contributed by Leslie
Where to begin. It was my second to last semester of college and I finally
got to stage manage a mainstage production, Jean Genet’s The Balcony. Months
of rehearsal go by, my ASM is great, my director is fabulous (a little scary at
tech time, but other than that fabulous) and I started dating one of the actors.
Everything else about the show was horrific; I’m convinced it was cursed. You
name it, it happened; designer issues, set not in until preview, diva actors,
horrid tech weeks…I still cringe at the thought of it. But it’s a learning
experience right? Riiiight. Well the set was rather abstract and one set piece
is a rolling balcony that holds four actors about eight or so feet in the air.
My boyfriend played the General and his costume was an amazing uniform that made
him look like the Kaiser. So right before our closing performance, he asks me if
we can bring the balcony on stage so I can take a picture of him on top of it to
give to his family. I say no, because it’ll take too much time to get the
balcony on stage, then all the other actors will want to do it, etc, etc. In his
mind he figures we’ll take the picture off-stage so as to avoid the hassle. So
I’m on stage checking up with everyone, making sure everything is going
smoothly and that the house will be ready to open. My boyfriend comes up to me
and asks me to meet him backstage left to take his picture on top of the
non-counterbalanced balcony. He goes backstage and I get distracted center stage
by my sound crew-head. As we stand there talking we hear a loud, “Shit! Shit!
Shit!” off-stage and see my boyfriend, my actor, my costume and my balcony
falling over and crashing to the floor. The crews immediately run to his aid, I’m
standing center stage stunned and speechless, and he stands and yells, “I’m
fine, get a staple gun!” (Did I mention he’s also a techie?) Did I mention
it was half-hour until the performance? Luckily he was OK and nothing was
sticking out of his arm. Long story short, the show goes on, only fifteen
minutes late and the final performance goes off without a hitch. The next day I
took my boyfriend to the doctor to find that he had a broken radial cap thingy
in his elbow. He was in a sling for about a month. Now I can look back and joke
about the situation and now I know I can handle anything.
