Familiar Ground

All to familiar ground is what we walk on in the theatre. There are the thoughts "of course, they haven't changed the mason in like 5 years..." but beyond that. Theatre is a wonderful thing because it is always changing. It is a constant learning process. One day you learn to build Antartica and the next you wish you were in Antartica.

Urinetown crew kicked into Install tonight, and the set kicked back. At least it moved forward. Slowly, but forward none the less. It took the entire night to bring the portal pieces downstage, and lay them down.

At least they are still in the theatre though, right :)


Here is a great out of focus shot. Now imagine them face down and you see the stage as is.


The Chairs also started it's install tonight.
It is much happier along.



I know the picture doesn't say much but it is all good. In that space we also have to set up the audience seating, so that is now done.

Glass Menegerie also began tonight. It is lucky to be in the shop building. Tonight 1 wall was built and covered in chicken wire, another one was built and was sadly left alone and cold. It will get it's chicken wire tomorrow. It is right on schedule.

All in all, it's theatre.

PLAYground

So, this is what our department calls playground week. This week changes between fall and spring depending on what else is going on. This year it happens to fall right now.

So what is a "Playground" week? Well, despite the huge monopoly board sitting in our front lobby...

playground is instead a week dedicated to putting on any kind of performance art you hear tmight be attached to. So times maybe you have some tech people writing and acting in a musical, or maybe you make a movie, maybe it ia dance, maybe it is a light show. Pretty much anything goes. Last year there was a show done in a bathroom (don't ask)...that is the mentality of playground. We have no drama classes, we are instead to focus our energy on these nonsupported shows which have less than a week to rehearse and then show friday-sunday. Each show gets about 1 hour in the space for set up and show. There are about 40 shows depending how many cancel...

It is a great expierence for a lot of people and isn't to horrendous. This does however put everything on hold. So The Chairs (which has a new director) is sitting in the hall waiting for an empty theatre on Monday.


Glass Menagerie begins it's buil don Monday and as we jsut found out, there will now be a door, so I guess it is time to draft that wall.

Urinetown however, has not hit the brakes. Rather it just keeps going... The portal has made tremendous progress, We had a fit together over the weekend for it and found oh so many problems. There toggles that were obviously not square, walls that were just plain the wrong size...holes for lights that were not matched up because the framing was in the wrong spot. We got all the quinks worked out except that we are still short 1 lighting hole which needs to be fixed because it looks weird.


Remember the things that looked like a big boot?, well now they are painted and finished. I was going to show a picture of the wonderful staricases that have been built and cut and fixed and cut and blah blah blah but it doesn;t seem to want to load. I guess you are lucky.

Here is a picture of a drafting of what this thing will sort of look like when it is complete.

and a complete wall

And I guess that leaves us to one amazing person. This is our third floor hallway. Remember how I said just about anything goes for playground, well one student has permission to paint the hallway.



I guess that will probably be it until crew starts up again on monday.
Oh Urinetown had a great run through of Act I tonight. The cast did a wonderful job and for how little rehearsal time they have had it is quite impressive.

blink blink

Friday was exciting. We got our long awaited staircase in for Urinetown to unwrap and find a beautiful dent in one of the legs. Or was that on Thursday? Eh, I don't remember. Anyway we got the double acting gate working on Saturday along with getting the upstage gate hinged and happy and will hopefully bolt it to the wall this week.

Saturday was our last show of Lysistrata.




I don't think people (particular people) realize how much the overhire has actually done and far behind we would be if we had unskilled overhire. We are extremely lucky.

Sunday was the last glimpse of the TV Workshop.

2 strikes took place today. The TV workshop is struck and gone. Lysistrata is well on it's way to being gone. After 4 hours there is not whole lot left.





The chairs also started build tonight but there is nothing exciting to show for it. Just some 2x4 cut down for legs...isn't that exciting?

Final count on injuries for the night? 6 that I am aware of. Worst one? Um, I think the slice up somebodies side that I got to bandage, it got to bleed quite a bit all over her pretty shirt. Funniest? Probably the person who hit her head while picking up screws.

Is it wrong that I find humor in this, nah, at least I pay enough attention that I know they all occurred. I even know about the actress in rehearsal who got injured. What a lovely day to be part of the school of drama.

so studly

mmm, studwalls. Amazing how stud walls can make it look like so much gets done. Guess what happened today...

