Author Topic: I could have kissed them!  (Read 35252 times)

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SM19

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #45 on: Mar 19, 2009, 05:45 pm »
I could have kissed one of my actors when every night she came in and complimented me on the fact that I was doing an amazing job. She was also the one who brought me a chocolate one night and I almost cried lol. Then she'd asked me if I ate and I said no, at which point she ran out the door and went to get me food. I love her :D She's definitely on my crew next year (lol she's already asked hahaha)
Second Place in a Stage Managers Competition = Half of an Award Winning Stage Manager! :P

crazylady

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #46 on: Mar 20, 2009, 11:53 am »
I was just reading through some of these because I needed a pick me up and realized most of these particular posts are when people acknowledge us for 5 seconds or thank us for our work. How sad is that that we don't expect that from people? We just sort of accepted that no one will recognize the hard work we do and continued on our way doing what we do. But that says a lot about us as people too. Kudos to Stage Managers! We hold the torch high when no one else will or thinks to!
“Perhaps, therefore, ideal stage managers not only need to be calm and meticulous professionals who know their craft, but masochists who feel pride in rising above impossible odds.”
                                           - Peter Hall

SM19

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #47 on: Mar 21, 2009, 07:39 pm »
I think we don't expect to be acknowledged because we're so used to the position, or we see the position as being very independent and we don't "need" to be complimented...I agree. It's very sad that we don't expect it. I know that I compliment everybody working within the theatre and I've only had one person compliment me this year who wasn't a director/theatre manager. I also believe that the other positions that are in the theatre (actors, singers, dancers, crew, etc.) are very dependent roles. They depend on the compliments to keep them going while we are the ones who have to dish them out. oh well ... it makes those compliments go a whole lot further! and I appreciate them more :D
Second Place in a Stage Managers Competition = Half of an Award Winning Stage Manager! :P

LCSM

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #48 on: Mar 22, 2009, 06:10 pm »
It's also in part because other positions in theatre lend themselves more easily to compliments (acting, designing, etc.) The end product is concrete and obvious: you know if there's a set onstage or if an actor performed a monologue. As SMs our end product is to make sure everyone else has an end product, which is more difficult for someone to recognise. Just think about how hard it is for us to explain to other people what we do.  ;)

gNat

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #49 on: Mar 25, 2009, 01:17 am »
. . . when I spent a good 45 minutes freaking out about Q2Q (beforehand, with the director) and feeling totally unprepared.  And the cast of 26 college students, at least 10 of whom were music majors who had never done theater before, hit every cue change, didn't wander off, listened to what we were asking for (even when the mic went out), and all in all made it the smoothest, easiest Q2Q I've ever been involved in. 

You rush a miracle man, you get rotten miracles.
- The Princess Bride

sasquatch_223

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #50 on: Apr 11, 2009, 12:16 am »
I could have kissed J when she brought brownies (homemade!) to rehearsal (a full-cast run-through).  The person who was supposed to bring the snacks was sick on that day (he also happened to be a lead character).  J was a total lifesaver, and I'm sure anyone who knows how hungry everyone is at rehearsal would agree.  (I might be a bit biased because she let each of the crew members have two brownies, while the actors had to make do with one apiece.)
Past: A Christmas Carol--actor (party guest)/stage hand
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Thespi620

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #51 on: Apr 15, 2009, 09:34 am »
I could have kissed my entire cast and crew last night! I'm working on The Pillowman right now and last night we had to build some set pieces, make a few props, spray paint our green girl's clothing, clean out our green room, set up our lights before filming a segment for our Little Jesus, running  Act 3, and figuring out shifts.  I sat there for the first part of rehearsal stringing our backdrops, my guys got there and immediately got to work, we finished prop/set needs about a half hour later than we'd hoped, but almost everything was done.  while we filmed in the space, I sent my boys to the green room to line through acts I and III.  twenty minutes into filming I pop in to check on them, expecting to have to give a pep talk on how they shouldn't be goofing off, and they're almost done with act III.  I leave after they've started I, filming goes incredibly smoothly, then we run transitions without a hitch, and act III is close to perfect.  To top it all off, as I'm thanking them for their patience before they leave, my Ariel turns to me and says, "thank you for everything. really, thank you so much. you're amazing" and gives me a huge hug. 

