I’ve been slacking of late on my blog, but this is mostly due to the fact I have been insanely busy! Back on May 5th, I spent the afternoon and evening volunteering at White Rabbit Productions (http://www.whiterabbitproductions.ca) fundraiser. Now, I have to admit, I’ve been fairly aloof and distant to the whole grassroots theatre/performance arts movement. Well, these guys are AWESOME! They are such a talented group and have a real understanding of making a show work.
What was I doing for them you ask? I was handling a camcorder! My job was to a) record what I like to call “Dynamic” footage for the event (basically, I have to shift focus to various performers on stage in a sensible manner) b) Ensure the footage I am capturing is suitable for re-broadcasting onto the screen BEHIND the performers (my feed was fed to the back of the room via composite video over a co-axial cable connection to a video mixer where a fine gentleman by the name of Ryan Schultz was switching feeds between some animated video for backdrop sequences and c) I did this part on my own, but I used their own camera to also record the event (the rest of the crew seemed very busy), so I went ahead and labeled the tapes, setup the camera (it was a Sony…with so few physical buttons it made my head spin, makes me appreciate Canon so much!).
Anyways, the event went off without a hitch and they raised $92 in their pickle jar dare for Jeff Kohut. With one of the group kicking in the rest of the money to meet their $100 goal to make Jeff eat a whole jar of pickles in 2 minutes. It was awesome!
Anyways, I definitely want to work with that group again if I ever get the opportunity!
On the other side of things, I’ve been working with Elmwood High School’s Dorothy Webster and her spring production team for the last 3 weeks on their production of “Usher – A Totally Teen Comedy.” It’s been awesome to work with such a talented group of young people and to have the opportunity to help give their production a boost (wait till you hear what work I HAVE been doing).
We’ve had some rough spots, but I think it boils down to just the difference in mentality of youth today compared to back when I was in high school (and doing productions). At the end of the day, most of the complaints I have are more about a seemingly stubborn streak about not wanting to learn behaviors that are beneficial to being a performer on stage. Respect is key to ensuring a production goes off smoothly, respect for your fellow actors, director(s), stage crew, the set itself, props and especially the audience that has taken the time to come down and see you perform. If you don’t respect instruction, why there are some basic tenets of being on stage and doing your part, you really need to take a long look at why you are involved.
With all that said, some of the kids are taking a lot of the problems very personally, when they’re working their hearts out on this. This has provided me with a very strange way of looking at some of my past experiences, even how I look at this production itself. Yeah, I’m sitting at the back of the theatre reading (almost) every line of script, catching EVERY error and becoming mortified at the missed cues, mis-remembered lines and at every HUGE stop where someone has completely forgotten their cue and/or line putting my head against the sound board. Before, I’d have gone home torn up, depressed and feeling like I failed, even when I’ve done my part perfectly! I’d feel some sort of need to feel bad for those who made a mistake and it would eat at me.
Perspective now has given me the grace to say to myself, “I did my part, I did more than my part, and I have nothing to really feel bad about.” I’ve gone beyond what is expected of me to help these actors, stage crew and those involved to accomplish the goal of a great production. It’s a rough ride this time, most certainly, but I’m learning a LOT of things and how to better handle these situations for future reference. I want to ensure that the next production I work on will work like (okay, as close to) clock work and that those who do put their heart and soul into their effort aren’t let down.
This has lead me to several conclusions:
So, I’ve already promised I’d help with next year’s production. So, first things first, I need to see if I can find a job that will let me support this.
Oh, right, what did I do you ask? I was the sound engineer (two monitors, 1 desktop computer, 1 laptop, 1 soundboard, 1 field recorder, 1 cd player (urgh, ditched), 1 iPod Nano), so I juggled all the sound effects (some I had to build up to meet a need, which turned out better for this play than the last one I worked on). On top of that, I helped the actors who were struggling with portraying their characters, trying to help direct actors to speak louder, provide motivational speeches, helped with some of the set work (thought, that was primarily a group of REALLY talented students). I also helped with some props (some old cell phones, a flashlight or two, a notepad, tied a hangman’s knot), running around taping doors open for actors to sneak around and the thing that ate a lot of my time today was wiring up adapters for standard light fixtures and devices to the dimmer pack and board. I’m so proud of that it kinda tickles. The students working on the lighting gear were SO happy with this, and I think that’s the part that makes me feel so great about it. To me, wiring something like these adapters up was so easy, it just takes a little time and parts and voila! Miracle for stage lighting!
In the end, we wired up a fake fireplace (which when used in conjunction with a program on the dimmer-board’s computer looks fairly convincing), a chandelier and a free-standing lamp. Man, what a difference that makes for special effects! Right, in addition to all THAT, I also used photoshop to make pictures of the “ancestors/ghosts” look suitably aged/era specific in their colour (or lack thereof). For the most part they turned out amazing, but the last two I worked on didn’t get the amount of care I’d have preferred, but deadlines are deadlines. For nights 1 and 2 we had a screen w/ projector to provide one character whom is silent throughout the entire play except the end with a way of having their thoughts displayed for the audience (juggling that, sound cues and helping to ensure lighting cues are met was doable, but dang, it made me nervous). Finally, I’m also videotaping everything, editing it and creating a DVD for re-sale to those involved for friends and family (since this is turning into a HUGE undertaking to say the least). I’ll have roughly 8 hours of footage to cut down to around 2 hours, effects work to ensure that the changed stage effects can be carried over into other shots since stage dressing changed a lot between night 1 and night 2 (I think that would count as rotoscoping…) and cleaning up the audio, adding titles, etc. I may shoot the after-party as well, though I know Pony Corral will most likely get miffed with me, meh! Anyways, once the video is finalized, I need to make a DVD, burn it, make covers, etc. Which I have to budget for, so I’ll need pre-order #s before I can come up with a cost, then deal with that.
Anyways, it’s almost 2am, I have to re-tie a noose and then get to bed, so adios!