Theatre Post It Notes

quotes from theatre and other theatre fun from your friendly neighborhood stage manager • currently: A Midsummer Night’s Dream

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Line Notes Template

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hSMURV4HfIjvsmWfbpQ2kj3hoqtyd9f-J27J1Lx49XA

Here is the link to my programmed line notes template.

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Can you be both stagehand union and equity? I'm working as a stagehand to pay off loans after college (getting established in my local before first year) but I'm majoring in musical theatre and want to at least make it to Chicago stages. Is it possible to be in both?

Hey!Yes you can join both unions there are just some factors to consider. The biggest thing is that to stay in the union and / or get additional benefits you need to work a certain number of hours or make a certain amount of money in a period of time. Because of this you may find it difficult in the beginning of your career to manage both and for example have health care. But yes you can join both unions.

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Tech Week Names

The two dollies are named Dolly Carton and Muhammad Dolly

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Hey! I have an equity question: I'm looking into getting my equity membership as a stage manager before going to school...but I heard a rumour that after gaining membership you can't choose to work non-equity contracts. Is that true? Because I'll be in school, I'd like the opportunity to take any job that might come my way. But equity is also such a boost on competitive uni applications (and life). Anyway, thank you! -Meg

Yes it is true that you cannot take any nonunion jobs after joining equity. Through my conversation with our Equity stage manager I would highly recommend that you do not join equity now. Especially if you are going somewhere that you are not currently in. It’s best to establish yourself in a location before joining equity. Without this it is almost impossible to get consistent union jobs as networking is truly how you get hired. By joining the union too early you put yourself in a situation that severely limits your opportunity to work and learn too early. I recommend waiting until you establish yourself and complete college before considering it. If you have a chance to work non union in an equity environment you should and see if it is what you want to do.

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Things that happened during Midsummer rehearsal.

Hippolyta was told to act like Melania at the top of show because she is confused and not sure why she is there or and what she was doing.

The people in Act I Scene I are told to be wary of the interaction between Theseus and Hippolyta as Trump and Kim Jung Un. “Is this going to be successful or cause WWW III”

“Pyramus arose!”

*A sword pops up between Bottoms legs”

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Equity Questions

Hey all! I’m currently working on a show with equity actors so I wanted to give you an opportunity to ask them questions. If you have any questions about equity or professional acting ask me a question and I will get you an answer!

[mytechcorner]

Creating a Calling Script

When you are starting to create a calling script it’s important to first create a list of all the different elements you will be in charge of cueing. For example lights, sounds, projections etc. This will help you figure out how many different tabs / colors you will need. 

After that, I like to create my run sheets so that I have a complete list of the cues I need to put into my book. Below is my cue sheet from the last show I did. Once I have these lists for all the elements I call then I can easily transfer everything into my book

NAMING CONVENTIONS

In the professional theatre generally, there are conventions used to label cues. I like to call the whole department (ie. Lights 1, Sound A). 

Lights: LX, use numbers LX 1, LX 2

Sounds: SX or S, use letters after Z move to AA, AB…

MARKING CUES IN A SCRIPT

Every stage manager has a different way of marking cues in their script. The general idea is to have the name of the cue next to the place in the script the where it will be called. I like to use colored tabs to mark cues which helps me easily identify what I am about to call. 

You should also mark stand-by’s for each cue. As a convention, I like to mark them about half a page before they are called. 

Once cues are solidified you can highlight your stand-by’s to correspond to your cues to help call easily. 

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My Tech Corner is now up!

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New Blog!

Hey all,

First of all thank you so much for all your love and support of my little theatre blog. I’ve been thinking a lot about creating more educational and tutorial type content around stage management and technical theatre as a whole. I have ideas ranging from building a prompt book to creating a resume. But I love this community and so I’ve decided to create a second blog! I will be posting the link soon when I finish creating it. However, this doesn’t mean I am abandoning this blog at all! I’m keeping this for all my favorite quotes, rants, and other theatre goodies. I’m excited to start this new chapter and I hope you’ll be excited to see what I’ll create!

[theatrepostits]

https://mytechcorner.tumblr.com/

[theatrepostits]

New Blog!

Hey all,

First of all thank you so much for all your love and support of my little theatre blog. I’ve been thinking a lot about creating more educational and tutorial type content around stage management and technical theatre as a whole. I have ideas ranging from building a prompt book to creating a resume. But I love this community and so I’ve decided to create a second blog! However, this doesn’t mean I am abandoning this blog at all! I’m keeping this for all my favorite quotes, rants, and other theatre goodies. I’m excited to start this new chapter and I hope you’ll be excited to see what I’ll create!

https://mytechcorner.tumblr.com/

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So I tried this again. Let me if you guys are enjoying this and if there’s anything you look like to see me talk about!

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ok I’m my high schools sm and our dicertor likes to put elementary school kids in the show to play little kid parts and I shit you not, one of these little fuckers pissed on stage during one of our shows. like didn’t even try to get off stage. so the next scene was in a cafe and the waiter and a tech had to go on and clean the piss with our car wash rags. not exactly a situation I was trained to deal with!

Well that sounds delightful. But hey now you know what to do when someone pees on the stage so if that ever happens again you’ll be the one with experience. In theatre the best type of people to work with are always those who do more than the bare minimum of their job and that makes all the difference. That’s the fun of live theatre you literally never know what could happen, but for me that’s the best part (even though my technicians in the booth may disagree with me saying that)

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So I made a video! I asked you guys if you’d be interested in theatre videos and you said yes so let me know what you think!

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Google Drive (My Holy Grail)

If you don’t use google drive to stage manage you should. Well, that is just my opinion, but seriously its soooooo helpful. As a high school student, I find its super helpful and since everyone at school has an email they have to check for school so I love using it. 

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A moment of silence for all the cues that are just almost

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Star Drop Op: So the good news is that I figured out to the make the stars slower. The bad news is I just deleted the entire show.

Its tech week everyone and we don’t get a final dress the day before opening night this is going to be fun...

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SM: *calls BO too early*

Actor in scene: Were we really that terrible?

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*Actor is asked to bring up his rug cleaning business in conversation*

Actor: So you have any rugs that need cleaning

ASM: You can’t say that you’re not a prositute