Stage Manager-ing

2011-12-17T21:52:00.000-08:00

I was in Rockester, New York, working backstage at the Geva Theatre Center on Naomi Izuki's "36 Views" and I was in Desire's wardrobe office listening to NPR as America fired our first shots into Iraq. It was surprising and scary and Alison DeSantis was there, only then she was called Alison Eastwood. And maybe Will was there, but I don't remember.

And we listened to those first brush strokes of war. And we went out that night, I imagine, to Mex or to Salinger's or to the Old Toad. And the last nine years started.

And now I'm in the booth at the world trade center in downtown Portland running "Angels in America" and I know I'm not supposed to be writing a blog entry during a show, but I do think there are things more important than theatre, and war is one of them.

And I just looked at CNN and our last troops are leaving Iraq.

And I think that's interesting. That history can be counted by curtain calls. And meetings in wardrobe offices. And cues called. And by shows. I'm not sure if I like it or not.

Regardless.

Waiting for a couch

2011-09-15T17:00:00.001-07:00

I'm actually writing this as I sit outside a stranger's house in Vancouver waiting for them to get home so I can buy a couch from them. It's a part of the job I imagine.

The couch will be reupholstered and will look at least twice as nice. Furniture is one of the few things that theatre folk make look better.

That and aging actors.

Today was a waste of driving around and waiting. It was a prime example of the Cheap-Fast-Good model.

Have we talked about that? I'm typing this with thumbs on a keypad on a phone. I can't look it up.

Regardless. The Cheap-Fast-Good rule is: you can only ever have two.

Cheap and fast, but not good.
Good and fast, but not cheap.
And my favorite...
Cheap and good, but not fast.

I love the last one and all my work is planned around it. To take my time and spread things out over weeks of careful consideration and approach. So things can be good.

It's incredible as you near deadlines how those gates start to close and either GOOD or CHEAP starts to vanish.

It's starting.

But try to hang on.

Liam 5.0

2011-09-12T12:19:00.001-07:00

SO:

It's been a few years. A lot has happened. My dad died. We're moving to New York. I worked for a full year at Portland Center Stage. I became equity and NOW I find myself working at Portland Playhouse.

The hottest company in town.

I think that's legit to say?

I have four more months on a two-and-a-half-show contract and I'm stage managing and production managing and technical directing and helping to teach nine apprentices what it's like to devise theatre for a living.

All in all, things are good. Busy but the good kind of busy.

And YESTERDAY I taught a class at Lewis and Clark College about stage management in which I premiered my new mantra on what we're supposed to be doing as stage managers.

Our fundamental role.

Which I've only recently figured out.

The fundamental job of a stage manager?

Ready?

To create an environment wherein everyone is able to do their job.

I think I'm totally right here.

To create an environment wherein everyone is able to do their job.

Think about that for a minute: Theatre fails when people divert their attention from the job they were hired to do, to some other aspect or responsibility that should be the job of someone else. A director who has to think about scheduling. An actor who can't find their prop. A lighting designer who is confused about staging. These are little moments of failure. Think about big moments, and tell me that ultimately...in the moments when failure occurred...if the underlying problem wasn't the fact that someone was doing someone else's job.

I figured it out.

Now I'm sitting in an office, looking at the sunshine out the window, listening to...

Welcome back everyone.

EVERY. One.

Portland Playhouse

2011-09-10T12:10:00.000-07:00

Climbing out. More posts soon.

-L

Touring:

2009-06-01T14:13:00.000-07:00

So I'm going on tour.

But first, a quick preview of the summer.

JUNE
Repeat After Me in San Francisco and Portland.
Undine in San Francisco and Portland.
Project X in San Francisco.
Beauty and The Beast auditions in Portland.
NET Festival in San Francisco.

JULY
On The Table workshops in Portland.
JAW/West Festival in Portland

AUGUST
Everyone Who Looks Like You in Portland.

Summer's looking good. Especially "Transformers 2"...for sure!

But here's what I'm excited about: The workshops for "On The Table" include a whole ton of people driving around on buses, trying to see if flat screen televisions and gestural acting styles work on a moving vehicle. You're not ready for THAT show, population. No way.

ALSO: The NET Festival which includes, but is not limited to, THIS:

Tradition Be Damned:
Stage Managing for Ensemble Theatres
Facilitated by: Liam Kaas-Lentz

For decades, the training of stage managers has been based around one fundamental idea: having a script in hand before the rehearsal process starts. But what if you don’t? How does a classically trained stage manager alter his or her craft to fit a rehearsal process from which there is no script-based action? How does a devising company best utilize a stage manager in the creation of a new piece of work? This workshop will explore all that and more, as we look into the ways a stage manager operates in the ensemble setting, as well as how the craft of stage management may be bettered, as a whole, by devising and ensemble methodology.

SMOKE YOU SMOKERS!!!!

(More on that soon.)

