Things surprise you from time to time. Just before the New Year, I received a large package in the mail. I hadn’t ordered anything and didn’t recognize the return address … some company in the U.S. I tore open the brown paper and found a cardboard box inside. Still not understanding what this was, I sliced open the tape and found a fitted Styrofoam box inside the first box. I managed to get that out and eased the top of the box off with that familiar squeaky sucking sound when things are held in tight and firm. Taped-up bubble wrap surrounded the still-mysterious contents, and, with more squeaky sounds, I pulled out what I could tell was a 3-inch-deep wooden box. I cut through still more tape and released the bubble wrap. This was King Tut’s tomb protection! I pulled back the last layer of wrapping and took in a deep breath of wonder as I realized what it was.

It had been well over two years since I’d been in Los Angeles at the (then) Kodak Theatre overseeing the Orchestra for the recording of “The Ultimate Manilow” Album. (That saga is set down in Part Sixty of this Blog.) It seems that things move very slowly in the recording business as “product” works its way through calculable sales landmarks. And this was indeed a landmark! Barry’s album had reached sales of more than a million units in those two years, and this was, as the presentation plaque inscription noted, “commemoration” by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) of that fact. I didn’t know what to think. There was also a card from Barry taped to the glass on the front of the shadow box exclaiming “What a year!” I felt part of something special, and the fact that Arista Records had included me in this way, of being a small part of making this industry milestone happen, was a big deal … at least to me! I found out later in the day that Sam had also received one. We congratulated each other in a phone call, and I made note of the fact that not a lot of people would know that this acknowledgement had even happened … it was sort of “in-house” … but we would! It hangs in my studio to this day as a reminder of that wonderful, slightly fraught experience.

Kayla Gordon and I were off on another of our Escorted Tours to New York. Spring is the perfect season to visit the City and this time, thirty-eight people had decided to join us. CAA had provided us with a New York Staff person to deal with all the scheduling and hotel details, so we were a great deal freer than we had been in the past. I took part of the group on a Tour of the Upper West Side, a two-hour Walk About I’d developed after the success of the Lower East Side Tour the last time, and we did some dinners and saw a couple of shows. I even managed to sneak in a little MSI business It was a wonderful week, but it was back home before I knew it.

I knew the summer was going to be quiet for me. Rainbow had decided to do two shows – “Good News” and “Smokey Joe’s Café” – and there was nothing for me in either of them. However, over the course of the previous couple of months Ken had approached me about directing “Urinetown” for the Fall and “Wizard” the following summer. He hinted at me doing ‘Tevye’ in “Fiddler” in the Fall of ’06 and then directing “The Full Monty” the following Summer. Things seemed secure for all of them … until they weren’t.

 I really never understood those show choices for that summer. Neither of them had struck me as Rainbow fare. I didn’t know where the titles had come from or who had suggested them. I only knew they would be hard sells because they weren’t familiar names to the Rainbow audiences. While the casts for both shows were excellent, sales were disastrous! There had been minimal advertising and no media hype for either show and the result of this misstep became painfully obvious as soon as the season ended. “This is the end of Rainbow! We’re done!” Ken yelled at me over the phone at one point. I took it all in with a very large grain of salt because he was prone to this kind of knee-jerk reaction to financial struggles, but apparently there were things coming down on him from other quarters. The performance rights for “Fiddler” had been secured by Rainbow well in advance of the Fall mounting. It was ours! It was the policy of Music Theatre International, the Licensing Agent, that allowed for only one professional company in any region to do a particular show during a certain time period. So I was amazed when Ken told me that the Manitoba Theatre Center had been in touch and wanted Rainbow to release the show’s rights to them because they wanted to do the show! Seriously? I think because of the summer’s poor ticket sales, they had smelled blood in the water and were taking their shot. I was at a loss for words! Ken told them that Rainbow had already made commitments to performers (me among them) and that he wasn’t willing to release the rights. To me, it was incredibly presumptuous of MTC to make this approach, pushy and very disrespectful. I wondered what the response would have been had the shoe been on the other foot. I knew that MTC had had this show on their want-to-do list for some time because I’d costed out a “Fiddler” Orchestra for them a long while back. The impasse stayed in the air.

