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Messages - Branden

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31
Tools of the Trade / Social Media and Self Promotion
« on: Mar 21, 2014, 03:50 am »
I'm a green Stage Manager, so I grew up with social media and the zillion things you can do online.

I know self branding is important, and I try to maintain a viable online presence [mostly to get the most out of networking]. I have a .com with an about me page and my resume, a Wordpress Blog, a Twitter, and a Facebook.

All of these things help me to stay in touch, establish new connections, and sometimes even get work.

With social media sites like Facebook, many times well-known actors would establish a second account for themselves, so they could keep the private separate from the public. Now, with my generation, we face a unique challenge. Facebook does not offer an easy 'clear posts and photos before a certain year' function, so many professionals my age find that their Facebook feeds contain a lot of information from Middle, High School, and College that they would rather not carry as baggage for networking.

The point being, it is more and more common for actors and designers to create a separate Facebook page for professional uses. A lot of actors who even just pick up a few gigs a year have their own account.

Is this a trend for Stage Managers? Should it be? Why not have a separate Facebook account for all your work as a visual CV?

What do you all think about this?

32
Thanks for finding that. Sorry all for not searching!

33
I haven't spent much time in storefront Chicago, but I'll say that often people get very exclusive. It's their own space, they they've poured their blood, sweat and tears, and for reasons beyond me, a new person is there to change the way they do everything, and ruin their lives.

I would agree with Kay. Continuing to blow up their phones and email accounts should get it noticed.

As a Stage Manager, I would say your job is running the show, so if you feel as though it is unsafe, you do not perform the show. Now, I wouldn't go crazy with this, but if that happens during a live show, you hold the show. And if it is something that people are reluctant to fix, you don't allow the next performance to start. That is a bit extreme, but safety is first. In rehearsals, I would arrange rehearsal take place in a different space.

Though it is not your job to fix the problem, it is your job to not put actors in unsafe places. Especially in storefront theatres with loose liability, you may end up at the wrong end of a lawsuit for negligence, knowingly asking actors to work in unsafe conditions-so it's sticky.

 

34
Does anyone do it any other way?

35
That's a good point.

I was talking to one of my nurse friends, and she said that for those who would rather not fill out an Emergency Medical Form, they should sign a waiver saying they choose not to do so, that way everything is in the clear. Have you ever heard of someone doing this?

36
The Green Room / Re: Personal Budgeting
« on: Mar 01, 2014, 05:32 pm »

Believe me I don't have the problem of "forgetting" to budget. I check all my accounts everyday. Plus I am buying a house so I definitely have to be on top of things. I just don't feel like sitting down with a spreadsheet anymore, it takes too much time. Mint seems to be working well for me.

I, sir, am envious of you. It slips my mind way more than it should.

37
That's true. And since they're not in rep, why would I want to carry a huge binder of extra shows in August that closed in June.

38
I was starting to print out some materials for summer stock, and I had a thought.

I'm probably going to put each show in a separate binder, since the shows are consecutive, but I last year, I did rep, and I wanted to see what you all prefer.

If you're doing a rotating rep summer stock, do you place all your material in one large binder? How big are we talking? Or do you separate it?

Also, with a two week turn around, there can't be that many reports and materials. Do you think I could get away with a 2 inch?

I think I'm going to keep everything separate, but I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Edited to add topic tag. - Maribeth

39
I want to share a story here that was presented to one of the teachers in high school.

As a high school student, I was working on a show. There were several closeted students (which I can say, because they are friends and are out now).

The technical crew was traditionally the stronger, jocks. In fact, the starting quarterback for the football team was a technician. The high-ups in the school though it was wonderful, and showed the dissolving of walls between cliques, and it really was nice to think that people who would usually bully someone who participated in theatre was participating themselves.

As an idea, it sounded wonderful. In reality, it brought tensions into the program, and created a wall between actors and technicians that was much greater than you would traditionally joke about.

So, here is what happened.

All the boys shared one dressing room, and the girls another. The only bathrooms backstage were in the dressing rooms, so male technicians would wonder through the dressing room to use the bathroom.

From what I understand, one technician had a bit of history being a bully to students he assumed were gay. Often in gym class he and his friends would bully them, to the extent that lawsuits could probably have been brought up if they were done today.

This technician decided that one day he was going to expose himself to the dressing room one day, doing something called 'a monkey's brains'. One of my good friends was in the dressing room, and he been on the receiving end to this technician's bullying before, so knowing better than to make a scene, he quickly left the dressing room.

The technician yelled some snide comments associating his leaving with getting physically excited.

