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watching pirates of penzance on hulu and it reminded me of the theatre group i was in back when i was in virginia, cos it was one of the plays they put on...
and then i remembered one of the scheduling issues we had for the play I was in (grease)
we were using one of the theatres on norfolk base and it was right before our show weekend. we had the set built and were rehearsing when someone in uniform (I forget what rank) came in, looked around and said "This set has to come down!"
It turned out the theatre was double booked. Although we had use of it for the show etc, someone had signed up a military group to use it for a deployment briefing and they needed to use the projector screen.
So as soon as they saw the set we'd built - including the large balcony stage we'd made - they wanted it down instantly.
Our director talked with them and they didn't care that it would ruin our show. Literally. It was so close to opening night that to pull the set down *now* would basically cancel the show.
No answer, except getting the stage down right away would be acceptable.
And then they found out just how long it would take to take it down...
Their deployment brief was that day, in a couple of hours. We said it would take at least 3 hours to take it down safely.
Which of course wasn't good enough. But... we couldn't just go up and chainsaw it all down. It really would take a few hours to take it all up.
So finally they relented and decided to go with another approach.
Turned out all they really needed was the big projector screen, not the entire stage. So we lowered the screen and saw it ended up draped half across the balcony... and then we said 'screw it' and taped a large sheet of brown paper to the bottom of it to extend the screen to a usable level.
sure it's not what the military guys really wanted - they really wanted our stage gone no matter what it cost us
but it at least worked for them
and we got to have our show still.
and after our last performance, we took the stage down, and yes... it took a few hours. I remember running power tools in biking shorts & dancing tights on top of the scaffolding, unbolting the thick slats of wood from the upper stage.
and then i remembered one of the scheduling issues we had for the play I was in (grease)
we were using one of the theatres on norfolk base and it was right before our show weekend. we had the set built and were rehearsing when someone in uniform (I forget what rank) came in, looked around and said "This set has to come down!"
It turned out the theatre was double booked. Although we had use of it for the show etc, someone had signed up a military group to use it for a deployment briefing and they needed to use the projector screen.
So as soon as they saw the set we'd built - including the large balcony stage we'd made - they wanted it down instantly.
Our director talked with them and they didn't care that it would ruin our show. Literally. It was so close to opening night that to pull the set down *now* would basically cancel the show.
No answer, except getting the stage down right away would be acceptable.
And then they found out just how long it would take to take it down...
Their deployment brief was that day, in a couple of hours. We said it would take at least 3 hours to take it down safely.
Which of course wasn't good enough. But... we couldn't just go up and chainsaw it all down. It really would take a few hours to take it all up.
So finally they relented and decided to go with another approach.
Turned out all they really needed was the big projector screen, not the entire stage. So we lowered the screen and saw it ended up draped half across the balcony... and then we said 'screw it' and taped a large sheet of brown paper to the bottom of it to extend the screen to a usable level.
sure it's not what the military guys really wanted - they really wanted our stage gone no matter what it cost us
but it at least worked for them
and we got to have our show still.
and after our last performance, we took the stage down, and yes... it took a few hours. I remember running power tools in biking shorts & dancing tights on top of the scaffolding, unbolting the thick slats of wood from the upper stage.
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