Messages

331

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / booth

« on: Mar 30, 2005, 10:38 pm »

I don't think there is one golden rule or situation for this.  I've been in both a booth and backstage, (and could produce dozens of stories with pros and cons for both positions) and especially on tour, I find that where I call depends on the original architect of the building and not nessecarily any other factors.  Old vaudeville houses especially were never designed to have 'booths' in them; while a lot of new PACs are not designed with a SM station in the wings.

Personally, if given a choice, I'd take an enclosed booth in the back of the house, with an opening/closing window & full sight of the stage.  I actually think the worst I've done is having to run sound from a mid-house position while calling lights & scene changes.  Try competing with an audience to be heard over headset!  While at the same time not disturbing or distracting said audience.

I think there's a tendency for folks who find themselves in less-than-ideal working conditions to dream that things aren't that bad elsewhere.  I hope that hearing stories here helps you feel like you're not alone with what you've got to deal with at your space.

-Centaura

332

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / don't think unprofessional

« on: Mar 24, 2005, 10:13 pm »

(unprofessional and slow, I know..but there is no way we can fit anyone else besides the actors backstage, and at my school the only people interested in tech are the few of us that do lighting, sound and SM.)

The slow part can vary from the motivation of the actors, the amount of scenery to shift, and the room in which to shift things.  But don't automatically think 'unprofessional'.  Most of the shows I've worked on have had the actors moving scenery - it is quite common.  There are even stipulations for actors moving scenery in Equity & IATSE's guidelines.  It all depends on the situation, the scenery, and the local crews.  My favorite scenario was when I was an ASM at a half-Equity/full IATSE house.  There was a set piece that had to 'open up' onstage, but it took two people, and the one actor couldn't do it by himself.  We had to dress up one of the local IA guys in a costume, give him an arbitrary 'role', and send him out only for the purpose of helping open the set.  So the show had a random 'Chef Bill' character for two minutes.

333

SMNetwork Archives / sounds easy, but

« on: Mar 24, 2005, 10:02 pm »

c) definitely proof everything for spelling and grammatical errors

This may sound like a no-brainer, but the theatre I work for was recently doing a hunt for a new sound guy.  The PM got one resume that was so gramatically incorrect, had so many mispellings, and was so generally awful that he thought it was a joke.  Because the presentation was so poor, when he looked at the credits, which seemed impressive, he didn't believe them.  Now that was an extreme case, not only had that person not spell-checked, it looked like they had never even visually looked at it before sending it.  But, first impression is what counts.  Neat, organized, easy to read.

-Centaura

334

SMNetwork Archives / headset nightmares

« on: Mar 24, 2005, 09:52 pm »

I just had a really fun one.  I was at an old vaudeville, at the sound position at the back of the house on the main floor.  The light board was at the back of a really high balcony.  Things were working okay at the start of the show, but then the light board operator was starting to have a hard time hearing me.  I could hear her, but she lost some of my calls.  So, she had another headset up in the booth with her, as they thought it was a bad cable on the headset she had on, at the next break in the cues she was going to swtich it out.  The union guys also sent someone to get walkie talkies to both her and me.  So, we're coming up on the fastest lighting sequence, a series of fast black-outs, lights up, and a couple of effects.  As we're getting closer, I'm calling into the headset "Lights, are you back yet?  Lights?  Lights??"  She doesn't answer.  We're getting closer and closer to the sequence, and still no word from lights, nor has the crew guy with the walkie gotten to her yet.  Then the moment arrives.  I play the sound cue that has the first black out at the end of it.  The two actors in the sequence are onstage, there's no way to tell them that there might not be a blackout.  The cue ends.  Still no word from lights.  I had kept up a running monolouge on headset, to try to catch her the second I had communication back.  The only thing I can think of is to play the cue again, as it was mainly a musical interlude.  Still no word from lights.  Thankfully the actors took the hint from the cue played twice and just went through the scene, though it looked terrible without the blackouts.

I had to spend my next show at that venue calling all my standbys twice as early, as we got some communication back with the headsets, but the only alternative was the walkie, which took a hand I was too busy using for running sound.  So I called my standbys early, and if I didn't hear a response, I then repeated the standby on the walkie.  Made life interesting.

