It’s been quite an experience, and a lot of fun to boot, but it’s also been an enormous time commitment. Between the shlepping from work in Tel Aviv to rehearsals in Jerusalem, while still trying to see my family when they’re still awake, coupled with an apparently misguided sense that no rehearsal should be skipped (ever), I’m fairly exhausted. Despite the thrill of performing, I’m definitely looking forward to a more relaxing week ahead.

From what I understand, there are still tickets available for the remaining shows, but be forewarned that they’re a bit pricey at 100 NIS. I quote the following disclaimer another chorus member’s blog with permission:

Gilbert and Sullivan’s Pirates of Penzance is being performed in Jerusalem this week and next. Pirates is an awesome, hilarious, magnificent show, particularly if your sense of humor leans towards straight-faced absurdity, British accents, and, well, pirates.

I’ll be singing in the chorus. Please don’t come to see me. If you’d like to come, make it because you think the show sounds like fun; if it doesn’t, it won’t be, and that’d be a shame. Also, the show’s on the expensive side (alack, 100NIS a ticket), so really – come iff you actually want to.

Of the production, I can say that this troupe has always put on excellent shows. A lot of the high price is due to high production values – we’ve got costumes, scenery and lighting out the wazoo; we’ve got a full live orchestra, we’ve got an excellent theater. More than that, though, we’ve got a cast which is having the time of their lives – we’ve got great actors and chorus doing their best and their most energetic. What all of this is going to say is, our production definitely lives up to excellent play.

If you have no familiarity with Gilbert and Sullivan, well, all I can say is that I’m very upset that you’re spending so little time around me, but also you can take a peek at some YouTube clips here and here. Those are from a Hollywood film with rather a larger budget and somewhat more renowned actors than we can claim, but they should give you an idea of what type of humor, story, and music you might expect from the show.

Full details are posted on the ENCORE website.

The show was solid. Despite obvious punch-pulling, the comics all got a solid flow going. Amy and I were careful not to sit in the “splash zone” – the first row and the front sides of the audience are the most likely to get picked on – as opposed to a certain member of the Beit Shemesh Board Game Club, who was probably looking for attention on a birthday outing.

The show was held on the evening following Obama’s Cairo address (which I’ll need to address in another post), and the first comic, David Crowe, was clearly caught off guard when he started to go into his “Obama routine” and was met with boos and hisses.

Finally, the last performer, Jeffrey Ross, asked for a volunteer from the audience to play a few mood-setting chords on the piano for his “Love Poems”. Amy grabbed my arm and said, “Don’t — you — dare!”, but she needn’t have worried. The cry went up: “Lenny! Lenny!” Lenny Solomon (of Shlock Rock fame) was at the show and bounded up to the stage. Jeffrey Ross looked at Lenny and the crowd’s unexpected reaction, and asked: “Are you famous or something?” Celebrity is a relative thing.

Well, it’s quite clear that I need a blog. For someone as opinionated as I am, not having a blog limits my potential ranting audience far too much.

But as a techie, I want the fine-tuned control that can only be achieved by hosting a blog yourself (not to mention the bragging rights). So, my account and blog here is temporary, possibly to be superceded by something else — if I ever decide on a package to use. Ah well, such is the life of the technological perfectionist.

Welcome to the blog, and good luck to me!

Update – Jan 17, 2008: I’m still running this on my own server, but I’ve moved over to WordPress. WordPress might have tons of potential plugins to manage, but at least the basic functionality doesn’t require as much tweaking as Bloxsom.