The night had now staked its claim over the skies, and the sweat-inducing humidity had (thankfully) given way to cooler and more comfortable weather. The dark wet spot around the neck of my shirt has almost disappeared, and I relax a little, knowing that, as far as appearances go, I just downgraded from a train wreck to a car crash.

The woman beside me excuses herself and leaves, thus eliminating the chance for more conversation before the second half. This forces me to sit by myself and think, and my mind focuses on the challenges I faced to get me to this concert, and how my whole trip nearly never happened.

I booked my trip to Los Angeles in March, six months in advance. Back then, things were going great at the casino where I work. I am a part-time dealer, and then I was working at least three days a week and making a decent amount of money. Not a truckload of money, mind you, but enough to pay the bills and have enough left over to do some things that I enjoy. My wife and I planned this trip with the notion that we would have six months to save up for eating and recreation expenses, including tickets for the John Williams show.

Oh how fate laughs at fools with intent.

Shortly after, the trapdoor was pulled on an already weak economy. Stores were folding in, gas prices were soaring to heights previously reachable only by NASA, and people everywhere were going broke. Suddenly, the idea of throwing away large piles of hard-earned cash on near-impossible odds seemed ridiculous to most folks, and they ran away from the casinos like Tokyoans at the sight of Godzilla (Except for the gambling addicts; they wouldn't leave if Godzilla was coming at them with a fork and a salt shaker. "Ignore the G*#%amned lizard, dealer! I got aces that need splitting!"). Argosy Casino responded by shutting down many of their table games, and forcing the part time dealers to schedules that gave them one to two workdays in a two week period. I was barely making enough to cover the mortgage.

"I'm sorry," said Jen (my wife) one morning as we studied our finances, "but unless a miracle occurs, there is no way you can go on your trip."

That "miracle" arrived in the form of a car accident. As Jen waited at a red light, the vehicle behind her made a move to change lanes, and in doing so scraped her rear panel. There was no damage done to the inner workings, so Jen decided to keep the insurance money. "You can have some of it for your trip," she said. "It's not much, but you can eat and do a couple of things while you're there." The meager amount meant that I could go on my trip, but it looked like I would have to skip the concert.

Then, another miracle. I opened my email a couple weeks before my trip and found a letter from a close internet buddy. Hey James, I bought two tickets for the John Williams show, but now I am going to be out of town for that weekend. Do you know anyone who would like to buy them?

I would love to buy them from you myself, but times are tough and the money is gone. I will see if anyone is interested, though.

He responded by making me an offer I couldn't refuse. OK, I'll take them.

(Just for the record, internet buddy-You are THE MAN! Let nobody tell you otherwise. And keep an eye on your mailbox ;-O )

So, I had money and I had tickets. "Nothing short of death is going to stop me from getting on that plane now," I said aloud.

But fate had one more card in its hand to play.

One week before the trip, I stopped into work to jot down the new schedule that had been posted the night before. As I stared at it, my jaw dropped, and a surge of anger coursed through my body.

"What the f#*k! They put me on the schedule for Monday the first?! I requested this day off six months ago! I'm supposed to be on a plane all day!"

I confronted the scheduler. "I am sorry," she said, "but Tom Schneider, the head of the department, demanded that all part timers be put on the schedule that day. It's Labor Day, and we're going to be busy."

"We haven't been busy in a long time, and Labor Day isn't going to be any different. You know as well as I do that half of these dealers are going to be sent home before they put in an hour's work. Can't you just take me off the schedule?"

"You'll have to talk to Tom about that, but he won't be in until Tuesday."

I left the scheduler's office with a pounding in my forehead and no clear idea how to resolve the problem. Calling off was not an option; Argosy employs a point program for call offs, and calling in on a holiday would set me dangerously close to the point of termination. I could take my chances with Tom, but if he refused to take me off the schedule, I would have only two days to find another solution. Every part time dealer was scheduled to work that day, which effectively eliminated the possibility of trading with them. I could trade a full timer, but the odds of finding one willing to sacrifice a holiday off were daunting.

Never tell me the odds. "I am going to find someone to trade with."

In the end, I managed to find somebody to trade shifts, but it was not easy. I asked several people before a nice woman named Kathy helped me out. She agreed, and as she signed the necessary papers, I bathed in the euphoric feeling of victory. All was well in the world, finally.

Fate may laugh at fools with intent, but occasionally the fool gets to laugh back.

The intermission feels surprisingly short. The lights dim once more, and Williams and company return to their respective spots on the stage. The lady beside me has yet to return, and I suspect that the lines for the women's bathrooms are horrendous. Why are bathroom lines always worse for girls?

The second half of the concert begins with Williams's rendition of "Hooray for Hollywood", which is an incredibly appropriate anthem not only for the concert, but also for my weekend. There is something oddly affecting about that tune, for I have discovered that it plays in my head more than anything else I heard at this show. I do not think a day has gone by since the show where I have not found myself whistling the opening snippet.

Here is the point in which I must confess my blatant ignorance of films made before I was born. In a previous Myspace blog (which I may eventually turn into an ongoing blog series), I shamefully admitted that I had never seen just about any movie made before 1980. Therefore, when Mr. Williams introduced his special guest, Stanley Donen, I was one hundred percent clueless about the man. Is he a songwriter? A conductor? A key grip? Perhaps he makes coffee for the London Symphony Orchestra?

A diminutive man enters stage left and walks to the center, where he and Mr. Williams engage in conversation. At first glance, I would have guessed his age at around sixty-five to seventy years, but as the list of projects he was involved in become disclosed, the figure in my head places him at eighty, at the minimum.

