Brush-up Rehearsals

As I gained more experience working on the High School shows I also got more responsibility with the Sayville Musical Workshop.
During my Junior year I moved from running a follow spot to helping run the lighting board.
I also helped to hang and focus the lights.
The Workshop had an old resistance dimmer lighting board, sometimes called a piano board, that they would wire in to run extra lights.
It was old even by 1972 standards and a bit dangerous.
You could easily stick your hand into the unit and get electrocuted if were not careful, but it still worked and gave us a few more lights to work with.

That year I worked three productions with the Workshop: Promises, Promises, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and Camelot.

When I tell people I work in Theatre they often ask if I have ever worked with anybody famous.
I always say: “Besides Me?”
I tell them yes and give them a few names.
Many times the people I worked with were not famous at the time I knew them but went on to gain fame later on.

Ten or fifteen years after working on Camelot I was looking through the program and there was a photo of the actor who played King Arthur.
At the time he was a 35 year old businessman who liked doing Theatre.
He turned out to be two time Tony Award winning actor Brian Dennehy.
I really do not remember much about him, I was just 16, and he was just another actor in the show.

Brian Dennehy in Camelot 1972

It was while working on Camelot that I saw what fun people could have during Brush Up rehearsals.

Now as an educator for 27 years I will always tell my students that every rehearsal is important and that a brush-up rehearsal is important to the show, and not a time for the cast and crew to have fun.
A brush-up rehearsal is done after a show has been off for a few days and helps the actors with their lines and timing before the next weekend run of a play.

As it turns out Brian Dennehy could not make the brush-up but the director wanted to have it anyway, plus I think it was just his chance to play the King.
After weeks of hard work everyone just want s to have a little fun.
Lines are said a little different, accents used, different props used etc.
During Camelot’s brush-up the royal Thrones were replace by two toilets.
At some point in the second act the director got pissed and yelled at everyone to take it seriously.
Not everyone had heard the outburst and someone had replaced Excalibur with a toilet plunger for the last big speech.
From behind a large box upstage I remember seeing a hand come up as the director was emoting away and replaced the sword taking the plunger away just in time.
I do not remember any other production with as much fooling around, but with the absence of the lead actor and the director overacting it was hard not to have some fun.

Now on brush-ups for other shows I worked on maybe the lighting was just a bit too green or lights flickered during a romantic moment or maybe a sound cue or two may have been added, but I would not know anything about it.
I was too busy laughing.