. But as much as we want his talent to take him far, we hope it doesn’t take him far away for good – or at the very least, that he will find his way back to Racine from time to time. There’s nothing quite like a the delight of performing for a hometown crowd who loves you.
pictured above: the talented cast of the RTG’s “I love you- You’re Perfect- Now Change” taken right before their final performance, December 31, 2007. left to right: Dan, Samantha, John, Nick (front) , Amber, Zack, Laura (front) , Katie.