Messages

46

The Green Room / Re: set design extending into the house -

« on: Jan 10, 2011, 07:25 am »

I'm mid-run on a production of Cabaret where, as I imagine is common to quite a lot of productions of this show, we aim to make the audience feel like they are truly in the Kit Kat Klub.  We've put Chinese lanterns on all the house lights, and they extend into the foyer, as do the mirror balls (there are 100 in the theatre roof - apparently in homage to a nightclub Isherwood used to frequent which was famous for having 100 mirror balls!).  We've also replaced the sign above the doors to the theatre - it did say Court One, now it says Kit Kat Klub. 

The Kit Kat kids are all out in the foyer and in the auditorium pre-show, interacting with the audience - singing songs, encouraging people to cheer for them when they're introduced in Wilkommen, slipping them lollies wrapped up to look like drugs, pouring them cocktails (if you buy a cocktail at the bar you get a glass and a ticket, then one of the girls has a jug of the stuff in the auditorium and will pour it for you), randomly deciding it's someone's birthday and singing Happy Birthday (in German!) to them.  They're also acting as ushers, ripping tickets and showing people to their seats. We're not using any pre-recorded announcements - they're all done in character by the actor playing Max, the club owner, using a period microphone (well, it's not quite, but it looks close enough!). 

Our audiences are loving it - you get the occasional grumpy reaction, but mostly they're delighted to interact with the actors and get totally involved - it's only a 300-seat house as well, so pretty much every patron has some interaction with a Kit Kat kid at some point.  The cast will often refer back to specific audience members during the show as well, and they seem to love that too!

47

The Green Room / Re: Performers & Safety - would you walk off a show?

« on: Dec 21, 2010, 05:40 pm »

I've just posted a link to a video of the fall in the Spiderman thread - by the looks of that, it was a safety wire that snapped.  He wasn't flying, but the wire was to stop him falling off the platform and it looks like it broke.

48

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

« on: Dec 21, 2010, 05:39 pm »

There's a video of the fall here - http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/20/performer-is-injured-during-spider-man-performance/#video - not nice to watch, be warned!

49

Students and Novice Stage Managers / Re: Student SM Challenge #12: Twelve Drummers Drumming...

« on: Dec 20, 2010, 05:37 am »

I have a lot of questions...
1. Which version of the words are we using?  There are a lot of variations in the order in which things appear from version to version and so obviously we all need to be on the same page as to how many "lords a-leaping" we need - ten or twelve? Are we having "calling birds" or "colly birds"?
2. Are the "five gold rings" referred to going to be five actual gold rings (giant-size and being worn? On someone's finger?) or are they five ring-necked birds, as in the very original meaning?
3. Are all the birds mentioned going to be real birds (and if so, do we have a source for them all?) or actors dressed as the appropriate birds?  Or if they are real, will they be carried by actors?
4. What about the music?  Are the drummers and pipers going to be doing the playing themselves, or miming to a backing track, or not playing at all?  Are we going to be singing a capella, or with accompaniment - do we need pit space?  And are we using the (marvellous) John Rutter arrangement of the carol, or just the traditional version?
5. Are the "maids-a-milking" going to be milking actual cows, are we going to have panto-style cows or props representing cows?

- Props and Wardrobe are going to need the answers to a lot of those questions to allow them to plan effectively!
- Obviously if we have live birds or cows onstage then there are measures which will need to be taken to ensure the safety of cast, animals, crew and audience. 
- If the "seven swans a-swimming" (be they actors or birds) are to be actually swimming, we will need to make sure that the stage is strong enough to take the weight of the water - people don't realise how heavy water actually is!  Adequate waterproofing of the pool will also need to happen as we don't want a flooded stage.
- If the "geese a-laying" will have eggs, they probably need to be fake and unbreakable.
- Dressing room allocations can't really be done until there are definite answers on birds vs actors!

50

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: PROFESSIONALISM: Managers in rehearsal?

« on: Dec 17, 2010, 05:20 am »

A little more info here....http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/showbiz/news/a293731/thora-birch-fired-for-cast-crew-safety.html

51

Students and Novice Stage Managers / Re: Prompt Book For Show with NO SET!

« on: Dec 06, 2010, 05:59 pm »

My calling script is just my cues as well - I generally run two prompt books, one in rehearsal where I write down blocking notes and other info, and one for the show itself which is just cues as I hate having a cluttered calling script.  Whether you have a set or not shouldn't really have much impact on the format of your prompt book, except that for blocking purposes I sometimes stick a miniature version of the set plan onto each page to draw blocking; as well as writing down "Sally x DS and sit on chair", I'll put an S in a circle on the plan where she started and then draw an arrow to her new position.  Thomas A. Kelly's book A Backstage Guide to Stage Management has a good section on The Rehearsal Period which includes some great information on prompt books - like me, he recommends having two books.  The layout of a prompt book is very personal and I don't think you'll ever find two stage managers who do their books exactly the same; I always have script on the left and cues/blocking on the right, but my two colleagues are the opposite.  For a musical, I merge script and score for a calling script, some SMs prefer just to have the lyrics of the song and counts of 8 for dance or orchestra breaks.  Provided you do the basics thoroughly, there really isn't much right and wrong when it comes to prompt books.

