Milestone - 40 years of Stern's "Stage Management"

[PSMKay]

I have the privilege to occasionally hear from Lawrence Stern via email. As you probably know, Stern is the author of one of the most seminal textbooks on stage management. He's now 80 years old and has been in ill health for the past several years, but he's still in the world and promoting stage management as he is able. He has included SMNetwork in the past several editions of "Stage Management" and has always been very supportive of what we do here.

Today I received the following story from him about how "Stage Management" came to be published, and its history since then. I thought you guys might find it interesting and got his permission to print it here.

April of 2015 is the 40th anniversary of the publication of Stage Management, a college textbook, written by Lawrence Stern. 

Here’s the story: 

In the late 60’s, after working as a stage manager in the Los Angeles area and in Sacramento, I started to direct in little theaters.  I found that the stage managers assigned to help me did not know what to do.  Not finding an instruction manual in the library, I assembled a crude manual made up of examples of my past work. When the manual had been “tested” by a few novice stage managers, I sent a feeler letter to 18 publishers of theater books.  Two responded favorably with requests for an outline and two chapters.

While negotiating with Allyn & Bacon, Inc., I ran into Ray Bradbury in the lobby of the Coronet Theatre on La Cienega in Los Angeles, where Ray’s one act plays were being staged.  I had met Ray years before when I stage managed his first produced one-act, The Anthem Sprinters, at Actors Studio West in Los Angeles.  I told Ray that I had a manual going on stage management and Ray asked to see it.

Ray’s office in Beverly Hills was very small, and seemed even smaller because visitors had to find their way around Ray’s bicycle to get to his desk.  The visitor’s chair was covered with books, which Ray removed and added to the piles on his desk.  Ray quickly turned the pages of the loose-leaf ms, and asked, “Do you have an agent?”  I did not.  Ray phoned his agent in New York City.

Ray’s agent did not want to represent me because, he said, my book would sell 100 copies at most and I would resent having to pay him 10% of my royalties.  But he did offer some good advice about what to ask for as adjustments to any standard contract that I might be offered.

I asked Ray if he would write the preface. He did and I sent it to Allyn & Bacon. They sent me their standard contract and I asked for the adjustments that Ray’s agent had suggested. Got two out of three.

A&B asked for revisions of the ms, and I rewrote several chapters (in the days before word processing) on an IBM Selectric, using lots of white-out. The first hard-cover edition was well received. From a small parochial college in Florida, the head of the theater arts department wrote that henceforward Stage Management would be their SOP (Standard Operating Procedure), their “backstage bible.” 

A&B was pleased after the second edition in soft cover, to see Stage Management become the best seller on their theater list.  Every three or four years A&B asked for a new edition.  With every new edition, A&B jacked up the price of the book. After the first few editions, I was amazed that sales continued to be good when books on the same subject were now competing at one third the price.

A&B was purchased by Esquire, Inc., in 1981.  In 1983, Esquire was sold to Gulf+Western (Paramount Studios), and A&B became part of Simon & Schuster's education division. Pearson purchased the education and reference divisions of Simon & Schuster in 1998.  These changes brought no changes to continued requests for new editions or to the continuing royalty checks, now from Pearson.

(On March 23, 2015, I received word that Pearson had sold my title to Taylor & Francis.  Is this the end of a 40 year run?)

In 2009, Stage Management was printed in Chinese by Peking University Press.

In 2008, I was hit with chronic fatigue and asked friend Alice O’Grady to help me with the 9th (2009) and 10th (2013) editions.  Alice had used my book to stage manage at a little theatre in Boerne, Texas.

There have been many rewards over forty years, like hearing from college instructors that they studied my book when they were students and now recommend it to their students.  For recent editions, I have contacted many Broadway stage managers to ask if they will share their expertise with the next generations.  Several said they studied my book in college and are happy to contribute.

A few years ago, I stopped at a gas station in Pollock Pines (population 6,400), CA. The clerk took a look at my credit card and asked, “Are you the Lawrence Stern who wrote Stage Management?” He told me that he was taking an acting class when his instructor asked him to stage manage a show and handed him my book. “Your book saved my butt.”  Wow! Recognized in Pollock Pines!

Do you have any stories about your first encounter with Stern's book? Have you used it in class? Out of class? Which was the first version you owned? (I have a 2nd ed. version from 1982 that I found second hand back in the late 90's, and the 9th and 10th eds that were sent to me gratis as thanks for SMNetwork. I had an 8th ed as well, but gave it away to a student in need.)

[DeeCap]

My college professor back in 1993 lent me a copy when I volunteered to stage manage my first show. I read it cover to cover, and like what the clerk said at the gas station, it did save my butt. I enjoyed the easy style in which he wrote in. For me its the book that started it all.

[Lauren]

The TD of the second show I ever stage managed way back in high school lent me a copy of the 8th edition, and I loved and read and re-read that book for as long as he'd let me keep it. Definitely a huge game changer for a high schooler with no SM's around to really look up to. Always wonderfully written, and easy to read.

[hbelden]

In 1998, when I realized that if I wanted to earn a living in theatre I should give up the idea of acting, I got a job as an ASM for a very small theatre in San Francisco.  Walked into Adobe Bookstore in the Mission on my way home, and bought a used copy of Stern's 2nd Edition for $7, I think.  Much of my approach (even today) to the work is due to that weekend I devoured Stern's book from cover to cover, and immediately applied everything I'd learned to the show I was on.  I've since purchased two more editions, I think, at full price; and continue to unreservedly recommend it to any who ask.

[MandalynM]

Not only do I use this book for myself, I also teach from it. I have read the 8th, 9th and now 10th edition cover to cover. Recently the chair of our department retired and handed me a first edition of the book! Its probably completely out of date, but I love that I will always have the first and the last edition! I can not tell you all how important this book as been to my education. Thank you for the post!

Mandi

[Maribeth]

I bought a copy of the 7th edition for a stage management class in college, and read it cover to cover. I especially loved the anecdotes from actual stage managers- it really made the "hypotheticals" of learning stage management real for me. I was incredibly excited a number of years later when I had the opportunity to work with one of the SMs quoted!

The phrase "What's your earthquake plan?" is one of my favorite lines from the book and really sparked my interest in knowing the "emergency plan" at the theatre.

[PSMKay]

Quickie update - received word from Lawrence yesterday that the 11th edition of "Stage Management" has been approved by the new publishers. The new edition will be in color, and SMNetwork will be mentioned in the websites section again.

[kdshort1]

It was a required text in my Theatre and Arts Management class in college - I got the book in the mail and read it cover to cover in an hour.  I keep it in my SM bag. 

I believe my edition is either 8 or 9 - this was only two years ago. 

I share it with all my newbie ASM's that I have.

[killerdana]

I have an 8th? edition that I keep at home for reference. Bought it full price about 10 years ago. I just looked at the copy I keep in my office at work. I pulled it our of a box of theatre books that had been sitting in storage for many years, as we have no room for a theatre library at our school. Turns out it's a second printing of the 1st edition. Pretty cool.

[Fisheje198rm]

Quickie update - received word from Lawrence yesterday that the 11th edition of "Stage Management" has been approved by the new publishers. The new edition will be in color, and SMNetwork will be mentioned in the websites section again.

any idea when it will be released to the  public?

[PSMKay]

The release I signed said "end of this year" (2015) but everything I'm seeing related to the 11th edition's ISBN says it will be out Nov 1 2016.

If you would like to track it, the Hardcover ISBN is 9781138124479 and the softcover ISBN is 9781138124462.