335

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / paperwork grows

« on: Mar 24, 2005, 02:12 am »

ummm... I feel really silly, but what do you guys mean by run sheets? What is the exact purpose of them?what exactly do you want on them?

Heh, the only silly question is the one that you don't ask!   :wink:

Seriously, the best way to find out information is to ask a question.  You might think of a run sheet as a scene shift list, or something similar.  The reason its called a run sheet is becuase it often has more on in than just the scene shifts, pretty much anything that needs to happen backstage for the show.  

The biggest thing you learn as you progress though life as a stage manager, is that the bigger the theatre, or 'higher' the position, the more paperwork you'll generate.  There are books dedicated to all the different forms, list, etc. that a stage manager might be called upon to make/use/etc.  A lot of it will vary by theatre policy and the needs of the show.

For example, I am currently working on a non-union tour.  That almost automatically sets me at a lower level of amount of paperwork I create than someone who was, say, working a union tour.  For this particular show, we have a box set, no scene changes, and the actors get the few offstage props they need from a prop table.  So, a run sheet was not something that we needed to stress over, as there was very little to keep track of.  Conversely, two years ago, the show was all these wagons that kept coming off and on, that we had to keep good track of who did what when, and we had run sheets tacked to the back of almost everything to help the actors keep things straight until they had learned it all.

-Centaura

336

SMNetwork Archives / cost

« on: Mar 24, 2005, 01:50 am »

  what if you want all wireless? Is that bad? I've never seen much point in the ones that hook you to a certain spot.

The theory behind it is that, in theatres where there are crew who only sit at a board and don't need to get up and move during the show, they don't need a wireless.  Wireless tend to be more expensive, sometimes less reliable, and often losable in a big theatre.  A lot of spaces that I see on tour actually have the booths' headsets wired to the wall, that way they are always there and they can't walk off like a wireless.

But mainly its a budget thing.  Put the extra money into the wireless where you really need it [backstage/fly rail/etc.] and save money by putting wired in places where theory says they don't need it.

-Centaura

337

Employment / required

« on: Mar 23, 2005, 09:29 am »

Howdy,

I'm a big fan of formal-education, but by 30 I also understand that you've gotten a lot of the life-education that can equal that out.  The thing that I've found in getting jobs in the non-eq market is motivation and experience.  I would not recommend NYC or LA if you just want to start out.  Unless you were looking for an ASM job in one of those towns.  Without any credits that someone can look at and say 'That's a professional [paid] theatre' that'd be my best recommendation.  Try for an ASM position, maybe in FL or Chicago where the cost of living is less, and from there you might get an SM position.  Just my 2 cents.

-Centaura

338

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Rehearsal/Performance Reports

« on: Mar 21, 2005, 09:27 am »

I have to agree that I've never had a blank rehearsal report.  But I also fall in the category of noting what we've worked on that day, so that section always has something.  There have been times when the rest of the sections are blank, but not the attendance & what did we work on sections.

-Centaura

339

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / trigger fingers

« on: Mar 21, 2005, 09:22 am »

I've had a rash of trigger-fingered light board ops.  Or maybe its just a twitchy finger, 'cause they'll hit the 'go' button twice.  Which generally happens during my scene shifts, so the lights come up on the actors shifting things.  Its happened to me three times in the past two months!

-Centaura

340

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / my situation

« on: Mar 20, 2005, 11:01 am »

P.S. I think your situation might be a new discussion thread

My situation is ridiculous, even the home office has said that.  And while I have the 'comfort' of knowing that the theatre will never hire these people again, I still have to put up with them.  If you'd be interested in my ventings over my current cast, its all in my journal.

As for baby-ing, I've come from a tradition of 'the sm is there to make the actor's lives easier'.  And I have truly believed it, but I've also been finding recently that casts are taking the things I do for them for granted, and then trying to step all over me for doing them.  Does that make sense?  

