Hello! More Showgirl terminology definition in this Showgirl Story Time video. I was inspired to create this video after interviewing former Jubilee! principal singer, Randall Patterson for episode 007, You Can Never Go Back. He mentioned a few things that I thought would be worth defining here. Here you will learn what Pixie Awards are as well as what a “Put-in” rehearsal, (term used for a Showgirl dress rehearsal,) is.
Both terms are unique to Jubilee cast members. Pixie awards were created to help build camaraderie amongst the performers. And you get a peek into what kinds of awards were given, and they were not your typical safe for corporate types of awards!!
Put-ins were the term given to the special rehearsal that happened during contract change when new performers would be “put in” to the show. It was their only chance at a proper, full tech/dress rehearsal before they performed their opening night. A bit like being thrown in the deep end, now that I look back!
Enjoy!
? Athena
Hey there, welcome to another showgirl story time! This week’s episode of show goes live podcast features a singer from Jubilee and also another show called City Lights in Las Vegas. And he talks about a couple things that are kind of show speak. So I wanted to define those so that when you listen to the episode, you kind of know what he’s talking about.
The first one is he kind of defined it a little bit but it was the pixie awards, and I will be learning more about the Pixie Awards the more people like talk to, like, who invented them and all of that. But the Pixie Awards were awards that the dancers gave to each other, they, they voted on, who had the best budget, and the best walk probably and all things like that. So those are the pixie awards, and when I get a picture of the pixie awards, I will share it. Because I think they were like little homemade trophy type things. So, the pixie awards that’s pixie awards.
Put-in rehearsals were when we put a new person into the show. That’s all they were. The rehearsal was basically their dress rehearsal, and they, if it was like a big hat like if they were wearing the big, Pete Menefee called it the wings, the biggest disco costume that there was besides the Mohawk. If they were wearing a costume like that they would wear it in the put in so that they could see the traffic pattern, so that they basically didn’t take somebody out with their backpack. Or, you know, they turned for, you know, passing the passing that had happened in some of the formations and things to change, and it was quite a choreographed spectacle, every single number.
So the putting rehearsal every performer dreaded because it was a lot. It was basically, we did two shows and then we would do the put in rehearsal on the last, I don’t think it was the last night of the contract it might have been the second to last night of the contract. Because the last night of the contract, everyone was crying and sad and it was just it was, it was a lot of emotion and stuff, and that’s when all the costumes would be taken from the dancers that were leaving, and altered, over a period of 48 hours. So that the new dancers could go in to the show that following Saturday. Friday was the dark day, a dark days, basically, the day when the show, the show is dark. So you don’t know, that’s what we were talking about, it’s come up with in another couple of episodes about the dark night is basically the night where there were no shows in the show room that night.
So, the put in rehearsal was basically the dress rehearsal and it wasn’t dressed for everybody it was just to put that person in their place and work through any crazy formations. There were a few formations sometimes we had to redo numbers. Disco was one of them, Red Fans was one of them, Top Hat and Tiller. Those four numbers because of how clean it needed to be, part of the formations and the traveling and all of that. Sometimes those numbers would be redone. But if they were really strong dancers and understood exactly where they needed to go, and they had been watching the show and over the period of their rehearsal period for two weeks, then, then it was like, it’s just like the girl that they just took their place over.
And so that’s what I put in rehearsal is about it’s putting the new people coming in to the show. And sometimes it would be stretched over two nights, but generally, it was just, we’re gonna do the whole show. We didn’t have to do it full out which was nice. Unless that person was within our vicinity, so that they could see how much moving space they had.
But every dancer had a mark on the stage, and we kept track by the rails. And then the tracks. So that the stage had rails, and then there were also tracks. So that was the perpendicular to center stage and then the rails were parallel to center stage. So, you would look at the schematic, in the book, and you would know where you would go.
So, I hope that helps, with some of the vocabulary that we are talking about in the Showgirls Life podcast. So until next time, please check out the podcast if you haven’t heard it. It’s showgirls dot life backslash podcast will have all the episodes listed, and you can start from wherever and every guest has been amazing. So, see you next time.