Keillor rules the ‘Prairie Home’ kingdom

Stage manager Albert Webster may be the hardest-working man in Lake Wobegon. He books the out-of-town gigs — anywhere from one-third to one-half of the season's 36 performances. He handles all arrangements for the troupe's yearly cruise, when the actors and musicians entertain a sold-out luxury liner for a week.

Then there's his real job: keeping the show on schedule, despite morphing dialogue and disappearing songs.

At 3 p.m. Webster still doesn't have a script for tonight's performance. He never really gets a final one, just a succession of marked-up pages as the day wears on. Webster gets each version to actors Sue Scott, Tim Russell and sound-effects guy Tom Keith.

"A lot of it's off the top of their heads," Webster jokes, "and other body orifices."

Like most of the cast, he lives nearby. (Drummer Arnie Kinsella, a wry and tiny man barely visible behind his high-hat cymbals, commutes from New York's Staten Island.) "We all come here every weekend to do a really fun job," Webster says.

Where else could a group of actors and musicians put on a radio show featuring renowned guests like actress Meryl Streep, author Calvin Trillin, musician Bonnie Raitt, comedy bits, gospel songs, audience sing-alongs and poetry readings?

At 3:45 p.m Keillor is having second thoughts. "I'm going to scratch 'Teardrop,'" he says. "It's gone."

He debates bandleader Dworsky about whether he's singing the right notes. "How do I know that you're right and I'm wrong?" asks Keillor. Dworsky hands him the score. "Oh, the sheet music," Keillor drawls. That little ol' thing.

The actors' call is for 4:30 p.m., but Scott is stuck in a traffic jam. Russell and Keith wait downstairs in the green room.

Another chance for 'Teardrop'
At 5 p.m. Keillor announces: "I'm thinking of restoring 'Teardrop,'" he says. "Try it."

The band obliges. "If he brings you happiness, then I wish you both the best," sings frequent musical guest Prudence Johnson.

No, Keillor decides after a few bars. "That's it," he says. "It's gone."

On to "Loving You," whose lyrics Keillor has rewritten. Now it's an ode to erupting children. He rhymes diarrhea with bad tortillas. Next verse: "Pools of vomit in my lap. Great big chunks. Of your lunch."

There's plenty of potty talk on "Prairie Home Companion." Much ado about poop and boogers and the various vagaries of advancing age — incontinence, for example, and its slippery slide into Depends. There is constant work for the sound-effects guys (Keith and Fred Newman) in simulating audible flatulence.

Such pranks never fail to delight audience members possessing the sense of humor of a 10-year-old boy. There's lots of these folks in the crowd. Many have gray hair.

At 6:30 p.m., the actors are rehearsing. Show time in 90 minutes.

To his sound-effects table, Keith has added shoes (he buys very old pairs at thrift shops because they have harder soles and make more noise) and three pieces of black fabric.

There also are miniature doors with metal knobs, a dead bolt lock, a rotary dial telephone (to get that old-fashioned, metallic brr-iinn-gg) and a box of small stones (in which he will walk his palms to simulate footsteps on a gravel road).

A gaggle of talkative geese
For a skit about migrating, talkative Canada geese, Keith distributes the fabric swatches. The idea is for the actors to snap them like accordions, thereby creating the sound of flapping wings.

They look silly doing it. That's Keillor's point. It's a sight gag for the theater audience. The folks listening at home won't know.

And while they're winging it, Scott, Russell and Keith take a moment to practice honking like geese.

For the next 30 minutes or so, they run through other bits, including a scene from Cafe Boeuf, where the patronizing waiter speaks in bad puns and French-accented gibberish (it says so in the script: "French Gibberish"). "What wine goes with zee pea-nuht buhterr and jellie sandweech? Why zee pea-nuht new-arrr, but of course. Heh heh heh."

Keillor listens with a faraway look. His mouth hardens into a perfectly shaped, upside-down U. This happens when he's not crazy about the way his lines are being read.

Keillor has written his monologue, but he rarely lets anyone see it. It's all in his head.

Ten minutes to show time; the house is full.

In his tiny dressing room, Keillor changes into a white shirt and black pants. Then he paces, fiddling with the knot of his red tie, which matches his red socks and his red shoes — the uniform of every show.

He slips on a black jacket, brushes the lapels and takes a sip of water. He strides across the hardwood floor to center stage and turns to face the Shoe band.

"Tony, white spot please," he says to an unseen light technician. He lifts his arms and nods to Dworsky at the piano, who plunks out the well-known notes that begin the show's theme song.

"Oh, hear that old piano," sings Keillor, "from down the avenue ..."

The audience claps and whistles. The noise grows thunderous.

Curtain up.

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