Combat Weekend

It was a busy weekend for the cast of Les Misérables. Not only did this talented group of individuals make a surprise appearance at the Midsummer Arts Faire with a performance of "One Day More," but many spent the days learning fight choreography.

Les Misérables is a very combat-intensive production. Anything involving a slap, a fall, or a teenager dying has to be careful blocked by a professional fight choreographer. Steve Looten, Jr. spent Friday night and most of Saturday teaching various members of the cast how to fall, punch, fire a gun, carry a fallen comrade, tie up a police officer, and even die safely and in the most picturesque way possible. 

Arguably some of the biggest and most challenging parts of the story to block are the battles at the barricade. The barricade boys spent most of their morning on these scenes and were joined in the afternoon by some of the girls to finish the last two battles. The way Steve has blocked these fights is comparable to a machine: each Friend and each girl is a singular piece of an intricate design. While one Friend is firing, another is reloading. Girls are tending to wounds and switching out guns. Each person does their part with such commitment to drive this machine, you have to wonder for a moment if this will be the production where the good guys win.

Of course, we all know there's no such thing as a happy Les Mis. Everyone at the barricade must fall. While it could just be every man for himself and "just die when the spirit moves you," Steve planned out the specifics of each and every death to give purpose and meaning to the bloodshed. Without giving too much away, be sure to watch how, when, and where each of the Friends is shot. You might find some poetic and distressing-in-the-good-way Easter eggs!

ABC 123, or How to Identify the Barricade Boys

Joly and Feuilly and Prouvaire, oh my! The Friends of the ABC (affectionately known as the Barricade Boys) are a major part of this grand epic. In fact, one half of the second act is set at the barricades. Yet it's hard to tell the difference between Combferre and Courfeyrac, Joly and Jehan, and Bahorel and Bossuet when they're all running around looking for scrap furniture. Even fans of the novel may have a hard time remembering who's who. Fear no longer, for we've provided a quick guide to identifying the Friends.


Enjolras: Leader of the Friends. Emphatic and charming, but "capable of being terrible." He is "angelically handsome," ambitious, resolute, highly-political, and fiercely loyal to his homeland. 

• Hugo's description: "To see the thoughtful light shining in his eyes, you would have thought that he had already, in a previous life, lived through the apocalypse of the revolution."
• Memorable quote: "The day will come, citizens, when all will be concord, harmony, light, joy and life; it will come, and it is in order that it may come that we are about to die."

Grantaire: Nihilistic, drunk, and cynical, he only joined the Friends out of his admiration, love, and veneration for Enjolras. His sarcasm and poor attitude irritate Enjolras, who holds very little respect for Grantaire. The values of the Friends hold no meaning for him until the very end, when he declares his belief in the Republic and dies with Enjolras. He signs his notes "R" as a play on his name: "gran" means "big" in French, and the letter "r" is pronounced "air." "Grantaire" would roughly mean "big r" in French.

• Hugo's description: "Grantaire, in whom doubt lurked, loved to see faith soar in Enjolras."
• Memorable quote: “Gentlemen of the human race, I say to hell with the lot of you.” 

Combeferre: Moral compass and right-hand man of Enjolras. He is "The Guide" of the Friends, keeping watch over the other members and favoring peaceful education over violence. Fights for the rights of all mankind, rather than simply the rights of the French. A medical student, scholar, and philosopher. 

• Hugo's description: "Combeferre was as gentle as Enjolras was severe from native innocence."
• Memorable quote: "There are people who observe the rules of honor the way you and I observe the stars - from afar."

Courfeyrac: The center of the group. The most personable of the Friends and Marius's bestie. Charming and promiscuous, his heart holds the barricade boys together. 

• Hugo's description: "The others gave out more light, he gave out more warmth."
• Memorable quote: "I've just seen Marius' new hat and new coat and Marius in them...he looked a complete ninny."

Feuilly: A lower-class orphan. Generous and pragmatic. The only Friend that isn't a student, he works as a fan maker. He taught himself to read and write, adopting the people of France as his family. Entirely self-educated, he studies the governments of other oppressed nations, especially Poland. 

• Hugo's description: "He did not want there to be a single person on earth without a motherland."
• Memorable quote: "Does anybody understand these men who promised to join us, and took an oath to help us, and who were bound to it in honor, and who are our generals, and who abandon us!"

Joly: Medical student and, ironically, hypochondriac. Believes in outrageous and unorthodox treatments such as magnetic current therapy. Sagacious and by far the happiest of the Friends. Often found checking his vital signs or the color of his tongue in a mirror. Best friend of Lesgles.

• Hugo's description: "He was the cheeriest of the lot."
• Memorable quote: "Peace is happiness digesting."

