Hello all! It’s been a hot minute since I’ve come at you with a blog (there may be a separate blog/vlog for why I’ve been absent), but today I saw something and I felt as if I was being summoned back to chat to you about it.
As I was doing my morning doom scrolling through facebook, I came across a blog titled ‘Producer blames actor canceled show in front of audience’ with many shocked and angry reacts. Not only that, but it came with a TikTok video of the actual speech so you could see exactly what was said. Colour me intrigued. Two and a half minutes later, my blood was boiling. Producer of the new musical ‘The Finellis’, Mark Janicello (who also happened to be the writer, director and was starring in the show) had well and truly thrown his co-star, Mike Stirling, under the bus.
The situation as Janicello explained it was that Stirling’s agent had informed the team at 5:20pm that the actor would not be able to do the show as he was in vocal distress. Compromises were offered, such as lowering the keys of his songs and changing the levels of his mic so that he would just have to whisper (both of which would make his illness worse) but “despite all of our efforts he refused” and the show had to be cancelled as there was no contingency plan. He then went on to say that in the “world premiere last night [5th June]…Mr Stirling had a magnificent performance yesterday and sang full throated, with no problem whatsoever…there was no evidence of it [vocal problems] yesterday.” Janicello added that he himself had been on cold medication for the last two weeks as he had started the production sick. There is more rambling in the speech which seems to vilify Stirling, but these are the main points.
After watching this speech, it is safe to say that I was shocked. I could not believe the absolute gall of this man! For a producer/writer/director/actor to publicly say that the cancellation of a performance was the fault of an actor is bad in itself, but to imply that the actor in question was faking this illness is just disgusting. This is made even worse by the fact that Janicello may very well have been the one to get Stirling ill in the first place (did the pandemic teach us nothing)!
Those are just the surface thoughts that I think most people would have (which was proved by the appalled comments under the blog), but as a producer and director myself I have been on the side where I would have to consider things and put contingencies in place if something were to go wrong. Janicello complains that with an hour before the actors arriving, there wasn’t time to put something in place which, granted, is short notice but I have sent home an ill performer fifteen minutes before curtain up and the show still went ahead with our marvellous understudy. But then, we had an understudy which this production doesn’t seem to have (despite having a cast of twelve). Even in the two Everything’s Rosie productions that didn’t have understudies, I was ready to go on with script in hand at a moment’s notice. Even in the well loved West End production ‘Six’, co-creator Toby Marlow has gone on for the part of Catherine Parr when cast illness meant that there was no one available to play that part. Failing all of that, Wonderville Theatre (which looks like an absolutely lovely space) is primarily a cabaret, so why not just perform some of the songs which did not include Stirling? Surely any of these would have been a better than cancelling completely. As a producer and director, these are things that you think about CONSTANTLY!
Having said all of this, I do somewhat understand poor Mark trying to blame someone. I also have been in plays where I’ve wanted the ground to swallow me up as I have wanted no part of the production. He is merely a rat fleeing a sinking ship. And looking at the reviews ‘The Finellis’ has received, I can’t blame him.
When I write blogs like these, I like to do my research. In doing so, I not only found the ‘The Finellis’ website (the page on the history of the project is an interesting read), but I also found three reviews for the show. Despite Janicello saying that opening night “was a huge success”, it seems that none of these critics agree, with one critic calling it “Altogether far too long and over-indulgent, this show is in desperate need of edits in all areas and doesn't seem to know what it's trying to be. The script is all over the place, feels dated and is filled with jokes that simply do not land - this isn't helped by a seeming lack of direction and poor pacing throughout”. Unsurprisingly, this reviewer awarded ‘The Finellis’ one star.
Dulcie Godfrey (who also awarded the production one star) seems to agree with this assessment, saying “The overall feel is unpolished, under-rehearsed even. Many of the jokes don’t land and all the cast oscillates between inconsistent accents and generic mafia sayings; there are only so many repetitions of ‘forget about it’ before all dialogue is rendered meaningless. It leaves a profoundly awkward feeling amongst the audience for the entirety of the production.” I’m sure you can see, the reviews are not particularly favourable.
Elaine Chapman’s review follows much the same pattern – one star, show was too long and in desperate need of editing- but what was most interesting about this review was a section about cast illness. “At the beginning of the performance the audience was informed that Mike Stirling who plays Juergon Drahseil is battling a respiratory infection at the moment and some points throughout the musical sound recordings would be used instead of him performing live.” Hmmmm…so when Mr Janicello claimed that he was surprised by Stirling’s sudden illness, was he telling some porkies? Or did he just not put the two things together? Or is there another possibility? Is it possible that is the face of these terrible reviews, Janicello is trying to find a scapegoat for if he feels the need to pull the production?
All of this is, of course, speculation but what is clear is that this producer was grossly out of line and needs to extend a sincere apology to Mr Stirling for this disgusting display (although, given his behaviour, I doubt that one will be forthcoming).
***Update: This morning Chris Frawley was flown in from Belfast to step into the role of Juergen Drahtseil (part played by Mike Stirling).
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