Messages

271

Tools of the Trade / Re: PROPS: Prairie Oysters

« on: May 17, 2010, 12:07 pm »

The sauce can be faked with water and food coloring (a bit of caramel coloring would be easiest, as opposed to trying to make a suitably dark brown with the standard food colorings in the red, yellow, blue, green veins).  The egg is going to be a lot harder to fake.  The easiest way to do it, if your actors are hesitant to swallow a raw egg, is to use ceramic mug that can't be seen through.  That way the actors can "drink" it without having to swallow it. 

272

Tools of the Trade / Re: iPad: What do you think?

« on: May 03, 2010, 07:34 pm »

It's amazing how we in theatre sometimes keep some old technologies hanging on by a thread.  I think we are also the only industry to still utilize mini-disk players.

273

Tools of the Trade / Re: iPad: What do you think?

« on: May 03, 2010, 01:51 am »

Related to the iPad, and the power wielded by Steve Jobs, I heard an interesting interview on NPR this weekend.  They were talking about how Apple has been extremely successful in not only bringing new technology to the forefront, but also in killing off technology that it deems unuseful and/or obsolete.  According to the interviewee Apple was responsible for truly popularizing the mouse, killing off the floppy disk drive, as well as making the idea of CDs obsolete (which I think, while not completely obsolete, are on their way out, and you can't deny that iPods have already killed portable CD players).  They even talked about how many websites are already beginning to adapt to Jobs's hatred of Flash, noting how even the NPR website (among others) is stripping away Flash content to make sure it is compatible with iPhones and iPads.

274

The Green Room / Re: Burnt Out

« on: May 03, 2010, 01:44 am »

I'm actually in the final week of a show that has had me close to burn out/breakdown mode for several months.  I'm sad to say that I did indeed let the work supercede my personal life to an extent that during this contract I have missed two different funerals and been unable (maybe even unwilling?) to take the time I need to get some other issues affecting my mental/emotional health under control.  This in turn triggered my insomnia to a point where I have been routinely going anywhere from 30-60 hours straight without sleeping.

I finally reached the point where I realized that if I did not turn in my notice and leave under my terms, and before the full contract was up, that there would be a very good chance of putting myself into the hospital before it was over due to downright nervous exhaustion or worse.

Luckily, the production manager and associate artistic director have both been very understanding about the situation, as have everyone else in the office for that matter.  But calling the office while out on the road and telling them about my situation and decision was definitely one of the hardest things I have ever had to do in my professional career.  I'm glad to say that I'm walking away from this without having burned any bridges, which was my biggest fear, and that the company fully supports my decision and will be waiting for me to be ready to return to them in the future.

275

The Hardline / Re: Do Members Need Equity's Permission to do College Shows?

« on: Apr 27, 2010, 11:50 pm »

I wouldn't say so much an exception as to just how different reps interpret the (sometimes very vaguely worded) rules.

276

The Hardline / Re: Do Members Need Equity's Permission to do College Shows?

« on: Apr 26, 2010, 10:59 pm »

These are the two clauses from the U/RTA contract that the business rep in the Chicago office (don't remember off hand who it was at the time, this was a good number of years ago now) quoted to me as to why a waiver/permission was not needed for each production while in grad school.  The waiver I did need to get for our one production under the U/RTA contract was to cover the fact that there would officially be no Equity SM on contract for the production. 

(3) For purposes of this Agreement, Equity members who are bona fide students and teachers
who are full-time instructors of theatre arts in degree-granting programs currently employed to
teach at the sponsoring college or university shall not be required to be signed to Equity
contracts and shall be deemed students and teachers.

(6) The status of bona fide students matriculated in a degree program shall continue for as long
as they are so matriculated. Should the student elect to register as a Membership Candidate,
all provisions relating to the Equity Membership Candidate Program shall apply.

277

Tools of the Trade / Re: iPad: What do you think?

« on: Apr 25, 2010, 07:03 pm »

I was neutral towards it until playing with one at the Apple store.  Now I really want one.  However, I am determined to wait a year or so until they release the next generation, because then it will be an even more viable option to completely replacing the laptop.  That, and according to the tech specs, you need Mac OS 10.5, and I'm still running 10.4 and can't afford to upgrade my OS and purchase such a fancy new toy all at once.

278

The Hardline / Do Members Need Equity's Permission to do College Shows?

« on: Apr 23, 2010, 12:11 pm »

<Split from SM:  Plays & Musicals thread Aspirations: ASM for AEA vs. SM for Non-AEA> -Rebbe

"I think you would need permission from equity to act or SM in college productions, because they would be non-equity."

