Backstage at the Nutcracker

[planetmike]

Here's an interesting article about a backstage cat herder for the Washington Ballet's Nutcracker.

Her job has been compared to herding cats, but for Donna Glover, it’s the mice that are tougher. They’re rambunctious. They step on one another’s tails. They’re at the point in their pre-tweens where everything makes them excitable, no matter how many times a grown-up tells them to calm down and stay in line. Same goes for the rabbits.

Full article at: http://www.tbd.com/blogs/tbd-arts/2010/12/herding-rats-backstage-at-the-nutcracker-5939.html

[Tempest]

Fun.  I particularly liked the Lord of the Flies reference.  My adult show is in rep with Madeline's Christmas (12 little girls), and we had a power outage/blackout the other night.  I acutally told my cast, after the show, "Thank goodness it was us.  If that had happened during the kids show, it would have been Lord of the Flies in 2.5 seconds!"

I also like the bit about "tails in hands!"  Oh, small children!

[bex]

My current show only has 7 kids, and they run me ragged.  I can't even fathom having that many children backstage!

[dallas10086]

The most I've had was 16, but luckily they were good ones! I couldn't handle an all-girl kid cast, that's a different monster all together.

[Rebbe]

I love the parent who got out of their car and ran their child over to the theater.  I’m sure I would have hated being stuck behind them, but I admire their commitment to the production.  I’ve certainly been tempted to ask actors to do that when they tell me they’re in traffic a few blocks away, or circling for parking.

[JMagill]

WOW I just want to let all of you who only have had a few children in a show know how lucky you really are.  all of the 3 show i have done this fall are all children heavy Annie, A Christmas Story and yes The Nutcracker.  each show progressively acquired more children. Annie had 9 with the understudies, ACS with 12 and Nutcracker is some where around 25. I can't wait until Nutcracker closes this Sunday because I will get a little bit of a break from all the rambunctious kids. And no I didn't have a child Wrangler for any of these shows.  When I did King and I last year I had a wrangler and it was amazing she brought coloring books and activities for them to do.
although some times even with full adult cast I sometimes feel like I need a wrangler for them too.

[Thespi620]

JMagill, I know how you feel.  I grew up acting in community theater involving 200+ children ages 8-Adult, and have returned to wrangle in years past, it's quite the task.  They don't work with a typical SM/Director/Wrangler setup (thank goodness...that SM would have to be absolutely insane) but the cast is almost 95% kids and it's over 200 people every summer....so scenes like these backstage at the Nutcracker aren't that odd to me.

[cprted]

I'm currently on tour with a production of the Nutcracker.  Yep, 100+ kids backstage, organised chaos ...

[pmooney]

My only gig is to work as a volunteer with a youth ballet and we just finished our Nutcracker with a cast of 90 kids ages 6 through 18 with a few adults as the party parents and Drosselmeyer of course. even my crew was made up mostly of teen and college age kids. We rehearse in our own building and thats when we have most of our behavior problems but when we get in to the theater we have only one day for dress rehearsal and then three performances over the weekend those kids are great! I am always so proud of them!

EDIT: Profanity check - PSMK

[late_stranger]

My elementary school did a musical every year. My friends were always in the shows, and they would complain constantly about the director and the guy who probably filled the role of stage manager (though that wasn't his official title). I recently saw the director in the lobby of our local community theatre during the intermission of a show there. He said "yeah, we've got ninety of them this year".

And suddenly, removed from my friends and for the first time with the context of stage management, I nearly broke down into tears on his behalf. Ninety kids? 9-0? I would actually die. I can't imagine how the poor man does it.

[centaura]

Every year the local ballet company takes over (for a week of Nutcracker), and they have about 150 or so kids that are running around.  But, they are the most organized group that comes here - with multiple parents assigned to each room/age group, meticulous checkin out procedures, etc.  While it can be scary to wander through - it truly is ORGANIZED chaos when they are here.  But, I worked a year once at a professional children's theatre - can't remember how big the biggest cast we had was, but it was entertaining.  And as the ASM, I spent a lot of time child wrangling.

-Centaura