Jean Prouvaire: A Romantic scholar with a passion for language and poetry. Joined the Friends because of his literary passion rather than political passion. Also goes by Jehan because it fits into poetry better than Jean Prouvaire.

• Hugo's description: "He liked to stroll through fields of wild oats and cornflowers and was almost as involved with clouds as he was with events."
• Memorable quote: "Long live France!  Long live the future!"

Lesgles: Law student and the oldest of the Friends. Also goes by Bossuet. Upper-class but notoriously unlucky, as he lost all his money and started balding at age twenty-five. Possesses a grand sense of humor and sarcastic wit. Best friend of Joly.

• Hugo's description: "His specialty was not to succeed in anything. As an offset, he laughed at everything."
• Memorable quote: "When a man is as much in love as a tiger, the least that he can do is to fight like a lion."

Bahorel: A lower-class law student not featured in the musical. Though he studied law for eleven years, he had no intention of becoming a lawyer. Bold, brash, generous, and much wiser than he led his friends to believe. 

• Hugo's description: "Bahorel was a good-natured mortal who kept bad company."
• Memorable quote: "They are peasants and not bourgeois; that is the reason they are intelligent."

The Road So Far

Seven weeks doesn't seem like a lot of time to put on a musical as fantastical and challenging as Les Misérables. The first three days, we did table work and read the script aloud. It wasn't until Monday, June 2 that we actually started to block our musical numbers. It's overwhelming to think about. When you say "seven weeks," it seems like forever until you look at the schedule and see that you're booked almost every week night. It's a thrill, though, and it raises the stakes even higher. Everything has to keep building and growing in preparation for that opening night. You can't lose steam. The days pass more and more quickly until suddenly it dawns upon you that next Monday, our guest actor Joe Tokarz arrives.

So what have we done so far? The first week was music rehearsal. We worked glorious harmonies and sang through the full extent of the show. In the next week alone, most of Act I was staged. We ran (or rather, stumbled merrily along) through this entire act on Friday night; this cast should be extremely proud of the work we've done. We couldn't have done it without the help of our wonderful production team.

The energy was palpable that night. Tensions were high, of course, but everyone brought their A-Game to the table. It was a long night, but we pulled through. The transitions weren't seamless and we may have tripped over our own feet a couple of times, but we worked through it. Some of the numbers weren't even blocked yet, but the actors powered through them on artistic instinct. We're doing it all again this week, staging Act II and running it on Friday, as well. By June 23 when Mr. Tokarz arrives, we'll be ready to welcome him in with an excellent foundation.

We still have a long way to go before we're ready to open, but seeing how much effort and passion the production team and the actors are putting in is inspiring. Even though the hours are long and the work isn't easy, there's no business like show business. (Wrong musical, I know.)

Sunday Fun Facts: Fathers

In honor of Father's Day, we've dug a little deeper into the family histories of our beloved characters to recognize and honor their fathers.

Jean Valjean lost his parents at a young age. His mother died of milk fever, but his father died in a work-related accident. Jean Valjean, Sr. (also called Vlajean) was a landscaper, pruning trees like his son would later do after his father's passing. Vlajean was crushed by a falling tree, leaving Jean Valjean with his widowed sister. Her husband had died and left behind seven children, the eldest of which was eight years old and the youngest, one. Upon turning twenty-five, Valjean followed in his father's footsteps and took over the fathering role for his sister's children. Later, of course, he adopts Cosette and provides her with all the wonderful things he could not give his nieces and nephews when they were poor.

Javert's father was actually a server in a prison gallery who wed a gypsy woman. His dishonorable parentage is what drives him to become an officer of the law. "He would have arrested his own father if he escaped from prison and turned in his own mother for breaking parole. And he would have done it with that sort of interior satisfaction that springs from virtue," writes Hugo.

Marius, who lives with his wealthy grandfather Monsieur Gillenormand, believed his father abandoned him in his youth. However, upon Marius's eighteenth birthday, he goes to visit his ill but living father, Georges; though he dies before Marius arrives, his son finds a letter for him. In this letter is the story of Georges Pontmercy's time in the battle of Waterloo and a request: to help Thénardier (yes, that one) in any way he can because he "saved" Pontmercy's life. The church warden also tells Marius that Georges Pontmercy was a grand  veteran under Napoleon, who appointed him a colonel and a baron. These were not recognized under the current regime in France and Gillenormand forced Georges away to protect Marius's reputation. Marius, idolizing his father's bravery, moves out and refuses the money his aunt sends him.

