Radio City: Swingville

I totally did it to myself. I angered the swing gods.

At least, that's what we say here in the Radio City dressing room when you do one or more of the following before a performance in the Radio City Christmas Spectacular:

* stay out late
* forget to buy eyelash glue
* skip the red lipstick
* had one too many the night before
* don't shower

I stayed out late last night. I undoubtedly angered the swing gods.

As many of you know, I am a swing in the show, which means that I am an understudy for three of the singers. Normally, I get to the theater between 8:30am and 9:30am, leisurely pour myself a cup of coffee with half a packet of Swiss Miss with marshmallows (we call this a ghetto mocha), put on a little makeup, and check my email. That way, I would look as if I could go onstage at any time, just in case someone falls down the stairs or something. (But since that only happened once in my four years, I mostly expect to do this as an unnecessary precaution.) Well, today my lovely morning routine was rudely interrupted when Mrs. Claus called out sick! PANIC ENSUED.

With just 30 minutes, I had to put on heavy stage makeup, put my hot rollers to work, find my costumes, go over all my lines and spacing, and step out on stage. The latter was especially terrifying because swings don't have an opportunity to rehearse on stage at all, let alone with unfamiliar costumes and microphones. And since Mrs. C. was the sickie, I would also be singing a solo while wearing a ginormous dress with hoopskirts and climbing up and down the Christmas train.

As you can image, I was more than a little nervous.

Luckily, that early morning hour infused everything with a dream-like quality. It barely registered that I was standing on stage in front of 6,000 people and singing something I've never sung in public before. And somehow, I was still relaxed enough to enjoy it. I looked around at all my friends on stage and had a grand old time. It was a Christmas miracle!

And I'm so, so glad that first unplanned performance is over!