January 31, 2004

DONE!!!

So this is going to be my last post for a few days...  Tonight, at 8:00 pm EST we managed to finish "The Show From Hell"... It gets put on a semi in the morning, along with some bits from other shops, and ships to Richmond for instalation Monday morning... I'll be going down there with the set (no not in the semi, my personal truck) to make sure all is well... Personally I know all is not well... I know there are going to be issues with some things... At the moment, I'm just happy the damn thing is built and painted... I'll deal with the odd detail later... They still have no idea how long they are going to want to keep me down there, but it may be as much as 7 days... We'll see... After I load the truck tommorow, I head out to a store to buy clothing since everything I currently own is dirty... Let me tell you, that is a feat... I own easily enough clothing to go over a month without doing laundry when there is a need... I've never gone past that point untill now...


I really need a break...

Posted by Backstage at 05:03 PM | Comments (0)

January 27, 2004

Backup...

So today, after a discussion with my partner, we decided that there was some concern about our scenic artist getting everything painted given the limited hours she could work on this project... The solution is naturally to get another scenic... How utterly simple right?... So it would seem...


So call one went out to one of my regular scenics, and my prefered choice for reliability reasons... Things seemed fine, untill I got a call back that her car was semi-dead... Well that got resolved an hour or two later, and she started on her way to my place... Call two was to inform me she had blown a tire, and was taking that as a sign she shouldn't come here in the bad weather... I agreed, and she headed home...


Call goes out to scenic choice 2... She's swampped... No chance...


3... Busy untill Friday, massively overpriced day rate, and slow performance, so I passed...


4... No answer, no voice mail, email bounced back, I'm wondering if he's ok now...


5... Busy, terribly sorry as she'd rather come work for us since we pay more, but she was committed...


6... Never talked to this one before, got the name and number from a friend of a friend... He came down a couple hours later, and worked out perfectly... He'll be back tommorow... He's moving way up in the phone call priority list now...


In the last couple years, there has been something of an exodus of scenic artists from this area for some reason... I know parts of why, I don't know all of the whys though... I've got people driving 70 miles in some cases to paint for me... There used to be 5 artists I knew in the town I live in... What a pain...


Moral?... it always pays to have as much backup as possible... and when you run out of that... find more...

Posted by Backstage at 05:03 PM | Comments (0)

January 26, 2004

Comment Spam...

A few days ago, I received my 3rd spam in the comments... Not really a major number, but then, I'm still a small time blog... They don't honestly bother me all that much as the versions I have been getting have been couched in an innoccuous comment, with a web link to their add site... So they get reported to Blog-City, and then they're deleted from my comments... The thing that annoys me about them, is I really do enjoy the feedback and comments I get here... I don't get a lot of it, but I make an effort to address every comment I get. I know I have missed a few, but they really weren't in need of reply, and I still intend to get back around to answering Mookie's questions from I don't know how long ago... (looking like mid Febuary before my schedule calms down now, but who knows) It's such a major let down to get that comment notification email, and then find that its nothing...


Such is life I suppose... I should be glad I'm not getting swampped with them right?... (wouldn't it just be appropriate if I managed to draw one to this post... lol...)






Many thanks to Rocket Jones for the plug a few days ago!... His is one of the few sites I've actually been trying to read on a weekly basis lately... My daily list has fallen to a tiny 3 sites durring this build... The rest I'm just hoping to catch up with again once I can take a day off... That is if they're still there... (note to self... update blogroll by March 1st... Otherwise it'll be July before there will be time again... )(march, april, may, june are my traditionally busy months, but who knows since this year isn't behaveing normally in the least...)






Back to work tommorow... Set is 25% painted now... I'm having issues getting staining my moulding to the right color, and one of our custom made cabinets isn't playing nice... Otherwise we're still right on track to actually pulling this off!


7 Days left untill Load-In in Richmond...

Posted by Backstage at 05:19 PM | Comments (0)

January 25, 2004

The Thrill of Victory...