Not much is said about Cosette's father in the musical, though we are painted a pretty clear picture that he abandoned Fantine and his own child. Félix Tholomyès was a wealthy student (sort of like Marius) and Fantine's lover when she was a girl in Paris. Félix, the eldest of the group of four students, took a liking to Fantine, the youngest in another group of four girls. Each of the men took one of the women as a lover: Listolier took Dahlia, Fameuil took Zéphine, and Blachevelle took Favourite. Fantine was doted on and eventually became pregnant; as a joke, Félix and his friends all abandoned their mistresses. Félix treated their relationship as a game, a trifle for his amusement, while Fantine fell deeply in love with him, making him one of the most despicable men in the novel.*

Éponine (and Gavroche, in the novel) have quite possibly the worst father in Thénardier. He uses his children to swindle customers and rob people on the street, constantly putting their safety in danger without a second thought. It's likely he doesn't know his eldest daughter died at the barricade; it's even more likely that he wouldn't care either way.

Though many of these may not be the best or the most traditional fathers, we can appreciate the efforts of Jean Valjean to save not only his sister's children, but a stranger's, as well as Georges Pontmercy, who continuously tried to visit his son but stayed away to protect him. 

*Possibly just as distressing is a single sentence Hugo wrote describing Courfeyrac: "We might almost, so far as Courfeyrac is concerned, stop here, and confine ourselves to saying with regard to what remains: 'For Courfeyrac, see Tholomyes.'"

Spotlight: Costume Designer

It's no secret that theatre is an extremely collaborative art. It's not all about the actors onstage. A great deal of putting on a fantastic show is in the combined efforts of the production team members. This week, we'll take a look at the goings-on of the costume shop and QCT's resident costume designer, Anna Grywalski. This will be Anna's final production after two and a half years at QCT.

Q: What does your average day look like?
Usually, I go up and talk to the girls in the office for a few minutes, say hello. Then, depending on where we're at in the process of the show, I could be immediately starting to sew or I could go downstairs and start pulling [costume pieces]. Maybe I need to go shopping for that particular show. It changes day to day, but in general, it's steps towards getting the show ready to open. If we're early on in a show, I could have production meetings with other people in the building or if it's near opening, I'm probably scrambling to get all the last-minute notes done and have everything ready in the dressing room.

Q: When you're beginning a show, what's the first thing you do?
The very first step is to read the script and listen to the music, if it's a musical. I'll read the script a few times and then we'll have production meetings where we discuss our ideas and visions with the other members of the artistic team. From there, we'll do research. Depending on if the show is set in a different time period, we'll do different costume research for what the clothing style was at that time and find specific examples of things that I like for different characters. I do character analysis with the director to figure out what we see are the most important characteristics of each, how we want to highlight those and how they tell the story.

Q: Where do you go from there?
After the research, I try to do sketches or renderings. Once we all agree on design styles, then I go through and decide what things I might have from our costume stock and what things I definitely know we can't find or buy. I'll have to build those. I make a list: pull, build, buy, rent. You check off what things you think would be available, what things you'll have to rent. Then you start pulling the things you think you need, buy the fabric, cut the fabric, make the costumes. It's a lot of work.

Q: So if you were going to start completely from the beginning and build one costume for this show, how long do you think that would take you?
I did that for Fantine's dress and it probably only took me about a day. That's with built-in lunch and meetings. It's still at a fitting point, so it needs finishing work on it and distressing.

Q: How much were you able to pull from QCT's basement for this show?
Actually, barely anything. Where I did get a lot from was that stock we acquired from Stage Door. I was able to pull a lot from that and I brought it over. It's all very clean and basic. It's a lot of cotton skirts and cotton shirts, which is great for the basics, but it doesn't quite have the detail and depth of grit that we're looking for in this show. I'm going to probably end up beating up a lot of it.

Q: How does one go about beating up a costume to distress it?
I like to cut holes in things, take sandpaper, and sand over it; it frays it really well. You can also then put it in the washer and that'll help the fraying. There are other tools you can use, like a grater and tools from the shop. Then to get the color, I usually paint, spray paint. I love spray painting for distressing. It's so much easier. I do spray paint, dye, and powders that look really good when you rub it into fabrics. It's all permanent, so it's not going to wash out. One time in grad school, I was trying to distress something and I ran it over with my car a bunch of times. It was fun.

Q: What's your vision for this particular show?
We're trying to keep it as realistic and as gritty as possible because it is such a dirty story. It's unhappy and these people were not clean. They were extremely poor. Most everyone in this show is poor and struggling, and we wanted to make sure we show that, so that it's real. The more real it looks, the more the audience will get into it and the story will be that much more. We want to create the most interesting and real, honest, detailed costumes we can.

Q: What's the contrast then for the poorest of the poor and the upper class rich?
We do have a few wealthy people and then there's the wedding, of course, which will be the biggest contrast. The men will be in formal tuxes and the girls will be in ball gowns, essentially. The colors, the type of fabric, the style of the dresses... Poor people can't afford to upgrade their wardrobes all the time, so we'll be mixing periods because someone might've been wearing the same thing for the past twenty years. The formal, rich people will have the latest styles. The 1830s has a very specific style of dress for women, so everyone will be nice and clean and bright and shiny. And sparkly sometimes.

