Light Cue 23

I know a lot of people, often actors, who say that their job is uniquely difficult because of the live performative quality of it. They are the ones working in front of an audience. And it is true. As a designer you never have to worry about that. By the time there is an audience in the theatre, your job is done. But there is another person who performs a play or dance or opera. The stage manager.

The job of the stage manager might not be as glamorous as that of a performer, or even designer, but they are integral and essential to the proper functioning of a play. A bad actor can ruin their performance, but can easily be boueyed by their fellow performers. A bad stage manager creates a snowball effect that can destroy otherwise wonderful performances and design elements.

When sound or lighting cues occur in the wrong place or a followspot suddenly turns off on the lead singer, the entire delicate and carefully constructed world of the show falls apart. If the orchestration of scenic moves and lighting cues is less than flawless all the hard work that went into it is ruined and for naught.

A good stage manager is essential to the creation of these little worlds we put on stage. They make it seamless. They make the delicate appear strong and the thin appear solid. Their energy dictates the energy of a production more often than the director. A calm and collected stage manager can make the most temperamental of directors easy to work with. But this power works in reverse and even a room full of calm and organized people can stumble over each other when the stage manager is not in total control.

Working on Artfuckers has been wonderful because not only is the whole creative staff fun and easy to work with, but the stage manager is top notch and has everything well organized and running smoothly. Last Word was a breeze as Marci, the stage manager, who I have worked with once before, made everything go calmly and quietly. And this was in a situation that had a lot of potential for tensions with many intense personalities.

It is an interesting position to be in since the job of the stage manager is to make everything run smoothly and it is human nature to rarely notice that which runs smoothly. As a result these people are rarely given the praise they deserve. Yet without them lighting cues would not happen properly, sound would never work as it should, scenic elements would be out of place and props would be missing. Actors would not be called to the stage in time to be cued for their entrance. In short, the production would fall apart under its own weight.

We are only in the second day of tech for Artfuckers, not even all the way through the show and Eduardo has asked me to light his next play he is directing. Another production at Theatre for the New City called Paula. It sure is nice working with people you trust. They can offer you a show and you do not even have to read the script in advance to know you want to accept. I will of course read the script for the show, but I trust his taste to know I will have a good time working on the show.

I have work booked through July and with the exception of Operation Ajax and one assisting gig, everything this year is with people I have previously worked with. There is something really nice about that. It means I am not being hired only on reputation, or having seen my work on another show, but that my work and process are valued enough to be brought back. That I am valued as an artistically creative force in the construction of a work for performance.

Working in a collaborative medium like theatre or dance, the final product is only part of the picture. The process is as much the work as the product. And for me, who leaves the shows on if not before opening, the process is paramount in importance. I do not sit back and watch the shows for weeks or months on end. I am around for the technical rehearsals and then leave the show in the trusted hands of the stage manager. Thus it is very important to me that the people I work with are both competent and pleasant to be around. And of course doing artistically interesting work.

The show itself is, to me, something wholly different. I feel less ownership over the product as I do the process. Once the show is open it is someone else’s. The lighting is a gift. A gift from me to the director and producer and performers that they might share with an audience. Once the show is open it already feels more like a portfolio piece than a living work, because my work is done. The performance is alive and the dialog between the design and the performance is very much still in effect. But the evolution of the design, the construction of the contextual world of the play is done. It becomes a daily negotiation between the mutable and the unchanging. As the lighting, one of the most mutable of media, becomes fixed for the performance to resonate against.

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Tags: artfuckers, design, last word, negotiation, operation ajax, stage managers

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 14th, 2007 at 12:52 and is filed under theatre. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.