Chapter 15 A bag full of ball dust Part 2

Power Suit begins to call us up one at a time. The Casting Director places the contract in front of us individually handing us his pen and we are told to sign.

We begin to form a line, like cattle to the slaughter.

"I need to read my contract", says someone. "No time", says the Casting Director. “We need to finish this in the next 20 minutes so we can get everything in gear” We sign and leave.

I lie in bed and look at the shadows on my ceiling; I drift in and out of sleep all night long.

We spend the next day in rehearsal, changing everything that we learned this far. We put things back into the show that we cut during the second week. We learn new sections that change after lunch. We have learned every possible combination to this show that we can learn. No one is retaining anything. We push on."Lots to do", say's the Assistant Director.

We are now rehearsing new things every day, changing old things from 30 minutes ago and nothing is ever set. We are told that “It’s up to be changed”

A sign is posted on the call board of the theatre after rehearsal. I can see a group standing around reading it. The heads of the company will be throwing us a Christmas party before we leave the island. The note goes on to say that they will pay for the first two drinks and then we will pay for anything we drink after that. Clearly they know this group.

The night for the party arrives; the company has reserved a special bus to drive us to a restaurant. We dress in our finest clothes and walk into the parking lot of the condo. Small talk is made as the bus arrives and we pile in and drive off to the party. Everyone is happy that at least the end is in sight. The mood is very light, we joke and laugh, we act like children hopped up on sugar. I haven't seen the Cast this happy in months.

The bus climbs the long hill to the restaurant, and the setting is magical. Twinkling Christmas lights cover all the trees and the moon is shining bright in the sky. We enter the place, warm lighting falls across the walls and soft music is playing. The Cast grows completely silent as we look around. “It’s a trap,” I whisper. This gets several giggles in response.

The crew at the restaurant hands out Raffle tickets as we make our ways to our seats. We look around the room with our mouths hanging open, we are in awe. The Company has gone above and beyond to put this together.

We have made it. We went into hell and we came out alive.

The heads of the Company are patting themselves on the back as they take their seats at the front of the room. I am reminded of the Bride and Grooms table.

One of them picks up the microphone, asks “Is this on?” and starts the show. It starts as a roast to the other company heads."We had a hard struggle, but we made it"' says one. I imagine him wearing dance clothes and sweating next to me. They continue the show with back patting and stories about each other’s wives. All the time they are laughing and pushing food into their mouths. In my eyes they turn into little pigs. The Cast look at each other in horror as they finish the show by swilling down liquor.

‘Attention, Attention,” one of heads yells into the microphone. “It’s time to start the raffle!” They all scream in excitement.

The raffle begins and numbers are drawn out of a hat. It is clear that this is fixed as we all begin to win prizes. So many company gifts are given out.

We drink and dance late into the night, another announcement is made."We have gift bags for everyone." The heads yell “Hurrah!” Everyone receives a bag with a watch and glass Christmas ornament. Everyone eagerly opens their bags. "Hey I got a bag of dust!"yells one cast member.

For the first time we are treated really well, maybe It won’t be that bad, maybe it’s all over and we will move on to the next phase. We are sure that it will be smooth sailing from here on out.

We leave the party happier than we have ever been, safe in the knowledge that things would get better.

Boy, were we wrong.

to be continued......

Geoffrey Doig-Marx holds all written and electronic rights to his writting "Not Only Magic Floats". It can not be reprinted in part or whole without his written consent.

Chapter 15 A bag full of ball dust Part 1

It’s time for another meeting. This one is to give us information on how to survive Italy. Today’s meeting will take place at one of the condos in Guanahani Village. The Casting Director and Power Suit will be running this meeting. As we all crowd in with our normal “over it” attitude. 

Power Suit and The Casting Director are at the main table in front of us. "Remember to bring a rain coat and rain booties" says Power Suit as she pulls and eye pencil across her lower lid. "It got awful wet when we were there" she continues, "The streets of Venice flood all the time and I almost ruined a pair of shoes."' She laughs at this. “Imagine?” I think to myself a city built on water, flooding, truly astounding!” I also imagine that she was at a 5 star and we will be at a no star. The bathrooms will probably be flooded all the time in our hotel.

We are told what to bring and what not to bring. Some of these things run the gauntlet from sensible to absurd. "Bring Advil, but don’t bring drugs"' says Power Suit jabbing the air with her eye pencil for effect. The Casting Director quickly jumps in with several suggestions; Power Suit shoots him a sideways glance not happy about being interrupted.

"We will be staying in a four star hotel"' he says forcing a smile that shows yellowing teeth. “And be aware that the mail service really doesn’t exist there, so we will receive all your mail and send it on to you.” There is an audible groan from the cast.