9:00 am. I am supposed to be in class but my overhire has called and he will nto be here so I have to be around to get my staircase that was supposed to arrive at 9:00am.

10:45 am. Staircase arrives.

11:30 am I have a weekly meeting scheduled for our crew heads... meeting gets cancelled on account of a class but doesn't tell 3 people.

11:29 am Lumber order shows up in time for meeting that got cancelled anyway.

12:21pm remember I have class and stop budgeting run to class give a presentation and come back.

2:00 pm get ahold of a LOWES that has 6 spools of Barbed Wire left. they are marked down to $5 a spool.

2:45 pm get keys and a credit card to run to LOWES.

2:48 pm get stopped by a designer (who I am buying the barbed wire for) to take care of another problem that has come up.

3:00 pm get stopped by another student to tell them what is wrong with the ground plans on public.

3:12 pm run out the door and drive to LOWES.

3:32 pm LOWES is out of barbed wire and will NOT be getting anymore in. They also do not sell boxes of bolts or an anluminum laminate roller. I HATE YOU LOWES!

4:45 pm start shopping around for more barbed wire. This takes us to crew, which needs no detail except to remind people "Est tantum fabula scholastica" which means "It is just a school play" This is about the learning process as much as it is about the final product and that some dutchman's won't be perfect, sorry about your luck.


Paints is really far behind and the first wall is close but not quite right. Here is the farthest upstage wall standing and painted...I think the tile is missing which is what goes in the grey area.


We also got one of the downstage walls up and standing. This was the hardest wall because of the archway that is curved on 2 different radii and is in forced perspective. Kind of crazy.

stretch**yawn**wednesday is gone

Wednesdays are the 'easy' days around here. Meaning there is generealy no crew here. I say that now but next wednesday there is crew, so maybe I just enjoy telling tall tales. No reall, it was quite a busy around purnell for us today.

TV WORKSHOP

We have a TV workshop. Generally a cool, goog thing. But the set is kind of old. This is year 3 for it. It gets twice year and has had quite a lot of things hung on the walls so it looks a bit like swiss cheese. I don't like swiss cheese, not the cheese itself and not what the terms represents which is why we are making a new set for the TV workshops and shows.



The one room is just so small while the other room is just so ugly. The orginal set looked nice but it has been moved and so nt cared about for a little to long. It will still allow the sessions to take place and serve it's purpose. What is the purpose of a TV Workshop? To give the designers and directors an oppurtunity to design for the camera. Things look different on film and this is a great oppurtunity for the to see what the hell it acutally does look like before royally scrweing up. In the spring we do a TV shoot over at a local studio so in a way thi is a practice session for the real thing, so really, it is a good thing.

URINETOWN

Build continued with our staff posistions working away. Some more drawing got finished and things are rocking on the floor. Really this has just been a pretty good process although I seriously feel like we are missing something.

We have a staricase coming in tomorrow. It is pretty big and somehow we have to get it from the downstairs to the upstairs...can't wait to see how big 6'8" actually is in comparrison to the world of the theatre building.

LYSISTRATA

Strike was planned today. Strike takes place the top of next week. Should go pretty quick. Tonight was photo call. Here are a few more photos, what can I say I love taking photographs!



What you should notice here the wonderful use of rocks as meditation balls, love that touch.



She really does a good job with this role.







Check out that statue head. Our props guy did a great job.

He worked on that head for like 2 weeks and the outcome is a completely sitable, standable statue head made out of a combination of wood, great stuff foam, some kindof modeling clay and fabric. Kudos to Props!






Funny shot of boys being boys and looking at the girl on a pedastool instead of the girl with control...oh boys.








The columns, looking up. Nice shot, that's all.

And someone wants on the computer so I guess I should run away. Besides it is wednesday and my job fot the evening is done apparently i have a prsentation tomorrow.

Buy it, don't build it...

The theme of one of our 'shows' is buy it. We are building a TV set that will be used for a mirage of things but that means it needs to be high quality...and as good as our crew our...they are not real carpenters. But they are doing an awesome job!



That is one person who is just enjoying life to much... Show number 2 is pretty far behind in the world of paints and she came in to paint away...

Also in the world of paints they did the base coat on the walls. I thought black was the base coat...apparently it was supposed to be yellowish swirls... who knew?

Wall E and F


Two walls laid out in order on the paint floor with the new base coat.