It turns out that Donen is a director and choreographer of some of the most memorable musicals from the Golden Era of the genre. He and Williams discuss each movie in length before the orchestra plays a song, and each story provides wonderful insight into the world of filmmaking.

They begin with "You're All the World to Me" from Royal Wedding. In it, a love struck Fred Astaire dances on the walls and the ceiling of his living room. It has been done many times since, but for Director Donen, nobody had tried it before. They pulled it off by designing a stage that could rotate three hundred and sixty degrees. They had to mount a camera to the stage also, which presented a problem: The cameraman still had to operate it. In the end, the cameraman was mounted with the camera, and had to shoot most of the scene hanging upside down.

Donen admits that the one of the most difficult films he made was Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (a movie I have seen, though admittedly it is only because of Jen. It's one of her favorites.) but it was not for technical reasons. He claims that the producers fought with him over the nature of the film. The movie centers around a clan of hillbilly brothers and their quest for love, and the suits argued that singing and dancing was "too gay" for country folk. Williams plays "Bless Your Beautiful Hide", and on the screens, the music synchronizes with the appropriate scene where the country brothers have a dance-off with the city men. The end result is very hetero-friendly. (I love musicals by the way, I do not get the stigma that you cannot be a straight male and enjoy them...unless the movie in question is A Chorus Line.)

The next film they highlight is It's Always Fair Weather, and Stanley explains that Gene Kelly was an excellent skater. He had always wanted to do a dance scene involving roller skates, but had never found a way to incorporate it into a storyline. For "I Like Myself", Kelly is having the best time of his life, and he forgets that he is wearing roller skates. He begins to dance, and he makes moves on skates that look impossible.

In Anchors Aweigh, Gene Kelly dances with Jerry the Mouse of Tom and Jerry fame. Donen claims that they originally wanted to use Mickey Mouse for the scene, but Walt Disney vehemently objected to loaning his character for an MGM movie. The studio decided to use one of their own characters instead.

The final film featured is one of the most popular movies ever. Stanley Donen co-directed Singing in the Rain with its star, Gene Kelly. The title track and the popular scene are showcased, and it amazes me how Williams can synchronize his orchestra up with the action on the screen with near- mathematical precision. I guess I should not be too amazed; I mean, this is what he has been doing all of his life, but to do it in front of a live audience with no chance for a redo is still daunting.

As a bonus treat, Williams asks Donen if he would like to do a dance before he leaves. Donen agrees, and I have to admit: The octogenarian has still got it. I am one-third his age, and he can dance circles around me. Then again, stone gargoyles can dance better than I can, so that is not much of a testament.

Stanley Donen exits to a thunderous round of applause, and Williams continues with a selection of music from the Sabrina remake starring Harrison Ford and Julia Ormond. Williams comments that this piece is special to him because he had the fortune of playing piano on the original version starring Humphrey Bogart and Audrey Hepburn. The music features a solo from Bing Wang. The music is beautiful, but by this point I am seriously longing for some signature John Williams stuff.

Therefore, when next he starts talking about his relationship with George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, I am more than eager to listen.

He salutes them with a medley of music from their films. This he begins with Jaws, and I cannot help but smile when the famous "dun dun dun" streams over the audience. I am reminded of my sister-in-law, who, due to both the movie and the song, has a completely irrational fear of sharks. We live in Ohio, which, as far as I am aware, has never suffered one incident of a shark attack, but still she has a panic attack every time I (unintentionally, of course) flash a photo of a shark in front of her. She cannot even stand to hear the song, and that serves as a testament to the power of both the film and Williams's music.

Next comes the main theme from Star Wars, and the moment the familiar opening began I felt the overwhelming urge to jump up and scream like a twelve year old girl at a Jonas Brothers concert. To hear this music live- and from the Man that created it- is one of the events that I will forever remember. Accompanying the music is a montage of scenes from all six films, but the more entertaining part is the large amount of Force FX light sabers that spring to life. The audience becomes an ocean of red, green and blue neon.

He follows this with a rehash of "The Raiders March", and as much as I love this, I would have preferred it if he would have replaced it with something that was not already performed. Something from Jurassic Park, perhaps.

He finishes the medley with the main theme to E.T., which holds a unique place in my heart. It is one of the few movies that, even to this day, makes me cry whenever I see it. A large part of that is due to Williams's emotional score, as evidenced when I felt my eyes go blurry in a crowd of several thousand people. If that makes me a tool, then it is a title I will happily live with. I love that damned little alien.

John Williams bows to the audience, and exits the stage. His departure is short-lived, as the audience demands more.

His first encore is the awesome "Imperial March" from The Empire Strikes Back. Once again, light sabers flare up. A thick group of them towards the center of the amphitheater even wave their laser swords as if they are conductors' batons. Surreal.

There is a second encore, but for my life I cannot remember what it is. I want to say it is "Marian Ravenwood's Theme", but I could be wrong.

He finishes the show with "Superman's Theme". It is an appropriate finish, a rousing number that represents Williams at his very best. I am sure that every one in the audience, at that moment, felt that they could take to the sky, and the feeling remained with me well after I left the Hollywood Bowl. I was very pleased with the show, even if it did not include some of my favorite scores, such as Jurassic Park or "Hedwig's Theme" from Harry Potter. A very important dream was fulfilled that night, and, like little Elliot as he watches a trail of rainbow exhaust in the sky, the world seems a much more magical place than it did before.

-YHOP

p.s. The videos used in this blog are not mine, I found them on the internet.

Also: Steve Anderson introduced me to this really awesome John Williams tribute.