Saturday Night Live Featuring Dana Carvey, Dennis Miller, Kevin Nealon

What a day!  What should have been the easiest show we have here turned out to be the most incredible detailed and hands on day I'll have.  We had Saturday Night Live stars, Dana Carvey, Dennis Miller, and Kevin Nealon.  But the story really starts about three days ago.  You would think, "ok, they're comedians, they need a mic, maybe some water."  That's exactly what the fair manager said this afternoon.  I get their requirements, 3 mics, 3 stools, a music stand, 5 unopened bottles of water.  Each guy does a 25 minute skit and then they all come back out together and do 25 mins of Q&A.  Now we're in a 10,000+ seat grandstand with hardly any way to pass a mic 'around' and I surely wasn't looking forward to half of those 10,000 rushing down to ask a question.  So after some thinking I asked the marketing department to go to the facebookers of the world and ask them to submit questions and pick 25 people to participate.  That way we can manage the number and screen the questions.  That part worked like a charm.  Until the comedians came in and asked, "Do we need to do the meet and greet?"  You bet you do, was my reply.

I spoke with Miller and Nealon's asst. who felt the most important thing to talk about was to confirm five times that the music stand will be there.  "It's very important.  Are you sure it will be there."  YES! After the 5th time.  There are 20 at another stage.  We WILL have a music stand.

But then I find out 2 days before the show day...that they will have a band.  Really?  We've gone from a three mic, 3 stool, music stand (don't forget about the music stand) and 5 unopened bottles of water to having a 5 piece band back them.  Well, really back Dana because it was his project but the others can just go along with it.  While it really wasn't that big of a deal it was the thought of receiving the information 2 days prior that irked me.  Plus local bands are so much more needy than those that tour all the time.  Today was case in point.  The band was great, easy to work with but their video crew was a little over the top.
While I got to add, construct and produce a Q&A to my resume today, I also got to add stage hand.  There were particular parts of the show where their huge lists of needs needed to be taken out on the stage.  Change the water, take the music stand, switch the mics, yada yada.  Instead of bringing two stagehands in to do that I figured, what the heck, I'll do it.  But then I found out being in three places doesn't work.  I can't be changing things on stage, coordinating the meet and greet on the track in front of the stage and sending the signal for fireworks.  Thank goodness for a great stage crew that will jump in.

The comedians were literally on site for less than two hours, and on stage for an hour and half of that.  They weren't traveling with a handler so I had no one to ask questions to but them.  They were very nice guys.  Dana is shorter than me.  Kevin is very friendly.  Dennis was, well Dennis.  Dana spent a few minutes talking with the staff backstage getting tidbits of local flare, the different neighborhoods, etc.  Basically so he could get everyone stirred up.  Dana asked me before the show, while standing with Kevin, so what type of show is this, can we curse?  I told him that we want to keep it a family friendly show, PG, PG-13.  They asked, so what you see on SNL.  I said maybe back when you were on it...but not now.  No Fbombs, very few curse words and try to keep it as clean as possible on the innuendos.  I should have known better.  Dennis went on a tyrant about the government, I think Viagra was mentioned in a story or two, with the subject matter going along with it.  Dana dropped the Fbomb twice and I heard a few others.  All in all it was a hilarious show.  Goes to show it doesn't matter what you tell these guys; they're going to say, what they're going to say.  My favorite part of the day; The fireworks are just starting and I'm walking backstage and see their vehicle pull away.  Hello and goodnight and they're gone just as quickly as they came.  Not sure what to do on a Saturday night when the show is over at 9:45P and the artists are already gone!  Now if they just would have had Molly Shannon with them....SUPERSTAR!

Kevin Nealon, Dana Carvey, Dennis Miller

 I can't forget to mention that one of the Dream Team honored me today with a WOW button.  Apparently the fair has special buttons that if someone sees someone doing something that deserves a WOW they can give them this button.  'Way beyond the ordinary, own it, win them over'.  I'm sure whatever I did was just part of the job but I appreciated the recognition.  Thanks WOW button giver. ;)