Wall C and D are now on there way to paints as well.


Urinal Unit is DONE! Scenery still has to add an air tank for the pneumatic castor systme...but hey, the system is working.


That is the unit standing except for it's air tank that needs to be added sometime soon. But the plumbing all works now :) big sigh of relief since we were never taught how to do it and was done complete trial and error. Kudos to us! That is what some of the scary plumbing looks like.

Wish we had hoses in different colors...

working outside on the loading dock (don't look no tables) While most rational would see that sometimes it just isn't feasable to use a table, if our advisor saw this picture...it would be on his blog bitching :)



In other worlds of scenery tech...The Chairs is next up on tthe shop floor and that begin on Monday although we might go ahead and start it on Friday...eh, why not.

Tomorrow we load in a different set than the one we are currentl budgeting and then rip it down next week.

Upcoming events:
Urinetown- Build (current), install, show, strike
Modular Scenery for TV- Budgeting (current), Build, install, show, strike
TV workshops -install, show, strike
The Chairs- Build, install, show, strike
Glass Menagerie- Build, install, show, strike
Geographyh of a Horse Dreamer- Build, install, show, strike
Nathan the Wise- Budgeting (current), Build
Beast of the Moon- Budgeting, tech design
Trust- Budgeting, tech design
As You Like It- Budget Pass for Scope


The closes out the semester...so think about it, we are on Week #7 of 16 and all of that will occur before we leave for the wonderful of not here for 3 weeks :)

the way things move

When you are a crew ahead of any department you should remember that other departments are depending on you and your knowledge of your own schedule. What the hell does that mean? Well, it means that if you are running behind and someone needs whatever thehell you are working on, you should say "hey, I am running behind. I hope to have it done tomorrow by such and such a time." It is general curtisy that if you know you are going to be behind to warn them...

In the same tongue, if you are changing your schedule and it effects other people, other departments you should tell them. So if you are expecting a certain piece of scenery say by, oh I don't know, Oct. 17. And you decide that you don't need it until Nov. 4th or 5th... you should tell both departments that are busting their asses off to get it done. That way, they can slow down and do it right.

Common curtisy, common sense.

What kind of rights are there in the theatre...can you cut and paste a drafting and then call it your own? So there is a set, the walls are where they are there is no choise what so ever. You draft chairs, tables and a couch and put them in the set. Someone else comes along and literally cuts the furniture out and then rearranges it and makes a photocopy so that it looks like a new ground plan. Do you have to give credit to the person who drafted it. Nothing fancy...in fact they almost look like the office elements in autoCAD that are just there and hanging out in cyber space waiting to be thrown in to use...Is it so horrible that someone would do it for a class project that the world needs to be blown up and put on the front page of the NEW YORK TIMES.

I guess I just feel like people are blowing up the stupid shit around here. Is it that we have nothing else to do or so much else to do that we don't care to do it and would rather look at the little petty shit.

Speakign of which, don't ask questions unless you are ready for the answers. Sometimes people just ask questions, maybe they didn't look up the info that could have been looked up. Instead of blowing up about it though and wasting not only your own time but also other people's time...and getting worked up, was the stress really worth it? Sometime it is easier to just do do it yourself, respond to things, then go to the bar and drink about it... it doesn't matter. It isn't changing the world. And hey, it if you answer quickly, it makes you look good...bitching doesn't.

On the floor Tonight:

The portal was almost finished. This is the big center piece. The portal is 5 pieces: the legs (the one that look like legs from a previous post) 2 corner pieces and the huge center chunk. Below is a picture of the chunk on it's way to the loading dock where it will receive a beautiful layer of Muslin. and then ship it off to Paints.


In the meantime:

Paints is well behind schedule. I don't think they fully understand what they are doing. Correction they don't. The paint charge has already said this. They can not figure out the perspective and the first attempt was a failure. It doesn't help the designer has designed something that can not be recreated. It happens every now and then. It is not that it is impossible but when the designer can not gice you certain points or know how the hell he did it in the first place...well you get what I am saying...

If you can't draw it, you can't build it. If you don't pass on the needed information, then do it yourself. We all (the production team as a whole) have enough other stuff to deal with.

Here is Paints trying desperately to not waste time.



PICTURE ID: there are 3 parts to that wall, each one has 2 sides seen by audience. The top of the wall if the top in the picture, the mid is the mid and the bottom is the bottom one with grey paint (it get's tiles instead of bricks) that looks kind of like a work table.

