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ONSTAGE & BACKSTAGE: Andrea, Alexis and Agonizing Auditions
By Seth Rudetsky
30 Jun 2008
On Wednesday I flew out to San Fran and because Juli's last day of school was Thursday, James came out that night (Juli went to visit her Gran in Texas). Andrea's show has been going great and her beautiful daughter, Alexis Kalehoff, is here with us. Alexis (now 19) made her Broadway debut as Young Cosette in Les Miz at age eight and loves to tell Andrea that she beat her to Broadway by five years. I knew that the Young Cosette's have to play Young Eponine also, as well as understudy Gavroche, the little boy. Alexis told me that she got to go on for Gavroche, and it was a "unique" performance. She was at the section of the show where Javert sings "Stars" and Gavroche is listening behind the barricade then steps out and sings, "That inspector thinks he's something etc…" She said that she really had to pee and didn't know what to do…go offstage? What if she missed her cue? Finally, realizing that the show must go on, she simply peed onstage!!! She said that the stagehands who stand underneath the barricade were horrified and had to shield their heads from the onslaught. Alexis thought the story was hilarious at the time and all Andrea thought was "Thank God we have different last names."
Of course, I asked Andrea for some Annie stories, and she hauled out a seventies classic. She said that one of the guys from the chorus accidentally left a vial of something in her dressing room called "Locker Room." To her, it looked like one of the things she would get at the magic store in Times Square she always visited. She opened it, and it smelled weird. Of course, she found out years later that it was amyl nitrate (poppers) but she had no idea at the time. She was always a total prankster and thought it would be hilarious to make the stage smell bad for the orphans in the opening scene….so she poured it all over the beds! Well, that curtain went up and suddenly all the little girls in the orphanage were swooning, staggering and gagging. She said that poor Danielle Brisebois, who played Molly, was seven and couldn't even make sense of her lines! Of course, they had to pull the curtain, get the girls back to normal, and even though Andrea didn't admit she did it, the fact that her face and neck was totally flushed from mortification made her get written up to Equity. And that was the last prank she ever pulled. That day.
When she was doing Les Miz, Andrea wanted the kids in the cast to have an Easter egg hunt, so she hid 72 eggs all over the stage. They were the plastic kind that had money inside so everybody in the show had a great time looking for them. Unfortunately, she hid 72 eggs… and they only found 68! The remaining eggs wound up breaking the barricade and the bank…Andrea had to pay $17,000 to get it fixed!
The most fun part about San Francisco is this Chocolate Café we discovered in Pacific Heights called "Bittersweet." They make a classic hot chocolate, which reminded me of the long-ago discontinued Starbucks "Chantico" hot chocolate…aka a melted chocolate bar in a cup….Delish! What's great about the town is they have lots of zoning laws, so all these charming independent booksellers are everywhere, instead of the big conglomerates that come in and close down all the stores. I've been going into all the bookstores because I love to read (just read "Twilight," which is a great young adult book about a 17-year-old girl in love with a vampire). At the first store I went into, I saw my books on the shelf, and the woman who worked there asked if I would autograph them! "With pleasure!" I said. After that, it was downhill. At the next store we visited, I asked where my books were, and the bookseller told me they were sold out. "Excellent!" I said, with a smile. "Yep," he continued. "We sold all four." Ouch. Then I walked into another store and said to the counterman, "I see you're carrying my two books, 'The Q Guide to Broadway' and 'Broadway Nights.'" Then I added, magnanimously, "Would you like me to autograph them?" To which I got a low energy, "If you want." Suffice it to say, if I had ever gotten a face lift, it would have fallen.
So, next week I'll begin rehearsal for the Rosie RFamilyVacations cruise. The last night on the cruise will be a concert version of Chicago, and I'm almost finished casting it. The amazing Brenda Braxton is going to be Velma, and Lillias White will reprise her role as Matron Mama Morton. Brava! Then, the following week I go to Dallas to play for Betty Buckley's all Broadway/all request show. Can't wait for the belting! While I'm there, I'm going to give a musical theatre master class at the Water Tower Theater, which should be fun because Dallas is a great theater town. Go to www.watertowertheatre.org/currentnews.asp#1
if you're gonna be in the area and you wanna come!
Okay, everyone, happy July and go see a show!
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(Seth Rudetsky is the host of "Seth's Big Fat Broadway" on SIRIUS Satellite Radio and the author of "The Q Guide to Broadway" and the novel "Broadway Nights." He has played piano in the orchestras of 15 Broadway musicals and hosts the BC/EFA benefit weekly interview show Seth's Broadway Chatterbox at Don't Tell Mama every Thursday at 6 PM. He can be contacted by visiting www.sethsbroadwaychatterbox.com.)
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