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Messages - On_Headset

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31
The Green Room / Re: On-camera interview
« on: Sep 10, 2013, 09:02 pm »
I think (emphasis on "think") you may be misreading it.

There are people in the world who think being on television (or on the web, etc.) is a sort of treat, and--to me--it sounds like your director was intending it that way. A little reward, a pick-me-up, a nice-job pat-on-the-back kind of thing.

The tricky thing is that, while directors (and actors! especially actors!) tend to be the outgoing gregarious centre-of-attention kind of people who thrive on that kind of reward (especially if it comes as an unexpected surprise!), stage managers tend to be the sorts of people who don't even like being photographed. ("You want me on camera? Oh my. I'll do it--if I have to--but let me get ready first." as opposed to "OOOH! ME NEXT! ME NEXT! Hi, my name is Stephanie and I love ~THEEEEEEE-AT-HRE~!!!!!!!:D!!!!!!")

So. That makes it awkward. Especially because, if I'm onto something here, you've just turned down what your director thought was both a kind gesture and a sort of reward.

32
Sometimes we are confronted by a life-or-death situation. We owe it to ourselves, our coworkers and our employers to be able to recognize and handle these situations with all due seriousness and professionalism.

There are also circumstances under which it's worth "riding" a wave of stress: where that stress will motivate you to do something more quickly, or more thoroughly, or otherwise in some way better.

But if, say, an actor's car breaks down and you end up holding curtain twenty minutes to accomodate it?

That's not worth fussing over.

It's not good. It's not okay. It's unacceptable. It's a serious problem. Many companies have fired actors over less.

But insofar as this problem is within your control, you're not going to address it by pacing nervously and snapping at the rest of the company. Your stressing out and fussing and being curt with coworkers is unproductive, it establishes a sour tone, it makes you look highly unprofessional, and it doesn't get the actor to the theatre any quicker.

My mantra in situations like these: "it's only a show".

Your lead actor is so nervous on opening night that you end up holding the curtain ten minutes so she can vomit in a toilet and pull herself together?

It's only a show. These things happen. Standing behind her pacing angrily and twitching won't get her on stage any more quickly. Learn to recognize these situations--where you can't intervene, where stress is unproductive, where the key elements aren't under your control in the first place, where you could not have been reasonably expected to accommodate this situation, and so on--and learn to let go of them.

It's only a show.

It's only a show.

Your fussing and stressing doesn't help. Let go. It's only a show. A month from now, nobody will remember what happened. It's only a show.

33
One major piece of advice that hasn't been covered: be cool.

This is a difficult show and it's one you should take very, very seriously. But because it's difficult, you're going to need to try extra-hard to be cool: approachable, at ease, comfortable, soothing, calm. Be the SM you think the actors need you to be; try, at all costs, to avoid becoming a stresspuppy or an automaton.

34
When I got my BFA, there were about 15 other people in my graduating "stream". (~85 in my graduating class, but only 14 others in the technology/design program.)

Do you know who got jobs afterwards?

It wasn't the people who had the most prestigious assignments during the BFA program.

It wasn't the people who had the best social networks and got on best with the professors.

It certainly wasn't the people who got the best grades.

It was the people who worked. The people who got themselves on payroll at the university theatres, who worked downtown during their BFA, who apprenticed at summerstock, who got involved with fringe shows, who volunteered with the university amateur dramatics society.

Yes, yes, okay, great: you did a mainstage show and a studio show each year of your BFA program. You and everyone else. What else can you offer? What else did you do? What else is on your CV? (In fact, given the choice between someone who only has a mainstage/studio-per-year BFA, and someone who doesn't have a BFA but can show me that they've worked 8-10 projects per year in a variety of environments, even if those 8-10 are orders of magnitude less prestigious [fringe, storefront, community, amdram, instructional theatre, etc.], many jobs would still go to the latter person.)

The kids who got amazing grades and great assignments but only worked on class-assignment shows fried. They become the waiters and baristas and washup drama teachers. (Not that "drama teacher" is a washup profession, but when you graduate, spend 4-5 years trying to find work, and go back to university to become a drama teacher [because what else can you do with a BFA?], you're a washup.)