What is going on down there? Well, the bricks for the facing are already laid out (we think correctly) and they are trying to do forced perspective on a curved wall that has 2 different radius' and a low vanishing point. Why does it matter that the point is low...because the designer want line to go up which means he wants the bricks to have a different vanishing point than the wall themselves. Fine and dandy but give the paint charge some point to work off of...

And on that note...it is time to start a rebelion...I rebel against being here any longer.

time for yourself

There is a reaccuring problem here at school. The same people are the dedicated ones. These people are dedicated to their work, not their school work. It's not really there fault. They enjoy what they do and as a result take on side project (hey, I know I've been there and still do a little too often) but when you are an undergrad at a school such as this...you don't get a lot of chances. Actually AI guess you get tom nay chances, you want to to do so much especially if you get the chance to do something out of your field.

For instance you come into this school as a freshman. WOHOOO FRESHMAN! Yeah, it's about that exciting, you are taken in and most of the upperclassmen help you out and show you the ropes and buy you beer. The important things in life. Through the course of the year you do some late nights because when they could have been early you to usy enjoying the rumors of college life is. In time passing you even get to do run crew for a few shows. Then at the end of your first year some of your friends get cut or decide this wasn't the right program for them afterall. Either way you drink, you cry, you leave, you come back, you remember.

Your sophomore year you are stuck on a build crew. If your lucky it is in an area that you have interest in. If you are lucky. You do some more work and you decide what you want to with your remaining 2 years. Some more people leave, some drinks are shared, you come back again... aren't you lucky.

Junior year is horrible. You have way to much homework to and no time to do it because you also have real jobs on the shows. These real jobs are usually doing what you are learning in class. I feel like your junior year classes should have already happened so that you know what the fuck your supposed to be doing on stage. Unforunately you no longer have time to drink but you make some by turning in assignments late. Some people never turn in some assignments and at the end of the year we once again say good bye.

Through the course of your junior and senior years you get assigned shows. You get assigned things from your area. But what if you have interest in more than one area...well that is when you take on outside jobs. a good thing, get your name out there prove you are responsible, don't really care about school cause you have senioritis anyway. But it isn't like you are not working. You are kicking ass on shows, but just not in the grade deptartment. Then there are some people who don't do shit for outside work, barely have any show work (probably cause the faculty don't trust them) and yet you are the one who will get in trouble at semester reviews.

Not really sure how many people get in trouble enough to say good by their senior year...guess I'll find out.

Over all, I think the wrong people get ridiculed adn therefore spend way to much time worring throught the course of the semester.

legs

Tonight a show opened...and it went well. No pictures though, if you want to see anymore then you have to come see the show. Don't trust me, go see it so you can argue it...

In the world of computers and paper...more drafting was done...now isn;t that exciting? Well, isn't it? Didn't think so.

On the shop floor tonight the put on some reveals for the portal and covered some parts in muslin...



If you look at this image upside down doesn't it kind of look like Italy, or a boot. That's a pretty fucking big leg for that boot.

Oh yeah and we also taught paints how to draw lines on an angle. Come on Miss Fine Artist quit bitching at senery and help your own people. You say you care about the show but all I see is you watching out for yourself in the world of paints. I don't think you care about your paint charges, I'll let you know when my opinion on that one changes. I won't hold my breathe though.

juniors

Oh juniors...

You all seriously need to get over your 'bad' selves. None of you are as good as you all think you are. There are of course some exceptions to this comment and they know who they are because I have told them straight out that they are an exception.

but the rest of you...

This is what you should learn in the next year and a half before you graduate, unless of course you get cut first...

The people sitting next to you, while they might be your competition are also your way to a job, and even more...should be your friends.

The best of you doesn't say or act like they are and no mister man, it is not you either...2-timers don't count, they don't exist once you are figured out, and you have been unmasked, revealed to the world as a 2-timing piece of, well you get the idea.

The problem with your mentality is simply put this...Yes you all will be competing for jobs, but there are more jobs than there are of you. You should be able to refernce each other for a job. Maybe PM 1 will have a job and get offered another one...so if PM 1 is friends with PM 2 then they might reference PM 2 for the job who is currently unemployed and living in a cardboard box.

