Messages

121

The Green Room / Re: Achieving a Professional Understanding

« on: May 06, 2011, 11:46 pm »

My best friend is an actor.  It was an instantaneous friendship when we met on a show a few years ago.  I don't remember now if it was his idea or mine, but we came up with the concept of "Friend Renee" and "SM Renee" (and Actor BFF/Friend BFF) to establish who we were talking to.  We've gotten so good at it now that we can flip on a dime as to whether we're engaged in a conversation as SM and actor or as two friends.  I don't treat him any differently than I do any other actor.  Others are generally aware that he and I are close, but there's definitely no favoritism exhibited.  Over the years I've had a few other actors who I'm friendly with adopt the same sort of routine.  It's a careful balancing act, but it is possible to be a friend and an SM, and it can be extremely rewarding when you're able to master it. 

122

The Green Room / The Onion - White House to Hold Second Auditions This Week For "Guys and Dolls"

« on: Apr 06, 2011, 07:03 pm »

Gotta love The Onion!!

http://www.theonion.com/articles/white-house-to-hold-second-auditions-this-week-for,19900/

123

Tools of the Trade / Re: OCR software

« on: Mar 22, 2011, 03:35 pm »

For my latest script, I used FreeOCR v3.0, which was a free download from cnet.  Overall, I'm extremely satisfied with how well it converted the text.  I was provided a .pdf copy of the script from the producer which I then converted.  You do have to convert page by page, but I was able to convert a 70 page script to Word in under 10 minutes.  I really liked that you could select columns of text, so I didn't have to rescan the script to be single pages (the .pdf had two pages of script per page).  Once in Word, the editing process went pretty quickly.  Text was fairly accurate except for sections in italics, and even that was pretty good.  Total editing/formatting time was under 6 hours, which is the fastest I've been able to edit a script (and WAY faster than typing). 

124

The Green Room / Do you add a personal touch to your booth?

« on: Feb 25, 2011, 01:45 pm »

An actor came up to the booth to visit me before a show and was surprised that I hadn't added some sort of personal touch to the booth, much like the actors decorate their dressing room mirrors.  I had never really thought about it before.  Do you decorate your booth in anyway?  Hang/post a picture?  Have a special item that you must have with you in the booth when you call a show? 

125

Students and Novice Stage Managers / Re: Preset before performance

« on: Feb 04, 2011, 08:27 am »

One of the best $5 investments I ever made was in a bound sheet protector.  Basically, it is 10 sheet protectors that are bound together with one three-hole punched edge.  I could keep my pre/post-show checklist, props checklists, run sheet, a contact sheet and a calendar all together in one big packet.  I could use a dry or wet erase marker on the checklists to reuse them.  And the packet is much smaller than a binder and could fit on a clipboard.  I usually just clip in the back couple of pages (contact sheet/calendar) and can still flip through the rest. 

Check out Presets and Run Sheets on the Uploaded Forms board for some examples of preset lists. 

126

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: Wandelprobe

« on: Jan 31, 2011, 07:59 am »

While my producer likes to call it a "wandelprobe," my musical director likes to call it a "work-through with the band."  We typically hold ours the day before we start tech but the actors are in mics so that sound can begin setting preliminary levels.  I sit by the musical director so that I can call holds for him as necessary and keep us on schedule.  We use everything that we have available to us in terms of set and props, especially since sound is working (but I'm in a non-union house).  The musical director sets the priorities for the rehearsal, and the director and choreographer generally watch and take notes as we generally don't stop unless the musical director needs to. 

Talk to your director, musical director/conductor and production manager about the expectations for the wandelprobe. 

127

The Green Room / Re: This one goes to Eleven!

« on: Jan 14, 2011, 11:04 pm »

In January of 2000, I was a senior in high school and had not discovered stage management, but I did know I was going to college to study theatre.  I was probably in the midst of preparing college applications.

Happy birthday, SMNetwork, and thanks PSMKay for all of your hard work over the years!!

128

The Green Room / Re: Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark

« on: Jan 05, 2011, 11:48 pm »

For a bit of a laugh on this serious topic, check out the recent Onion article: Nuclear Bomb Detonates During Rehearsal for SpiderMan

129

The Green Room / "An Actor Postpones"

« on: Dec 25, 2010, 11:42 am »

http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/an-actor-postpones/Content?oid=5960482

Fun article about how actors spend their time offstage during a show. 

130

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / COMMUNICATION: Giving notes to young actors

« on: Dec 21, 2010, 11:31 pm »

I'm currently working on a production of Annie and am working with 13 young girls.  We're about 6 weeks into the run and some of the girls are getting to the point where they are bored and coming up with new things to do onstage.  I give them notes like I give notes to the adults in the company when what they are doing exceeds the world of the show that the director created.  However, they'll take one note and come up with something new in a different place the next show.  I have reiterated to them and have spoken with their parents about the importance of doing the show that the director created and to stay focused when they are onstage.  A member of the adult company has suggested that I figure out a way to punish/scare the girls into behaving onstage.  While I understand the actor's frustrations, in watching the show it is not as bad as they are making it out to be and it is really not my style (nor do I particularly feel it's my place) to punish the girls if they do something wrong. 

For those of you who have worked with young actors before, what have you found to be the best method of giving notes to them?  At what point do you involve the parents, if you involve them at all? 

131

The Green Room / Re: What was the last nice thing someone did for you?

« on: Nov 24, 2010, 10:29 am »

so nice when they do that even tough you get less rehearsal time for those kinds of things that the cast does.  Where was the tough sequence? Mine were out of Easy Street and Easy street reprise

Every transition is a tough sequence; we have so many things moving and flying.  I think I have more rail cues in this show than any of my previous shows combined.  We were working out curtain call and had to reset for all of the quick changes in the moment I was referring to. 

The other nice thing that happened on this show was that my director told me how beautifully I called the show.  It's nice when a stage manager's artistic contribution is acknowledged. 

132

The Green Room / Re: What was the last nice thing someone did for you?

« on: Nov 23, 2010, 04:29 pm »

I have two moments from my current show:

1. Daddy Warbucks brought the SM team pumpkin pie milkshakes from McDonald's while we were working on the schedule & report after rehearsal.
2. My director turned to me in tech rehearsal when I made a mistake in a cue sequence and we had to go back and a few of the actors complained while we reset and said, "You get rehearsal time too." It might possibly be the nicest thing a director has said to me :-)

133

The Green Room / Re: Funny definitions

« on: Aug 21, 2010, 01:03 am »

Stage Manager's Nightmare: a dream in which you are stage managing a show and are running extremely late or miss the show entirely.  Other variations may include sitting down in the booth to a blank prompt book, having a prompt book but discovering it's for another show, or trying to call the show when the actors are performing it in a different language. 

 

134

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: Technology: Facebook photos and videos

« on: Aug 11, 2010, 09:28 am »

Are you working in an AEA house?  If so, most of the contracts have very specific rules regarding when photo and video recording may occur and how/where they can be used.  If not, I would recommend speaking with your producer about the possibility of providing notice of the photo/video shoots to the cast at least the day before, especially in the case of the materials used in the web campaign.  You could also speak to them about having a policy regarding photos taken in rehearsal by the cast/staff and have the producer or their rep explain the policy at first rehearsal.  It's a little hard to retroactively punish people or ask them to remove photos/videos if they had no idea that what they were doing was wrong in the first place.  If there is a policy in place and they are breaking the rules, then that's another story. 

135

Employment / Re: Local and not so local job resource websites

« on: Jul 24, 2010, 05:44 pm »

For the DC area, you can join the DC Theater Tech Yahoo group:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DC-TheaterTech/