Backstage...State Fair...1998

A new feature here, along with my common ones, which include On the Heels of, In the Shoes of, Image of the week, My Favorite Bad Movies, and Breaking News.
This new feature will showcase pictures of shows gone by, either depicted backstage or on.
My first look back takes me to State Fair at Shenandoah Summer Music Theatre, during July of 1998. I adored doing this cornpone show. I don't know why, but most Rodgers and Hammerstein really sits well with me. And I HATE old shows, usually. I am much more of a contemporary Musical Theatre buff. I hate war horses and museum pieces...but this show is really neither. It is just cotton candy bought on the midway.
With Unforgettable songs like, "That's for Me", "The Man I Used to Be", "Isn't it Kind of Fun?", "It Might as Well be Spring", "So Far", "You Never Had it So Good", "That's the Way it Happens", "It's a Grand Night for Singing", and the show stopping "Iowa", there is hardly a weak point in the score. I adored it. I still pop the old movie in on lazy days.


This first photo features (Left to Right) Me, My beloved Straight husband, Ryan Dean, Mary Robare, Matt Conner-the husband, and Marcus Davis, who remains one of our dear friends to this very day. This was taken during "You Never Had it So Good". We played the "FairTones". We called ourselves the "FairyTones". Notice the mylar strips behind us.
We had to enter through these, doing several rounds of turns. We always got stuck in them, or the tendrils would wrap around one of us, and we would continue the number with mylar wrapped around our necks. We would fight off hysterics every night.

This last photo features the FairyTones backstage, before an entrance for "That's the Way it Happens". Could we be wearing any more make-up? SU has a HUGE theatre, so we were always encouraged to do "corrective make-up". For queers, that meant-"Bette Davis Eyes", as seen in this photo.



This last photo is very damaged. It was on the refrigerator of the house on 16th St. that we lived in when it burned down. As you can see, more ridiculous make-up was used, but we were not playing FairyTones here. We were backstage, getting ready to make our entrance for the showstopper, "Iowa".
This picture tells the future.


We were all just good friends when this was taken. I was not with Matthew at the time. I wasn't particularly fantastic friends with Ryan at the time. Eight years later, Matthew and I have been together for 7 years, and Ryan, Matt, and I have been living together for almost 5 years.
When Backstage photos are taken of sometimes fleeting friends, sometime long lasting relationships, nobody knows what the future will hold when they are taken.
During this show, lasting friendships and love were created. And we didn't know it at the time.
A picture says a thousand words.
These pictures show a lasting friendship and love between 4 people, who did not know when the flash went off, that they would be linked together so much longer than when the curtain came down.
This post is dedicated to Ryan Dean, Matthew Conner, Marcus Davis, and Me.
I hope you like this new feature. I think I love it.
Saturday night, and signing off.
Luv,
SGS