This is the post where I am going to tell about the secret project I mentioned a few times, but that is going to be towards the end of the post…. (just to keep you reading)

Some of you may have drifted by the blog in the last couple weeks and wondered where I have been.  Some of you probably couldn’t care less, and those of you who actually know me probably spent the last two weeks in the same building as me for the duration of said two weeks.  Such is the life of theatre people, when we get into full swing on a show, well, there is nothing else in the rest of the world.  Heck, i didn’t even participate in this past month’s Bloggerstock event because I didn’t have time.  Speaking of which, we really need to come up with a topic for this month and I don’t want it to be something cliche about the holidays.

Right, holidays.  Today is the seventh day of Hanukkah, that means that tonight is the last night.  So for those of you who don’t actually know what that means, tonight we light eight candles (unless you follow the traditions of Shamai instead of Hillel) in celebration of the eighth day.  I have been keeping my menorah in the booth at the theatre.  I thought that it was appropriate as we are working on the nice Christmas musical written by a good Jewish boy, Irving Berlin.  The man was smart, he knew what would sell and he capitalized on it!  White Christmas was bound to sell way more tickets than White Hanukkah would, though you probably could write a similar story about either.  The show is far from dominated by Christmas related songs.

The show.  Well, this production is certainly one of the biggest of the season, it might be the second largest.  I have a feeling that Sunset Boulevard will be bigger in many respects.  However, as I wrote before, this show is so big, it doesn’t really fit in the space.  I can’t remember working on a show here at PTC that had so many issues as we were going through tech and into opening.  I mean even during Les Mis when things just started to fall apart, we made it pretty well into the run first.  Most of the early issues we had with that show were due to operator error or oversight.  This show on the other hand, well it never really worked right until last night.

From day one of tech, after three weeks in the shop and $350 of repairs my moving light that died during Hamlet was returned to us and we promptly discovered that it was not fixed.  At this point I went to the other repair shop in town, and while it took four trips down there and ordering a part that we didn’t actually need, they fixed it.  Turned out to be something so simple that I am kicking myself for not noticing.  One of the fans that cools off the lamp housing was broken and a bunch of the wiring had begun to melt together.  All things considered this is something that should have been noticed by the first shop tech when they had the fixture for three weeks.  Whatever, it seems to be fixed now and we are happy.  During the fiasco while we were in tech, all it did was serve to stress me out.

Then we had Thanksgiving.  Once again, the holiday fell right in the middle of our tech schedule which is a mixed blessing.  We only get one day off, so there would be no visiting my family, but luckily I have a girlfriend with a wonderful family who was happy to add me to their festivities.  There was one stipulation by one of her cousins though and that was that I make my chocolate-butterscotch pudding pie.  Well, not only did I make that pie, I made a gluten free pie for one of the aunts (the host of the festivities), I made a chocolate free pie for Ruth’s mother, and one other pie for a total of four pudding pies.  Needless to say, between Ruth’s father’s deep fried turkey and my pies, Thanksgiving was quite a hit.  Ruth also made some home-made hummus that went very well (I am not a big hummus person, but everyone else like it) and her brother made a blue velvet pomegranate cake that has become a family favorite.  Lots of good food, as it should be.

The next day we were back to work bright and early to try and keep up with the demands of our eccentric and stubborn lighting designer.  This was a day that I won’t forget for a while as somehow I managed to injure my left knee while, of all things, I was walking up the stairs to the stage.  I can’t remember what actually happened, or if I tripped, I just remember getting to the top of the stairs and being in pain.  My knee felt like it was popping when i tried to extend it fully and it really hurt.  I was literally floored by it.  My crew managed to get me off the stage and into the house where I spent most of the rest of the day on the floor, icing my knee.

“Why didn’t you go to the ER?” I hear you ask.  Well, it turns out that one of my crewtons is good friends with an Orthopedic Surgeon who also happens to be the head doctor at Snowbird.  We had been introduced last year and skied together, but I didn’t know at the time that he was a doctor.  In any case, we called him and I described the injury and he said that it wasn’t worth the ER trip.  Do what I was doing and follow the principles of RICE and then see him on Monday.  Of course after seeing him, he wants to get an MRI because he can’t make a definitive diagnosis based on the exam he did.  This is fine with me save for now trying to get workman’s comp to OK the scan.  Yeah, exciting.  The good news is that he thinks it is just a torn meniscus, and this could probably be fixed and healed in time for me not to miss the entire ski season.

So, now I am hobbling around the theatre not able to climb ladders and barely able to do my job.  Then we run into yet more snafus.  The network node that is our main control output for the lighting system seems to have died.  I spent a day trying to cobble the system back together into a workable state.  We did it, but it sure isn’t pretty.  I tried getting in touch with the manufacturer but they have yet to respond.  I did get int touch with the competition, who happen to have some of these nodes stashed under a desk in the factory, so they are sending me one at no charge.  I don’t know how to thank them for that.  We will hopefully be back in operation at full capacity by the end of this week.