SO GET YOUR HEADS OUT OF YOUR ASSES YOU WHINY ASSED LITTLE SHITS!!!!

get it?

This entry is based on a little commotion around the deptartment lately...I am just saying what no one else will say. whatever.

after an evening of theatre...

So apparently a set can only last as long as the first preview night. Tonight I walked the set after the show (just something I do every now and again) and found that the facing was just plain ripping off. Yeah for notes to do tomorrow.

On the shop floor tonight we learned quality control...notice the toggle (piece of wood)that is not quite attached...


Also in the shop today (for those of you who might have once known the layout) the scrap rack moved. This is in anticipation for a CNC Router that the shop will get sometime in the next few weeks.

Where Scrap was (and cnc will be)



Where scrap rack is (follow the blue arrow)



In other news...got some nice show shots tonight...lighting finally kicked into gear.
Here is what I considered the biggest downfall of Lysistrata (besides a few actors that I still can't stand) the lights. My earlier pics had to have some severe touch up in photoshop to be able to see people. Not because lights were low, but because there was a huge lack of lights. For some reason that I Will not try and understand the tech process waited until Saturday night to the Cue-to-Cue when tech had begun on Wednesday. So here we all were watching actors in the dark.. The lighting was extremely saturated, lots of colors, not lots of reason. As a result there were a lot of holes that actors kind of just sat in. The design er is a good designer, I have seen some of his other work...but he is, for lack of better word, an artistic designer. He likes color, he likes bold things, he likes to make it not quite so real. This is fine for some shows but not for a lightweight comedy. The fun is in the text not the lights, not the set. Took some understanding and after getting through the cue to cue by the skin of his teeth he made some serious changes (although there is still room for improvement) and it is now a bareable show.

Here a couple shots from tonights performance...






Lack of light on the scenery is sad...but at least the actors got their deserved light.


In other news...it is time to flee the scene of the crime... and no you may not know what the crime is, else why bother fleeing.

Oh yeah StuTech Version2.0



This is do to a recent evacuation of Stu Tech which apparently not for tech people for Production Managers and Stage Managers...I could go into this more, but believe it or not they have already had their dedication and I say nothing. I just need a space until Dec. That is when I am done with shows for the semester and maybe the year. On call next semester...

on the floor

So we all know that I can not just be doing one show... So while Lysistrata has it's preview opening performance tonight, we are already well underway with our next mainstage show, Urinetown...

While I can not speak for the show as a whole yet or even the design as a whole because there are yet to be any story boards...full paint elevations... or I don't even designs for every aspect yet...

Anyway, the walls are um, well, fun. It is like looking down a cone as you look across the stage. This is a set for Matt Hales to pull his skateboard out onto the night before strike. May I should email him and tell him to come play. The down flaw is I can't do most of the drafting, or at least I am not. We have not learned this stuff yet nor is there really a way to learn it. I am paying how much money a year to learn what I can't do. I appreciate that faculty are helping but maybe it would be cool if we got to do it too so that we learn it but whatever.

The staple guns still shoot 13.5 hours a day and a set still appears in the scene shop.



What the hell ar eyou looking at? Well it is a wall. 1 part of 6 walls from the top view. I guess it will make more sense in a month when the set is installed. Hmm, only a month...scary thought.

There are 5 other shows in the works right now as well but they are still just paper work trails. The chairs, which is still not quite in budget and shouldhave been 2 weeks ago. Glass Menagerie, which we should probably not be trying to do on a scenery budget of 125...but i will leave it at that for now. Geography of a Horse Dreamer, um no clue what is is about...I mean i do, it is about a gambling guy who is kidnapped in order to call the races but looses his touch zzzzzzzz that's about where I loose it. Nathan the Wise, just started budgeting yesterday.. WQED project, basically we are building a mobile set for the TV studio.... hold your breathe it's so exciting...

lysistrata

This is my current show which opens tonight...Lysistrata.

Is it a good show? Well it has it's ups and downs, besides the male genitalia... the show hits right on with a lot of points but some other points are so far off it is kind of sad. The lead is amazing and she captivate you from the moment the lights come on her. Some of the secondaries are not so hot, but are quickly shut up Lysistrata (thank god). Is it worth seeing, sure isn't everything worth seeing, trying expierementing with at least once?

It is a short show only an hour 20... and not a complete waste time. There are worse things I could be doing besides watching every night. Think about aren;t some of your classes an hour 20?