Ok... Ok... It's not really all that exciting to anyone but me, or perhaps someone on my crew...  Here's the deal... The nightmare show has to go out into a truck Saturday (perhaps Sunday if I can push the trucking company off a bit).  Yesterday, the designer came by for a little visit, at which point my shop looked less than impressive... The platforming for the show coverd most of my shop, and was almost done being painted, but that just doesn't look impressive... Today, we came in and started putting the flats together... (flats are walls if you're not from a theatre background)... Now, let me digress a moment about these flats... There are around 30 flats and assorted headers, beams, etc... The design for this show incorperates a ton of odd angles, so building the flats was a bit of a pain... On top of this, the show is a tour, and they want to be able to set up the entire stage in 4 hours... So all this boils down to me spending an inordinate amount of time drawing every single detail of the show into AutoCAD so that theoretically everything just works the first time... Now, of course, I've been sick all week, so I kinda lived in a fog (103 fever will do that to ya)... At the start of building this stuff, I told the crew to please be carefull, and that everything has to be perfect... (normally, because of how most of our sets go together, you can be off atleast a 1/16 of an inch everyplace and have no problem) Well they moaned and groaned and called me names, but they must have listened... As of 7:00 tonight, the whole set is standing in place in my shop... There is less than a 1/16 inch of error over the entire set!... I took a minute before to estimate the number of cuts and assembly points in the process, and its between 3000 and 3500... The odds of not screwing up any of that many is just impossible to grasp in the world of theatre...


I've said it before... I'm sure I'll say it again... My Crew Rocks!


We're not out of the woods yet... There is still a ton of painting to do, and the moulding has to go up, but, I can actually see the light at the end of the tunnel...


I'm going to be buying atleast the first round for a month after I get healthy...






Of course the light at the end of the tunnel is the train of the next show hard on the heels of this one... Can you beleave the deadline is not only worse, but MASSIVELY worse than the current show... We will have all of 4 days to build a show that is almost the same size, though no moulding, angles, or complacations, and we don't have to paint it... Still, I swear the reputation we're developing as the go to shop when there isn't any time, can't be a good thing... Its a nice ego boost for me, but it means we'll just keep getting hammered like this at the last second... That's a perfect recepie for failure...






Thanks for reading folks!... I haven't been able to do any shout outs to the folks I'm reading when I can... Hell I haven't had time to re-do my horribly out of date blog-roll... I promise, I'll get back to being a good blog owner sometime around mid to late Febuary... Sooner if we manage to not get one of these bids... lol... I hate to loose a bid, but I sure could use a day off to rest...

Posted by Backstage at 05:19 PM | Comments (0)

January 21, 2004

The Reprise of Blech...

So I'm currently swampped with my nightmare show as one might expect... My crew is seriously kicking ass though, and it should be built by the end of tonight.  Next step, moulding, and then paint... So we actually may make our deadline... I'm not exactly sure how we're pulling this off, but I'm not going to complain...


The aspect of life that's really making this hard, is that the cold I had back in December seems to have made a miraculous comeback... Almost as strong as Rocky does in his movies... This bug is kicking my ass so badly, my crew told me to go home since I'd be no good to them dead... (every morning, death seems like it might be a more pleasant condition...)


Oh well... I suppose I can tough this out as long as the show gets done on time...

Posted by Backstage at 05:20 PM | Comments (0)

January 18, 2004

Enviro-mental Cases...

So I was trying to relax at my favorite pub Saturday night, when I was invited over to a table where I knew one person... Since I've been working way too many hours, my resistance was low, and I headed over there... Generally most of the people seemed nice enough, but then these two kinda scruffy guys started down the road of bashing Bush... Well, whatever... I hate politics, but the way they were going about it, set me on edge because I just knew where the conversation would go next... The Environment...


I accept that my industry is highly wastefull... We do what we can to recycle if it isn't going to cost us a ton of money... I also live in New Jersey... Home to more Superfund Sites than perhaps anyplace else in the country... But these two started in on forest fires, and the timber industry... At that point, I should have taken my beer and headed over to the foosball table, but damned if I wasn't tired and felt like sitting... So they start in on how the forest service and the fire fighters that handle forest fires, need to clean out all the under brush and dead wood from all the federal and state forests... They feel that that would reduce the likelyhood and intensity of the inevitable fires... So far I can't really disagree that it would reduce fires... My qualm comes from a couple things... a) who the hell do these idiots think they are deciding that the fire fighters should be clearing brush?... They are fire fighters, not brush hogs... b) they have decided that to do this, there can be no use of heavy equipment as it might damage the forest, or disturb nature... Um, is it just me or is that asking a bit much to walk all those square miles of forest and hump brush around by hand?... Personally I have spent many, many days in the forest at my parents farm, cutting and hauling trees for firewood, and some hardwood lumber for furniture we make... I can assure you, that clearing undergroth without equipment is simply insane...  As for disturbing nature, wouldn't you be doing that anyhow by removing all the undercover anyhow? c) They have decided that selective cutting by any timber company is not only without merit, but evil... Now, I'm not crazy about letting timber companies do what they want in federal forests, but they are without a doubt the only group of people with the ability to clear the shear number of miles involved...