To cap off things with the show, my grandparents came in for a visit on opening weekend.  They got to see the show on opening night, which was one of the better performances of the weekend and I got to visit with them before they head to Israel for the better part of the winter.  It was nice to get to seem them as I was not able to join my family for Thanksgiving.  In some ways, not being able to ski on account of my knee made it a lot less of a dilemma on spending time with them or skiing!  We had a good weekend together.

So, the last major thing.  This probably could deserve it’s own post and may get one in the next couple days.  I applied for a position at CalArts, they are looking for an Electrics Department Supervisor.  I didn’t want to talk about it here before I told my boss at the theatre.  I wasn’t really looking for jobs, this one just happened across my desk and it seemed like an opportunity that should not be passed up.  At the time, things were moving slow with their process, but now they actually are flying me out there for an in-person interview.  It is both exciting and nerve racking at the same time.  I think that I job like this could be a step in the right direction for me, I will certainly know more after I go there to visit.  Working in the educational arena is something that I have thought of for a while and this would probably be a great way in to that.  So, as things move along with this I will keep you all updated.

Yup, that is where I have been, stressed out, tired, injured, baking, and going to California.  By the way, what day is it?

I couldn’t really come up with a better title.  I had ideas for posts this week and now none of them seem worth writing about or inspiring or something.  It is quite possible that the recent events of the evening had an effect on that.  I had been thinking about writing something about election day, but that didn’t happen.  It would have been something about how I don’t really know enough about local politics to make educated decisions, though I know that there is too much religious influence on politics here.

Then I thought that I could write about how I ought to start my own Apple-Fix-it service business.  When it comes down to it, though I am not an Apple Certified technician or an Apple “Genius,” I am very good at fixing both software and hardware issues with Macs.  This week I was commissioned to help migrate one of my co-workers to a new machine.  A relatively easy task, all things considered.  Swapping out hard drives and optical drives on the old iBook G4s on the other other hand, is quite the project.  I like working on computers, it is fun, and it is always very satisfying when everything gets fixed.

I had also considered writing about how I think that it is so strange that here in Utah everyone celebrated Halloween a day early, because heaven forbid that anything should happen on a Sunday.  I get that some people justify it as a “school night,” but if you are over 18 and out of high school, there is no excuse.  Then, to top it off, since I totally forgot that Utahans are crazy, I didn’t have any candy for the first time since I moved into this apartment that I actually had trick-or-treat’ers.  Go figure.  I felt really dumb having to tell kids that I didn’t have anything to give them.

I could also have written about life at the theatre and how we just finished Dracula and are moving on to White Christmas. The show went well and people enjoyed it.  In other theatre news, Ruth’s show, Hay Fever, opened on a very high note.  It is great fun and I would encourage anyone in the area to go see it.

I could have written about all of those things, but my mind isn’t quite with any of them anymore.  While I was sitting around at home, killing time before strike, I decided that I would bake some cupcakes.  Now, when I say cupcakes, I really mean mini cakes, because we have the really cute tube-pans that are really fun to make “cup-cakes” in.  As I was about to start pouring the batter I get a phone call from Ruth’s mother.  Her grandfather, who has been very ill, was in the hospital and she wanted Ruth to come up after the show.  She wanted me to go up and tell Ruth because we thought that would be better than a phone call.

So, I rushed up to the theatre to make sure that I was there when her show ended.  This meant that I actually left the oven and the TV on in my apartment.  Yeah, I know it isn’t the safest thing to do, but it was important.  At least I hadn’t put the cakes in the oven before I had to run out the door, that would have just turned into a charred smelly mess.  I did still manage to burn things when I finally got home after strike and baked the cakes.  Some of the batter rose over the sides of the pan and burned in the bottom of the oven.

It has been a long week.  At least I get an extra hour of sleep tonight!

At the request of some of my followers, this weeks photo is from the archival photo call for 42nd Street.  It is rather apropos as lately I have mentioned working on the show in a number of blog posts.  Also, we are going into the closing weekend today, so if you count tonight’s show there are only three performances left.

Beth Glover as Dorothy Brock in 42nd Street

This is one of my favorite images from the shoot and from the show.  The scene is the “Shadow Waltz” where Dorothy (an older actress who was hired to be the “star” of Pretty Lady) “auditions” for the part.  The lyrics of the song talk about shadows on the wall so she plays with shadow puppets as well as later going on to a big shadow-play dance number.

I also think that this image has some fun artistic merit as well.  I try to get some more “artsy” shots when I can, as opposed to just standing in the center of the house and shooting the scenes.  This was not the easiest subject to get close to on account of the angles of the lights for the shadows.  I had to work pretty hard to not get my own shadow in the shots (no one wants to see my shadow anyway).

So, now I am counting down the days to get ready for my photo excursion in Moab and hopefully will bring you a few fresh images!  For now though, as always, comments, questions and critiques are welcome!