It's been awhile

2009-05-29T21:11:00.000-07:00

Sorry Team: I've been busy. More on Stage Management in awhile, but FIRST:

I watched a couple of episodes of "He-Man" the other day, HERE.

Did anyone catch this in the opening text?

"Fabulous secret powers were revealed to me, the day I held my sword aloft and said, "By The Power Of Grayskull! I have the power!""

My question:

Why the fuck did he initially hold his sword up and say "By the Power of Grayskull! I have the power!"?

The powers were revealed to him the day he first did that.

Egg before the Chicken, guys. Egg before the chicken.

Natch.

Happy Mother's Day

2009-05-10T08:58:00.000-07:00

THE DEAL:

I've been in tech lately, which in this particular process, feels about 6 days long. Which is fine and good and whatever.

But time has been short. And last night when I asked my wife if I'm a bad son because I didn't send a mother's day present, she replied "yes."

Which is true.

I didn't send a mother's day present. And that does make me a bad son. And now I feel horrific about it. Particularly more so this year, for reasons unknown.

Theatre gets in the way sometimes.

So: Mom: If you're reading. I'm only a stage manager because you and dad supported me being a stage manager. And not just in that spiritual, long-distance kind of way, but in a very real, very practical way. The kind of way that allowed me to become the person I am now, due to countless rides to rehearsal, countless late nights, countless blank stares as I explained how exciting the release of the "source-4 junior" was, and countless opening nights in countless cities all across the country.

And mom: I know that most of those opening nights were awful. A-W-F-U-L. But you would never let that show. And I always secretly appreciated it. Thanks for that. And thanks for everything else you've done and do and probably will do in the near future.

So Happy Mother's Day, mom. I'm sorry there's no card in the mail. I promise I'll do better. I love you.

Summertime

2009-04-22T09:03:00.000-07:00

Here's what happens when there's a brief (yet fake) interlude of summer, stuck in the middle of April in Portland:

It gets unbearably hot.

The sun comes out in a serious way.

Everyone gets their fixies out of the garage.

Everyone walks their fixies to the nearest bar.

Everyone chains their fixies to a bike rack.

Everyone in Portland sits outside and drinks Session Lager.

The rains come three days later.

No one goes outside again until July when the heat finally returns.

This is a year-after-year phenomenon here. And we're in the waning portion of it as I write this. I imagine tomorrow will bring rain storms again, and I'll have to go back to buying 10-packs of tri-met tickets at the customer service kiosk in Fred Meyer. Dammit.

But here's the thing:

I'm serious about Portland drinking beers all day when it's sunny. No one actually goes to work, which is evident by the number of folks quaffing beers at outdoor tables at 11am. BUT COUPLE THAT, with the fact that the Blazers seem to be surviving the playoffs, and I'm fairly certain our economy has ground to a halt.

We don't WANT our %12.1 We just don't mind it all that much.

Thanks, Blaze!

It's hot out.

2009-04-20T09:11:00.000-07:00

Seriously? Let's talk rehearsal halls.

(I twitted the shit out of this earlier in the week)

I've worked a couple of regional theatre jobs, and both of those dudes had rehearsal halls that were uncomfortably cave-like, fashioned out of abandoned basements, empty classrooms, or (in the case of PCPA) old Dunder Mifflin buildings.

The point:

No rehearsal hall I've ever been in had windows.

Serious! Maybe a skylight, or a tiny little guy on the top of the wall whose purpose was to let light in. But nothing you could actually see through.

Which sucks SOMETIMES.

But with weather like this? I fucking hate windows.

And if we're all honest for just a minute. I think everyone would rather be drinking PBR than warming up. Vote anyone?

High School Sets

2009-04-14T13:03:00.000-07:00

My friend Devin once said that building sets at a High School is like eating Cheerios with chopsticks. You can do it...but if you just had a FUCKING SPOON!!!!!

Which brings us to:

I've never seen Annie, and only know a little bit about it because of this and because of that song "Tomorrow" which was quite beautiful when I heard it played solo on the piano 10 years back.

(FYI: The Jay-Z thing? That's how I'D reimagine the show)

BUT: THE POINT IS:

I've been helping build the set for the show up at Lincoln High School. If you get a chance, go see it...and here's why:

1) You haven't seen High School Theater in a long time. This will remind you.

2) The more tickets they sell, the more money they raise, the more chances I have of getting hired.

3) Watch the parents watching the show. It's so interesting that the kids can do no wrong. The forgive-ability factor is out of this world. And I think that's fucking FASCINATING.

Plus, there's a dog in it.

Boo-ya.

J-O-B

2009-04-10T09:35:00.000-07:00

Didn't get the job.

The one with all the telephone shenanigans.

It was for the Assistant Production Manager position at Steppenwolf.

It would have been cool to live in Chicago for a time, and to jump (full throttle) back into Regional Theatre.

Cause...I have to say...it's hard these days. This ensemble theatre.

