I had a few days between my flight home and the end of the tour, so I was left in Europe with nothing to do. I jumped on skyscanner.net, searched for a cheap flight from Paris to anywhere, and settled on Switzerland. Basel it was.
A nice three-day vacation.
The second (and final) leg of our tour was to Paris, France.
We struck everything in St. Etienne, stuffed it into the van, and headed up to Paris. Between strike and load in we had one travel day, spent on the TGV, trying hard to sleep on the train as French children made our acquaintances. A seamless reception and pickup met us at the train station in Paris, and everything already looked better, smoother and easier than St. Etienne.
A visit to the space confirmed that everything was well underway, all of our communications had been heeded, and the crew was a jolly and good-natured bunch. Rock.
And then it was load in. Four days of frantic activity, punctuated by typical French meal breaks (although these were only one hour long) of civilized eating and relaxing, topped off with a coffee. We opened on Bastille Day, with a free performance that might have been considered a preview. It was packed, with many appreciative kids giggling at our gags. Shortly before we opened the doors, we learned that we had just sold out our entire run. With no press, no previews, no word of mouth. What? ...Awesome. We were that cool American show.
The run continued to be a smashing success, with huge and appreciative audiences each night. We ran solid shows, socialized with the incredibly-friendly house crew, and perused Paris during our free mornings.
A work day would start around 5pm for a casual preset, getting the million things ready for the start of the show, checking all the equipment and putting everything in its very peculiar place. After a couple hours of prep by the 5 of us, the set would be ready. Then it was actor warmup and fight call, then the familiar pressure of the house crew wanting to open the doors, and us wanting a quiet moment. Finally, we would arrive at an appropriate time to open the doors (maybe 5 minutes before show time... Oops), start the show a few minutes late (the French theater-going audience is not known for their punctuality), run a solid hour-and-a-quarter show, then clean up. We'd be out of there around 10pm every night, then usually head to get dinner. Very Parisien. And we'd be completely free until the next day at 5.
Which left me free for exploration of Paris. I had only visited the city once (see the very first post of this blog for elaboration of that adventure). I had three weeks in the city to better visit and tour and relax. Much better than 20 hours with no accommodations... I kept meaning to find the bush that I slept under. I never did...
I did make it to the Eifel Tower, the Basilica Sacre Coeur, the Louvre, Shakespeare and Co, the Bastille, la Defense, and the Champs-Elysees, among other sites. I became familiar with the extensive subway system, as well as proficient at avoiding getting flattened on its cobblestoned streets, filled with chaotic European traffic (we even rented scooters one day... What were we thinking?!).
All in all, it was an excellent sojourn in France, giving me another taste of the touring lifestyle, as well as another experience living in a foreign country. My French greatly improved, as it was the first time I had used the language outside of the classroom. Paris still has many attractions I didn't get to, so there's always room to go back, but until then, it's full-tilt in any other direction.
After a brief stop on the East Coast to dump most of my belongings, repack into a smaller suitcase, and pick up plenty of props and show equipment, it was off to France with the show from Edinburgh last year.
A week in St. Etienne, down by Lyon, would be followed by three weeks in Paris. It's a highly ambitious show to load in, but we had a great team, and we knew what we were doing, after Edinburgh. The show had also gone to the London Mime Festival in January, while I was on ships.
So off to St. Etienne, to work exclusively in French, loading in a full convenience store into some kind of performance space. We weren't sure exactly where we were performing. We knew it was the Palais des spectacles, but exactly where in the 6-acre building, we didn't know.
The team we met there was a little overfaced by what we proposed to do. We needed to install a full ceiling, floor and walls. Plus very specific lighting and sound plots, and intricate rigging for all of the tricks of the play. Like our ducks that need to fly through the ceiling. I think they thought our french was just very bad...
But the magic of theater prevailed, and despite constant doubts on our part, we opened on time. The actors did the entire show in French, changing the script over into a different language. We performed in a wildly different space from anything the show had seen before. And we performed despite deafeningly loud rain beating on the roof of our venue, drowning out the subtle and silent sound design, and breaking the actors' voices as they tried to yell over the chaos.
We played to sold out houses, and were well received. And three days later, we struck it and headed to Paris.
On the day of strike in St. Etienne, we had the morning off. Which meant time to explore the town. The company that was transporting the set from London down to St. Etienne was also taking the set up to Paris, which meant they were sticking around town with us for the week it took to install and perform our show. Which meant we had a van at our disposal.
This van had three seats, though, and we were seven people. So most of us packed into the back of the van, sitting on spare tires, leaning against bikes bungeed to the side walls. We left the van door opened, and proceeded to try to claw our way out of the city for a brief breath of fresh air.
After 10 minutes of driving and about 300 left turns (and not a single right turn), we saw greenery. Then it was into the magnificent foothills of the Alps, through forest and valley, overlooking fields of cattle and forested hills.
We stopped at a park with a nice trail system, winding around a small stream in a forested valley. It was a beautiful day for hiking, and we enjoyed ourselves wandering through the woods. We stopped for a picnic lunch on some logs.
All of a sudden, a group of people drove up the logging road, stopped in the glade next to us, and unloaded a large picnic. A couple women in stripped shirts sauntered over. Apparently, it was a hen party, or a pre-marital tradition, or their own bridal shower prank. The bride-to-be, in drag and named Robert, was to greet and kiss as many men as possible, then have them sign her shirt for good luck.
Always an adventure...