The next day in gym class, that technician and his friends approached the actor holding him to the ground and rubbing their genitals on him, making snide remarks about his reaction to the previous day's 'monkey braining'.

Here's where I got involved. My friend went and told one of the teachers in the drama program, and asked me to back up the technician's tendency to expose himself in the dressing room.

The teacher told my friend that this was not a problem for him, but for the gym teacher.

This is where I believe the drama teacher went wrong.

So, the point of my story is that you have to be very careful about shared dressing rooms. Students who are openly gay may be the target of bullying in the dressing room, or vise versa.

If anyone is uncomfortable in the group dressing room, I would carefully find a way to make them comfortable; for example, one year all the actors were told that they were to wear a white tee and athletic shorts under their costumes, with the idea being that changing into the costumes would be less exposing. This made said student comfortable with sharing a dressing room.

(On an unrelated note, the year that everyone wore shorts and a tee was the year with the most de-pantsing, which lead to some angry phone calls from parents.)

As a Stage Manager in the school, I would say it is more up to the department to handle such situations, and not your personal liability. It's treading on egg shells, and every school department will want to handle it differently.

40
And I would only do it with the GM/Producers' blessing . . .

I'd say I would also check with whoever owns the rights to the show. If you do it during the show, you're intentionally changing someone's IP. I'd assume they would say no, but it's worth a phone call.

So...propose during a Shakespeare show?

41
The Green Room / Re: Personal Budgeting
« on: Feb 20, 2014, 11:03 pm »
Lots of people suggest Mint.com, I don't personally use it but I've heard good things. I just dont feel all that comfortable giving a third party access to my accounts.

I've used Mint for a while, and wouldn't recommend it. I find that it's just as easy to forget about or ignore as checking your bank statements. Since it's mostly automatic, it doesn't have the same effect as sitting down and doing the math to see how much money you have.

I will say that it alerts you when big purchases are made; so it's not a bad way to detect fraud. When I bought my iPad it sent me an email and a text, letting me know that I spend a large amount on electronics at Apple.

I prefer to stick to a simple excel spreadsheet, that forces me to enter the data. That way I'm looking at the money I'm spending regularly, instead of letting a program do it for me.

42
Hey all!

Due to some personal complications, I can't work as the Stage Manager-so I'm posting it here!

A Fine Line
A two-act play, with a small cast and unit set.

The show has been cast, and all the pre-production paperwork has been created. The cast has had one rehearsal together.

The rehearsals are in the evenings from 6:30-9:30, on Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday 12-5.

Tech starts April 5th (11a-7p), and 6th, and from 7:30-10:30 that week, to the opening on April 11th, and runs until strike on 5/4.

Stipend is $400.

If you interested, you can PM me or email me at brandenscottstewart@gmail.com

Moderators: This post will expire March 15th, or as soon as the position is filled.

43
Employment / Re: Cutting the Cord
« on: Feb 16, 2014, 08:37 pm »
I would have to say that I agree with Matthew Shiner.

Sometimes parent's don't really understand working in theatre, but they do have valid points.

Every time I tell my parents about a new contract or gig, I get asked, "Do they house you?"

At first I was hesitant-why did it matter?

But the more I've worked, the more I've learned to ask that question myself. Housing is a big cost, and if you're only working a four month contract somewhere, it can be a big problem.

The question they used to ask me are now questions I ask before I accept a job.

44
Tools of the Trade / Re: The Curse of Drop Box
« on: Feb 16, 2014, 04:45 pm »
My dropbox account is set up so that I can store all of my files in one place, and that I feel comfortable sharing it with just about anything.

Every folder has a subfolder titled 'Drafts', and they hold all the word documents-and almost all of them are password protected, on various levels.

All of my performance reports are kept in Excel, with each performance as a new sheet-which means that all the performances are available in one [sometime massive] Excel file, and the document is 'Read Only' password protected, so anyone can view it, but only those with the password can edit it.

The more sensitive documents require a password to view. Then the things that everyone need to see are saved as PDFs outside the 'Drafts' folder.

I suppose, as already mentioned, a dedicated plagiarist could reconstruct a template from a PDF, content even, but it at least offers some protection. 

45
BUMP

I know this Emergency Medical Forms were discussed in school settings, but what about summer stocks? I feel like I'd rather give them out and let the cast fill them out if they choose, so that way if anything ever happens, I can relay to the EMS squad that said actor has been taking Xmg of Ativan, and is allergic to Morphine.

I would hand them out, and make it clear that they don't have to fill them out unless they choose too.

Thoughts?

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