Conversely, the kids who only got mediocre grades and relatively unimportant assignments, but worked their tails off to get their fingerprints on as many projects as possible (at the university and elsewhere) are the ones who succeeded.

35
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remember, you don't work for the director, you work for the producer
Dingdingdingdingdingdingding!
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As a pure hypothetical (because I'm not going to allow it to get to this point): is it ever okay, as an SM, to announce a break anyway? Say, go on stage and say that it's break time and it doesn't matter if they're halfway through a scene.
I can hypothetically think of situations where this might be necessary and, as a result, appropriate, but I think these situations would be far better-resolved at the planning and scheduling phase.

If you've got an hour-long scene that can't possibly be interrupted for any reason because it throws everything off and we have to restart from the top and UGH UGH UGH UGH UGH, you should be framing the entire rehearsal schedule around these enormous inconvenient hour-long marathons, not shoehorning them in wherever the director finds convenient.

If the director is unable to prepare a rehearsal schedule which complies with the union rules or the actors' contracts or with company policy (and if you've already had this go-round with them, and if they just refuse to comply), that's a personnel matter: call in the quarterback and go whine at the production office.

36
The Green Room / "Not Another Dream, Ugh!"
« on: Aug 13, 2013, 01:46 pm »
Gaetan Charlbois (a biggish wheel in Canadian theatre crit) has an interesting blog post about (essentially) how dull regional theatre has become:
Quote
Now out of Atlanta, last week, this headline: "Financially strapped Theater [sic] of the Stars cancels season." It's a headline that begs a read. The company couldn't raise money for Little Mermaid and Cats after having already cancelled Anything Goes and Dream Girls. As I read those titles my tears dried fairly quickly. Am I to weep for a lost season that boils down to pandering?; that is nothing but: we-can-usually-sell-tickets-to-most-of-this-crap-so-we-can-produce-more-crap! People - even the most mainstream audience - get tired of same old same old, sometimes.

There's a lot of that in the theatre world. Companies having trouble and try to save the day with a Les Mis or a Cats or whatever hackneyed road-show that is passing through town. And BIGGER IS BETTER. Yes, well...until it's not.
It's an interesting argument, and one I find compelling.

"Why are we doing all this Broadway dreck?"
"Because people buy tickets to that dreck."
"BUT THEY AREN'T!"

A lot of this feels like gloating, and I'm not totally comfortable with the tone--I might not have liked this season, but that's at least a few dozen people getting laid off, and that's not in any way good or deserved--but I do sympathize with the message.

37
The Green Room / Re: Director in Booth!
« on: Jul 31, 2013, 05:58 pm »
Then there's the fact that the show is going to look completely different from an eyrie than it looks from the front row...

38
The Green Room / Re: Director in Booth!
« on: Jul 31, 2013, 02:11 am »
My policy: the director can be present. The director will be given a clipboard and a pen, and will make whatever notes they want. Silently. We can discuss the show afterwards. Not at intermission, not during the curtain call, but afterwards, once the show has well and truly been put to bed.

Beyond that, unless someone is literally about to die, stay in that seat and shut up.

Post Merge: Jul 31, 2013, 02:16 am
Incidentally, if you need to provide a reason why the director needs to shut up and not interfere (and you're uncomfortable saying "BECAUSE IT'S A PRICKISH THING TO DO, YOU DWEEB"), there's an extremely good reason for this, even moving beyond the whole issue of distraction and concentration and juggling other priorities.

During the show, the stage manager must be in control. Having someone hanging out in the booth looking over your shoulder and questioning you and telling you how things ought to operate is going to directly undermine that control: it makes it more difficult for the SM to assert their authority, it makes it more difficult for the SM to feel in-control, and it can reduce the respect that any witnesses have for the SM. All of these are bad things, but they seem to be something to which most directors are oblivious.

Mind you, telling the director that they're no longer in charge of the show might be a recipe for a divafit.  ;)

39
Quote
lucky I am based in NYC, so there is some theatre there
Sorry, haven't heard of it. Is NYC a summerstock town or something?


