June 2, 2008 -
The hit musical and puppet-show
Avenue Q strikes Manila for the third and probably the last, time come
June 13 to 22, 2008, again in the Carlos P. Romulo Auditorium in Makati. Today is their first public announcement of their upcoming Farewell Run, and what's so special is that they have chosen
BLOGGERS to be their first witnesses! Hooray for the power of cyberspace advertising!
This special rehearsal cum interview session was held at the
Centro Flamenco. SJG Bldg, Kalayaan Ave, Makati at 11 am. The bloggers in attendance were organized by no less than the indefatigable
Bachelor Girl. And I, as a totally new and amateur blogger, am very honored to have been invited for this particularly rare opportunity. This is definitely a first for me, and, clinic notwithstaning, I dare not waste this singular chance! Thank you very much for the generous invitation, Ms. Bachelor Girl. Thank you Dr. Abbie Sanz for covering for my clinic.
They were all there from the old cast:
Felix Rivera (Princeton/Rob)
, Aiza Seguerra (Gary Coleman)
, Frenchie Dy (Christmas Eve)
, Joel Trinidad (Trekkie Monster/Nicky)
and Rycharde Everley (Brian)
. And there were two new faces in the cast:
Carla Guevara who takes over Kate Monster and Lucy the Slut. And
Thea Tadiar who takes over Mrs. Thistleswat and Others.
The cast performed three songs for us: the hilarious
"It Sucks To Be Me" by the whole cast, the even-more-hilarious
"If You Were Gay" by sang so skillfully by
Felix Rivera and Joel Trinidad as the Ernie and Bert-inspired Rod and Nicky, and the beautiful
"The More You Ruv Someone" by the vocally-bombastic
Ms. Frenchie Dy, with
Carla Guevara.
After this came the
Interview Portion. The cast sat down in front of us and gamely entertained our questions. The questions ranged from the shallow (like Frenchie Dy's previous bouts with Bell's palsy) to the sublime ("What did you gain from the Avenue Q experience?" asked by my new online buddy and co-theater blogger
Julie). While watching them in this spontaneous part, you can feel that the cast has really gelled very well with each other, and that they were having a lot of fun together.
In between, we got to know more about
Carla Guevara. It turns out she was one of the auditionees before in the first run and was called because
Rachel Alejandro already had other commitments this year. This is her first time working with Atlantis. She says she can relate to both her characters, and the stark contrast of these two is what she likes about her roles.
We also got to learn more about the other newbie there,
Thea Tadiar. She takes over the role of Mrs. Thistleswat and Others, previously held by
Teenie Chan. Thea happens to be the better half of the guy who plays Brian,
Rycharde Everley. They apparently met while she was taking up her Masters in England, and got married while performing a play by Brecht in London seven years ago.
They talked about the
Puppets. Marvin the Puppet Master was there. While audiences think Trekkie Monster is the most difficult puppet to handle, it was actually Lucy the Slut. This was because it was quite heavy, and she needs to flip her hair a lot, thus requiring a lot of wrist work. I learned later from Ms. Thea that one of the more difficult puppetry techniques to master is to move the mouth by
moving the thumb downward in order to drop the jaw of the puppet. You can imagine how difficult this is when you see the size of the puppets!
The directors
Bobby Garcia and Chari Arespacochaga were also on hand to answer questions. When asked what they looked for when casting this show, Mr. Garcia enumerated
Talent, Dependability and an Obsessive-Compulsive attitude, which each member of this present cast possesses, but with varying rank each person. I was also able to ask a question about possible revisions on future editions of the play, since certain details within the book date it, like the mixtape or George Bush. Answer was there will definitely be changes in the lyrics next year when Bush steps out of office. And that the book writer
Jeff Whitty already has a trove of suggestions from the numerous fans on how to update the play!
After this, the cast sang around the piano the
"Theme from Avenue Q" (
video). And invited us, and all of you, to join them on this their Farewell Run. We were then given the opportunity to talk and mingle with the cast members over Krispie Kreme Donuts. Felix and Sir Jojo (the pianist) still recalled
our SLMC concert with the Repertory Philippines last April 16 (photos
here,
here and
here). While I took the opportunity to promote the
Voice Center of St. Luke's Medical Center, but the bad case
laryngitis I had this morning was really in poor timing.
Ms. Aiza even quipped, "Hindi yata sila ang tumingin sa yo a!" LOL!
So there it is. Don't miss this last chance to catch the funniest and most entertaining play staged in Manila last year. Call
Ticketworld at 891-9999 or click on their
website for tickets. You can also contact
The Bachelor Girl because the shows she booked (14 June 2008 2pm and 21 June 2008 8pm) also feature her special
"Spread the Fuzz" activities before and after the shows. Believe me, I was in one of those "Fuzz" shows last year, and it was a blast even outside the theater! Again, the Farewell Run shows are from
June 14 to 22, 2008.
After this run, they are already slated to perform in
Singapore, from October 31 to November 16, 2008. Break a leg, guys!
More photos of this event
here.