At least my “Urinetown” contract had been signed and I began preliminary casting about for an ‘A’ List of performers. I knew who I wanted, but kept running into problems about scheduling conflicts and, unbeknownst to me, some ongoing-behind-the-scenes antagonisms that took some good folk out of the running. I was confused and getting pissed off. It’s a complicated little show and needed solid character performers with inventive approaches to the roles. Even though I kept at it, there was an odd feeling lurking deep down inside about the whole project. I had been focused to the point of even having designed the set myself, which apparently surprised Ken, but I kept passing along names of folks to approach. We had managed to pin a few folks down, but still needed a few major roles to be filled. I persevered.

Music Services continued to bulk out my days. We had tours happening all over the place. Sam was even drumming up business in China! “Les Miz” and “Chicago” were still on the road as was Petula Clark’s Concert Tour. We had a show called “Rat Pack” out and a bunch of regionals to payroll. I was desperately trying to get things taken care of before heading into “A Christmas Carol” at MTC. This was a project that had been on the docket for a long time, and my involvement was deep and all-encompassing long before rehearsals began.

The adaptation of the Dickens short story was being done by Bruce McManus, a prolific local playwright. Since Stephen (Schipper, the Director) had cast me as ‘Scrooge’, I felt emboldened to the point of putting in my two cents worth with each draft Bruce produced. Actually, it was more like ten dollars’ worth. I had been giving my input via Robbie (Paterson, our Assistant Director) pretty much since the start, and I’m sure my “observations” drove Bruce crazy. It was almost too bad that Dickens’ words had seeped their way into my very core over the 16 years of readings at Dalnavert. I couldn’t let them go. This was also my third production of the show at MTC. From the initial draft, I found myself resisting the approach of a Narrator telling the story rather than the characters, and felt that the odd little subplots that had been created obscured the through-line of the tale … Scrooge’s journey to redemption. Happily, Robbie and his diplomacy prevailed, and changes were made. By the time we started rehearsals, most of the Dickens language had been restored and I was off script.

It was a large cast (23), all local, all very comfortable with each other. There continued to be some conversation concerning the original and the adaptation, but I managed to settle in to Bruce’s script and felt more and more at ease with each staging session. Table talk was mercifully minimal and getting the script on its feet was sheer joy for me. After so many years of being held captive in the chair during the Dalnavert readings, this was a huge release and I reveled in it. But I was also a little bit scared. I had all my words down, but between the extensive flying and the pyro, costume changes and moving scenery … well, it was a tad overwhelming. I was never off stage except for a quick change or two, or to be frantically harnessed and hooked up to wires for the running leaps from the wings into the air above a scene on stage. It was exhausting. There were a few minutes in Act One when I got to “rest”, albeit dangling twenty feet high watching characters play out of a scene below me, but I talked non-stop for the rest of the show. Fortunately, my castmates were spectacular and incredibly supportive in every way. The production had a great feel to it because everyone was so committed and at ease.

After a couple of ‘Wizards” and a “Peter Pan”, I knew that getting the flying right would take time. A guy named Mark was our “Foy Boy” this time around. “Flying By Foy” is the Company out of Las Vegas that is universally accepted as the standard of the industry and has been around since the days when Mary Martin first took to the air as ‘Peter’ on television in the early ‘50’s. Mark had been with us for five days and the delicate finessing of the ropes and wires and pulleys and rigging was coming along under his irritatingly patient but eagle-eyed guidance. Our local flying crew still had a ways to go and it took a lot of practice to get me into the right position at the right height in one smooth go. But I didn’t mind the sometimes gut-wrenching lifts being done over and over again. I wanted it to be perfect. And I was thankful that the crotch harness was heavily padded and relatively comfortable.

