LOS ANGELES — A light pitter patter quickly grows into a rainstorm, setting the stage for romance. For a certain generation, the rainy kiss in the film “The Notebook” is one of those indelible Hollywood moments. For Justin Myhre, making it rain on stage is all in a day’s work.
Myhre is the production stage manager for the touring company presenting the musical version of “The Notebook.” The rain is kind of the star of the show, but in actuality, it only lasts about two minutes. Still, it takes a lot to pull those two minutes off. It starts with a tank that holds 90 gallons of tap water.
“It lasts for about a week,” Myhre said. “It’s probably only five or so gallons per show. It’s not a ton.”
That water travels up a hose into the lighting grid and to a rain bar, which lives above the stage.
“It’s basically like a big, long showerhead,” Myhre explained. “And there’s a heater up there too, actually. So it’s not freezing cold on the actors.”
Of course, indoor rain has to go somewhere. In this case, it all pools inside the platform it falls on and then gets less romantically vacuumed out at the end of each night.
Having the rain scene, especially as the show tours to theaters around the country, posed unique challenges. But Schele Williams, who co-directed the musical with Michael Grief, said bringing that moment to life was essential.
“Well, there was no way we were doing the show without rain,” she laughed, recalling the early stages of development. “We all sat down in a room and said, ‘Okay, how are we going to make it rain, and how are we going to do it in a way that really makes it feel like this epic moment of epiphany for these two people that have been fighting so hard to get back together?'”
Those two people are the central characters of Noah and Allie, portrayed by three sets of actors who represent them at different ages. Kyle Mangold and Chloë Cheers play the youngest versions of the couple and don’t get to kiss in the rain. That scene is for the middle couple as their young counterparts watch from a mostly dry spot a few feet away.
“Sometimes Ken, like, whips his hair back and splashes me a little bit,” Mangold joked.
They’re not jealous of the other actors — they know the story is about way more than weather.
“I mean, I think there’s something about an enduring love story where people will just fight for each other for their entire lives that’s very timeless and classic,” Cheers said.
(Spectrum News/Tara Lynn Wagner)
And this story has certainly endured. The book by Nicholas Sparks was published in 1996, with the movie released eight years later. It took another two decades to bring it to the stage, with music and lyrics by singer-songwriter Ingrid Michaelson. Sparks, who admits to being a fan of musicals and theatre in general, said seeing the story play out on stage is a completely different experience.
“Novels can be very, very intimate, yes, but that’s just you,” he explained. “Whereas with this, you’re in this shared experience that I think adds to the power of what you’re seeing.”
That’s especially true, Mangold said, for people who have known someone affected by dementia, like his grandmother who had Alzheimer’s.
“This gives people a chance to deal with those emotions and see that story being told in a community, and I think it’s a really healthy way to face those emotions and to heal them,” he said. “I think it also helps caretakers. It helps them feel seen.”
Seeing it rain indoors may be a thrill, but Myhre knows it’s not raindrops that people are wiping from their eyes as they leave the theatre. That’s the product of technical skill, talent and the power of storytelling.
“It is very, very satisfying,” he said of the audience reaction to the show each night. “It’s a good reminder of, you know, why we do this.”
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‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source spectrumnews1.com ’
