So!

It's been a busy week around these parts. Actually, it was a busy week around these parts, a couple of weeks ago. Specifically, in the completion (!) of the script and lyrics. Which, yay! Are done. If you actually read this thing, which I realize is doubtful, although if you're reading this I guess you must, so it gets confusing, but anyway, if you do you may recall that what kind of jump-started this project again after I'd put it aside for quite a while after The Troubles at my day job, was the fact that I wanted to submit the book for the Kleban last year.

As it turned out, there was no way in heck that I could have finished it in time, but a couple of months ago I realized that the deadline date was coming up again for this year, which kind of lit a fire under me. So I got back to work on it, hoping that for once in my life, I might actually get a submission for something in with at least a few days to spare before the actual drop dead date. Long story short, let's just say my streak continues unbroken, but I did get the thing in, at around 4:30 on the 15th, actually walking it into their offices on my lunch break.

In the end, I have to say I was very happy with the finished product. Quite frankly, there is one song that was kind of a temporary dummy lyric, and even that wasn't bad. And I realize I may need to write one more song for the second act, but other than that, it's quite good, and I only submitted the libretto anyway; they're not even going to be judging the lyrics, so it's all good.

Anyway, the deadline was Wednesday the 15th. That Friday, I sent out a copy to the composer, to the email address I'd always used for him in the past. Now, I had taken kind of a risk in not being in touch with him for a while, because the work had become so stop-and-start erratic that I actually felt kind of bad about it. I had finally decided I would just work full out on the thing whenever and wherever I could, and then just send him a completed script when it was completely finished. That way, no matter what happened on my end, it would be entirely in his hands and he could work at his own pace without having to wait for me and the vagaries of my daily life. If, God forbid, I got hit by a bus, he could finish the show and produce it posthumously, in honor of my memory.

So I sent out the script, and a week went by, and I heard nothing. And I was like, well, dumbass, that's what happens when you leave someone hanging for like, a year. He must have changed his email address, and now you have no way of getting back in touch with him. And I'mn going six kinds of crazy thinking, well, now I'm right back to square one, having to find a new composer and it's going to be a total nightmare and if I don't find someone in like, three weeks at the outside, or put it this way: if I couldn't get someone started on music in time to have at least three songs finished by say mid-January, that was it for 2011. Based on the way the deadlines run for the various festivals and workshops, timing wise, I would be completely out of the running until 2012. So there was a bit of a panic moment until ... I got a reply from him this morning! He was working on another show, had been busy, was glad to have received the script, lalala, all is good.

Meanwhile (and there will be more about this later, but:) I had a couple of major lightbulb moments a couple of weeks ago. One relates to the next show, which I'll be getting started on like, Monday. The other was that since I still haven't nailed down a definite replacement director, it might be a good idea to get in touch with a former co-worker of mine from the Law Factory. Who happens to have been an assistant director on Spring Awakening, Memphis, the Musical, and a couple of straight plays, also on Broadway. She's quite good friends with a couple of friends of mine, and seems like a lovely person, although we didn't interact much when we worked together because our schedules were so different. But both my friends have said absolutely, send it to her, they're sure she'd at least consider it, and now that I don't have to worry about whether I have a composer or not (a pretty major consideration, you know. For a musical!) I'm gonna email her next week and see if she's interested in at least getting involved at the Equity Staged Reading level, and then see where things go from there.

So all in all, a productive couple of weeks, and things seem to be moving in a pretty positive direction. Fingers crossed, they'll stay that way going forward.