52

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

« on: Nov 24, 2010, 05:42 am »

I opened Cabaret last Saturday night, and when I went to my prompt desk to call the half I found, as I often do on opening nights, a few thank-you cards.  I flicked through them and found that most were from the usual suspects - actors I often work with who never forget to do cards for the crew, but one was completely unexpected.  It was from an actor I've been working with for three years - we've done quite a few shows together, and I've watched him grow up from a brash, egotistical drama school grad who thought that the world revolved around him, who blamed every tiny last little thing on someone else (nothing was ever his fault), and who was totally my "problem child" for a couple of years, to a wonderful actor with a truly extraordinary voice, phenomenal stage presence and a much better attitude!  I've never had a thankyou card from him before - it just said "Dear Anna, thankyou for once again keeping me in the right place all through rehearsals, and for everything you do"; but it was totally not about what he wrote, just that he's finally grown up enough to realise what I do and appreciate that.  I think this boy is going places, and one day I'll be proud to say I SM'd him way back when!

53

The Green Room / Re: 10 things actors can do to get off to a good start with a stage manager

« on: Nov 09, 2010, 12:48 am »

10) Like everyone, I am human. I make mistakes, like everyone else. I may set props wrong from time to time. I may execute cues early or late or not a all. Just like you will forget lines and blocking, etc. Mistakes happen, so lets move on and deal with them, fix them, learn from them and do the best that we can!

So, so true.  A while ago, I got cornered by an actor (who had had too much to drink anyway) who was ranting and raving furiously about the operator who had mis-hit the GO button and so the lights were a little late up for the curtain call.  This guy was from out of town, and was saying that he had done over 50 shows in his home town and never known an operator to stuff up before, the operator should be fired, this operator was useless, we do things wrong here (telling me how to do MY job!), yadda yadda yadda.  This was despite the fact that the operator had apologized to them all personally and offered to buy them a drink at the bar - said actor was complaining that this was "not enough of an apology".  I have never had to try so hard to hold my tongue, because while it wasn't my show, I had been talking to the SM who was commenting that a week into the run, the cast were still not secure on their lines and cue lines were often being messed up.  I refrained from asking him if he was word-perfect and giving him as much of a rant as he was giving me, because I knew it would be pointless, but I was very, very tempted.  SMs and techs are ONLY HUMAN!

54

The Green Room / Re: Performers & Safety - would you walk off a show?

« on: Oct 29, 2010, 08:26 pm »

One of my colleagues has been dealing with a safety concern. She had multiple people on her production (non-equity) share their concern to her and she has vocally been against an unsafe practice that the director (who is also the artistic director) insists having in the show. As they were heading into tech the director told her she needed to get on board and stop bringing up the concern because it wasn't going to change.

I think that in this situation I'd be going to the production manager or the producer.  I'm firmly of the belief that artistic integrity must come second to safety; I've had episodes (working in a university drama department) where I've refused to let students perform self-devised stunts because they simply had too much potential for injury.  I do think that sometimes health and safety goes mad, and that you can't prevent freak accidents, but most risks can be managed effectively.  It can be a fine line and a balancing act, but I think we as stage managers (in conjunction with producers/production managers/technical departments) are responsible for walking that line. 

I also think that when an accident does happen, figuring out why and how it happened can be enough to stop the particular piece of action being cut; I had an incident yesterday in rehearsals (for Cabaret); the Emcee was supposed to be catching the legs of one of the Kit Kat girls as she went into a handstand.  They misjudged it, and it resulted in the Emcee being kicked in the head.  Serious? Possibly.  But we figured out why and how it occurred and how to stop it re-occurring, and both performers are happy to continue with it.  Effective risk assessment and management can solve most issues, and for those that it can't, safety has to come first.

55

The Green Room / Re: Convolution Creep

« on: Oct 16, 2010, 08:40 am »

- Wheelchair patrons and those who can't manage the stairs have to be brought through backstage and up a ramp onto the stage, then across the stage to their seats in the 2nd row, which is at stage level.
- The backstage loo can't be flushed during the show (dressing room and green room loos are fine though!)
- When you switch off the amplifier for the FOH PA, the warning chimes chime - no-one has ever been able to fix this, try though we have!  They also chime if you switch anything that's plugged into the same circuit on or off...and sometimes if you just walk past the amplifier (not so much with me, but it happens to one of the other SMs quite regularly!)
- The lightswitches for the rehearsal room are nowhere near the door, so if you're locking up at at night (there's a door at the far end of the space which has to be checked) you either have to stumble through in the dark or find something to prop the door open with (easier said than done!) until you can get to the lightswitch

56

The Green Room / Re: BTDT help and discussion

« on: Oct 14, 2010, 08:46 am »

Because my brain goes faster than my fingers, I also managed to somehow call "A Doll's House" just "A Doll".  Sorry!