This may have changed in the past few years, but when I went back to grad school, after getting my Equity card, the only school production I needed to get a waiver from Equity for was one where we were using the U/RTA contract because of the number of guest artists that we were bringing in.  Other than that all other productions that were under the auspices of the department were fair game and needed no permission from Equity to participate in.  This was the same for several of the actors who came in to the program already Equity, or got their cards during their time in school.

279

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: SCHEDULING: Do you include crew calls on your daily rehearsal calls?

« on: Apr 16, 2010, 10:54 am »

Can you post or link a copy of your current format?  It would be hard to give advice on adding information without seeing how that information is currently formatted.

280

Tools of the Trade / Re: iPad: What do you think?

« on: Apr 06, 2010, 01:06 am »

A couple of techie-geek type friends of mine said the iPad is more of a preparation for where laptops/portable computers are eventually headed.  In evolutionary terms it could someday be viewed as that missing link between what we know now as laptops and what the next generation will call laptops.

281

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: COMMUNICATION: Actors want more info, but can't process what they already h

« on: Mar 11, 2010, 10:46 pm »

Thanks for the ears everyone.  It helped just to get it out to other SMs who would understand the frustration.

I'm going to start reminding them at breakfast, which most of them make it down on time for, and those that don't are not the ones who seem to have trouble understanding the schedule, so I'm not worried about them.  Beyond that, like MissLiz said, it's just a matter of gently reminding them that the information was in the email, which I can only assume they got since they made it to the van on time.

282

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: Actors wanting more info, but can't process what they already have?

« on: Mar 11, 2010, 07:33 am »

They get the tour itinerary, which has the dates, venue location, performance times, and hotel information, which is really all they need.  The office discourages us from setting a daily schedule in advance, as things can change really quickly out here, and we all know that actors seem to have a hard time dealing with a change.  I can't count the number of times in the past when a director would set and want published a full daily schedule days, even weeks, in advance, and then actors freak out when that has to change.  And there have been days when I'll hear from a venue the day before about some change, or weather conditions coming up, etc that makes pre-planning call times more than a day in advance very tricky.

Sad to say, upon sleeping on it, that they are just looking for a way to cover their own mistakes.  Like I said, they tried to tell me they just want to know what's going on with things like the meal break, but when I pointed out that every day I have included that in the email I got the "can't keep them straight" response.

283

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / COMMUNICATION: Actors want more info, but can't process what they already have?

« on: Mar 11, 2010, 01:11 am »

I ran into a confusing situation tonight.  I'm currently on a TYA tour.  My cast has told me that they feel they don't have enough information about our daily schedule.

Each night I email them the next morning's call time (email was their requested method, as I don't have unlimited texting and thus refuse to send 12 text messages nightly), that also includes the curtain times, which version of the show we are performing (we have two), and when we are taking the meal break (i.e. between shows, after load out, etc.).  Now at our company meeting tonight they brought up the point that they feel they are not getting enough information.  I pointed out that just this morning, despite the above mentioned items being in their daily email, I was asked by no less than 4 people whether we would be doing the long or short show.  I was then told, "Well, we get those emails every night, it's hard to keep it straight sometimes."

I'm thinking "You can't process the amount of information I'm currently giving you, but you somehow want more?"  I didn't even know how to respond to that without making it sound like I was calling them stupid.  I'm not really even sure what more they want in terms of information for the day, and I don't think they did either, as it did seem to take them a moment to recover when I asked them if they were reading the entire email, since things like which version of the show and when the meal break is occurring are covered in each email.   

They also said they realize I run things by the book, but they weren't entirely sure what all was in there, but somehow didn't seem to see that as being their fault.  Is it wrong of me to assume they should know certain things that are covered in both the TYA rulebook and the company's Standard Operating Procedures that they all get a copy of and that is discussed with them at a set meeting during the rehearsal process?

Needless to say it was a very frustrating evening that ended with me completely dumbfounded as to where to go next with them.

Edited subject line-Rebbe

284

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: COSTUMES: How involved do you get with costumes and wardrobe?

« on: Feb 18, 2010, 04:07 pm »

Are you talking handing forms to the designer and/or shop, or run sheets for the actual run?  Because in opera world if you walked in to any rehearsal using costumes and/or wigs and did not hand run sheets to the crew, odds are you'll have a crew sitting around doing nothing.

285

The Green Room / Re: Musical Misfortune

« on: Feb 08, 2010, 05:54 pm »

I'm currently working on Seussical and "Alone in the Universe" just tends to sit in my head all day long, and when it leaves it's usually because "Oh the Thinks You Can Think" has pushed it out of the way.