But maybe I'm down because it hailed today, in the middle of April. Or because I'm working too much to go out for a good run. Or maybe it's just a down sort of day.

Fuck it.

More like interv-ewwwwww!

2009-04-08T17:50:00.000-07:00

So I had this phone interview last week with an unnamed agency in an unnamed second city. I think it went alright, and for all intents and purposes it seems I'm still in the running, which makes me feel great. Though I may have botched the last question, which I'm always nervous about, because I can always think of four hundred different answers that would have sounded much better had I used them instead.

"The ability to discern between tradition and habit. Then, I feel, the more important distinction which is to parcel out the good habits from the bad. My fresh perspective on the mode of operations will yield greater results than, perhaps, someone who is uniquely familiar with your way of working, and the city in which you operate."

Something like that.

BUT: The interviewER said something interesting:

He referred to using money as a tool. Not as something to constantly worry about.

Now, this is coming from a theater with a budget slightly larger than the theaters I traditionally work in. For one, they have a theater instead of a haunted ex-elderly care center.

But in my little theaters I work for, we tend to be terrified of spending money. The fetishism of commodity has not yet sunk in. (Fuck! I should have said THAT on the phone!)

Once the money is gone, we view it as gone, and seem to ignore the product which just replaced it...so:

How to better use money as a tool?

And I speak of this only in the production budget sense of the word.

I'll write more as I ponder.

But speaking of money: I'm about to risk losing a few tools. Dammit.

Liam OUT.

Ever play monopoly?

2009-03-31T16:39:00.000-07:00

Have you ever played Monopoly, and the game is going fine...there's someone clearly in the lead, then suddenly that person makes a trade with another person that DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE. Like, they trade all 4 Railroads and $500.00 for Oriental. And you spend the next several minutes scanning the board, trying to figure out what the fuck they're up to, and why on EARTH they would get rid of something so good, for something so seemingly meaningless.

Then the game ends, because your three friends who weren't there when the game started, showed up and the movie starts in 20 minutes. And you never figured out what the deal was with Oriental.

***

Today's a shitty day for Portland theater. And a whole lot of people are super pissed about it. Including me.

But what I'm SURPRISED about, is that no convening has been called for. No one has said "Hey. Let's all meet up and talk about why this happened and what we can do to make sure it doesn't happen anymore." We're a small city of theaters. We have each others e-mail addresses and phone numbers. We could put together a sit down in no time at all. We could help each other in a way other cities can't even dream of.

Instead, the entire city seems to think certain people are evil vindictive bastards. I'm not disagreeing...I just think faceless name calling doesn't seem to help anyone. Instead, let's help each other and get back on our feet.

Is that too Disney of me?

I fucking hate Disney.

Back on the Horse

2009-03-30T17:07:00.001-07:00

Sometimes you forget how to do something you're really good at, and then you have a bad dream, and you wake up, and it all comes back to you.

So there.

Google Groups is an amazing tool for stage management.

A Duke loss and a Memphis loss makes my bracket worthless.

Welcome back.

In Unrelated News

2009-03-21T14:33:00.000-07:00

...we're in the heart of the second round right now, and my dominant opening 4/5ths have proved worthless with a Wake Forest loss and a HEARTBREAKING Florida State loss. But my final four are still in it. I may win that NYTimes Kindle after all!

Ice Cream Cake

2009-03-16T14:41:00.000-07:00

Remember that episode of The Simpsons when Homer is trying to get Bart to not be gay, and so takes him to the Steel Mill to show him what REAL MEN are like, but instead, the whole thing turns into a rave, and one of the Steel Mill guys says "We work hard, AND play hard!" then they all strip and dance?

Well, that's besides the point.

Yesterday Sy and I spent all day in our pajamas, until Jack and Megan brought over ice cream cake.

Sometimes you gotta balance that shit out. I'm just sayin.

ALSO:

Opened and closed a circus show on Saturday night.
Have another few weeks off until Family Show kicks back up.
Have a performance of Undine in 10 days.
Have a phone interview next week.

Pajamas Rule.

HUGE NEWS:

2009-03-10T19:08:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you do OTHER things that are WAY MORE FUN than THEATRE!

Like LIVE BLOGGING the first of a two part FINALE of Battlestar Galactica!

WITH A PRESS PASS FROM THE WILLAMETTE WEEK!

Watch for it this Friday.

And the best part?

Katee Sackhoff is coming to Portland to answer deep insightful questions and to possibly marry my friend Daniel!

Let me relax a bit.

2009-03-09T14:06:00.000-07:00

I'm between shows. My shows are on hiatus, and I'm planning for the future.

Sy and I are thinking about big changes, and pondering what we can get elsewhere.

There are new episodes of Battlestar Galactica, and old episodes of Dexter.

Our cat is fat and happy.

Life is grand.

