Comedy and Musicality

I am working on a production with a huge company. We are going to play an open-air arena; one of the biggest in the country. We have a huge budget, and we keep adding hilarity and stretching out the show until the very last second. People who aren't writers start to add things. Brandon Holloway writes a skit and puts it in without my permission. What has been raucous laughter up until this point dries up and quiets as he and another guy put on a farce involving destroying an upright bass, singing falsetto opera, and other buffoonery. As soon as the rest of the regular show goes on, the laughing resumes. I'm in the wings with my headset and belt pack and I'm fuming to crew members about Brandon's intrusion. There are people from my high school in the production. Then I am way out in the audience, and there is a man with a gun holding up people for their belongings and souvenirs. I watch as he forces and father and son to remove their 2008 Olympics tee shirts. The father says, "We really were at the Olympics. These are irreplaceable." I decide to put a stop to it. I am suddenly center field, and the stage is gone, and there's just a football gridiron. I am speaking into a mic about the mean robber, and somehow my deciding to tell the audience at once causes him to lose his robbery power. The audience has dwindled, and the stadium is much smaller. I can see faces.

I am sitting in a big building whose walls and ceilings are a band room, but whose floor and
furniture are my grandparents' house. I am sitting beside Cindy Haffly, who has out her tenor and is examining three new altissimo keys that have been added to the sax, but in keeping with the auxiliary F key, not the palm keys. I have my tenor in my lap, and I'm looking, too. I start playing the notes and then using the new keys, comparing intonation. Apparently we are making a chart of which fingerings to use in certain settings. When we're done she straightens her collar and pulls at her button-down shirt and says, "I'm getting the hell outta here! I'm starving!" and walks out. I laugh, and continue to play. I am playing when I hear a staticky interruption. I stop playing and hear Rick Shaw's voice filtering through the speakerphone on the desk. "Tamara! Tamara!" he's shouting. "Yeah?!" I say, irritated. "Listen, I have some bad news for you." Bob Besant has joined Rick, wherever he's calling from, and is snoring loudly into the phone. He sounds like Butthead sleeping. "When you go in to play for Dr. Mroz, he's going be like, 'Okay, hi, where ya from?' and you're going to say 'Senior high,' but the thing is that I forgot to tell him you're coming, and he doesn't like to take senior high." I scoff. "Great!" Rick continues. "Just say, 'Dr. Mroz? I'm going to be your daughter-in-law-" Bob interjects, "'with your kind permission,'" and Rick continues, "'-so if you'd give me the chance to play I'd really appreciate it.'" I stand there, not replying, trying to figure out who the hell it is I'm supposed to be marrying that Dr. Mroz would be my father-in-law.