I floated all the way home, and I'm still on a high from my glorious cast. ;D
[The SM is] a very gifted, slightly eccentric master mechanic [keeping] a cantankerous, highly complex machine running at top efficiency by talking to it, soothing it, & lovingly fixing whatever is broken. 
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yesterdaysroses

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #52 on: Apr 18, 2009, 11:04 am »
I could have kissed one of my cast members.

We had a fundraising/publicity concert last night for the show I'm currently working on, bare. It's the annual freshman class musical and as such, we're not a recognized group by the university and can't get any funding from the theatre department like other student theatre groups. Our fundraising/publicity director had organized the event with the cast performing two songs, an on-campus dance troupe performing, and a popular on-campus a cappella group performing. We were locked out of the tech booth, couldn't find enough mics for the stage, the amp for the accompanist's keyboard wasn't working, and a few people were late showing up.

The fund/pub director was panicking a bit (understandably) but then he started taking it out on the cast, shouting at them and ordering them around. God love the cast, but they're flaky. In the three weeks we've been rehearsing, I've figured out what it takes to get them to do stuff, so I say to fund/pub, "Hey, I'm the stage manager, I'll take care of the cast. You focus on getting into the tech booth." I turned around to start getting the cast to do stuff and the fund/pub director makes some snarky comment that I didn't catch all of, but that at least one member of the cast did. The cast member that did hear sees that I'm a little tweaked about it, walks over to me, and tells me, "No matter what anyone says, you're fantastic at what you do. You're the most professional one on the team and you're the best stage manager I've worked with."

And then I gave her a big hug.

kiwitechgirl

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #53 on: Apr 24, 2009, 08:44 am »
Not so much an "I could have kissed them" moment, but one of those lovely moments that make you feel happy - so this seemed like a good place to share it!  I was having a chat with a couple of guys on my crew tonight, and we were talking about how we got our starts in theatre.  One of them was saying that something that really influenced him in going into the industry was being given the "best backstage crew" award at an event we have here called Stage Challenge - he'd been crew chief for his school's entry.  I suddenly remembered an outstanding crew and crew chief that we'd had through the year that I ASMed the Stage Challenge - I realised it was the same school that this guy had been to, and so I asked him what year it was - sure enough, it was the same guy!  He's now a fully-fledged and very well respected professional technician (if horrendously cynical for one so young!) - nice to know that the award really did mean that much to him!  It also turned out that the other guy had been the runner for the event that year - I shouldn't really be surprised, because the theatre scene here is not huge, but still funny when things like that come almost full-circle!

missliz

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #54 on: Apr 30, 2009, 05:37 pm »
...when my cast said "Sure, we'll come in half an hour early to help you set up."
I personally would like to bring a tortoise onto the stage, turn it into a racehorse, then into a hat, a song, a dragon and a fountain of water. One can dare anything in the theatre and it is the place where one dares the least. -Ionesco

shanakathleen

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #55 on: Apr 30, 2009, 11:14 pm »
As an ASM, I had to collect and return valuables every night. Because it's a university setting, people really didn't bother to put anything in them, and I collected and returned empty envelopes for about two weeks. Then for one performance, every guy in the cast put everything that would fit into  their valuables envelopes-it got so heavy that I needed help to carry it out of the dressing room! And when I came back at the end of the night to return them, they all applauded. It was nice to know that even if they didn't take adventage of one of my jobs, they appreciated that I did it every night.
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Bwoodbury

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Re: I could have kissed them!
« Reply #56 on: May 01, 2009, 04:23 pm »
Aw, Shana, of course our boys did that. What a great dressing room!