A Two Parter:

2009-03-03T18:57:00.000-08:00

PART ONE:

STAGE

The part that is technically minded. The part that speaks a lot of languages. The part that ensures, that at the end of the day, the technical aspects of the show will have their ducks in a row, and their cats in pajamas. This is the side that knows how to rewire lights, and run a litany of sound equipment, and install and use external sound cards, fancy audio software, and keep track of your different kinds of lumber.

This part of the stage manager can put together a standard platform. Can tie a clove-hitch, bowline, figure eight, and trucker's hitch. Can change the lamp of a light. Can operate a fly rail. Can lift 50 pounds. This part of the position requires strength, intelligence, and constitution.

This part can also thread a Surger, hem a pant leg, sew a button hole, and dye a coat. It can fold a drop, stretch a cyc, sweep a floor, coil a cable, use a router, not strip a screw, and can clean a paintbrush.

PART TWO:

MANAGER

The part that is a people-person. This part has a sense of humor. This part can organize paperwork, distribute paperwork, call on past paperwork, and knows exactly who should have what kinds of paperwork. This is the part that makes people love the stage manager. This part is a computer, a rolodex, a file folder, and a stopwatch.

This part of the stage manager knows everyone's names. They can write an entire year-long schedule down to the minute. They can keep people on the schedule, because this part of a stage manager has convinced everyone that this is paramount. This part is clean, concise, on time, precise, and cares a great deal for the theatre.

This part communicates with everyone, and everyone tells this part of the stage manager more information than he or she needs. This part keeps all of that information in tupperwares in it's brain, and uses it later.

If you're not getting both parts out of your stage manager, find a new one.

If you're not using both parts of your stage manager, get to it.

Undine

2009-02-12T13:43:00.000-08:00

So I've been stage managering this one-woman show called "UNDINE" that rocks out with rockstar lighting and even rockstarer sound operating.

All of it has led me to thinking about the two worlds of this job.

Which will, of course, come into some sort of clarity with a later post.

In the meantime:

UNDINE

2009-02-09T08:51:00.000-08:00

My hands are unusually dry this morning which make bring me to start using Lotion. Something I've never done. BUT WHY THE HANDS?

Because rehearsal is wreaking havoc on my nails.

I'm a nail biter. Others are not. Others can simply twirl pencils or Twitter.

I'm a nail biter.

And sometimes...when I find myself in a room inside of which, nothing is really happening, save the occasional note or music cue, I bite my nails. This particular process, is particularly trying, therein.

But I digress.

I recommend two things:

1) A long time ago, when I used to host Socratic wanderings on the topic of Stage Management, I would tell people that the worst thing a stage manager can do is to bring a laptop into the rehearsal process. Bob Leonard agreed with me, I couldn't afford one, so I kept saying it. I told my children that laptops served as a blockade between the stage manager's role in the artistic shaping of the process. That to use a laptop simply reinforced the thought that stage managers were to be seen...not heard.

Again: couldn't afford one. Now I can. Or I could. And so I bought a nice pretty white thing that follows me everywhere I go. And you know what? Turns out, Socrates was right.

2) Don't sit next to a window during rehearsal. Sit somewhere you can't see the beautiful world outside. Sit somewhere where the only things to watch are the rehearsal and your fingernails.

***

I hate being right.

Wait, what the hell is this?

2009-01-25T16:29:00.000-08:00

Just adding to the stereotype of stage managers.

This is the shit we have to wade through.

When will it end?

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/TV/01/25/lipstick.jungle.arrest/index.html

APOLLO

2009-01-19T20:28:00.000-08:00

Did you see this?

If you did NOT, here's a trailer:

I just saved you $65.00 and 4 hours.

You owe me a beer.

A break in time and space

2009-01-05T19:45:00.000-08:00

Sorry. It's been awhile. All of you.

ALL of you.

Have you heard of Hand2Mouth Theatre?

You should. I'm working for them.

For those of you who read this blog because I once told you that your grade was DEPENDING ON IT, they are the company with the constantly fluctuating American Flag Drop and beer-soaked confetti. Yes. THAT company.

Anyway, I'm working for them this New Year on a couple of NEW shows.

One is a one-woman musical about the UNDINE MYTH.

The other is a full-length extravaganza about FAMILY.

Both are rehearsing in Portland at Mile Post 5 which is a S-T-E-L-L-A-R venue if you own this:

If you don't...well...bring a thermos.

Also online for 2009 and THIS stage manager:

Prep work for the Mega-Sojourn-Show: ON THE TABLE. Questions? Check out the badass new website. http://www.sojourntheatre.org/ I'm excited. Are YOU?

A much anticipated and DE-MANDED REVIVAL of "Ghosts of Celilo". That's right. BRING IT.

"Beauty and The Beast" at the Newmark Theatre. You (actually may have) heard it here first.

And probably "Woyzeck". Finally. We'll see. I have to talk to Devin.

In the meantime: Happy New Year. Happy New President. Happy New Plays.

-Liam

Wait!