Our production of 42nd Street opens tomorrow.  That marks the final opening night of the 2009-2010 season here at the theatre.  It is really amazing how it feels like we just started, and yet we have been at it for almost nine months.  As usual, the weeks leading up to this opening (like this week) have been completely chaotic.  I think by the time the curtain falls on Friday night and we head out to the opening night party I will have clocked more overtime hours than regular hours this week.  All things considered this is not a bad thing aside from the fact that I am amazingly tired and I haven’t been able to spend a lot of time with Ruth, who just had her wisdom teeth out and could use some TLC.

Even though things will really slow down after Friday, I think this is the time of year where it feels like things will go really fast.  There are a lot of things that are going to happen in the next month.  We of course will have the performances of the show, but we won’t have to be working on the next show (this is nice).  Ruth will be heading off to London for six weeks soon.  I have my photo workshop in Moab, then at some point I have to arrive on the East Coast in time for my sister’s college graduation (I still have to get a plane ticket).  After that I head off to camp where I will reconnect with Ruth.  It’ll all happen pretty fast, it is crazy.

The fun thing about winding down the season at the theatre is that we can start to look ahead to next season.  Next season we are taking on some big challenges and we are switching things up.  We will be producing eight shows instead of our usual seven.  There were a lot of factors that went into this decision.  First of all, we lost the rights to Spamalot on account of the fact that there will be a non-equity (AEA is the actor’s union) touring company in town for a three day engagement.  To me, this seems like the kind of thing that someone at the licensing company gets fired over.  I mean, we would make them a lot more money, but whatever.

So, in lieu of having that big name show to close our season, the powers that be decided that we would assume the risk of doing an eighth show as opposed to having to cut back on budgets and possibly salaries.  We won’t be getting raises (for the second year in a row) but we will get an extra 5-ish weeks of work.  In theory, the season that they have planned should be a pretty good seller, and I certainly can’t argue with the extra work as in those weeks I will make more money than summer camp.  One of the other ways that the theatre will save some money is that one of the shows will be a co-production with Indiana Repertory Theatre.

Hopefully by now you are wondering what the heck those eight shows we are planning to do will be.  Well, guess what, I am going to tell you.  Though I don’t think that the information officially goes public until tomorrow, I am sure that plenty of people know because most of our staff and crew can’t keep their mouths shut anyway.  So, here it is, the 2010-2011 season line up for the Pioneer Theatre Company:

• Hamlet
• Dracula (to play over Halloween)
• White Christmas (to play during the Christmas season)
• Black Comedy
• In (a brand new play, this will be the first performance)
• The Diary of Anne Frank (the co-pro with IRT)
• Sunset Boulevard
• Rent

So, I bet those of you who read my earlier post about possible shows are wondering why we are doing White Christmas when no one really wanted to do it.  There are two reasons for that.  One is that a Christmas show generally sells well at that time of year.  The second reason is that since we have added Rent to the season, we figure that we balance out the edgy show with the classic.  Hopefully all the theories are correct and we have some shows that sell!  It will really be interesting to start the season with a straight play in stead of a musical next season though!

All things considered, the coming season should prove to be a very fun season.  There are a lot of dark shows on the line-up, but they are good shows.  I really hope that Rent does well so that we can prove that we can sell the edgy shows in this demographic.  I also think that it will help bring in some younger audiences.

It also sounds like I will be taking on some additional responsibilities at the theatre next season as our resident sound designer is leaving.  I won’t be going into sound, but he did some other odd jobs like help manage our website and maintain some of our computers, like our ticketing server.  I am happy to take on these jobs, and there is a little kick in pay for it, so it should be good for everyone.  It will give me something to do on the days that I wonder what to do with myself.  Hopefully next season there won’t be many of those days on account of having more shows!

So that is where we are.  Winding down to the end of the season.  In general, things are looking good for next year, which is great.  If any of my readers happen to be in the SLC area next year, give a shout and I can see about getting you in to a show!

One of the photographers whose blog I follow always has great advice.  One of the tidbits that he has mentioned for people who want to be professional photographers is to find some niche in the market.  So, what I do, which seemed to be a natural fit, is shoot for theatre.  I do production stills for the theatre company that I work for as well as a couple other local theatre companies and the theatre department at the U of U.  It is a lot of fun and it can provide a way to make some fairly artistic images while capturing the art that we make on stage every day.

This week I thought that it would be fun to share one of my recent images from the archival photo call from the U of U theatre department’s production of Molière’s The Would-be Gentleman.  The show is extremely funny and it seems like the cast had a lot of fun working on it.  It was hard to pick one image to share with you, but I think that the one I picked is pretty good.  If you want to see more of them or the cast list you can find the entire gallery at this link.

Lucile's "fairytale entrance"

There are many rather funny and what now seem cliché moments in the show, however this is the kind of literature that defined the ideas we think of as cliché.  The moment in this photo is Lucile’s “fairytale entrance” where she comes in to meet her lover accompanied by perfume and birds and flower petals.  Of course you couldn’t complete the scene without the servant sweeping up the mess.

So enjoy the photo, and as always, please feel free to leave comments, questions, and criticism.