So I asked them, very politely at that, if they had ever spent much time working in a forest... The response I received apart from the icy stares was that they were serious campers... It was at this point that I laughed at them, told them they needed to try working for a living, and then headed over to the bar for a refill, not to return to the table...


I suspect I've made a couple more enemies... Screw 'em... They would go crunch under the tracks of a logging crawler just like that dreaded underbrush...

Posted by Backstage at 05:24 PM | Comments (0)

January 16, 2004

Its just killing me...

Here it is Friday night, and I should have had dinner, and at least one beer, and most likely be playing foosball right now... Instead?... I'm sitting at home after a long and rather frustrating day... The nightmare has commenced... Let me just give you a hint of what its been like so far...



  • We're way past deadlines, and I still don't have complete plans, or anything to show me how to paint this set.

  • Yesterday, the lumber slid off the delivery truck, knocking over and spilling 10 gallons of paint, plus I have a gaping hole in the shop bathroom and it also destroyed a $700 paint sprayer.

  • We started building the decking for the show as that was the least likely thing to change, so after we had finished all the platforms for the first level, the powers that be, decided to get rid of that level and drop everything down that 6 inches... They're still paying me for that level, but I'd rather have the two days back more than the money...

  • My best carpenter has been moving over the past couple days, so he's not around much...

  • My partner had an unavoidable commitment today, so he was gone all day...

  • The fuel in my truck froze again last night...

  • The breaker that I had my truck's engine heater plugged into last night tripped, so after I got the fuel back to a liquid, the engine was too cold to start...

  • The kitchen closed at my usual pub before I was able to get there, so I'm stuck eating a loaf of bread that I had at home. (yea, I could go someplace else, but I look like I just crawled through a 2 mile dirt and sawdust filled ditch, so that would require a shower first, and then back out into this miserable weather)

How's that for 2 days?... I can't wait untill this build is over... Sheesh...

Posted by Backstage at 05:25 PM | Comments (0)

January 14, 2004

Nightmare Update...

Well the nightmare build is about to comence in the morning... We have ordered a pile of material, and the work schedule is kinda set in my mind at 20 hours a day for the shop, with crew rotateing through on 8, 10 and 16 hour shifts... We're picking up an additional warehouse for the next two weeks hopefully to do a full setup in too, so when it gets to its first stop in VA, it will actually all fit together as it should...


I'm really going to miss sleeping for the next two weeks... Blogging will be light I'm sure, and all questions are currently on hold (I will get back to them, honest Mookie...)

Posted by Backstage at 05:26 PM | Comments (0)

January 13, 2004

Stress

Its currently 3:20am now... The project I should have gotten aproval on Friday, has still not decided what they are going to do... I still don't have complete drawings... I am quite honestly running out of time to make the show happen... I don't mean running out of days... I have stopped thinking in terms of days... I am now thinking of hours... As in there are 24 hours in a day when work could theoretically be accomplished... One would think that knowing I'll be working 24/7 untill the 30th when it will go out the door, I'd be tucked into my nice warm bed right now, stocking up on sleep I'll need later... God knows I'd be happier there... Problem is I can't sleep... I've been laying there for the last hour since waking up, mentally doing scheduleing, and trying to figure out where everything will go once it is built untill it ships out... I've been mentally scheduleing labor, when I don't even know if those people are available... I'm trying to find a space big enough that is heated so I can take care of the paint projects, and I certianlly have no hope of finding that tonight... My brain is running full tilt and I can't get it to just take a break... This is the reason I decided to get out of the "art" end of the business... My corperate clients give me enough time to do a project... When they decide they want something, then they make money available, and generally don't screw around like this...


I don't mind a little stress now and again... In my mind a little stress is often a good thing... It gets people "up" mentally... This however is not a little stress... This is the kind of stress that used to keep me in bars late at night, just so I could sleep more than 3-4 hours that night...


To sum up.... This Sucks!


I swear I should get my head examined for decideing to take on "art" again...

Posted by Backstage at 05:30 PM | Comments (0)

The sands of time...

Tick Tock... Its now 18 days until the show I've been complaing about has to go out the door.... I still don't have approval... That means 16 days max build/paint... (I wouldn't get any material untill tommorow, and the last day I have to spend loading it on to a truck)


All I keep seeing is these mental images of hour glasses, clocks, watches, callanders... Its like some bad Twilight Zone collage while someones last moments on earth are passing away...


