All the world is a stage

Hey look. Two days in a row. What's up with that?

Since Mr. Mayhem isn't here, I'm working on my fourth cup of coffee. I really do make less when he's gone, but all the coffee mugs are slightly different sizes so there's always a splash and go in the bottom of the pot.

Anyway....Mayhem # 2 and I have decided that we will be glad when the play is over. This week, the prize has not been worth eating the Cracker Jacks. The mom who has been the stage manager/costume maker quit because the kids are inappreciativeiative, and don't really care about working to make the show good. They're teenagers. Duh? Don't get me wrong. She's been knocking herself out since June on this stuff. She has done a wonderful job. But two weeks before the show, things aren't finished and she's the only one who knows what's going on. She admitted to me that she's not very good at delegating, so the info we need is in her head, so now we just have to try to figure out her thought processes and finish the costumes. Of course, her son is one of the principle characters so I know his wardrobe will be done. I've already brought Mayhem # 2's costume home to finish. I've also been working at the school on other's, but I wasn't suppose to do costumes. I was suppose to do ticket sales. The director handed out the tickets on a day I wasn't there over a month before the show. His wife seems to be handling everything. I'm just trying to do whatever I can to help.

I blame this fiasco on the director. At the very beginning he preached to the kids about being serious about this. He set up a demerit system, and after so many demerits, you got kicked out of the play. That never happened. Mayhem # 2 noticed about two weeks into rehearsal, that the boy who was her "partner" should have had more than enough demerits to be gone. Her comment was, "The demerits don't apply to the boys. He won't kick them out because there are too few of them already." And she was right. If you don't enforce your rules from the beginning, you never get control. (Kind of like dress code.) So the kids are now getting blamed for causing the mom to quit, and that's not fair. And of course, they lump the good kids with the bad kids. I don't agree with corporate punishment. The director also plays favorites. Most of the principle characters had been cast over the summer before auditions. His kids get significant parts even though they can't do it or can't behave. Then he scheduled the play during football and volleyball season. Normally it's in late January, early February. You have no idea how many students are involved with stuff during football season. Cheerleaders, trainers, band. Band is a huge thing in the fall, with the kids getting to school at 7:00 am to learn the show, every Friday night is a football game (We have girls who play volleyball on Friday evening and then rush to the football game to march half time.), plus marching competitions. Mayhem # 2 isn't in some parts of a main scene because she had band sectionals one afternoon a week, that was scheduled before the play started, so she wasn't there to be included. Funny, but the director's daughter, who had the same sectional practice, has a pretty big part in that scene.

I know I'm whining like a stage mom. I know this is a life lesson for Mayhem # 2. "Life isn't fair." What really bothers me about this is, it's been like this every time we've done a musical, but Mayhem # 2 wants to do drama. I don't know if I can deal with this for four years. With the director's daughter being in the same grade as Mayhem # 2, what chance does my child have to get a role she wants?

Ok....I'm done whining.