Then, just before we opened, they closed Rainbow! In a phone call one morning, Ken told me that the Board had decided that “the audiences of Winnipeg didn’t want Rainbow any longer” and they were “ceasing operation and liquidating the assets!” Mercy! While I’d listened to Ken go down this road before, this time there were no histrionics, and I could tell he was dead serious. My mind immediately leapt to all the projects that I had agreed to do with Rainbow, in particular “Urinetown” and the casting we’d done as well as the contract that I’d signed to direct the show. I gingerly mentioned it to him, and his response was “Yeah, I know, I know” and I let it rest at that. But he was in a dark place.

I was in the Rainbow office a few days later and things seemed to be in a holding pattern. The Staff had been let go and volunteers were now manning the front desk and answering the phones. Ken’s thinking had altered somewhat as well. Now “suspending” was the word being used, not “ceasing” and to his mind productions were being “postponed” rather than “cancelled”. But that wasn’t the way I was thinking. Nor was Equity! Word had spread very quickly, and Equity had called me to let me know that I was entitled to half the contracted fee for “Urinetown”. They were taking that amount from Rainbow’s Security Deposit and sending me a cheque. They also told me that they had let Ken know they’d be doing this! Oh Lord! I was on the phone to him mere seconds after the conversation with Equity. He wasn’t too happy about having to fork out $6.5K to me. He had thought maybe a couple of thousand dollars would be the pay-out at most, so this was a jolt.  He said it was “my call”, what I took as a hint that I might consider a “donation” to the Company. I angsted about that for a few days. Knowing they were in financial straits weighed heavily on me and I decided that $3K would be good for a tax receipt. Ken was very surprised at the amount and told me it was way beyond what he’d expected. I was glad our relationship hadn’t been dampened because of money.

It seemed that this crisis had also spurred the Board into action, something they hadn’t been known for during my time at the Theatre. Among other things, they’d come up with a major Fundraiser in the form of a Raffle, the top prize of which would be a package of Season Tickets donated by every performing Company in town. It appeared that this Goodwill came as a surprise to the Rainbow Board. They had no idea how important they were in the Community and this largesse on the part of the other producers was a shock to them They had also initiated plans for a Fundraising Concert in the Spring. But by far, the best step they took in the right direction was bringing Campbell McIntyre back in to head the Board. I now held out some hope, but it was all in a wait-see mode. I told them I would do anything they wanted me to do to help … despite the fact that I’d lost two shows in all this.

“A Christmas Carol” opened to great notices and the audiences were huge, engaged and wonderfully responsive. But it was mercilessly exhausting, especially on two-show days. As we settled in, I managed to feel pretty good about my work, but there were niggling little things that bugged me, particularly in some of the kid’s performances … not paying attention or making each other laugh on stage and generally being bratty. I had some “curmudgeonly moments” with them and cleared things up in short order, but it rankled that I had to do that. On the positive side, the flying settled in nicely, smooth and “artistic”, if that’s the right word for what the deck crew ended up doing. I never quite knew how fast I was going to be hoisted up or brought down, but I got the feeling that the guys were trying to “enhance” my movements above the stage, and it was always interesting to see (and feel) what was going to happen. To my chagrin, I found out early on that my flying about had an unexpected “bonus” for the people who were sitting in the theatre’s front row. While suspended so high for extended periods of time, those lucky few down front could see right up my nightshirt! There was no way the flying was going to be altered, so it was quickly arranged that my very contemporary boxer-briefs would be replaced with period-authentic underwear. Ain’t showbiz grand?

