Understanding the title ‘Stage Manager’

This whole process is a brand new experience for me. I have never been involved in anything more than basic tech: choosing whether the music does or doesn’t play, and deciding if the lights should be coloured, dimmed or a spot light. So the role of Stage Manager is completely alien to me!

As this is the case, I have been doing as much research as possible in order to fulfil the role as best I can for the company; The biggest task I am facing currently is defining my job title. On the surface, ‘a stage manager takes blocking notes, calls the lighting and sound cues during performances, and gives acting notes once the director leaves. But such a simple list of physical activities does not completely describe the stage manager’s real role in a theatre project’ (Kelly, 2009, 20). The biggest task, I feel, for any Stage Manager is to provide effective communication between all members of the company. There are ten of us in Fill In The Blank Theatre, which means there are a lot of voices to be heard! I have taken to recording group discussions and scribing notes in order to keep everyone up-to-date with our ideas, as there is ‘no one to feed the stage manager the line if he or she doesn’t communicate fully… expressing oneself clearly and without editorializing [is] of vital importance’ (Kelly, 2009, 24).

Production Notes

These notes are a more defined compilation of my rehearsal reports. These reports are colour co-ordinated, for my own personal ease, into four categories: Performance, Lighting, Set/Props and Sound. As we are devising, and in the early stages of creating our performance, we are still deciding exactly which ideas we will definitely be using. By colour coding my rehearsal reports I can easily group specific elements together when creating the above production notes, which makes referring back to ideas if the company require me to do so within rehearsals simpler.

Alongside this, I have been and will be attending numerous Tech classes in order to obtain as much knowledge of the subject as possible. Myself, our ASM and DESIGNER are currently attending set design classes, where we are learning how to design and create ground plans. Following these classes will be lighting design, where myself and our LD will have the opportunity to experiment with ‘Front light… Side light… Back light… Down light… [and] Up light’ (Campbell, 2004, 79) in order to add dramatic effect to scenes. As well as both these classes, a few of us will be attending a Technical Masterclass, which will allow us to learn the skills necessary to use the equipment within the LPAC auditorium (Qlab etc.).

If you read these rehearsal notes closely, you;ll get a sneak peak into our current ideas for our performance-in-progress, The Man Whose Memories Fell Out!

Works Cited

Cambell, D. (2004) Technical Theatre: For Nontechnical People. New York: Allworth Press

Kelly, T. (2009) The Backstage Guide to Stage Management. 3rd edition. New York: Back Stage Books.

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