For example:  I'll give them directions to someplace they need in a town.  They will get lost or worse case, not find it.  Upon returning to the hotel, they will yell at me for giving them bad directions, though when I quiz them I find out that they just didn't follow my directions.

I want to help them by telling them where things are in a given town, but I'm tired of the disrepect I get.  If I was giving them bad directions, then it would be another matter, but I'm not.  This is just an example.

I've been wondering recently, have I been making their lives TOO easy, that they loose the ability to take care of themselves?

-Centaura

341

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / leaving the booth on tour

« on: Mar 20, 2005, 10:45 am »

I think its one of those issues where it depends on the situation.  I have left a booth before, in what I thought was a life-or-death situation.  I was on tour, and the only two tour crew were me and the sound board operator.  We were in the booth in the back when the local on headset backstage came on and said that one of my actors was having the symptoms of a stroke.  I am first aid and CPR trained, and the only one availabe who knew the actors and show to direct how we were going to do things.  I've had to deal with more minor crises, and having to work with locals who don't know anyone's names, or don't understand your show references can be time comsuming in explanations.  

This was a time when having a well-written prompt book worked to my advantage.  I asked the IA guy in the booth with me if he could follow a prompt book, and when he said yes, I threw my book at him and booked it backstage.  In that situation, it was the right thing to do.  I was able to take charge in the wings, get someone else into his final scene costume, keep the show going, and get EMTs to take care of the sick actor.

It was the right move in that situation.  But it might not have in another situation.

-Centaura

342

SMNetwork Archives / not even once?

« on: Mar 20, 2005, 10:21 am »

Cool Thou shall not hit your actors with a 2 x 4, for tho there is no rule against it in the Equity Rule Book, it is still frowned upon greatly.

Dang.  Not even when they're being REALLY stupid?  No, really, I have never struck someone, no matter how tempting it would be.  Though, there have been times when I've wondered if it would be the only way to get the message across. . .

-Centaura

343

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / not lazy

« on: Mar 19, 2005, 09:38 am »

I'll call "standby lights 14 through 22, sound Dx through G and fog." and then just call each one by name to go as we get there. It keeps my board ops quiet, and I can get all the cues out of my mouth in time. Some folks have called that lazy, but I think of it as efficient.

I don't at all think that's lazy.  But then again, in my current show, I have some pretty tight cueing sequences that I call mass standbys for.  At the top of the show, I have 6 light cues that happen during the length of a 28 second sound cue.  There's barely enough time to spit "Light cue 5 go" out before I'm at LQ 7, etc. etc.  My general rule of thumb is that I'm saying standby too early if I'm saying it more than 30-40 seconds before the cue.  But if a series is going to all happen within a few minutes, definately I'll do the group standby!

-Centaura

344

SMNetwork Archives / toys

« on: Mar 16, 2005, 09:34 am »

I saw someone say that they had a deck of cards.  Yes!  I can't tell you how many times I've taken my deck out and handed it off to folks to play with.  I spend a lot of time working in children's theatre, and its a quick and easy way to keep kids/teens amused if they have to wait for a while for their scene to be worked on.  I am also never without my leatherman.  I use my leatherman so much, I ran into a dilema when I broke one.  I couldn't live without it long enough to send it in to be replaced!

For folks short on cash, which I was when I got my first one, putting it on a christmas wish list got me mine.  My mother even had my name engraved on the side.  Useful, when you're in a room of 10 techies each with leathermans!

-Centaura

345

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Actors who direct....

« on: Mar 14, 2005, 09:36 am »

and he replied 'I'm hired to dance. There's nothing in my contract that says I have to LIKE what I'm asked to do.'

Is this person available to do an attitude workshop with my current cast?  I've got two who are such major primma donas that they think they run the world just because they're onstage the most.  This means that anything that anyone else does onstage is free for them to edit.  I've tried to talk to them about it, but they got all mad because 'they were just talking to each other, as fellow actors discussing the show'.  These 'discussions' have involed the divas screaming at the top of their lungs the things they think others should change in their performances.  This is their first professional [paid non-equity] job, they dropped out of college to take it.  And I can't get them to understand that their behavior is innappropriate!

-Centaura
(frustrated on tour)