Lawrence Gowan is the Coolest Pianist Ever. A Post For the Music Nerds.

Piano's not exactly considered the coolest instrument to play.  I've played since I was 5, and it's not an exaggeration to say that I can't imagine my life without it, but no one's ever said, "oh, that's a sexy instrument," or "ooo, piano players are hot," like they do about guitarists and bass players and drummers.  I played in jazz band in school and in a jazz combo with an electric violinist and a drummer, and I always felt like the keyboard was the solid, steady, sensible one to the other instruments' coolness.  When I go to a rock concert, there are plenty of air guitarists and air drummers in the audience during solos, but I'm pretty sure I've only ever seen one other person who plays air piano.  There's a reason they made Guitar Hero and not Piano Hero.  Guitarists get to strut; they get to be showmen and have stage presence and do the Nancy Wilson kick, while the keyboardists are usually stuck behind a stationary piano, frequently sitting.  Keyboardists feel the emotion of the music they're playing just as much as guitarists, so why shouldn't they be able to express that emotion through their physicality, too?  Not that keyboardists can't have some stage presence, but it's certainly limited.  Or so I thought.

Little did I know that there was actually someone out there who had discovered how to combine strutting and dancing with piano playing.  If I had discovered the impossible being that is Lawrence Gowan when I was a child, I think I might have announced to my parents that I was going to become a rock star.  Albeit a dancing one. 

About three songs into the Styx concert I attended a couple weeks ago, where I was happily watching Tommy Shaw right in front of me from my third row seat, I spotted this mesmerizing, mystical being across the stage who was playing keyboard with his back to the instrument (the solo at the 3:50 mark here).  From that moment on, I don't think I took my eyes off him.  He played over the keyboard, he played with the keyboard spinning, and, most importantly, he was a technical virtuoso while doing it (having trained at The Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto), even inserting a classical piano solo into a piano medley he performed.  Oh yeah, and when he got away from the keyboard, he was dancing all over the stage.  Double pirouette?  No problem.

Watching Lawrence Gowan play makes me want to sit (or stand-and-spin) behind (or in front of) the piano for hours, playing until my fingers are numb.  The passion and depth of emotion he feels while playing is contagious, and there's not a false note (no pun intended) or contrived pose to be found.  So the next time someone you're with is admiring a youtube video of a rock band, talking about how cool the guitarist is, maybe suggest they click on a post-1999 Styx video to see that pianists can be cool too.  I'm going to go ask Santa for a spinning keyboard now.

Gowan spinning, strutting, playing backwards, and rocking out to Blue Collar Man (Long Nights): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcrPtCghQ-E&spfreload=10

Because sometimes you just need to stand on your keyboard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQgiCYX_sdY&spfreload=10

One Effective Acting Technique

I recently had my first experience on set with a movie star who asked the crew to all "hide away," clear his field of vision, and not look at him.  If they weren't someone who would actually be in that experience in real life, he didn't want them visible while he was acting.  That meant the monitors and every single station for every department, which were all set up on the side of the set he was facing, had to move and hide.... I'd look over and see ADs and PAs hiding behind pillars.  Today I learned that this actor has done theatre before -- I'm curious how that worked.... Does that mean that the stage manager has to have a table on wheels and roll around so that they're never in his field of vision during rehearsal?  Maybe have a desk set up on a bike and just pedal around the rehearsal room?  And the crew in the wings... Do they have to wear costumes?  I'd love to be a fly on the wall in that tech.... 

Girls Can Be FBI Agents, Too

When I do work as an extra, I like to think of it as a learning experience.  I get a paycheck to be on set and observe what works and doesn't work, from both the cast and the crew.  I've seen some amazing leadership skills, which I incorporated into my stage management work, as well as some wonderful examples of how not to lead a crew.  I've seen actors who are mesmerizing to watch, making specific, detailed, nuanced choices, and I've seen actors floundering in generality without detail or clear beats.  I've seen directors give direction that focuses an actor's performance and makes it click, and I've seen direction that does nothing but confuse and stress an actor.  Regardless of which it is, I always learn, and I always try to make my big takeaway from the day about something more than just my individual experience.  And then there's yesterday, when all that went out the window, and my big takeaway was that my ordinary day as an extra sitting in a bar turned into a day where I got to be fitted with a bulletproof vest, get a tutorial on guns and proper FBI procedure for clearing a room, and then play a tough FBI chick, before getting an hour ride back to the city with an actor who I've watched on television since I was little.  My day rocked because of a little luck, being in the right place at the right time, a touch of assertiveness, and a director who loves strong women.

