there’s something special about closing night of a community theatre/school/college play.
a group of people from a wide variety of walks of life - as few as a half-dozen or as many as a hundred - spend months perfecting something solely to bring joy to themselves and others. and they pour their hearts and souls into it night after night for audiences. each performance is unique. special.
and then it’s over, more quickly and abruptly than seems possible, or right.
that last show?
it’s the very last time that a given group will perform a show. never again will these actors embody the characters. oftentimes, video recordings don’t exist.
and yet, somehow, the actors still get on stage and smile and entertain with jubilance and joy.
it’s an ending. it’s sad (i’ve seen the tears backstage, shed a few myself).
but it’s also a culmination, a celebration of accomplishments and of things learned and of skill and talent and of community and friendship.
so much ends after withering, shriveling up. but such a play ends at its peak, before it has time to grow old or dull or uninteresting.
so many lasts in life are uncertain, messy, sad.
there’s something special about a last that’s definitive, clean, even happy.
This is the aspect of theatre I’ve struggled with the most so far.
You get used to that group— and they’re gone.
My brain knows that there’s a very good chance I’ll work with most of them again: but it’s still such a bittersweet thing. I think I’m getting used to it. But damn.
Also… our last show of Robin Hood, zero fucks were given. Brave Beverly played it drunk drunk, Friar Tuck replaced his prayer with a Gregoria chant, they scared one actor with a stuffed animal he hates hidden on a table, we collectively decided that when Robin is trying to enter the tournament, all script went out the window and just, chaos. 😍
This is the aspect
of theatre I’ve struggled
with the most so far.
Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.