2008-11-25T18:57:00.000-08:00

Did I forget to tell you that while I'm not in DC, I'm VIDEO CONFERENCING into the classroom to continue teaching my class?

It's 7:15am my time. Which means I get to teach in my pajamas.

Shouldn't that be the new norm?

Thanksgiving PROPER

2008-11-25T09:08:00.000-08:00

Now it's actually Thanksgiving, and I'm home, and I'm back with my wife, and I'm totally happy, and I'm totally in love.

And we'll talk about the fear of burning out later.

For now...make outs.

Thanksgiving

2008-11-12T14:09:00.000-08:00

Actually...not quite. But it is RAPIDLY approaching my final hours in D.C, and I should say a few extra things about teaching CLASS:

Had 8 kids. Zero of them...well...maybe one...were interested in pursuing Stage Management as a career, and I can't say I blame them. It's fucking annoying work, and what with the pending economic DOWNTURN...maybe it is better to become a CFO. I'm just sayin...Mike, you're on to something.

But I invite everyone to take a minute and look around you.

(I'm not digressing)

Examine the state of your rehearsal or your backstage or your opening night or your cast or your crew or your...whatever...your acting "class" you teach high schoolers on weekends out of your garage.

WHATEVER IT IS, take a minute to look at it through a completely different light. Something that you might also have some speck of knowledge about. Say you also play basketball. How would you do what you do with THEATRE if it were basketball? Say you also know how to re-wire a 1976 Mustang Electrical Panel. Does the flow chart of your organization make sense through that lens as well? Say you don't know anything except for theatre?

Then get the fuck out of theatre. We don't want you.

I'm serious.

It's just REFRESHING to have students...young and naive as they may seem...take what I hold near and dear and examine it through a set of eyes that differ than the way it's looked at constantly. CONSTANTLY.

Plus, it helps when you have someone like Jonathan Masserano to poke fun at.

Natch.

RECAP

2008-11-10T11:03:00.000-08:00

A couple of things:

We opened. We ran. We closed.

The show in D.C. was big and rocked and had a massive front-page article written about it in the Washington Post. NOT HALF BAD, Sojourn. So pretty much, everyone wins this one.

To sort of, RETRO-actively write about the process would be wildly difficult, and so I've decided to go ahead and give it the ol' college try.

There are a lot of shows out there that are trying a lot of different and new things with a lot of different and new technology. It's all very exciting and very distracting and very, usually, inappropriate for what is actually happening in and around said technology. (Read: Story, characters, plot, relationships, et al)

But the things we were able to accomplish and the things Shannon was able to seamlessly integrate into this show were top-notch.

And trust me...it's not just because I worked on the show. I'd call shit out if it wasn't working on a show I worked on. Intelligent lights, anyone?

We broadcast live-feed video of people across the country, interacting with actors onstage, audience in the audience, and other people also live-feeded into the theatre.

It worked, I would say, %70 of the time, which is pretty stellar, eh Portland Center Stage?

And akin to the board game in Sojourn's BUILT

I'm fucking proud.

So I took a break!

2008-10-11T13:57:00.000-07:00

It's my birthday!

Rockstar Me!

Intelligent Lights

2008-09-27T23:55:00.000-07:00

When I stage managed The Ghosts of Celilo for Artists Rep in Portland, we had a litany of Intelligent Lighting. Something like 50 instruments. And man...was my ass PAINED.

(Read: PAIN IN THE ASS)

I mean. It's WONDERFUL that we can chillax in the house during tech and alter the focus and shape and color and taste of every light in the damn theatre until we see something we like, but don't you just want to take a moment and remember the good old days when lighting designers had to put a light in the air and it had to stay in the air wherever they pointed it? Unless some High School intern crawled up there with a wrench and moved the damn thing. Remember when lighting designers had to stand on the stage with their hands in the air pretending their hands were actors' heads? Remember that?

Now I'm not saying Artists Rep did anything WRONG with the use of intelligent lights. The show was effing beautiful.

BUT I FEEL LIKE MAYBE when you use the things you get a little flexibility in MAKING CHOICES as to a design. Is that fair to say?

All of this is a lead up to next week when Shannon and I head to the theatre to learn about the DL2s that we have hanging in there. The things can do friggin anything.

And frankly? That unnerves me a little.

But in other news:

The Race Is On

2008-09-23T11:57:00.000-07:00

This show here..."the race"...is coming along swimingly.

IN FACT: If you want to talk about arcs of devised theatre, I'd say we're sitting pretty somewhere on our own 40 yard line. It's maybe second and 12, but that's nothing to fear at all. We're in a rehearsal studio all this week which means focused energy on the show itself rather than the technical elements. Do I smell a delicate balance?

