TECH WEEK


We are just finishing up the dreaded TECH WEEK of our Winter Show 2019.

I've "quit" a couple of times this week. Ask my kids. Ask my friend, Amy, who gets me and probably rolls her eyes a little bit, but answers every one of my panic texts with grace and peace. People like me, who are passionate and excited, need people like her who know how to soothe us when we fracture.

Tech week is ridiculously hard for any show. Things happen that you never ever thought would happen. Everything takes about 18 times as long as it ever has taken. Some major costume piece will go missing...the props will move and no one will know where they've gone...somebody will completely forget to bring food. And that's just the hard parts we don't expect.

Tech week is where the dream of creating the show becomes the nuts and bolts of creating the show. It's the super boring part (for some small actors) where we don't even say our lines but instead find every single cue that we've glossed over all these weeks and make sure each one has a part, whether it's sound, or light (for this show) or some other action so that the audience SEES what we really want them to see. It's where every single prop finds a place to live backstage so we don't lose it so that when the actor is supposed to use the radio or shuffle the papers, there IS a radio or a pile of papers.

Tech week is where I say, "ONE MINUTE," and I really mean it. And if you can't do it in one minute, you do it again, and again.

Tech week is where we find out if you are REALLY off book. It's also when my cast starts realizing that maybe they haven't studied quite enough and certain individuals put themselves on restriction until they can get those lines straight.

It's where some of us first look around and realize that every person in the room is working to their best ability and is just as tired as we are.

I have to keep reminding myself that in less than 48 hours this whole stressful, ridiculous, frustrating, WONDERFUL thing will be over. Just another show in books.

If I'm honest, tech week is my favorite week of any semester. Sure, it's hard. But there is something magic about doing something difficult with other people who also think it is difficult and managing, even if it took forever, to do this difficult thing. Somewhere in the challenge and the tiredness, walls come down and we accept one another as equals in this process. Actors are great. Directors are great. Light and Sound, GREAT. Stage Crew? Totally great. But not one of these parts comes to its completeness in the show without the others.

I enjoy watching people. I enjoy seeing what makes them tick. These are the weeks where I figure out that I have gifted prop organizing folk, and I get to find that one kid who has every line memorized because they are the ones who answer the line cue when I've lost my place.

Yeah, I love Tech Week...It ALWAYS ends up being worth it.

Now, we do have a few shows y'all should totally come out for tonight and tomorrow. An Appointment with Mystery is a collection of 3 mysteries, one of which was written by our own Tabitha Thompson, costumer, cast member, and now playwright. Click the ticket tab above for showtimes and ticketing info.

Come see what we've been working so hard on.

See you there, <3 Ms. Stacey

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