I've learned that very little in the world of hiring in this business is final.  I've been offered multiple stage management jobs that were retracted when a friend of someone involved in the production emerged who wanted the job.  I've made it through a pre-screen in the audition process only to be told the night before the audition, "Never mind, the producers decided they don't need to see you" and then been called the next day and asked to come in after all, two hours after which I booked the job.  I've been offered a role in a new musical, only to have the entire production get canceled.  I've seen my headshot go in the "yes" pile for a cut during the Radio City Christmas Spectacular cattle call audition, only for the director to impulsively ask, as my group of three was walking off to the side, for us to do the combination a second time, after which my headshot was moved to the "no" pile.  Usually, there's nothing you can say to make a difference, and when a director or casting director changes their mind about you, you normally have no idea why.  

Yesterday morning, as I was sitting on my bar stool on set, an AD came over and asked me and the guy with whom I'd been paired if we would be comfortable playing FBI agents later.  We of course said yes (Is there really someone who would have said, "No, I'd rather just sit on my bar stool than do whatever cops and robbers fun you have planned later, which rumor has it involves breaking down a door?"), and we were repositioned with only our backs to the camera.  After the shot was finished, we were brought over to meet the director, who introduced himself and asked if we were up for playing FBI agents after the bar scenes wrapped.  Apparently the original FBI agents got nixed once on set, and I guess we looked very FBI-y.  A conversation immediately ensued with hair/makeup and wardrobe about what they'd do with my long wavy hair and what they had to dress us in, when it was discovered that they didn't have anything small enough for me (There are no FBI agents under 5' 5"? Really? Height discrimination).  As wardrobe huddled trying to figure something out, a crew guy (whose position I still don't know -- best guess is stunt adviser) came over, took one look at me, and said to the director, "Her? You're going to have one of the two be a woman?" with a derisive shake of the head.  "What, you don't like women?" the director replied with a smile.  Crew guy glanced at me, saying, "No offense to you" before returning to the director, explaining, "We originally had four FBI; now we only have two, and if you want it to be really strong and have a strong impact, with only two, you need two men."  Someone piped up, "There are women in the FBI!" and my fellow FBIer (a 6' 4" Ryan Gosling look-alike, whom no one would doubt fit the FBI door-busting stereotype) chimed in, "She's a tough girl."  

The director looked me over, telling crew guy that they had men for all the other stunts and police stuff, so he thought it would be cool to have a woman for this scene.  Crew guy voiced his objection again, saying I wouldn't give the scene the strength it needed.  As the director studied me, I saw my chance at playing Tough FBI Chick slipping away.  Observing as an extra is great and all, but... now I really just wanted to play cops and robbers and be the awesome tough girl breaking into the house.  I also saw that  A. this was the rare moment where I actually had the opportunity to see why my headshot was being moved from the "yes" pile to the "no" pile, metaphorically speaking, and B. this director wanted a woman.  He wanted a strong woman in this scene, and he was being told that I wouldn't make the scene strong enough, so this was not the time to be the passive little waif who lets men look at her and make decisions about her.  So I announced, "I'm a dancer.  I can kick and be tough and sell the strength.  I'm a tough girl."  Right then, wardrobe announced they found what they needed to costume me, and as the director turned back, he studied me with a twinkle in his eye and pointed at me and Fake Ryan Gosling, saying, "These two.  It's these two."  As a wardrobe girl walked by me whispering, "I was pulling for you," I felt girl power had just won a small victory.  Though I'll never know if my speaking up actually influenced the director, if nothing else, it delayed his decision for the impeccable timing of wardrobe's announcement that they could make it work, and I know that I didn't stand by and watch my awesome play day go to a man just for being a man.