57

The Green Room / Re: BTDT help and discussion

« on: Oct 13, 2010, 08:54 pm »

I managed to add "The Shape of Thing" rather than "The Shape of Things" - and I'm happy to help with proofreading

58

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: SCENERY: Video

« on: Sep 22, 2010, 09:52 pm »

I saw the British touring version of Les Miserables back in May and the use of video was fantastic - the fact that the projections were based on Victor Hugo's original drawings helped!  I'm always dubious when anyone says that they want to use projection in a show, as I've seen it used very badly as well as very well.

I did a gig with the Sydney Dance Company last year where they used video brilliantly - they projected onto a green "slash" curtain (backed with a smother) which looked amazing - accompanied by a banging soundtrack, and then projected static backdrops onto the cyc - but they had done it properly, spent the money and had the proper gear to make it work!  I also worked on a show last year about two retired couples travelling around Italy, and to cover scene changes the director had the idea of getting people's holiday video footage of Venice, Rome and a couple of other places, and our video designer created montages out of them all.  It was a nice idea and actually worked pretty well (we put an appeal in the city paper for footage, and people were more than happy to give it to us!) - it set the scene nicely.

On the flip side, we did a show a little while back where the set was a grey box with no front or back; the back was a white cyc which the set designer wanted to project different images onto for different locations.  Getting the footage was no problem, but projecting it was a whole other kettle of fish.  We couldn't rear-project as the cyc was virtually on the back wall, and front-projection was very problematic as it would have hit the actors before the cyc, creating nasty shadows.  So we spent a fortune on a short-throw projector, but even with it we still couldn't get a large enough image that was completely in focus, as even the short-throw wasn't designed to project an image as big as we wanted it.  It didn't look wonderful, and it also created huge problems for the lighting designer as he had been forced to bring his frontlight in very flat, because of the roof on the set, and of course it then spilled onto the projection screen, causing problems with the visibility of the projections.  All in all it was not a good experience, and looked far from good.

I go onto a production of Cabaret in a few weeks, and I know the lighting designer (who is also a video designer) is planning to use a projector coming in from either side - but he wants them as a lighting effect (beams in the air and effects on the floor) and not to project specific images.  He's planned for this right from the word go and I think it'll be absolutely fine, because it's integrated with his lighting design and the show, and not a bolt-on "solution" for a problem caused by the set designer.

Operation of video can also be problematic - for years we've been running off DVD players, which I hate, but we haven't had the budget for a better solution.  Recently we got some funding to buy Arkaos and a laptop to run it off, so now our video is triggered off the lighting desk, which has made all the difference in the world!  I operated a show earlier this year where we had two video sequences (in the script - the characters made a couple of short videos which the audience then see) and we actually ended up running them off VHS!  The show was set in 1995, and the video designer was busy degrading his footage so that it would look like it was running off VHS, when it suddenly struck him that we could just run it off a VHS which would make everybody's life easier!  And I have to say, it was a breeze to operate; when you hit PLAY on a DVD it spins the disc up, thinks a bit, then plays the track, so you have to pre-cue it then pause it and hope that you did it late enough that it won't stop, having been on pause for too long; with a VHS you hit PLAY, the tape rolls and it starts instantly!  It was dead easy to cue up - I'd just run the tape through to the right time, then hit STOP - no faffing with the pause button!

59

The Green Room / Re: Why is it that...

« on: Sep 06, 2010, 10:34 pm »

...Mother Nature decided to send us a (big) earthquake the day we were supposed to start changeover?  Our production week schedules are tight enough without losing two days because we can't get into the building, as it hasn't been checked for structural integrity...still, no-one is hurt, everyone still has their houses and the theatre is still standing up (unlike one of the smaller venues in the city, where most of its front wall is lying in the street), so we have a lot to be thankful for.  So what if opening night has to move from Saturday to Wednesday?

60

The Green Room / Re: Kids say (and do) the darndest things!

« on: Sep 02, 2010, 06:09 am »

We do four kids' shows a year (every school holidays) and usually they involve some audience interaction.  During one show, one child - probably about the age of five - got so enthusiastic while yelling "he's behind you" and jumping up and down, that he managed to go head over heels mid-jump and land in the lap of the guy sitting in the row in front - not sure who got the bigger fright!