200

Week 29: San Antonio, TX

After the dry hot air of Albuquerque, the oppressive humid heat of San Antonio hit me like a wall. It is swelteringly, sultry hot here. Fortunately, San Antonio is an eminently walkable city and the theatre is in walking distance of my hotel, the historic Wyndham St. Anthony.
This landmark hotel was founded in 1909 and over the years hosted luminaries and celebrities ranging from Eleanor Roosevelt to Lucille Ball to Fred Astaire to Grace Kelly. The lobby is ornate and old world; something out of Henry James. And I have to say the guest services are the best I have encountered on my travels thus far. Truly wonderful customer service. Especially housekeeping. Incredibly discreet and efficient--none of that horrible rapping on doors screeching "housekeeping!" at 9AM every day. I have a lovely big room with a huge four poster bed and a spacious black and white tile bathroom-- a great space to host this week's movie night, and it is a far cry from the Extended Stay in the strip mall! Truly it makes such a difference to have comfortable and pleasing accommodations.


All of San Antonio's popular sights are within easy distance of where I am staying and working this week. The big attraction here is, of course, the Alamo. This old mission, originally erected by the Spanish to educate and convert the Native Americans, became a fortress which was the scene of the famous confrontation between Texians, led by William B. Travis, Jim Bowie, David Crockett and others, against the Mexican forces during the fight for Texas independence. Of course the brave Texians were massacred after putting up a valiant fight and the Alamo has become the symbol of Texas liberty. Far from being a reverent and solemn place--despite the many plaques and monuments, the ancient yellowed buildings, and a magnificent tropical garden on the 4.2 acre grounds--the Alamo is a busy tourist attraction, overrun with crowds of noisy visitors snapping photos. It is incongruously situated in the midst of a busy shopping district and surrounded by hotels and souvenir shops, as well as garish attractions like Ripley's Believe it or Not! across the street. I imagine if one could visit the site in the very early hours or late at night, one might enjoy the place and have an opportunity to "remember the Alamo" as a place where idealistic men gave their lives for the concept of freedom.

The San Antonio Riverwalk is equally crowded with tourists, but is intended to be a lively pedestrian passage below street level along the banks of the San Antonio River. Started in the 1920s, the construction of the walkways and attractive bridges was executed mostly in the 30's by the WPA. Today it is a very quaint and appealing stretch of restaurants, bars and shopping. Many of the cast and crew enjoyed a first night of dining on the Riverwalk, absorbing the revelry and energy of this popular area. Once you get past the business sections of the Riverwalk, moving north, it becomes a charming and beautifully landscaped public park. It's a lovely feature of this city.
On a particularly beautiful stretch of the Riverwalk lies the Southwest School of Art and Craft, housed in what was once the Ursuline Academy, a convent school for girls from the mid-19th century. While I was not especially impressed by the artwork on display in the gallery or the gift shop, I was very taken with the compound itself: beautiful old stone buildings with wooden upper galleries, and an exquisite courtyard with lush greenery and a charming fountain. It was a lovely place to enjoy a quiet old world respite from the scalding heat of the city.




This week marks the start of my second six months on the tour. I have already worked through half of my initial one year contract and it is unbelievable how quickly it seems that time has rolled by. I gave my 200th performance as Sir Robin this week. This is a milestone for me as it is the most performances I have given of any role, with perhaps the exception of my nightclub acts which I performed on and off over a period of eight years. There are performers in this tour who have been with the show since the tour launched in 2006, and they have done close to 1000 performances each at this point! I guess on the one hand there is something so strange about an actor doing one part for so long, but at the same time, there is such an opportunity to perfect and refine one's performance and really (one hopes) master it. My experience as an actor has been mainly in regional theatre, where at most one gets maybe four to six weeks of performances of any one role, and as I have played quite a lot of Shakespeare, I wonder how much I would have achieved in some of those parts had I been given 200 performances to play.

Here's a little mundane tidbit about touring life, lest you think it is all glamour and standing ovations.
Living on the road presents certain challenges, and one of those can be the doing of laundry. Many of the hotels we stay in have guest laundry services (and in fact, Candlewood Suites, one of our favorite chains, offers free laundry facilities to its guests), but many hotels do not--as in the case of my San Antonio hotel. The real kicker is that there is no laundromat or laundry service ANYWHERE in the downtown San Antonio area. After doing research and inquiring at the hotel front desk, I came up with one which is a 15 minute drive away. Not a help when one has no transportation. I am astonished that this downtown area, so full of tourists and business travelers, offers nowhere to clean clothes. And if you have ever had laundry done by hotel housekeeping services you will know that they charge ridiculous prices--the St. Anthony wants $4 per shirt. Fortunately, our lovely wardrobe mistress, Angela, took pity on me and allowed me to use the theatre's machines, which are usually off limits and used only for costumes.

Cool, indoor activities are the order of the day, so I visited the San Antonio Museum of Art, which houses a fine collection with an emphasis on Latin American art from all periods, including a gallery of religious items and iconography and a delightful collection of folk art.
Great Latin American artists are represented too, with a few pieces by renowned Mexican painter Diego Rivera, and a delicious Botero sculpture of Venus. There are some very fine antiquities, including a gallery of Roman, Greek and Etruscan sculpture, and a decorative arts gallery with an extensive collection of Wedgwood and one of the most famous canvases by the wonderful late 19th century painter Bouguereau, "Admiration."




We are performing this week at the Majestic Theatre, which has the distinction of being the gaudiest, kitschiest, most over the top theatre I have played in since joining the tour. Built in 1929 as a movie palace, it is a wacky blend of Mediterranean, Baroque and Spanish Mission architecture which adds up to what looks like a combination of the set of "Sunset Boulevard" and the background for an old Mario Lanza movie. The place is a fantasy villa, complete with starry sky, balconies and statuary, stuffed peacocks and doves poised in mid-flight, and a proscenium arch adorned with enormous urns containing plastic potted palms. The place is a hoot. And so was our opening night audience! What a reception they gave us! Those people came to have a rollicking good time and man, was it ever. Nothing like a playful, enthusiastic audience to remind you why you do this crazy stuff.


Dana is my San Antonio dresser, and what an admirable woman she is. Married to a stagehand, Dana is mother to four children, two of them older teenagers and two of them quite young. Her ten year old is named Jamie--good choice! Dana not only works wardrobe (and expertly at that), she works full time for Mary Kay Cosmetics, part time as a waitress on the weekends, and part time as an assistant special education teacher. I am reminded of my mother, who worked several jobs when I was a kid to support me and my two siblings. My hat is forever off to hard working moms like Dana.

Next week we bus to Fort Worth to complete the Texas leg of the tour, and then the long awaited sit down in Vancouver begins! Thank you to all of you who have generously written to me to let me know how much you enjoyed "Spamalot" and my work in particular, and for all your good wishes. I assure you, I take none of it for granted, and am most grateful to have the joy of doing what I love and receiving your support and kind words.