So after I got my FBI makeover, we were driven over to set with the director and did our blocking rehearsal (where the director told me I would be the one to bust open the door, "because they probably won't expect that -- Yeah, it'll catch them off guard" -- I love this director).  It was also during the blocking rehearsal that we got advised on how to properly clear a room (I've totally got the corners covered) and that the crew guy who had objected to my casting gave me a seemingly very sincere "You look great. Very believable." -- Yep, I know.  I look awesome.  Then we got a gun tutorial (Here's our union working for us: they have to show both us and the 1st AD that the gun is not loaded every time they hand it to us), got fitted with our bullet proof vests (Again -- no FBI short girls? Oh well, extra coverage from my vest) and gun holsters, and then did a bunch of takes of awesomeness (preceded by the obligatory on-every-film's-blooper-reel-ever take where the door was locked when I tried to enter), including a slow-motion shot that the crew reacted to with glee and someone singing a TV show theme song over upon playback.  They announced it was a wrap for the FBI agents, there was some crew applause, and then after we went back to base camp and changed, I was loaded into the cast van back to the city, where I actually heard the sentence "Yeah, I got a Grammy nom for it" come out of someone's mouth, along with "I actually won an Oscar for it," and "[My book] made the NY Times Best Seller list" (none of which was said with braggadocio)….  I think I managed to work maybe three sentences into the conversation.  None of them involved awards. 

And so my takeaway from the day?  Girl power rules.  Speak up for yourself when you have the chance, because you don't always.  And then maybe you'll have an incredibly awesome day being paid to play cops and robbers.

Pop your pink-hair-streaked head, Cassie

You know that dream where you have a final for a class you've never attended?  Or you're about to go on stage for a role you never learned the lines to?  Or you have a paper due that you totally forgot about?  I lived a version of that nightmare when I auditioned for A Chorus Line (I also lived the "I have a final paper due next period that I totally forgot about, and this period I have to direct my live-to-tape 3-camera sitcom final and have to write the other class's final paper while directing this sitcom" one, but that's a different story).  Apparently, every musical theatre dancer in the city knows the famous combination from A Chorus Line.  The creative team took it as a given that every girl in the room knew it before we walked in, so they didn't teach it.  Being the sole dancer in the room who knew nothing more of it than the "how many jazz hands can we work into a single bar" opening, and of course being auditioner #3 (which means I went in the first group of four), I wound up getting a wonderful opportunity to showcase my improvisation skills.  Unfortunately, I don't think the creative team was looking for improv skills....

A Chorus Line seems to be to every generation of theatre dancers what Center Stage is to my generation of bunheads: that movie you watched at sleepovers, learning all the choreography from, learning every line by heart, wishing you were in it.  But I've always been that odd dancer who finds the show to be far more disturbing and depressing than the inspirational and touching story most of my theatre friends find it to be.  (Then again, I would imagine non-ballet-dancers probably don't watch Center Stage and think "gee, that movie where the girl was throwing up after eating her pizza and there was a lot of workplace sexual harassment totally made me want to be a ballet dancer"… but what can I say, that film's gold to me.)  Sitting through A Chorus Line once was plenty for me.  That scene at the end where they've all been lobotomized into "one singular sensation" and have ghoulish grins on their faces -- though I'm not an expert on the show, I think that was actually the point of the ending, whereas most productions of the show treat the finale as a celebration.  To me, the resonating message of A Chorus Line is that as dancers, we so desperately need to do what we love that we will squash our individuality into conformity in order to do it.  And that, to me, is sad. Because it's true.

