I love campy, super-cheesy movies. This weekend, my very favourite – Hudson Hawk – was on. I watched it (or parts of it, at least) three times in 36 hours. So good. I’m also a big fan of Joe Versus the Volcano, Judge Dredd (the Stallone version), and the particular goofy delight of Little Shop of Horrors. A few years ago, Child invited me to see Little Shop at his high school because his best pal was in the stage band. And turns out, Little Shop is also part of the Stratford playlist this summer.

Little Shop holds a special place for me because I’ve been part of the show – twice. Once with the CN Players in my highschool. And the second, at the Theatre Aquarius Summer Theatre School. At the end of the 2 months program, we presented a show at the theatre that hosted the school. One of those years, we did Little Shop of Horrors. At one point, when Audrey2 eats Seymour, we sang this angelic interlude. It was a 3 or 4 part harmony, and there were three of us on each part. One of the girls I sang with and I were very solid on our line of the harmony, so we sung it with confidence, projecting to the back of the theatre. We learned it so well that now, 30+ years later, I can still sing those measures. The girls on the melody couldn’t hold their line because they said that the two of us were drawing them off their note. So, we were supposed to… what?… Not do our best because it made it hard for someone else to do their job? Pfft. As if.

We were kind of jerks about it, really. We could have rehearsed at half strength until they found the muscle-memory of the melody. As their confidence grew, we could have increased the power on our harmony. But you couldn’t have convinced me of that then.

I find myself, even now, sometimes, with an inclination to overpower someone’s figurative melody, because I can. Try to keep up, bitches, ’cause here we go.

This Lent, may I encourage others to give their best performance. This Lent, may the value of the harmony be more than just the sum of its parts.