We have been privileged to rehearse this whole damn time on the set with a playbook full of technical wizardry. (I mixed my metaphors there. Harry Potter and Tony Romo. Maybe "technical quarterback sneaks"?) BUT: Not that we're downstairs in an oh-so familiar wooden-floored room with flourescant lights and some acting cubes, we'll be forced to set "TECH" aside for a little bit of the time, and look at choreography. Scripts. Relationship. That sort of thing.

It is a delicate balance. And my finger's on the scale.

Do I HAVE to become a Redskins fan?

High Five

2008-09-18T18:06:00.001-07:00

So...this is the SECOND HALF of the Debate.

Now we have 3 self-defined "undecided" voters onstage to ask questions to the surrogates.

RIGHT NOW we are going to CHANGE SOME MINDS! MAKE UP SOME MINDS! WEAR SOME TIES!

ANNNNNDDDDDDDDD I've lost my signal.

(which is apro-pro for my own feelings right about now. Ho Hum)

Four and One Half

2008-09-18T16:44:00.006-07:00

That's right. 4.5 I'm on a Live Blogging ROLL!

So here's the layout:

A moderator on a podium Stage Right. A silly red table with ugly black gaff tape in the middle. 3 Bloggin' Journalism Bras at that table with mics and water and papers. (And by "papers"...think John Stewart) ON EITHER SIDE sit the two surrogates. McCain on Stage Left...a middle aged woman in blue. Think Sarah Palin's Great Grand Mother. (If her brood are an indication of age/birth ratios in AK) Stage Right, Obama's Surrogate. An African American Man with a yellow tie.

And a LAPEL PIN! (Oh Team-Obama...you think of EVERYTHING)

So the role of stage management?

(Aside from cleaning up that gaff tape...)

(Ready? Ready?)

Anticipating the use of all this bullshit said onstage. (And truly? Total bullshit. If this is the imagining of quote-unquote-discourse between "Normal American Students" and the leading political entities of today, then we have some serious problems here in Washington DC.)

Anticipating the use for all the twitter comments in the show as well as brainstorming the POTENTIAL of this sort of technology.

And anticipating the relationship between what we're seeing here tonight and what we'd like to see / needs to be seen on opening night.

Dramaturgically. Design wise. And in every other freakin' avenue.

The commute tonight is going to be a KILLAH.

F-O-U-R

2008-09-18T16:44:00.004-07:00

(I'll probably only do five of these. I'm not that interesting)

Journalist panel. All bloggers. Some Hoyas. No basketball.

BUT CAN YOU IMAGINE the political debate between Kareem Abdul-Jabar and Dwayne Wade?

Sorry. Off track.

So, when you're sitting in the balcony of a fancy lecture hall, live blogging a debate while AT THE SAME TIME moderating a Twitter Conversation, and paying attention to the stage...where the hell is Lawrence Stern in THAT equation? What's the role of a stage manager when there's no rehearsal along with no script? It's a question.

And I bet I'll have an answer in a few posts.

NATCH.

Volume Tres

2008-09-18T16:44:00.003-07:00

Untitled from Liam Kaas-Lentz on Vimeo.

v.II (?)

2008-09-18T16:44:00.002-07:00

The whole cast and design team are sitting in the balcony of a performance hall built in 1322.

We're about to Twitter our way through a debate for the purposes of a TEXT HARVEST (new term, natch, created for this piece...for REALZ)

"Text Harvest". Remember. You heard it here first, boys and girls.

This whole shebang is about the race...two surrogates from Obama and McCain debating about things one debates about (dinosaurs?) and we're gathering info both FROM the debate, and from the CAST as they Twitter it.

The TWITTER aspect is really why we're here...for those of you who don't keep up on the day-to-day additions to OED, Twittering is a form of blogging that you can do from your cell phone. It limits your thoughts to 160 characters, but is nice when there's a large group of people, spread out over an audience, whose thoughts you want captured.

Does anyone else think the name "Twitter" was a SERIOUS lapse in judgment?

Say it again..."Twitter". *shiver*

LIVE BLOGGING-ER

2008-09-18T16:44:00.001-07:00

Hi faithful,

I'm trying my hand at live blogging today. Debates. Georgetown.

Effin yeah.

Wait. What?

"Teaching" is "Teching" with an "A"

2008-09-13T13:51:00.000-07:00

They're the same thing.

That is to say...the goal of sending a great deal of information in a lot of different directions that MUST be retained in order for the class/show/experience to succeed.

And it's often pretty tricky.

So I'm teaching this class here alongside stage managing "The Race" and it's a fantastic class of 6 students who are interested in theatre but also interested in not being interested in theatre, which is pretty much my favorite combination in people. And so far we've had too classes in which we've discussed the merits of E-mail, the necessity of face-to-face conversation, the trials and tribulations of the director/stage manager relationship, and Models.

The kind made of foam-core. Not the other kind.

And I keep forgetting, but I need to have them read this.