Though I've had plenty of amazing musical theatre auditions where we did get to act out characters through our dance (the joy of getting a golden ticket to the ball in Cinderella, the discovery, love, and ultimate loss of a relationship in an audition for Christopher Gattelli's In Your Arms, the flirty toughness of a Philadelphia bar girl in Rocky), I've also had lots of musical theatre auditions in which we're asked to do that ghoulish grin that has nothing to do with the choreography, while the choreographer spends more time reading our resumes than watching us as we perform in groups of four.  And I would take those jobs in a heartbeat, too, and genuinely love every second I was on stage, because I love to dance, and I love to perform, and I need to do both as desperately as I need to breathe.  But what I would love even more is to be an individual on stage -- someone who has a story and a character, even if the audience never gets to know it.  And too frequently, as dancers, we're just the glittery smiling kickline.

Then this summer I discovered the world of music videos, where at the audition we get to dance one at a time in front of the camera and the director and show off what we do best, where the director never even glances at our resumes during the auditions, where we get to freestyle at the shoot, where the choreographer actually reads the "special skills" section, and something from that winds up in the video (hello 230° splits).... A world where I booked a job auditioning with a pink streak in my hair.  A world where "Pop your head, Cassie" is the best advice to follow to book the job.*  And a world where showing how I'm different from everyone else in that room results in somebody paying me to do what I love.  And so I love music videos.

And this is my favorite music video of the year.  I was fortunate enough to dance in a video earlier this year by the same director, Emil Nava.  I love his work, and I so wish I were in this gorgeous video.  And I love that dance seems to be making a bit of a comeback in music videos lately.

* For those of you not familiar with this soul-crushing show, when former leading lady Cassie auditions to be part of the ensemble, the director beats her style into conformity with one of the most famous lines of the show, "Don't pop your head, Cassie."  Dance teachers everywhere say this in class and rehearsal to mean "fit in; match every one else; be uniform."  When attempting to find a clip of that line to link to here, I found this one instead.  It's a more interesting interpretation of the line anyway....

How to cry in a scene

Sometimes you get all teary eyed in a scene because an incredibly gifted, Oscar-winning actor is giving an emotional, beautifully acted speech about his character's dead daughter 4 feet in front of you.  And then sometimes, 10 takes later, you have tears streaming down your face in the scene because as soon as he started talking you really had to cough, until by the end of the very long take, holding the cough in hurts so bad that tears are pouring.... Both work.

When prop tables won't suffice

Me: "So where does my fan go after I fan myself with it?"
Director: "Back into your shirt."
...After which I do a couple double pirouettes and some partnering lifts.... Do some of you lucky well-endowed ladies actually have makeshift storage closets on your chest? Is it like Mary Poppins's purse? Because a fan in my tank top looks like a fan flying across the stage and hitting someone, but I feel like I'm missing some great big female secret of this magical giant supply closet where props can be stored on our chests....

Well, that would explain it....

Sometimes a principal on a film introduces himself to you in the van taking you to set, and because he's looking over the call sheet and the transpo sheet and is sitting in the front seat of the van and says you're picking up 6 more people, you assume he's a PA, and you ask him questions as such, and you wonder why he's so unknowledgeable about what's going on, until the van drops him off at his trailer half an hour later. Yep. Sometimes that happens.

The Red Shoes

As she watched me get ready for a black-tie formal wedding wearing my elegant long blue gown, fancy hairdo and jewelry, and.... bright pink-red Keds sneakers, the little flower girl, full of wonder, awe, jealousy, admiration, and an expression that gave a sense that her mind had just been blown by possibility, to her mom: "Mommy!! Is she going to wear THOSE SHOES!!???"

Her mom: "No, you know how mommy always puts on my shoes at the last second if I'm dressing up? Just like that. Dress-up shoes hurt, so she'll slip her shoes on at the last second when she has to."
Me: "I would wear them if I could! But they wouldn't let me." (and then showing her the 4-inch heeled black feet-killers I would be wearing)

And the little girl looked absolutely crushed, like that magical world of possibility she had just discovered where you could wear red sneakers with a gown had just been stolen away from her. It was as if learning that women are expected to wear elegant painful shoes rather than fun comfy ones was as bad as being told Santa didn't exist.... Women definitely did not invent heels. And I hope that little girl always wears her pink sneakers wherever she wants, with whatever she wants, no matter what anyone tells her.