The meeting goes on and on and information really isn't given to us, not the information that we need, it’s more about packing tips supplied by Power Suit. For some reason she is trying to be all sunshine and lollipops today. Maybe its so the Casting Director can be the bad guy for a change. “

We will wire all your money electronically into your accounts, until we take possession of the product" says the Casting Director. Another groan from the cast as a hand shoots straight up. "When will that be?" the person attached to the hand asks. "I’m not really sure", says the Casting Director. He looks at Power Suit and sweat begins to form on his upper lip. She shakes her head slowly from side to side as if to say “You poor dumb fuck.”

More hands shoot up and more questions get asked, they are being rapid fired in his direction. The Casting Director begins to look deflated from all the questions, not to mention the tight lipped unblinking stare he is getting from Power Suit. She has said little since her last tip about making more room in your luggage by rolling up your clothes.

Power Suit reaches across the table in front of the Casting Director and with one finger taps his briefcase. A smile crosses her face and she looks directly into the crowd."Now let’s get down to business"' she says, I have another contract for you to sign.

to be continued.........
Geoffrey Doig-Marx holds all written and electronic rights to his writting "Not Only Magic Floats". It can not be reprinted in part or whole without his written consent.

Part 14 How do you get a tree into a van?

The island is now in full swing with everybody getting ready for Christmas. Everywhere you look are little reminders that the holiday is coming. Many of the local Bahamians are wearing little Santa hats and putting up mistletoe. A feeling of ease has settled upon the cast and we are beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Allegedly, everything didn’t go so well at the run-thru’s and the company feels that we need to go back into rehearsal. Our initial contracts were only 3 months long. The Company feels that the shows are not ready. We are now going to change many of the numbers that we spent months learning.

To combat this, the Company has added another rehearsal space. This way no one gets a day off and they can finish the product that they want. This new space is just up the road past our condos. It is the banquet hall of another hotel.

From the look of things when we arrive at the venue for the first time it’s clear that the original name of the hotel was “The Flea Hop Inn.”  As we walk inside, we are asked to push the tables out of the way before we start rehearsal. Today we begin with sword fighting. Our fight director has a clear vision of how it should go, if only the director and choreographer would stop changing their vision daily, we would be done by now.

In the middle of the fight scene the choreographer suddenly wants a big dance number. He jumps up and starts swinging a sword while twirling around us “Can you believe that I never had a lesson?” he asks while we were busy ducking out of his way.

The main stage in the casino is still for running parts of the show that have big dance numbers. We quickly find that with our new additional space we spend most of our time running between the two venues.

Today we learn of a new “dilemma.” Our cast is full of amazing singers with incredible voices but the company has added voices on a click track to “sweeten” their sound. This has thrown the cast into turmoil once again.

The Director approaches one of the African American female cast members who is currently wailing and singing the hell out of one the songs.  I feel like I am sitting a Baptist church watching a sermon when the director asks this girl "Can’t you be more ethnic?" He then goes on to do his imitation of what “be more ethnic” means. He acts like he is in a minstrel show.

Now during the dance break of this number the choreographer has another one of his brilliant ideas. "I was watching a church revival on TV the other night.”  “Can’t you jump around like that?" He begins to jump around like he is on fire.

There is no end in sight.

To keep us in a holiday mood, our Stage manager steals and stuffs a fully decorated Christmas tree that he took from the hotel into his minivan. "Tis the season" he says.

We begin decorating for our island Christmas party, it’s still pretty hot, but we pull out our winter wear that we have packed away in our closets. All our houses get filled with Christmas lights and tinsel and eggnog is made. We gather together where people read a poem entitled the 12 days of the company and rehash all that we have been through. Then we finish by singing carols.

We have been through such and emotional and draining mess, and yet have so much love to share with each other.

After our party, I stumble home, tuck myself into bed and pass out.

to be continued....

Geoffrey Doig-Marx holds all written and electronic rights to his writting "Not Only Magic Floats". It can not be reprinted in part or whole without his written consent.

Chapter 13 Start Spreading the News

It is a very busy morning for the cast as we prepare to run the show for the department heads. They are here to watch the final run-throughs of what we have learned so far. Everyone is wearing their best dance clothes. The girl’s faces have been painted and most are wearing false eyelashes. 

We are exhausted by all these rehearsals and we push ourselves to the limits. It would really be terrible to be “let go” at this time in the rehearsal process but that is still a legitimate threat. The ‘Company’ posted a list of how we should look for today on the stage managers wall and we are told to follow it to the letter.

We run the three shows back to back for the next two days, at full tilt. The audience is made up of department heads and they don’t react to anything that is being presented to them. When the cast is not on stage you can find people napping in the wings and being woken just in time for entrances.

