I made, as you know, a scouting run to the Rose Festival’s Waterfront Village a week ago last Sunday to see what things looked like regarding the stages upon which I would be performing (convoluted sentence structure GO!). One of the things I had been told was that the stages were in fact covered.
I was not aware, until I got there, that the stages were covered at a height of about … ten feet. For most acts this isn’t a particularly low ceiling, but for variety entertainers… sometimes it’s too low for certain bits.
When I ran into Rhys Thomas we both were a little suprised at the headroom, or lack thereof. “Well, I won’t be doing the Ladder Bit then…” was his thought. Mine was “Well, I don’t think the Mallet Trick is gonna work out here…” Fortunately, we both have a whole lot of other things we can do in our shows to counter this low-overhead situation.
Each venue has its own unique set of restrictions and opportunities. This is why it’s a really good idea to scout out the venue (Tobias Rule #2: Look before you perform.) and have a few alternative bits ready in case the venue precludes you using one or more bits (Tobias Rule #3: Always have a backup plan.) …
Mind you, it was really cute watching Rhys balance on top of his Exceedingly Tall Unicycle, braced against the “roof” of the awning, yelling “SAVE YOURSELVES! I’LL HOLD THIS UP!!!”