Because here's what I WANTED WHEN I WAS LEARNING HOW TO STAGE MANAGE:

(though...and here's a quick sidebar...I learned how to stage manage from two people: Tricia Jester and Kirsten Brannen. Tricia pulled me under her wing when I was a Junior in high school and was slightly interested in stage management. I ASMed "The Witch of Blackbird Pond" and was hooked. I went on to ASM for her 4 more times through high school at the college she attended. It was incredibly amazing of her to offer such a thing up to someone like me. I think from this, I carry with me a need to pull young people with slight theatrical interests under my wing in hopes of igniting the same sort of talent and passion in them. Kirsten, I SMed for at PCPA and ASMed for her at the Geva Theatre Center. We were friends. Then I broke contract and fled to Mexico and we aren't friends anymore. But I learned a lot from both of them. Then I went off and taught myself everything else. Seriously)

BUT WHAT I WANTED was more reading material of how Stage Managers thought about their jobs and their processes. I would have eaten that shit up as a young stage manager.

So really...I wish I had a blog of a bunch of stage managers that I could access. I still do, infact. I think it would be a great forum for all of us to share our work and our thoughts.

And also a great place for narracism.

If that's what you're into.

September 11th

2008-09-11T17:37:00.000-07:00

Happy September 11th!

I've never been sentimental about this, and LORD knows I don't want to start now, but on the FIRST September 11th, I was an interim production stage manager at The Pacific Conservatory for the Performing Arts in Santa Maria, CA. I was only supposed to be the PSM for a week as classes transitioned in and the Summerstock season ended. No real responsibility. Just a place holder while the old one left and the new one came in.

And that morning, I woke up to go through the paces, and the twin towers were on fire.

And then suddenly I had to make a big call about canceling school that day or holding a vigil, or keeping classes in session, or what.

And I think, now, looking back on that, that it was in that moment, more than any other moment, that I most felt like Colonel Tigh.

Darryl Worley - Have you forgotten
Uploaded by smokey3769

Wow

2008-09-10T21:41:00.001-07:00

Check this out

Didn't see THIS one coming.

Jet Setter

2008-09-09T07:43:00.001-07:00

At the airport. Waiting for a plane.

Headed to DC to start work on a devised piece called "The Race" about the coming "Race".

"The one with Sarah Palin in it?"

That one.

Anyway. It's morning. And I'm drinking coffee. And this'll be the first big play I'll blog about from top to bottom.

Shit Yeah!
Liam

PS: Who flies US Airways?!?!?!

PPS: I'll talk about closing that other show later.

11 Shows / 72 Hours

2008-09-07T23:14:00.000-07:00

T-B-A.

Oh. I get it.

So back when I worked at the Geva Theatre Center (where I played the PAINTER in 1776, natch) we used to run this F-ing production of "A Christmas Carol" 9 times a week which BARELY scraped in under the equity limit of too many shitty productions of a single play in a 7 day period.

We had Tuesday and Thursday 10am matinees. Which are hard to do when you're still drunk from the night before and your run list is slightly longer than the script.

SO I WAS TIRED.

But THIS? This is 11 shows in 72 hours. For SERIOUS.

Here's the lesson:

If you're going to do site specific theatre, as a stage manager it is your JOB (particularly when there is no STAGE to MANAGE) to manage the shit out of that warehouse/library/courtroom/subaru dealership. That includes being very aware as to whether or not the entire floor is made out of concrete, and then taking a minute to wonder if your actors should be running on said concrete.

Or...better yet...if you should be running on concrete.

For what is, in essence, 72 hours straight.

Time Based Art hurts my Feet.

Someone make me a shirt.

Having Just Returned From The Theatre

2008-09-05T01:31:00.000-07:00

...where we sat and decided the end of the play in an agonizing three-hour postmortem that resulted in a new idea to be rigged up tomorrow before our first real audience, and subsequently repeated three times in a row.

Jesus.

T-E-C-H

2008-09-01T00:45:00.000-07:00

SO?

Here's the thing: We've just finished our two day "Tech Period" on BUILT...the big show right now. And I just want to talk for a moment about the prescribed "TECHNICAL REHEARSAL" period.

Because I think it's wrong.

Maybe it works in some theatres where you have certain hours to abide by, and certain UNIONS to consider, and certain Lighting Designers who are only in town for 17 minutes and have a THING OR TWO TO SAY about where you decided to hang that projector.

But I'm also going to say...that in just about every theater outside of Rochester, NY and Ashland, OR, the tech rehearsal is misappropriated.

I LIKE the idea of two 10 hour days in the space. But I think it should be handled on a case-by-case basis. An example? An example:

"Boston Marriage" by David Mamet should NOT have an extensive tech period. It should be a blissfully appreciated weekend during which the lighting designer should be able to kick back with a Session Lager and look at his-or-her lights while the actors work out the kinks.

That is to say...the weekend should be cut short and the director should get extra time to work with the actors if they feel they need it.

If the play is in great shape, then make the two days, two 5 hour rehearsals. Easy? Easy.