(insert blood curtleing scream here)


And what do I get to do in the mean time... Nothing... I sit here and wait... I actually get to blog a bit, though with little content of value since my brain is toast... I stare blankly at the walls... I drink so much coffee that I am considering buying into a plantation someplace to supply my need...

Posted by Backstage at 05:26 PM | Comments (0)

January 10, 2004

Note to Those with Diesel Engines

Diesel fuel as many may know turns to a jelly like substance down around 15 degrees... At that point it simply plugs up your fuel filter, and injectors... End result, is an unhappy engine that will not run...


Fuel stations, are supposed to "winterize" their diesel during cold months to prevent this... That generally means that Kerosene, or Gasoline is added to the Diesel, and life is ok...


Apparently my fuel station didn't get the memo...


It is currently 5 degrees outside...


I am currently back in my apartment, pissed off, and stranded untill my partner comes down here with a couple gallons of gasoline...


What a way to start the day...

Posted by Backstage at 05:31 PM | Comments (0)

January 09, 2004

Open Note to Producers

If you decide to do a show, (and that's what producers do) here are some helpfull hints... (particularly if you're doing a tour)



  1. Consider sending out you bid packets with more than 21 days before delivery.

  2. Make damn sure the bid pack is complete with all drawings, and color renderings.

  3. Do not try to take a box set designed to fit into one specific space and then try to have that set built to tour without major modifications

  4. Do not hem and haw over decisions that will cost the 21 days you have allowed for the miracle of production.

  5. Do not be suprised at the cost of units when you have allowed 21 days for the build.

  6. Understand that if you waste days the prices will start going up at an alarming rate untill you reach the point that the shop tells you they can no longer actually accomplish the build regardless of how much money you are willing to spend. (I'm not quite there yet, but damn if we're not getting there fast)

  7. Accept the fact that the pricing will include an annoyance fee for such short notice.  No, there will not be a line item on the bid listing the fee as that, so don't bother looking, its there, just trust me.

Now, if you chose to ignore all of that, accept the fact that the price will most likely make your head spin right off your shoulders when you get the bid.


Accept that the guy that managed to turn the numbers around for you in record time may be somewhat less than sympathetic to any excuses you may try... Also accept that that person may be suffering from sleep deprivation and their ability to remain polite and professional all the time will be somewhat strained...


'Nuff Said... (now where did I put that beer... I think I could use a drink)

Posted by Backstage at 05:32 PM | Comments (0)

January 08, 2004

When it rains it pours...

So there I was today, minding my own business, welding for one of the places I freelance, when my partner calls me... "hey, some bid prints just came in, you should take a look at these later"


So off I go after a long day, and with a nasty headache... When I got to my office, I pulled open the prints, and was shocked to see, not one, but two different shows... One of them is a touring show... So I'm thinking, hey, cool, this should keep us rolling for a while... Then I noticed the date they have to go out the door... January 30... Um... Hello?... If I were to start on Friday, that gives me all of 22 days if I work 7 days a week... My brain hurts already... It's going to be a nightmare to get these two shows done in time... Expect blogging to be back to the really slow level unfortunatly...


Now why can't I get shows that will just let me work 5 days a week?... sheesh...

Posted by Backstage at 05:35 PM | Comments (0)

Open Note to Scenic Designers

When you are designing a set for a touring show, do not spec your walls to be 2" taller than will fit into the truck...


(you only think I'm joking...)


You want big walls, fine, have big walls, but 2" will do nothing more than simply piss off the scene shop... That's almost as bad as builting a platform that is 8'1" long... (plywood is 8' normally... 10' plywood, is outrageously expensive in comparison)

Posted by Backstage at 05:33 PM | Comments (0)

Plywood... Again...

Ya know, I really didn't think the price could keep going up... Damn if they don't keep proveing me wrong... I swear I could invest in skids of plywood today, and next week sell it off for markups only a loan shark could dream of...


Sheesh...

Posted by Backstage at 05:33 PM | Comments (0)

January 06, 2004

Fake Grass

As previously mentioned, the show I just loaded in had a lot of fake grass on the scenic units... We all pretty much agreed that the scenery looked like it belonged on the muppet show when you really looked at it.  From any distance though, it worked quite nicely for the effect they wanted, and the audience was all atleast 25' away... It ended up to be a very simply solution to our needs, with one minor issue... I have fake grass all over my shop now... I mean this stuff has gotten into every crack, crevice, and possible location in my shop... We will be finding this stuff for the next year I'm sure... We spent the entire day cleaning, and I just know I'll walk in the door tommorow, and there will be more of it there somehow...


