Jones Beach and the Disastrous Road to Jimmy Fallon

View from the back of the venue

We woke up in Jones Beach, New York. And I mean "in." We stepped off the tour bus into high tide with water up to our ankles. I consider myself a 'roll with the punches' kind of girl but dropping your foot into cold water  minutes after you wake up does not start the day off right. The air was damp and chilled, a storm was inevitable but we crossed our fingers that it wouldn't rain out the show.

The venue was amazing, 14,000 seats stacked on a steep incline looking down onto a massive stage. I hate to admit I didn't appreciate it on my way in, weaving through mazes of puddles, finding our way to higher ground, even my attempts at the most graceful ballet leaps left me with soaking pajamas.

And then a miracle happened. 

We walk into the dressing room and it was huge. 

It also smelled weird but I didn't care. There was an oversized sectional and a love seat, ottomans, a big TV (with cable) and another mini room next door that was the size of the band's usual dressing rooms. Daniel Wayne made the small room his studio for the day and I tried not to distract him too much while he wrote. When you are basically making each dressing room your temporary home, it is such a treat when you have enough seats for everyone and room to breathe plus having television on a rainy day was icing on the cake. I normally spend most of the day wandering the city but the venue was located in a semi-isolated area not to mention the storm blowing in. We all curled up and watched a marathon of Kitchen Nightmares while the boys were in and out of promo. Somedays, you just need a day like that. 

For the show that night, the cast of Impractical Jokers pulled a prank right before the band went on. ID was in on it but basically two of the cast members had to go out on stage with no musical experience, in "rockstar" attire and pretend like they were the opening band. After a couple "songs" they got the hook from Shakes, Imagine Dragon's stage manager. Pretty entertaining stuff. Impractical Jokers takes place in NY so you could tell a lot of the New Yorkers in the audience either knew what was going on or were extremely polite to the terrible performers. 

Impractical Jokers. Note the zebra leggings.

Imagine Dragon's set was so powerful. I didn't know that the venue was completely sold out until right before they went on. We were told that the venue normally leaves the top corners of the nosebleed section unsold but Live Nation decided to put them on sale to see what would happen and sure enough: 14,000 tickets sold. Generally, it's more difficult to hear the audience singing along in outdoor venues but I had no problem at Jones Beach. I stood on a platform looking over the stage with a great view of the audience. During "30 Lives" thousands of people turned on the flash of their phone and swayed side to side. The silence in the audience along with swaying lights was one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen. 

After the show, I came into the dressing room sure the band would be celebrating one of their largest and most successful show to date. Instead, I found them diagnosing mistakes and how they could improve upon them. They are not always this analytical after performances but they are very in-tune with each other and their show each night and when it is any less than their standards they are very aware. Even if no one else notices, including me. The rest of the team and myself thought the show went beautifully and the audience went crazy. The band started to come around after seeing our reactions and also an overwhelming amount of positive tweets that came in describing their performance. And I thought ballerinas were perfectionists. 

We took the bus into Manhattan that night to stay in a hotel before Jimmy Fallon the next day. We didn't end up getting into town until 2:30 in the morning, so when we got into the hotel lobby we were more than ready to crawl into bed. Unfortunately, it took us a half-hour of unsuccessful reservation searching and phone calls to realize that somehow we were booked for the hotel the next night and not the night we showed up...and they only had the presidential suite available...and there was ten of us. So we found a Marriott close by that could house us but the bus driver took us to the Marriott Marquee instead of the Marriott Renaissance so for the second time we wandered up to the lobby only to be turned away. I thought the boys were gonna loose it, because they all knew how early they had to be up to soundcheck. Third time's a charm and after many roundabout detours we found a place to stay. We were asleep by 4. 

Hotel lobby; snot light fixtures

The band and crew got up early and went to Fallon in the morning for camera blocking and soundcheck and spoiled me, got to sleep in another hour. I grabbed breakfast to-go in Times Square, where our hotel was and wandered around for a little while in the area before I had enough of the crowds. I knew Bryant Park was close and so I thought that would be a nice place to enjoy my food. I ended up sitting on the stairs, people watching and taking random surveys from NYU students. Why not, I've been in their shoes. 

Bryant Park

After a little more walking (it's what I do), I met the boys at 30 Rock for the taping. Let me say that again 30 ROCK. Not only do I love the show, 30 Rock, but SNL (mostly old-school SNL)has been my favorite show since I could remember, it was the only thing my dad would let me stay up to watch. Being in that building was a dream. I walked by Jimmy Fallon as he was doing a photo shoot in one of the small dressing rooms and it was awesome.

The show was so fun! My favorite late night show to date. In the beginning of the episode, Fallon said that although some people may think "Get Lucky" or "Blurred Lines" is the song of the summer but he believes it is "Radioactive." Then he began to dub-step and and sing the song while pretending to hit a giant drum. We all watched this from the dressing room and couldn't believe how much he hyped the band.

Play at 8 minute and 20 seconds: "Crank up your TV"

I stood in the back of the theatre while the band performed. They really gave it all on that tiny stage but I couldn't take my eyes off Fallon who rocked out for the entire song. Still pretending to hit his giant drum. Incredible. I wish the camera showed him. Here is the live Performance of "Radioactive."

After the show, we went to dinner at Nobu 57. I have never had such incredible Japanese in my life. We got some special dishes brought to us by the chef and some other classics that we ordered and shared. Wagu beef, sashimi, crab, crispy rice and spicy tuna (my favorite), dessert sampler and so much more. Let's just say, they had to roll me out of the restaurant. I feel so lucky to get the chance such great food.