Q: What's been your favorite show to costume?
Here, I think it's been Peter Pan. It's not necessarily the best costumes or the highest design, but it was just such a great production. I think that's probably been my favorite one that I've designed.

Mermaids, Peter Pan

Peter, Wendy, and the Lost Boys, Peter Pan

What's the word?

Walking into a rehearsal or can be daunting enough without feeling like a stranger in a strange land. Like most other professions, the theatre has a lingo all its own. Many actors, crew members, and sometimes even theatregoers are suddenly thrust into this foreign dialect and end up more confused than when they started. Fear no more, for we've provided a bit of vocabulary you can study to get you through.

Ad-libbing: making up or adding lines to fill vocal space, such as shouting in a crowd

Apron: the part of the stage that sticks out in front of the curtain (the round-ish part of our stage) 

Blackout: when all the lights go out, usually at the end of a scene

Blocking: the physical movements the actors perform 

Box Office: where you bought your ticket!

Cameo: a brief appearance onstage, usually by a well-known actor

Call Time: the time an actor must arrive before a performance (it's an hour before the show begins here at QCT)

Costume Parade: an actual parading of the actors in their costumes to present to the director

Crossover: when an actor walks across the stage, usually without any interaction with the main story in the scene

Cue: the action or dialogue that prompts an actor to perform his/her action or dialogue

Curtain Call: the bows at the end of the show where the actors thank the audience for attending

Downstage: towards the front of the stage

Ensemble: the group of actors that interact as a single unit to tell the story 

Flies: the system of ropes and pulleys that raise and lower set pieces from the ceiling 

(All those lines behind behind Mackenzie)

Fourth Wall: the invisible barrier between the world of the show and our "real world"

"From the top": starting from the beginning

Green Room: the room where the actors rest between scenes

Grid: the rails where the stage lights hang high above the stage

(A little peek from the audience. This curtain hiding the lights is called the border.)

Hold: to stop the scene, usually to fix an issue

House: where the audience sits! 

House Left: the left side of the audience

House Right: the right side of the audience

Light Booth: the control center where the lights are controlled 

Mezzanine: the part of the house that you climb up the stairs to reach; it's pictured above

Motivation: the reason a character does something

Objective: what the character wants

Obstacle: what prevents the character from getting what he/she wants

Orchestra: the group of musicians who provide live music; also the part of the house that you walk down the stairs to reach (the seats closest to the stage)

Pace: the tempo or speed of the show 

Pit: the big hole in the stage where the orchestra plays

(Views from above and under)

Proscenium: the brick wall/archway that separates the apron from the rest of our stage 

Props: things that actors carry onstage to help tell the story

Quick Change: switching from one costume to another in a very short amount of time; every actor's worst fear

Rehearsal: a practice session for actors, orchestra, etc.

Run or Run-through: a rehearsal for performing the entire show 

Scene: one section or chapter of a story

Scene Change: moving the set and getting into position for the next part

Set: the scenery that builds the location and the world of the play 

Sound board: all the buttons and doodads that create noise effects and recorded music

Spike Tape: colorful tape that is laid down to mark where furniture is to be placed (it's bright so it can easily be seen in the dark)

Stage Left: the left side of the stage when looking at the audience

Stage Right: the right side of the stage when looking at the audience

Tactic: different approaches a character takes to get what he/she wants

Tech: the weekend (and sometimes weeknights) where the entire cast and crew run the show from beginning to end, working out kinks in lighting, sound, and scene changes; usually the week before the show opens

Upstage: the part of the stage farthest from the audience

Wings: the sides of the stage 

Sunday Fun Facts: The Thénardiers

In the musical Les Misérables, we know that Monsieur and Madame Thénardier run an inn, a cover-up for swindling their customers out of their earnings and their possessions. We also learn that when their daughter, Éponine, grows up, she also assists them in their scams. They make a not-so-happy family of three, which is sadly reduced to two by the end of the show.

In Victor Hugo's novel, however, Éponine is the eldest of five children. She has one sister named Azelma, who survives and travels to America with her father after the wedding of Cosette and Marius. Interestingly enough, both girls enjoyed playing with little Cosette in their youth until they began following their parents' example and abusing the orphan.

Cosette by herself while Azelma and Éponine play together

Éponine also has three brothers. Two of them are unnamed; the third is Gavroche. Yes, the adventurous and beloved street urchin in the musical is actually a Thénardier. Éponine actually asks Marius not to let Gavroche see that she is dying because he would "scold."

Samantha Barks (Éponine) and Daniel Huttlestone (Gavroche) in the 2012 film

After the fall of their inn and during their life in poverty, the Thénardiers actually live under the name "Jondrette."