With a swinging rhythm section (Bass and Drums), and full complement of a horn section, and two fun frontmen. (Plus a great guitar player and keyboardist) And if that’s not enough there’s the added bonus of beat box to liven things up! If you want to see a great energetic and highly entertaining band, Phat Cat Swinger is one for you. They are off to do some shows in Las Vegas next, where I’m sure they will be greeted with enthusiasm.

After their set, and a quick four minute change over of the stage Jay Leno came out without announcement and made the crowd laugh until they cried. He has been here a few times, and I wrote about him in my book, Stagehand: A Backstage Pass to my Life Stories.

Jay is always friendly and happy. When he arrived he came to our crew break room to say hello to everyone. Afterwards I presented him with a copy of my book. When I stopped by his dressing room he was skimming through the pages. He commented on the chapter about Art Garfunkel. Apparently Art is well known as the guy I wrote about in the first part of the chapter about him. I’m glad to have yet another chance to work with Jay. He is one of the most down to earth entertainers who I know.

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Here’s an example of stagecraft trickery. How something flat looks 3D.

The amount of wigs and wardrobe on the show is also incredible. 

The cast was friendly and also quite talented. Their acting and dancing skills showed on stage but the most impressive thing about them was their singing. One of the best things about working a Broadway-type musical show is standing in the midst of the chorus while they sing the songs from the wings (at least when they’re good!).

I had the pleasure of meeting the actress Caroline Portner when she missed the cast bus to the hotel at the end of the first night. I waited with her outside until her Uber arrived. Funny thing is I didn’t know what character she played due to everyone wearing elaborate wigs and costumes in the show. I found out the next day she was one of the lead characters. Caroline is a super nice person but in the show she plays the mean girl, a sign of a really good actress.

This production brought four fully loaded semi trucks (road cases stacked 3 high), so fitting everything into our theater was pretty tight. Myself and some of our other house crew had to work with the touring crew to use the stacking motor in our shop to un-stack road cases at the load-in and re-stack everything at the load-out.

Unfortunately a lot of the company’s road cases were in bad shape, which sometimes made this difficult. (Likewise The set pieces were also in pretty bad shape). We would tell the crew, ”You ought to fix that,” to which the typical response was, “It’s just gotta last another 5 weeks!”

I don’t envy their crew for the next five weeks, but at least they all work well together and have fun. Overall, working with them was a pleasure; they were good people, and their cast was talented.

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