As of May 29th, I have, with my crew:
- Zeroed out all the advertisement billboards
- Cleaned out props, costumes and the stage
- Held a cast-crew party to celebrate our accomplishments
- Hung lights, run sound and lighting board, and crewed the fashion show.
Since the play closed, we have still been busy, just with a different goal in mind. We are now roughly six months away from our next fall play, which means that we have got to set everything back to a blank slate for the next production.
We have had successes since the play closed, such as our cast-crew party during which we all got together to talk, watch the recorded version of our performance that my assistant stage manager and one of the actors collaborated to edit together into a viewable video, and ate lots of food and deserts. We also managed to collaborate with the fashion club with minor challenges to run their fashion show without a hitch.
A challenge we faced with the fashion show was the fact that the fashion show representatives and teacher representative did not supply the crew dinner. It is customary, courteous and expected for the crew to be given a meal if they are required to stay at the school for many hours at a time, and for a 3-8:30 call time like the fashion show, it should have been obvious that a dinner should be served. Even though it has been this way for years and the teacher organizer has repeatedly supplied dinner for us in the past, this year it did not happen. Mr. Case resolved the issue by taking time out of his day to go buy pizza for our crew, however, in the future, clear communication via email will happen to prevent this next year.
To clearly communicate via email, the body of the email should focus on clarity, relevance, structure and tone. (Abong, 2025) It should also address both the student and teacher organizer to ensure all details are seen and understood. Outreach in person before the event with responsible organizers also aids in ensuring all needs are met.
Next moves include further cleaning and painting of set pieces, setting up and operating sound board for the year end music concert, crewing for the French Immersion Leaving Ceremony and the Athletic Banquet.
Bibliography:
13 tips for effective email communication + do’s & don’ts. (2023, September 5). https://influno.com/effective-email-communication/
Hello Melea,
The art of stage management is truly fascinating, and something I love learning about. The biggest stand-out to me is how you emphasized the importance of clear communication and organization to ensure that everyone involved felt on track, satiated, and pleased with their time spent working on set. The fact that something like this would lack proper planning is quite interesting to me, as one would assume with the long hours spent on set, dinner would be more readily supplied/accounted for. I would love to see you talk about what an ideal stage event would look like if you could plan and execute absolutely everything to perfection. How could this attract more people to stage craft? Stellar topic, and I cannot wait for your presentation of learning!
Below I have listed some helpful resources:
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1476127020914225
https://human.libretexts.org/Courses/Santa_Barbara_City_College/Mastering_the_Art_of_Stagecraft_(Crop)/01%3A_Production_Organization/1.02%3A_Organizational_Structures
https://news.sjs.ca/arts/behind-the-scenes-how-the-stagecraft-crew-bring-the-art-of-av-to-life/
-Ava