What a pain...

Posted by Backstage at 05:37 PM | Comments (0)

Someone explain the French to me...

Ok, now I am not trying to bash up the French here... There are plenty of sites that take care of that far better than I could, or want to... This just happened to catch my eye, and just made me confused, and somewhat angry...


Last weekend, a charter jet, carrying mostly French passengers crashed into the Red Sea after taking off from a resort city in Egypt.  So in an effort to help out, the French sent some navel assets and personel to help in recovery efforts... So far they're doing great right?... Well somebody in the French navy did whatever they had to do, and figured the black boxs were down at a depth of 600-800 meters... I'm not going to figure out how they can tell that, but apparently they can... So they fowarded a request for diving equipment (most likely unmanned) that can get down to those depths to the French government... They're still doing great, but wait for it... The French government sent out equipment that can only handle 400 meters... Ok, there it is... Why the hell bother folks?... Equipment that can go down to this depth is certianlly not unheard of... The Titanic is down at 12,460 feet, that's 3798 meters... Subs and remote veihicles go down there and salvage little bits and peices to put on display in museums, how the hell do the French justify not getting propper equipment to Egypt to pull the black boxes up?...  Ok, perhaps the French don't have the equipment, I can accept that, though I doubt it... The Russians managed to swallow their pride enough to get two Dutch salvage companies to lift a nuclear submarine for them... I suspect someone would be willing to get the right gear out to the Red Sea if the French asked for help... I am disgusted by the French governments lack of concern to do the job once they got involved... Did they just want to be the good guys if it wasn't too difficult?...


Here is the CNN page that set me off on this...


Ok... I'm done now... They make me sick with this...

Posted by Backstage at 05:36 PM | Comments (0)

January 05, 2004

Its good to plan...

So today was the day I had to load-in my wallpaper/fake grass show... (did I mention the fake grass before?... I'm never going to get it all cleaned out of my shop...)


Anyway... We got there are 8am... We were out the door at 10:30am... This has got to be a record for an artistic set load-in... Corperate stuff can go quick, but its odd when an artsy deal goes well... All I can say is my crew rocks! Now I have a nice half day off...

Posted by Backstage at 05:47 PM | Comments (0)

The quest for tools...

Ok... I am a tool junkie... That's probably well accepted at this point... My favorite place in the world was a place called Woodworkers' Wharehouse... It was a nice store, that catered to woodworkers... (duhhh...) Well unfortunatly, just before Christmas, they all went out of business... Perhaps the best part of them being around was they stocked Freud rounter bits... After many years of useing routers, in mighly unhospitable circumstances, I've found the the Freud bits hold up better than any of the others I've come accross... Router bits are something you can't really stock enough of in your shop to cover all permutations, so it was good to have a place right down the street where I could buy whatever I needed... So now I am faced with the annoying task of finding a new supplier... There are online places that carry the selection, but that's always atleast one day and a shipping charge away... I need someplace I can drive to at night, on a weekend when I manage to ruin the last one I needed to finish a project...


All in all this sucks... Chalk up another store that got run out by places like Home Depot and Lowes... Those places are ok for some things... But you want anything beyond basic homeowner type stuff, and you're screwed...

Posted by Backstage at 05:38 PM | Comments (0)

January 01, 2004

Insight to the psychosis...

You want to know the kind of person that would get involved in theatre production?... It takes a unique nut to go down this road... One needs to be interested in more than art, or construction, or theatre... I have worked in a couple different fields outside theatre, and naturally I know a variety of folks from the "real world"... Only in the world of production have I met people of such bizarre and varied tastes and intrests... Not so much as one person haveing an odd intrest, but almost every single person has wildly varied intrests... An example?... Ok... Go watch the show Mythbusters on Discovery channel... These two guys are great examples in my opinion... They're in the film industy, and primarily special effects at the moment apparently... They are however so much like most of the stagehands I know they're a good reference... If you go through the website, you can check out their diverse bios... And hey, even if you don't care about the mindset of stagehands, check out the show, its worth an hour of your time for the laugh you'll get out of it beside what you may find out...

Posted by Backstage at 05:53 PM | Comments (0)

Happy Blogiversary!

Congrats go out to Jen today on her 6 month blogiversary!... If you're not one of her regular readers, you should be!... Jen's site was one of the early blogs I ran across, and to an extent she's one of the reasons I started down this road... lol... (so now you know one of the people to blame)


Congrats again!

Posted by Backstage at 05:48 PM | Comments (0)