Up the Down Staircase

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[edit] Post Mortem Notes

Thursday, October 23, 2003

Cast

• There needs to be real system of punishments for missed rehearsals.
• A lot of people don’t know things when they get here.
• They were mostly very clean (not on closing night :| ) in the dressing room.

Props

• Sam missed some meetings.
• They made up for it in the end, and we had everything.
• Heather did a lot, and deserves thanks and recognition for such.

Makeup

• Did a good job from the SMs POV
• No one helped clean up on closing night, except Carrie, Daniel and Patterson.

o Some of the cast helped when they weren’t on stage during the closing night performance.

• Chris thought the “old hair” wasn’t terribly realistic.

o Carrie says it could’ve been much worse. o This activity is not something you can really do well, apparently.

• The cast either showed up for their call, or came in makeup.
• Call times were lopsided male and female.

Costumes

• Danielle says the cast didn’t bring their costumes in on time, including having people have to bring stuff in for Sunday.

o Patterson thinks we needed to contact the cast earlier so they could get their costume together.

• Danielle had no real prior experience with this position, and we should have provided help (in the form of Emily or similar) much earlier than we did.

o Perhaps Danielle should’ve asked for help earlier. Either way it worked out. o We probably want to be much more proactive.

• Emily says that it went well.
• Cast changes during the show went well. Danielle did a good job handing Patterson her dress.

House

• Carla says “excellent job”
• Jeff wants to thank everyone (literally everyone) for helping out.
• He asked for help, because he didn’t know what he was doing.
• We did handle the selling out twice reasonably well.
• We need to remember to reserve seats for impaired individuals, even if the show is general admission.

Publicity

• T-shirts were crazy. We needed a lot more prep time, and to deal with it much earlier.
• Sara loves folding programs like nothing else.
• Programs went okay, even though the copier is a bitch.

Sound

• We didn’t have actual music until final dress, but that was Gale sucking.
• Op anticipated calls a lot, but got it right... somehow.
• Chris claims some reinforcement would’ve been nice.
• Fast turnaround on creating cues on Tech Sunday.

Set

• Derek wasn’t around as much as he shouldn’t been towards the end. This was due to some ‘other stuff’. (Says Derek)
• He would’ve liked to be able to change the design more, but the script was pretty specific.
• Lights would’ve liked the set up earlier.

o It was up for two weeks. o The bricks were late.

• Lights would also like a scale drawing early.
• Patterson was impressed by how quickly the set was put up, but hated the color. This is partly from the makeup perspective.

o Phil really didn’t like the brick work. o Lights also didn’t know the colors ahead of time. o Sam thought some actors looked jaundiced under lights in makeup. • He also noticed a change of skin tone when they entered the

• The platform was amazingly stable. And didn’t kill anyone. These are things the cast likes.
• We could’ve put some legs in, but time did not allow.
• Derek would’ve liked keys, but he didn’t ask.
• Set is anything that’s nailed down, everything else is props. Remember that.

Lights

• Tim says: we were editing cues very late and...

o But we got them all up for Monday. o Chris should’ve gone to more rehearsals. o Tim would’ve liked a plot and more gel to work with. o He would’ve liked more help with the party plot and the board to such less.

• Less late nights would’ve been good.
• Derek says: use the remote more, even though it blows. Or a walkie talkie. There also wasn’t a lot of jiving between ME and LD.
• Sam says: in general the show looked pretty good, although there was some

weird stuff with how well the light mixed. It might’ve been the paint color.

• Chris would’ve liked to light the set better.
• Way to submit a budget, you bums. (hint: they didn’t).

ASMs

• They did a very good job, running both the shows and rehearsals.
• They couldn’t see the stage, which was fine.

SM

• Derek: Phil rocks.
• SM had his com clicked for everything, which bothered everyone.

o As he explained on com, its not a democracy once the curtain goes up. The reason the SMs com is clicked (i.e., mic is on) for everything is that s/he will invariably forget to unclick it to call cues and talk.

• He also told terrible stories.
• Phil was doing more than just stage managing. Is this bad? Primarily for him.
• Phil was really late with schedules, because the process sucked and he had no time.

Director

• Patterson says the organization overall was lacking. Once again, scheduling should’ve been done before rehearsals had started, not two days before things started.

o This is probably the reason that people in the cast were late / absent. o We probably needed an Assistant Director just to handle directing duties.

• Stuff should’ve been done when it was due, i.e. before Tech Sunday.
• Waiting for the people’s schedules doesn’t actually work when you want to

get things scheduled.

• Emily says: Waiting for minor roles at rehearsals slows things down too much; we have ASMs for a reasons.

o Gale says: we didn’t hold rehearsal for “one or two” people very often.

• A show of this size in this slow is a real problem.
• I (Phil) thought we were going to cut it to 15 people.

o I was apparently wrong.

• We had fun?
• Some of the cast were severely unhappy at some point during the process.
• Patterson thinks that Gale took on way too much.
• Carla would’ve liked more direction.

o This isn’t Gale’s style.

• A cast member who’s name I can’t remember things the show went really

well, and that was what was important.

• Derek thinks that Gale did a very good job from his POV, and she kept him

well informed. Maybe most of the problems were with the cast size. The battle was tough, so the victory was sweeter.

• We needed a separate director and producer.
• Sara knows a lot of the cast and was on the tech side of it. She says that most of the cast had a good experience.
• Sam says: rehearsal (practice?) sucks. The glory is at the end. That’s what’s important, and what you walk away with.
• Chris would’ve liked more feedback for specials and blocking.

Producer

• We had a show, which was good. She thinks it went well, and was very impressed with how things went.
• Derek had a lot of budget, and that was good.
• Emily says: How soon did we have a full production staff?

o First week of rehearsals, just about. o Because... • As a cast member, she didn’t know who to contact for the production staff. • Should the cast really be talking to them? For some things, yes. For others, no. • A contact sheet went out via email, and the (A)SMs had one at every rehearsal. This shouldn’t have been a problem. o Emily was also not on the production mailing list, and that’s bad...

• What happened to Brandon? He wandered off, perhaps because he had a stupid job (Assistant Master Carpenter).
• Patterson thinks that people fell through the cracks. Some people were doing too much, some people too little. The Producer needs to keep an eye on them.
• Did Gale need help? She didn’t think so.
• Lighting budget was given even though wasn’t requested.
• We probably want to treat Costumes & Makeup differently then the rest of the production roles, because they require more context-specific experience.
• We need to provide a more comfortable environment for people to ask questions and tech things.

On the whole it was good show.

These notes were compiled by Phillip Genera, the Stage Manager of the RPI Players production of Up The Down Staircase. An effort has been made to make them impartial and concise. To effect the correction of errors, please contact him.