I am writing this several weeks after the actual rehearsal, so I’ll try to remember what I can. I got to CBS studios about three hours early. We were the first ones there, and we chatted a bit with one of the pages about where to go out to eat. We picked up a turkey sandwich and went back to the studio. It didn’t matter that we had gotten to the studio early before since they didn’t give us numbers. Eventually they let us into the studio. I was surprised at how small it was compared to how it looked on TV. I was moved to about three different seats before finally sitting on the floor directly next to the right side of the stairs. I don’t remember exactly how the show opened, but it started off with a song and dance number in the center stage. Since it was just a rehearsal, Wayne was lip syncing to his song. They did a skit on the right stage that featured Michael Jackson in a courtroom scene. They also did a scene on that stage called “Stunt Doubles.” It wasn’t very good and was cut from the show. In the center stage they did a scene called “Siegfried and Leroy.” JP played Sparticus, the white tiger. He moves so well! He also played Bubbles in the MJ DA scene. During the Siegfried and Leroy scene, Jonathan (Siegfried) had to get in “Ze box of death” where Wayne (Leroy) had to slide two pieces of sharp glass through the center. Unfortunately, Wayne couldn’t get the second piece of glass in. He was struggling with it for about five minutes before it finally slid through. After the scene was over, Wayne said that he didn’t think it was noticeable at all. Ah, the glories of television rehearsal errors! On the left stage, they did a scene titled, “Escape from Alkeseltzer” which took place in an old age home. The residents were trying to escape from the home in sort of a Mission Impossible type of way. At one point, Wayne was supposed to slip a piece of rope through some dentures, throw the dentures to the top of the window, pull the rope, and the window would come down. However, Wayne couldn’t get the rope through the dentures. He tried for a few minutes and then commented, “This reminds me of a magic trick I used to do!” This scene was cut and not used for the actual filming. They did use the same set, however, in a “Forward-Reverse” scene for the taping. They also did a birthday party scene where the mechanical animals came to life. I enjoyed that one. The song was stuck in my head for the rest of the week for some reason, which drove me out of my mind, but I’ll forgive him. On the center stage, they did a scene called Notorious COZ, a parody of Notorious BIG that featured Bill Cosby as a rapper. They also did a scene with Wayne as his grandmother (which was particularly strange out of costume) in which he was an expert in ear cleaning. They also did a gospel song with Wayne as a singing minister about the joys of Scotch. For the rehearsal, they didn’t have a gospel choir in the background, so the rest of the cast had to back him up. I’m afraid I don’t remember any other scenes right now. The rehearsal only lasted about an hour and a half, maybe two hours. I really enjoyed seeing this show in rehearsal. It was very interesting to see them do their skits out of costume and makeup. See my next report for a description of the actual taping of this rehearsal!