("Some" theatre? :P )

40
Employment / Re: Thousands in back taxes ride on one question:
« on: Jul 23, 2013, 10:09 am »
So, if, for example, a banker, REALLY LIKES BANKING . . . it's his hobby?
If someone self-identifies as a banker and claims all sorts of banker-related deductions and sets up a little banking window in her kitchen (made out of LEGO and lincoln logs) and sits there all day long waiting for customers to arrive and nobody ever does, then, yes: that person is a hobbyist. (Or a performance artist. YMMV.)

As the article says, they provided a whole list of reasons. Nobody's shutting people down for enjoying their jobs. But when the only thing your "job" seems to provide is pleasure (no livelihood, no savings, no appreciable assets, etc.)... isn't that what we call a hobby?

41
Employment / Re: Thousands in back taxes ride on one question:
« on: Jul 22, 2013, 06:44 pm »
No, there are business that operate in the red for years before they become profitable, and it's still a business - and no one would bat an eye at that.
Yes, and when she becomes a business, that argument might have some gas in it.

But she's a private individual who identifies as self-employed. She's, presumably, claiming all manner of deductions related to her self-employment. (Most self-employed artists do--and the ones who don't, ought to.) In the absence of any evidence that she's making a living at this self-employment, the government does at least have good reason to audit and examine and probe. The purpose of these deductions isn't to make life cushy, it's to allow you to eke out a living. And by her own account... she isn't.

Post Merge: Jul 22, 2013, 06:46 pm
And some, like many commercial theatre ventures, never turn a profit.
When a business doesn't turn a profit and eventually collapses, the shareholders and investors and partners get taken to the cleaners, but there's no real splash damage. Only the people who signed onto or purchased a stake in the enterprise have to wear the failure.

When someone spends several years living without an income, it's the taxpayer who ends up on the hook. (And that's doubly true if, in the mean time, they're claiming deductions.)

42
Employment / Re: Thousands in back taxes ride on one question:
« on: Jul 21, 2013, 06:04 pm »
This is nothing new in my jurisdiction.

It's nothing to do with the amount of pleasure you take, it's that, as the article says, "de Mars did not make a profit in any of the three years audited".

If you don't have any income, then you can't be self-employed. Because, well, you aren't employed. And the proper term for a career which doesn't generate any income is, in fact, "hobby".

43
I bet someone in your life has told you that you should skip university and become a carpenter. (Plumber, tool-and-die maker, paralegal, etc.)

After all (they'll say, in a serious, admonishing tone) I have a cousin who works as a tool-and-die maker and earns 80k just two years out of community college. And anyway (they'll continue) university is worthless. The humanities and the fine arts are pointless. No, no, you should focus on your career. Focus on getting a job. Don't waste your time with a degree you'll never use.

I bet this person exists in your life because this person has existed in literally every college-bound person's life since roughly 1990. And on some level they're right: if your goal here is to earn lots and lots of money and own a nice house and have your butler bring you foie gras on the lido deck of your yacht, you should almost certainly not go into the fine arts and humanities.

But you know what?

People do. Millions and millions of people do. They hear that advice--TURN BACK! HERE THERE BE DRAGONS!--and they ignore it. They aren't ignorant of the choices they're making, but rather they're deciding that, well.

Yes, I know that studying philosophy will mean there's a very real chance I'll end up working at Starbucks. But I'd rather be a barista who reads Nietzsche than a bored, unfulfilled aircraft mechanic.

Yes, I know that studying visual art will mean there's a very real chance I'll end up teaching pottery classes to twelve-year-olds. But I'd rather have the education I need in order to become capable of creating and appreciating beautiful things than a paralegal who idly doodles on her notepad in meetings. ("Hey, that's a pretty nice house, Stacey! You should become an artist or something!")

And, yes: I know that studying theatre will mean there's a very real chance I'll end up working as a waiter. But I have to do theatre. I must do theatre. It calls to me, it makes me smile, and if I don't kick open this door, I'm going to spend the rest of my life wishing I had.