I'm tired.

This wasn't as eloquent as I'd have hoped.

Kind-of-Finally...

2008-08-21T11:42:00.000-07:00

So anyway.

This thing about Martyrdom.

I have this belief, and it’s wonderfully compounded because my other job is a teacher, that STAGE MANAGERS and TEACHERS both enjoy a self-imposed Martyrdom.

Come on.

How many stage managers has the average theatre artist come across who enjoy, and may even be in L-O-V-E with the bitching and whining that comes with how much work it takes to BE a stage manager. How exhausted they are and about how close to tears they are, and about how they’ll never survive tech because the set will never be done and the lighting cues haven’t even been written yet and about how that’s the lighting designer’s fault, and if the director says one more thing about how the tech is going too slow, well then that Stage Manager will just walk right out.

Fuck em.

It’s this self-imposed martyrdom that is the RUIN of stage managers. Its making it intentionally hard on yourself because you feel the world owed you some sort of sympathy for even choosing this profession.

And maybe I’m angry right now because I just had a phone-meeting with one of those stage managers.

Or maybe I’m just angry this morning because it rained a little bit.

But I’m not angry at the theatre world. I’m angry because I have to return this rain jacket to REI because it sucks. And the reason I’m good? Because I can differentiate those two things.

I love this job. Effing love it. It’s hard and I love it because of that. I don’t hate it because of that. That would be insane.

Did I mention I’m writing this at Pine State Biscuits in Portland? Oh, Reggie. You gastronomical bastard.

Good ideas and Bad ideas

2008-08-20T21:19:00.001-07:00

Here's a video clip from a show I stage managed last year:

(I also lighting designed. Obvi.)

It was a celebration of the phrase I found on a fortune cookie last year while eating in Chicago: "The way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas". I sometimes believe in the other fortune cookie "Too many cooks spoil the broth" but often times I don't.

Though I do believe the latter is from shittier Chinese.

LONG STORY SHORT:

Lots of ideas today. In fact, today won the award for most ideas thrown out in a one-day-sitting. Amazing. But GOOD. I think. GOOD. It means that we'll have a good idea. Lots of ideas = Good ideas.

Right? That's the thing about design?

So...stage managers...write it down. All of it. Every idea. That way, in a week, when the elusive finality of the show is STILL OUT OF REACH, you can go back and review the ones that were skipped over. Everyone will thank you.

Martyrdom? Later.

I'm also designing a board game.

2008-08-19T23:38:00.000-07:00

So this show...the one with the 23 city blocks and the one that has an odd degree of prominence amongst the TBA:08 crowd, has a central focal point in...a board game.

I play board games. I rock some GTA:IV. I also DM. And I'm not afraid who knows it. And I ALSO am REALLY PROUD of this board game I've had a huge part in concocting for this show. Really proud. And its sort of unnerving that in a mere 14 days or so, there's about 450 strangers coming from across the world and country and state to play it. That will probably make me happy and make me drink a celebratory beer or nine to mark the occasion.

WHICH BRINGS ME TOOOO...the recognition of stage managers and the self-imposed martyrdom, therein.

Stay Tuned:

I watched "Dangerous Minds" last night.

2008-08-18T08:14:00.000-07:00

If you haven’t taken a classroom management class and you’re in the stage management profession, you should seriously re-examine your DEAL.

Along those same lines, do you THINK they’ll ever make the “celebrated teacher comes to inner-city school and changes the hearts of the students through immersion in celebrated specific subject” movie about stage management?

(could you just IMAGINE the sexy montage of writing blocking???)

Some other things:

I tour regularly with a company in Portland. I stage manage their most regularly touring show, though they have other stage managers stage managing other shows in their year-round cycle of shows. Grand.

AND I HAPPEN TO ALSO THINK that this could be a new model for small ensemble stage management. Multiple talented stage managers each handling the (often-times-chrono-enlarged) rehearsal/performance process of individual shows.

Maybe watched over by a slightly talented-er production manager? Maybe not.

Welcome-ing

2008-08-17T22:27:00.000-07:00

It’s the middle of the heat right now and we’re solving problems slightly faster than we make them. Which is…I’d imagine…the entire goal of stage management.

I’m in a site-specific location in the new South Waterfront in Portland. It opens the TBA:08 Festival with a bang. We have 1/8” scale models of city-scapes and 50’ projection screens.
Maybe someone is on a balcony 300 yards away. Maybe 4 actors are lifted up on United Rentals Aerial Lifts. Maybe there are bacon wrapped dates.

Maybe not

Stats?

7 Actors.
2 Live musicians
4 chorus
4 crew
23 City blocks
6 Board Games
1 Tightrope

What ABOUT site specificity?

What ABOUT foie gras? It’s fucking hard to make, it costs a disproportionate amount to its final product, and it pisses a lot of people off. But if you just eat it, you fall in love.

Then you buy a T-Shirt.

Dinner time.