Beginning Math:)

[mrdreamjeans]

My mind often works in mysterious, random, and quantifying ways. I was telling Tim (gotmoof) this morning (Wednesday) that today is the 50th performance of “Evita” on this current tour. This brings my tally to 1260 performances in the 10 productions of “Evita’ of which I’ve proudly been involved.

Now here’s where the math begins. The stage version of “Evita” contains two funerals each performance. That means that I’ve attended 2520 funerals during my tenure. I have 16 costume changes during each show. The math says that I’ve done 20,160 changes while performing my track throughout the various productions. I never tire of performing in the show, I just get weary of changing clothes:)

I never was this anal with most other shows that I’ve done, though I do know my personal performance count on most of my tours. I did 880 performances of “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas”; 270 “Fiddler on the Roofs”; over 200 performances of “Mame” with Juliet Prowse; more than 240 performances of “Jesus Christ Superstar” and most significantly, 1528 performances of “The Phantom of the Opera”, exactly 100 of them as Ubaldo Piangi. I am proud of the number of weeks I’ve worked in a very difficult profession. 2005 is my 25th year as a member of Actors Equity.

On “Phantom” I took to making fun of myself and my inclination to keep track of show statistics. People would often ask me what my motivation was for staying with the show. I jokingly assigned the scenes I was in dollar values. For example, off-stage vocals were $12.50 per occurrence, the opening sequence if I was on as Piangi, $63.50 and so on.

During the construction of my house, I began to do various scenes for items associated with the house. “Masquerade” would be for new window shades; “Don Juan” would be for a custom refrigerator; dressing-room time would be $50 per 45 minutes. Since I was resting, purchases were for the place I planned to rest, my bedroom:) I know it sounds incredibly silly, but it made people laugh and broke up the monotony of the long run.

I have many more “Evita”s left in me, so in a few months, I’ll revisit this subject and do the math. But for tonight, I’ll just make a mental (and journal) note that today this production of “Evita’ turned fifty.

Comments

[gotmoof.livejournal.com]

All I can do is roll my eyes and sigh. and laugh.

[anothertxn.livejournal.com]

I did something rather similar while I was playing soccer around the country. The tournaments all had particular methods of determining who would advance, typically relying on the 10-Point system. While other kids would run off to eat with their friends, I'd sit in front of the scoreboards and calculate all the possible situations in which we might advance or get left behind. At a certain point I even started to play games with the 10-Point system in mind rather than simply focusing on the score at hand. Although I generally hated math, I felt as if by comprehending the numbers I'd be best able to control my own destiny, and at the same time it made every weekend a unique experience.

[backawayslowly.livejournal.com]

Oh what a circus, oh what a show! Those're some pretty amazing statistics.

Congrats!

[ciddyguy.livejournal.com]

Wow, I wish I could be like that with math. My mind does not work in that manner. :-)

But I can see how it would break up the monotony and gave people laughs.

Good luck on this being your 50th show so far this run.