Our nerves are jangled and frayed. I sit on the steps that lead to the wings and smoke my second pack of cigarettes for that day. There is a mouse stuck to a glue trap that continues screaming as I inhale. It is five feet away from me and doesn’t know what is happening to it. I walk over and pick up a stanchion and bring it down killing the mouse. I can’t stand to hear or see things suffer and this is a quicker death than for the mouse to starve. I end up sticking the stanchion to the glue trap and the dead mouse. I’m too tired to feel really sorry for his death, but I couldn't free him.

Like trained monkeys we smile and nod when the Director or The Department heads address us. The Director and staff are so busy kissing the Department Heads butt’s that they don’t see one of the girls nodding off to sleep. I hope that the director bought a box of depends because if anything went wrong he would mess himself. He almost chokes while laughing at his own jokes in front of the cast. It is clear to us that he is just as nervous at pleasing them as we are.

We are a hit on the first day, and they love us, but there are to be many changes in the show. This comes as no news flash to us. A day hasn’t gone by without major change.

When we leave the theatre the Director pulls me aside and tells me that I looked great today. He was worried because he thought I was looking lazy for the past week. Here’s another place that I have to clarify. I had let my understudy do my role while I taught him and stayed right by his side. That's how I looked lazy.

Tonight the Director is rushed to the hospital with severe de-hydration. We won’t see him again until we get to Italy.

We aren’t nervous to continue the next day without the Director present. Even when we swordfight, we move like a well oiled machine. It feels like a black cloud has been lifted. The Company Heads are happy and the department heads are happy and we are happy because we get the next morning off.

We go home to our condos and drink in celebration of a great run. Soon we will be back on our ways home and points beyond. Or so we think.

To be continued…..

Geoffrey Doig-Marx holds all written and electronic rights to his writting "Not Only Magic Floats". It can not be reprinted in part or whole without his written consent.

Chapter 12 Ho Ho Horror

The argument is already in full swing by the time we enter the theatre. Several cast members had an early morning rehearsal, leaving the rest of the cast to lounge in their beds one extra hour. 

We arrive at the casino, enter through the theatre doors, and head down the ramp to the stage. We place our dance bags on the tables and everyone pretends that we don’t hear anything. Silently, we all glance at each other.

"Fuck you" screams The Director, "I am senior show director at the parks, and when I give you a direction, you take it, you don’t ask me any questions." The cast member that he is screaming at is in tears, and she has begun to shake. She puts her head down, and quickly walks the ramp at the front of the stage. He follows her as she walks over to her dance bag, pulls out paper and pencil and begins to write. As if in a television episode, she speaks her thoughts out loud as she comically writes with large gestures. “Dear mom this place sucks, the director is an asshole.” With that she glances at The Director and storms up the aisle out of the theatre.

In rehearsal, whenever we ask this director for character development he tells us to watch the cartoon version of the film. As we all know cartoons are all trained in the Stanislavsky method of acting.  Soon the response to his series of questions including “Why can’t you move faster?” “React bigger?” “Jump higher?” is summed up best by a cast member who screams out “Because we aren’t fucking cartoons!” I’m surprised that no falling anvils are placed into the shows.

Another day spent with lunatics. Another cast member and I pretend we are in strait jackets with our arms tied behind our backs; we rock back and forth and sing “It’s a small world.”

The Choreographer doubles over with laughter at another one of his funny ideas, no one else laughs. When he has one of his brilliant ideas, we are in deep shit. He comes up with new dance steps for a part we have already learned, the steps look all too familiar because they are usually taken from a current Broadway show. We find that if he doesn’t take the steps from the show, he steals them from their television commercial.

After two hours of this new idea, someone asks for a break. "I always give breaks”, he responds. "I came from the Equity theatre" and "I will give one when I am ready".

Blue in the face and gasping for air, we move forward. One of the cast members begins to slow down, her face is flushed and she bolts into the wings. I follow. She is doubled over and crying."Two down", I think to myself.

"I can’t do it, I can’t,” she sobs. “I was hired as a singer, and this is putting a lot of pressure on my knee". “You can do it, I say, now get back out there before we get in trouble.” “I won’t go back out there, this is bullshit,” she says.

I go back on to the stage and get The Directors attention. "What now?” he screams at me. I tell him what’s going on and one of the choreographer’s assistant’s walks into the wings. Unfortunately, the cast member in trouble has danced herself right into a meeting scheduled for the next day.

We break for lunch, its pizza again. We all meet at the pizza parlor in front of the theatre, and go over our early morning woes. When we return our flight information for our break has been posted. None of us are leaving on the same day.

to be continued...........


Geoffrey Doig-Marx holds all written and electronic rights to his writting "Not Only Magic Floats". It can not be reprinted in part or whole without his written consent.

Chapter 11 Vacation is Rumored Part 2

We finally arrive at the Dolphin encounter. It is a series of wooden floating decks attached to each other forming a corral with one end open to the sea. The trainer in charge is about 18 years old and wears a whistle around his neck. Every time he speaks he lifts the whistle and blows it. I’m not really sure why as we don’t see any dolphins yet.

