Author Topic: Scooped Ice Cream on stage  (Read 5181 times)

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BilOregon

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Scooped Ice Cream on stage
« on: May 26, 2016, 12:21 am »
We are doing Scapino! and at the opening of Act II we would like to have scooped ice cream.  I don't really want to use real ice cream, but will if that's the best.  Any suggestions on how to best do ice cream scooped to cones on stage? 

Colored mashed potatoes?  Pre scooped hard frozen ice cream bars?  Softer ice cream so it's easy to scoop?  Any suggestions would be helpful! 

Thanks
Bil

PSMKay

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Re: Scooped Ice Cream on stage
« Reply #1 on: May 26, 2016, 05:51 am »
Does it have to be eaten? How long does it have to be on stage before scooping? Does it need to look good in a cone, or can it vanish below the rim of a dish before serving? Do people have to dance with it?

Tempest

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Re: Scooped Ice Cream on stage
« Reply #2 on: May 26, 2016, 01:26 pm »
Frozen Cool-Whip scoops like ice cream, but is really soft and easy to do. And if they have to eat it, it's relatively low-cal/sugar, for those actors concerned about that.
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BilOregon

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Re: Scooped Ice Cream on stage
« Reply #3 on: May 26, 2016, 02:19 pm »
Does the ice cream have to be eaten?  Sort of.  The cast will carry the ice cream cones around stage and appear to be eating them.  They exit after about 4 pages of script still "eating" the ice cream. 

I'll give the frozen cool whip a try.  I could even color it before it is frozen for different flavors. 

Bil

jhcap

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Re: Scooped Ice Cream on stage
« Reply #4 on: May 30, 2016, 05:13 pm »
I recently worked on a production of She Loves Me, and we used mashed potatoes. They held up well, and our actress found that it didn't effect her singing the way that real ice cream would have.

Best Wishes!!

ambrosialx

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Re: Scooped Ice Cream on stage
« Reply #5 on: Jun 03, 2016, 03:26 pm »
I would again recommend the mashed potatoes. Stickiness is something to be avoided at all costs! And if you make them with water not any dairy they will taste like garbage but will take much longer to spoil.

Good luck!
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BilOregon

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Re: Scooped Ice Cream on stage
« Reply #6 on: Jun 03, 2016, 05:09 pm »
Thank you all! 

We've tried cool whip and ice cream so far.  The cool whip looks really good but made one of the actors gag. (sorry but it made me  ;D )

With the ice cream, we pre-scooped it and then deep froze it.  It was easy to "scoop" and since it is on stage for a relatively short amount of time, it didn't melt. 

I brought up potatoes but that got voted down fairly quickly.  I told them if we have one problem with the ice cream, we're going to potatoes right away.  :)

Bil

leastlikely

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Re: Scooped Ice Cream on stage
« Reply #7 on: Jun 06, 2016, 03:06 am »
I have ice cream in my show right now. Two different servings actually. One is a sundae on a dish so that's not a concern. But the other is in a waffle cone and is also on stage for a little over four pages like yours. And we've had no dripping problems.

We leave our ice cream in the freezer until a couple scenes before it needs to enter (off the top of my head I'm not sure of the exact timing) at which point the tub of ice cream gets transferred to the refrigerator, so it becomes just a tiny bit soft and very easy to scoop. So we scoop it into the cone while it's soft, then stick the completed cone in the freezer (standing up inside a glass) until immediately before its entrance.

We went back and forth about putting a paper wrapper on the bottom of the cone, but then decided to go with a folded paper napkin wrapped around it instead. That way if it starts dripping at all there's already a napkin onstage to clean it up with. But we haven't had any issues yet!