Sam and my MSI life would fill the days again once we opened. We were now up to five of us in the Winnipeg Offices with dozens of local reps and subcontractors all over North America. We were truly a going concern. But it was the China trip Sam had taken that now presented me with a myriad of challenges. I was handed a list of potential shows in the Chinese/Asian market for which to create budgets. I hated hypotheticals! I considered it busy- work with no return, and I was already busy enough! Then, added to the mix was our renewed involvement with a “resurrected” Garth Drabinsky! This baffled me no end. As the year passed into 2006, Garth, who had been criminally charged with fraud and conspiracy by the Securities and Exchange Commission in the US and Security regulators in Canada with regard to his producing entity, Livent, had somehow managed to procure and develop projects that would keep his head above some very deep waters. He was now producing a series of Christian-themed films and had pulled Sam into his on-going quest to produce “Jesus Christ Superstar – The New Gospel Version”. I don’t know what power Garth had over him, but Sam thought this could be a major money project for us and, combined with the Chinese potentials, had decided that we now needed to expand and create an Off-Shore Company! Oh, Lord!

We met with a couple of very reputable high-end accountants to investigate what the pitfalls and positives might be in creating this new company. It seemed that the biggest hurdle would be finding someone to head an office in a yet-to-be-decided location – Barbados, The Bahamas or Bermuda. Guess who unthinkingly said, “I’ll do it.” The reaction in the room was immediate. “Are you serious?” they all asked me. “Because if you are, it would be very easy to set up a Company!” Um. It was duly noted, and we left it at that. As I was leaving Sam in front of our building following the meeting, he said that the idea wasn’t so far-fetched. I was turning 61 soon, loved a warm climate, knew that aspect of our business in spades and it would be a good life for me. Mercy, why had I opened my big mouth? Now that it was in Sam’s head, he wasn’t going to let it go. The potential of all that money coming in from those foreign projects coupled with his desire not to have this new income taxed at 45% in Canada … well, I knew these wouldn’t be the last words on the subject.

Once home, I went to a couple of websites just to see what living in one of those places would be like. How much would I be giving up from a quality of life point of view? Would I buy a house? Would I sell my still-new house in Winnipeg? Could I live in a small town on a small island with nothing to do but keep the books and look at the sea? How quickly would island fever set in? Could I take Morgan? (Not to Bermuda, it turned out.) We’d both love the hot weather, but I’d be loathe to consider anything less than my current lifestyle. So another trek had begun, and I didn’t have any concept of where it would settle except in remembering all the planning conversations and details surrounding the “New York move” and where that had ended up – nowhere!

“A Christmas Carol” closed on a high with a 95% attendance record. Thousands came to see us, the show ran like glass after a while, and the audiences ate it up. But I must admit to being happy it was over. I was exhausted after each performance and two-show-days were killers. Perhaps I was getting to old for these larger, more physically demanding roles. While I was doing good work and there were performances when I enjoyed myself tremendously, there were nights I’d get to the middle of the Second Act and could only think about getting home to the recliner, my TV and a Diet Pepsi!

There was only a day off before diving into “A Christmas Carol” again, this time for five nights back in the chair for an hour and fifteen minutes at Dalnavert. Unfortunately, my body decided that after the MTC run, my ‘Scrooge’ was ready for a shut down. My energy waned and I developed a nasty cold in short order. It was only the fact that I was doing half the usual number of readings in the Museum’s new performance space that kept me going … and the money I was making. It was an adjustment to say the least, discovering how loud to talk to fill a space three times the size of the Attic packed with a hundred people. All the performances had long-been sold out and I discovered that the audiences were a lot more responsive than they had been in the old space, mainly, I realized, because they knew I could see them. The lighting was brighter than it had been upstairs and there was no place for them to “hide”. No one fell asleep. Surprisingly, I found out that some people really missed the intimacy of the Attic, so the suggestion was made that we do a couple of shows “up” and the rest “down”. We’d see where that idea went in time.

All of this went out of my head very quickly as the final “God bless us everyone” came out of my mouth for the season, and it was just a matter of hours before a great big plane would wing me off to Paradise, away from Christmas, ‘Scrooge’, budgets and payrolls and into 16 days of sun and sand at the Hyatt on Waikiki Beach!