He asks us to form a line and we are handed life jackets. No one is allowed in without one, even though the water is about 3 feet deep. Slowly everyone creeps down a ramp that leads us into the water.

Now the trainer lifts the whistle and blows long and hard. Two dolphins swim into the coral.

One dolphin named “Jake” swims right up to us but the second dolphin named “The Fatman” refuses to swim over to us and stays at a healthy 20 foot distance. The trainer blows the whistle making Jake “perform” all sorts of tricks. He jumps, he splashes and he humps my friend. I’m not sure that the “humping” was part of the show.

The trainer blows his whistle and “The Fatman” swims up to me. He is balanced on his tail so it looks like he is standing up. The trainer blows another series of whistles and “The Fatman,” begins splashing and spitting water in my face. For this trick he gets a series of fish. It is explained to us that the dolphins are not captive mammals but are free to come and go as they please.

We wrap up the day throwing fish to a baby dolphin that giggles and spits at us.

I return home to find a message on the phone; another meeting is in the works for tomorrow. I climb into bed early, and even the shaking of my bedroom cannot keep me awake, I drift into sleep.

I rise early; the sun still hasn't come up. I go downstairs and spend 45 minutes warming up with a ballet barre. I don’t have a barre, so I keep one hand on the sliding glass door. After eating a quick breakfast, I shower, dress and mentally prepare myself for the day.

The cast have started having secret meetings to discuss meeting about the meetings that we've had before. Then we have meetings to plan about having future meetings. Nothing gets done at these meetings except we agree to meet again. Today we plan to meet to have another meeting and talk about future meetings, and then we meet to get everyone up to date about new meetings. So basically nothing gets done except that everyone is very vocal and complains about our conditions and how we are being treated. When it comes down to meeting in front of the producers, the sound of crickets drowns out our silences. Everyone is afraid to lose their job and no one speaks.

After todays cast meeting we have another meeting with the Producers and the staff. The casting director now stands in front of us.

"Hi, everyone." he says into the microphone. He is met with silence "How is everyone?" he asks hoping to get some sort of response. Everyone grumbles feigned happiness. "What I want to tell everyone is that because of the delay of the product, we all feel that everyone should have a nice break, and be home with their families for the holidays”.

The cast look around and at each other in stunned silence. “Then we will all meet in Italy,” "You all mean so much to us and we feel that a break would be great."

“When?” shouts a voice from the back of the room. "We aren't really sure yet, but we will let you know?" “Why?” shouts another. The Casting Director raises his hand and blocks the lights in his eyes."As soon as we find out,” he responds.

Not happy with the answers another person yells out “When will that be?”  Now becoming agitated he shouts out "I said as soon as we find out." He has become slightly impatient with the group.

The cast agrees to have another meeting soon to discuss this meeting.

The Casting Director taps the microphone "Oh, and one more thing, I have new contracts for you to sign before you leave".

to be continued...........


Geoffrey Doig-Marx holds all written and electronic rights to his writting "Not Only Magic Floats". It can not be reprinted in part or whole without his written consent.

Chapter 11 Vacation is Rumored

The cast schedule is hand written on the dry erase board and for the second time since we started, I have the afternoon off. I am very excited because a friend of mine has flown in from New York to visit and I plan on showing her the Bahamas.

I plan for a big adventure; first stop is the dolphin lagoon. Since the vans are busy transporting the cast to and from rehearsal I do a little research about how to get around the island. Right now, the easiest and quickest way is to take the bus. This is the bus that the people who live there take. Basically, they are converted van’s that run the length of the island. To get one, you stand on the road, wave it down and hand the driver a dollar.

There are four of us who decide to take the bus to the dolphin lagoon. Standing out on the road we flag down a bus and climb aboard and ride downtown. This bus is really just a cargo van with seats that flip down.

Climbing aboard everyone stops and stares at us. I smile and nod as I walk the 3 steps to my seat. I squeeze into a seat next to a very large woman and find myself hanging half in the aisle. I smile again and nod; she just grunts turn away and looks out the window. This woman makes the bus lean to one side. Once we get back up to speed we hear the tires make a grinding sound against the metal frame. We pass vendors selling hand painted company merchandise; better start now before the company finds out. Their hand painted version of “The Mouse” is hysterical and decorates everything from handbags to straw hats.

Finally, we arrive downtown where we meet our water taxi and we are off.

The Taxi bounces over the water, sending sprays of it into our eyes and mouths. There is a slight chill in the air as the sun sits high in the sky. 

To be continued…………..


Geoffrey Doig-Marx holds all written and electronic rights to his writting "Not Only Magic Floats". It can not be reprinted in part or whole without his written consent.