SM: the musical

[sarahbear42]

Note from Moderator:
This topic is split from "The 12 Days of Christmas thread" found here:
http://smnetwork.org/forum/index.php/topic,4198.0.html
~nmno

That was fun and I think we just wrote the big Act 1 finale number for Stage Managers: The Musical 

Now there's a fun and/or scary idea... can you imagining being the "real" SM on that show?

Hmmm... visions of 20 tapdancing stagehands...

[Thespi620]

That was fun and I think we just wrote the big Act 1 finale number for Stage Managers: The Musical 

Now there's a fun and/or scary idea... can you imagining being the "real" SM on that show?

Hmmm... visions of 20 tapdancing stagehands...

I think SM: The Musical would have to be entirely produced, directed, and acted by SMs, past or present.  I'm not sure I could handle watching actors pretend to be/understand SMs....too painful to try to explain exactly how we work.

[cprted]

Hows this for a plot?  An ASM arrives from a small midwestern repertory theatre and tries to make it big on Broadway.  In spite of some initial set backs, one of the big shot SMs is sidelined and our spunky would-be SM gets his/her chance at the big leagues and knocks it out of the park! 


Darn!  Thats 42nd Street. 

Edited by nmno for content.

[sarahbear42]

Hows this for a plot?  An ASM arrives from a small midwestern repertory theatre and tries to make it big on Broadway.  In spite of some initial set backs, one of the big shot SMs is sidelined and our spunky would-be SM gets his/her chance at the big leagues and knocks it out of the park! 


Darn!  Thats 42nd Street. 

Edited by nmno for content.

Oh, come on, all the best shows are just reiterations of other shows.

But could you find enough SM's who would be willing to act? Or would you end up with actors who could say "I SM'd once in college" (ugh ugh ugh nothing more frustrating than an actor who thinks they've stage managed)

[crazylady]

I think you could actually, since we all feel that actors would never get it right (of course, because we think we are the only ones who can do our jobs right!). You would also have to throw in an electrician, the td, the designers, a director and like one or 2 actors that do EVERYTHING a horrible actor could possibly do (the actors are of course dating each other). Oh, and some of the scenes would have to take place during the smoke break.

Wait wait wait! You could totally do a murder mystery thing or alfred hitchock or something, except on the line of, the missing prompt book! Omg, we are so writing this. It's gonna be the best musical ever.

[Lizzie]

You'd have scenes in the crew room, booth/prompt desk, production office, fly floor, grid ...

Some sort of dance number done in complete silence, by people in black, doing a super-complicated prop-and-scenery change, is floating round my head.

[Amie]

This is, by far, the funniest thread I've read!

[sarahbear42]

Some sort of dance number done in complete silence, by people in black, doing a super-complicated prop-and-scenery change, is floating round my head.

Yes! As the opening number. Perhaps with each SM at some point putting a piece of paper on a giant callboard flown in at the crescendo... when all the paper's on it, it forms the show's logo.

Perhaps a finger-snapping gang fight, road crew vs. house crew, to add tension?

[cprted]

Riggers repelling down the proscenium?  Dancing carps?  Ohhhh ... "The Circular Saw Ballet!"

[Thespi620]

ASMs racing each other to spike the stage? a printer on a downstage edge firing out line note pages throughout the show? The Ballad of the Lost Pencils?

[BLee]

SM the musical would be done backwards showing the backstage while a "musical" was going on the "stage". You would see the scene changes from the wrong side and all the hijinks of props being in the wrong place and essentially all the possible mistakes that could be made.

The main plot is the ASM is trying to run things backstage and doesn't think she could ever manage the stress of an actors life so she is working backstage. Then the lead actress gets hurt either just before the second act or at the 10 minute call and understudy is nowhere to be found so the ASM is pushed onstage to perform.

The hit song "Call the Understudy" (think Slings & Arrows) sung by the leading male on a side plot...

[Amie]

Riggers repelling down the proscenium?  Dancing carps?  Ohhhh ... "The Circular Saw Ballet!"

Oh, the classic ballet dream sequence, eh?

[tempest_gypsy]

And of course, the lighting design will all be done in dark blue, or dark red, with a bit of spill coming on stage from the "stage" in the wings.

[allenah]

You could have a "fight call" where the actors completely forget the choreography and end up injuring the lead....that's how the ASM could be needed.

[LCSM]

I immediately thought of people suspending themselves Cirque du Soleil like from the fly lines wearing black spandex and doing complex body moves.