Even if you’re a Broadway dancer in top shape, it’s not easy looking good and staying fit when you’re on the road with a show like Les Misérables.
"Touring is a difficult life because you’re constantly moving," said Trinity Wheeler, production stage manager for the Les Mis touring company, playing through Sunday at the Adrienne Arsht Center in Miami.
"It’s not like you can go to a grocery store and have a kitchen and cook the foods that you want and have a consistent workout schedule. We created something that is consistent for the cast," said Wheeler, who is also a certified trainer. "Eating out every meal and stuff can be challenging to stay healthy. Being healthy and on tour is a goal we all try to accomplish."
Thursday morning, Wheeler held a “Guns of the Barricade” boot camp at Steel Gym in Wilton Manors. The workout session allows cast members and others to stay in shape while they’re on the road, Wheeler said.
The Les Mis touring company has 89 people who travel with the show: cast members, crew and musicians, according to Wheeler.
"It’s a large group of people that have this nomadic lifestyle," he said. "Having fitness incorporated into it, you feel better, you wake up, have more energy. It’s been really great for us as individuals, but also for the show."
Among the touring cast members: Wheeler’s partner, Alan Shaw, who plays Joly. The couple own a house in Fort Lauderdale’s Poinsettia Heights neighborhood.
" Les Mis is three hours long and we do eight shows a week. I realized early on because I’ve been with the show over two years now that if I don’t take care of my body and if I don’t eat right and if I don’t really stay on top of it, I can’t do eight shows a week," Shaw said. "We’re onstage in front of 2,000 people on average every night. You have to look your best. It’s part of our job."