| A GRUELING SCHEDULE |
There used to be, and perhaps still are, packaged tours called "See Europe in Two Weeks", which generated the
scheduling joke, "If it's Tuesday, this must be Belgium". Take a look at this mind-boggling schedule the dancers
in Agnes de Mille's troupe followed. Your eyes will glaze over after the first half dozen entries.
Now picture these hard-working kids doing this tour in a 1950s bus. Liz said you couldn't lean that far back to
sleep as you'd be banging up against the knees of the person behind you. I rode some of those buses, courtesy of
the 1950s USN and can attest to that (much the same as airline coach seats today) as well as a lack of other
amenities such as an on-board bathroom. To top that off, the troupe had to show up at each site at least two
hours ahead of time to warm up. Liz remarked that a lot of those places were cold and you HAD to warm up or
you'd be too stiff to perform. Because of that requirement, they sometimes pulled into town and went straight to
the theater and only hit the hotel AFTER their performances, which usually lasted two hours.
While not mentioned in the schedule below (copied by Liz from an original and reproduced here, complete with
all typos) there was a tap dancer and puppeteer who were also along to break up the routines. Liz said they were
needed as people would tire of seeing the same choreographer's work the entire evening.
scheduling joke, "If it's Tuesday, this must be Belgium". Take a look at this mind-boggling schedule the dancers
in Agnes de Mille's troupe followed. Your eyes will glaze over after the first half dozen entries.
Now picture these hard-working kids doing this tour in a 1950s bus. Liz said you couldn't lean that far back to
sleep as you'd be banging up against the knees of the person behind you. I rode some of those buses, courtesy of
the 1950s USN and can attest to that (much the same as airline coach seats today) as well as a lack of other
amenities such as an on-board bathroom. To top that off, the troupe had to show up at each site at least two
hours ahead of time to warm up. Liz remarked that a lot of those places were cold and you HAD to warm up or
you'd be too stiff to perform. Because of that requirement, they sometimes pulled into town and went straight to
the theater and only hit the hotel AFTER their performances, which usually lasted two hours.
While not mentioned in the schedule below (copied by Liz from an original and reproduced here, complete with
all typos) there was a tap dancer and puppeteer who were also along to break up the routines. Liz said they were
needed as people would tire of seeing the same choreographer's work the entire evening.
