By Michelle Gao
Gargoyle assistant editor
Posted Friday, Nov. 3, 2006, The OG, arts

[Note: Uni High's fall play, “You Can't Take It With You,” opened Thursday night in the North Attic Playhouse and will be performed again tonight and Saturday at 7:30. Directed by Barbara Ridenour, the play features a cast that includes Gargoyle staff member Michelle Gao, who has been giving us a first-person look at the production. Click here for Michelle's previous article and here for play photos. For more about the play (including cast list), click here.]

Opening night is always exciting. I mean, you have a very few people in the audience for the final dress rehearsal, but opening night is … special. There are actually going to be people out there. People who haven't heard the lines a million times, and people who have no idea what to expect. It's a huge adrenaline rush.

Things go wrong, of course. For instance, Ethan Stone went home because he had a migraine, and we were worried that he might not be able to perform. Turns out he was able to, but jeesh … it was scary for a while, there.

Other than that, last night proceeded as usual. Za's for dinner, again — I don't think I'll ever get sick of that place. They have soup now, did you know? And you can get the soup in a bread bowl. And then making up names for yourself is fun: Yesterday, I was Maureen (because I was in a “RENT”-ish kind of mood). Hannah Lake-Rayburn was Alice, and Jamie Weiser was Kelsie.

We got back to Uni by 5 and got into the swing of things right away. When you've done hair and makeup the same way day after day after day, it's not quite so hard anymore. Or frantic. The atmosphere wasn't so much tense as excited, I thought.

Every night before going out on stage, we do a warmup, and then we do a little huddle and shout an amusing line from the play. So far, we've had, “Kenneth, my virginity is a priceless thing to me!,” “Everybody got sex?,” and “Life is chasing around inside of me like a squirrel!” It's always very fun.

Opening night went great, I thought. No one missed any cues (majorly, at least), and little mistakes were covered up very well. For those people like the Agents who aren't onstage much, it was so fun to sit backstage and listen to the audience laugh at things that we hoped they'd laugh at, and also at things that we had no idea why they found funny. There was a feeling of incredible pride every time that they laughed. It was like … WOW. They LIKE it. SCORE!!!

And hopefully, even MORE people will show up tonight. So it should be awesome.