The sharp smell of scene paint mixed with sweat, and she became aware that she had painted herself into a corner of the stage . It seemed that at least once every summer she did something silly like this , and her exploits had become legend, tinged with envy, as underclassmen, new to the Playhouse, wrote home or to their friends about the adventures of their summer stock summer. She knew such things were laughed at good-naturedly but how could she ever get Ellis Simpson, the trumpet player, to take her seriously if she kept painting herself into corners?
She gave up trying to figure out a graceful exit from this dilemma and plopped down on the small unpainted red on which a bit of last week’s show could still be detected. Everyone else on the paint crew
had gone out for a food break and would be back soon and maybe by then she’d have figured out how to finish painting the floor and be triumphantly sitting in a house seat, looking relaxed and calm, as if nothing silly had happened at all.
She felt vaguely annoyed with herself as the sweat trickled down her neck and the casein paint fumes stung her eyes, but more than that, she was tired and hungry. Now she wished she had asked the guys to bring her a burger and shake, and that she didn’t have to be on the stupid diet she had forced herself to maintain. It was just that she had the lead in next week’s show and she wanted to look as svelte and sexy as possible in sequined finalé gown because, even if it was black, sequins caught all the light and the dress showed every pesky curve. So, if she wanted a flat tummy for FUNNY GIRL, no burgers and shakes on this strike night, even if it was a closing night ritual indulged in by the entire company.
The way it worked at Wheel of Fortune Summer Playhouse in Wilma , Indiana was that eight shows filled the summer stock season, one a week for eight weeks, with each new show running from Monday night to Sunday afternoon. As soon as the final curtain rang down on one week’s show, the entire company, made up of music and drama majors from Indiana and Northwestern Universities , got out of costume, into worn-out work clothes, because then began the exhausting business of tearing down the current set and putting up another for the next show. The kids (all summer stock people seemed to be called kids, no matter how old) worked all through the night, not stopping until the new show was totally installed, ready to be lit, because after all, another Opening Night was literally hours away.
So, working hard all night, a break for burgers, hot , juicy and dressed to the nines, with Cokes and delicious sweet shakes was a well-earned reward.
And that is where everyone else had gone, leaving her all by herself. No one was around to help her out of the corner she had painted herself into.
There she sat , with only the paint brush and bucket and a few tireless mosquitoes for company, as she let the fatigue of the long day melt her into a relaxed cross-legged position on the floor. It was probably about 2:00 AM she figured, so the thick August air was not as hot as it could have been. All the wooden Dutch doors of the theatre-in-the-round were wide open, to help the traffic of old scenery moving out and new set pieces coming in, so the air around her stirred every now and then with gentle breezes, filled with enough sweetness from the honeysuckle and apple trees out back to break through even the thick smell of the scene paint.