None of this is to say that paralegals or aircraft mechanics or tool-and-die makers are bad people, or unfulfilled people, or sad sacks. Your condescending relatives are right: many of them are quite successful and happy. (And as Matthew Shiner told us years and years ago, doing something you don't really love in order to fund/create time for something you truly love is a perfectly viable gameplan! Nothing wrong with becoming a paralegal who does a fantastic community-theatre Evita!)

But, like, we know this. Anyone who reaches the age of 18 without being absolutely bombarded with advice to the effect of "Don't bother with the subjects you think will fulfil you; go into electrical engineering instead" is such a rare bird that they ought to be put in a case at a museum of natural history. And yet young people defy it. Young people don't go down that path.

Young people, with full knowledge of their circumstances, make their own choices. And if you feel strongly, why should you be different?

Study as much as you can, know as much as you can, make the most well-informed decision you can. You're right: there are major downsides to this career path, and those who make the attempt but fail end up scattered across the Starbucks and Asian-German Fusion Restaurants of the land. But if you want to do it, if you must do it, if this path calls to you and urges you forward, and if you're willing to accept the risk...

(Does it show that I work for a university's Faculty of Fine Arts?  ;))

44
Students and Novice Stage Managers / Re: Invaluable Advice
« on: Jul 10, 2013, 05:11 pm »
Two pieces of advice I've always found useful

Piece 1: Always remember that it's only a show.
With very, very few exceptions, theatre is not a matter of life or death.

F'rinstance, if the show goes up twenty minutes late? Yes, it's inconvenient. Yes, it looks bad. Yes, you ought to examine the reasons and endeavour to fix them. But you know what? We work in live entertainment. The show starts when it starts, and there always comes a point at which we can do nothing more to expedite the process. Don't lose your cool or tear your hair out; make a note, look into it, get it fixed. But right here, right now? It's only a show.


Piece 2: There is no career path.
Okay, okay, there's a progression. You start off as a PA/ASM/apprentice/junior, and you grind and grind and you gradually work your way into more prestigious, better-paying gigs, right? (Hopefully?)

But there's no path.

Former classmate of mine teaches a summer course at a university. Mostly mature/non-traditional students, no theatrical background or experience required, and they essentially do what we'd consider high school-level theatre. (Or community theatre on steroids.) She loves getting to do this. It's the highlight of her year. She has turned down much better-paying, more prestigious work in order to keep herself free to run this class. (And I'm not kidding around here: she was offered a full SM seat at a major summerstock festival which was willing to pay her what most of us would consider a fairly healthy annual salary for a 6-month contract. She turned it down.)

No, she's not earning as much money as she could. No, there's no real prestige in what she does. No, it's not apparent how this advances her career or prepares her for her next job. (She doesn't want to teach theatre, she's not into community theatre, etc.) But she loves it so much that she's willing to make significant sacrifices to keep herself there.

This classmate, who "chooses" to be stuck in an unconventional and non-traditional SM role, is happier and more fulfilled than several colleagues who earn far more money and exist much closer to the centre of the artistic community. I really do envy her. And it's not at all a role she would have chosen coming out of university. (She was, at the time, all about dance.) But I really do envy her.

Her career path isn't one they'll teach you about in Career Management in the Arts or whatever course they'll make you take. But it may be one of the best decisions anyone in my cohort made.

45
The Green Room / Re: Forwarding previous information in emails
« on: Jul 08, 2013, 01:27 am »
As an update of sorts, we just had someone file a grievance because someone higher-up an email chain was careless and didn't excise remarks concerning the person in question, and they subsequently found their way into that person's inbox through this method. (The initial emails were between management discussing this person's conduct and performance, and the conversation continued and continued, and eventually someone was told "Okay, we need to send an email to Person X encouraging them to improve X, Y and Z", and so one was written--but the author of this message was careless and didn't bother excising the earlier discussions from this new message.)

Clear your email trees, guys. It's the right thing to do. If you MUST MUST MUST keep your conversations in a single place, get a gmail account.

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