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Make Yer Scenes Meet, 1886

The following article first appeared in the 1886 edition of The Cornhill Magazine.

Formerly the scenic artist was strictly a scene painter, and his work was simply to cover canvas with beautiful and effective pictures. To this class belonged Grieve and Telbin, and Stanfeld, who later became a Royal Academician. The large bold style required for scenery is a fine training, and at this moment it is easy to distinguish one of Telbin’s landscapes, so poetical and rich is the treatment. The artist of the Lyceum, Mr. Craven, is also remarkable for richness of colour, freedom of touch, and much grace and fancy.

It is curious to visit the painting-room of this theatre, which is high up in the roof, when some great and costly piece is being got ready. Here on a table we find a small model stage, like a toy theatre, but which is carefully made to scale, with all the entrances, &c., marked. The artist first paints his little scenes on cardboard, cuts out the doors, windows, &c. exactly as he intends it to be on the real boards below. He has, besides, large plans of the stage, done to measure, on which can be arranged all the portable structures in their exact position. Now arrives the clever manager, who is possessed of much suggestive taste. The little scene is set for him—it suits—or he may suggest some more brilliant and effective idea.

Meanwhile assistants are busy at the canvas hung on the walls, with rules six feet long, ruling the  perspective lines in black, or getting in the rough colours. Of course, only a portion of the scene can be painted at a time, as the room is a low one. In the great foreign theatres the canvas can be raised or lowered through a slit in the floor, or the wall made high enough, as at Drury Lane, to take in the whole scene.

But in these times the scene builder has taken the place of the scene painter. Houses, bridges, porches, streets even, are all constructed in the carpenter’s shop. There is now no system for scenery; all that the stage manager requires is that his stage should be a perfectly clear, open, and unencumbered space on which he can launch his army of men to drag on and build up these great structures.

Formerly there were grooves for the scenes to slide in. At the sound of a whistle the scene was drawn away right and left, and we saw the grooves let down on hinges, and in which the new scene was to slide. All this is rococo and old-fashioned. In some of the older theatres one has often seen the two halves of a scene driven from right to left, the two men in their shirt-sleeves who moved them being quite visible, until the halves met in the middle with a sharp crack. Occasionally there used to be an imperfect joining, when, according to the old story, a fellow in the gallery called out, ‘We don’t expect no grammar here, but yer might make yer scenes meet.’

Smith, Elder, & Co., ed. “The Scenic World.” Cornhill Magazine 1886: 283-85. Google Books. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.

Useful Sites

March Forth With Props

Over at HowlRound, Seth Tyler Black talks about career transitions from theatre to film. He interviews a few art directors and props people to see what skills are shared between the two fields, and what makes them different.

I loved this article and photographs about Syrian refugees building scale models of historical landmarks. As their homeland is destroyed by war, and ancient artifacts are being destroyed, these artists are coming together in their cramped camps to create a record of what is lost. They construct the models with whatever materials they can find, from rock, to MDF, to wooden kebab skewers.

Brendan Bernhardt Gaffney has been researching ancient methods of measurement, and has come up with the Rulers of the Ancient World. These wooden measuring devices come in several flavors: Ancient Egyptian, Japanese “Kanejaku”, and Ancient Roman. So if you’re sick of inches, but millimeters leave you cold, why not measure your next project in Pes and Uncia?

Bill Doran shows us how to make shiny metal prop finishes. The real trick he shares? Make your prop glossy before adding the metal spray paint.

Finally, Make Magazine has 11 tips for creating a good weld. Here’s a twelfth tip: welding is awesome.

Jobs

Perfecting your technical theatre resume

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It’s job-hunting season in the technical theatre world, especially for those of you just graduating. SETC is only a day away, and USITT is right around the corner. If you are looking to get a gig at a summer theatre, now is the time to apply. Not next month. Now.

You need a résumé if you’re going to do this right. You can find lots of help with crafting a résumé in general, but not much on a technical theatre one specifically. Here are a few tips to help you on your way.

List your objective.

Somewhere at the top near your name, you should list what you do: prop builder, props master, stage manager, etc. Some websites will tell you listing an objective is not necessary, but for a technical theatre person, it is. Particularly when you are going to a conference or a job fair, you will probably have one representative from a company collecting all the résumés from applicants, then dividing them up between the appropriate departments back at the office. It’s helpful for them to know at a glance whether a résumé should go to electrics, carpentry or costumes. Plus, it tells them which job you are interested in. You don’t want your résumé handed to the master electrician if you want the props master to look at it.

Drop names within reason.

It is helpful to list the names of directors and designers you work with since the technical theatre world is small. Chances are, your interviewer may recognize someone on your résumé, and it will give them an idea of what kind of environments you have worked in. However, when you are just starting out, you may have only college shows listed, or the shows from one small professional gig. I’ve seen résumés where the applicant has only worked with one designer, but they list them over and over again, so that an entire column is just one name repeated on down the line. If the majority of your work is done under one or two people, they should either be one of your references, or listed just once in your work experience.

Also, don’t make a mess with all the names you drop. Any name you put on your résumé can potentially be contacted by the company interviewing you. Don’t list someone because you were in the same room as them for ten minutes. The employer may call them and be like, “Hey, you ever work with Joey Bookcase?” And that person will be all like, “No, I ain’t never heard of no Joey Bookcase!” That’s how people in technical theatre talk to each other.

Check your speling.

This should go without saying, but with the résumés I see, it unfortunately needs to be said more. If you can’t take the time to read your résumé once for spelling errors, why should an employer take the time to read it? If you don’t notice a misspelled word on the most important representation of your work, I may assume you won’t notice your prop still has a bit of wet paint on it as you hand it to the actress in her hand-dyed silk dress.

Check the work of others.

If you have no idea how to start a résumé, start looking up people in your field, especially those with jobs you aspire to. Most professionals have their résumé online. You can see how they organize it, what kind of information they list, and how they design it. Here, you can start with mine.

Useful Sites

A Prop-er End to the Week

First a quick announcement. For anyone going to SETC next week, the conference is in Greensboro, just a few blocks from where I work. We will be opening up our shop for an open house on Saturday, March 5th, from 2-5pm, if you wanted to see where I make things. And if you’re looking for a job, I’m looking for an intern next season. It’s August through May with a weekly stipend and shared housing. Check out the Triad Stage booth for more information.

Buzzfeed takes us to the scene shop where Arcadia is being built for the Sydney Opera House. There are some great photographs here.

Harvard University is recreating an Ancient Egyptian throne using Ancient Egyptian craftsmanship. They have also used an impressive array of digital scanning and fabrication tools to design and mock-up the throne, but for the actual construction, they are trying to learn how the Egyptians may have actually built a piece as exquisite and intricate as this.

Propnomicon reminds us to NOT burn the edges of paper when ageing it. Instead, there are a few more realistic and accurate methods for giving paper that antique look you desire.

The Unicorn Theatre over in the UK catches up with Alexandria Kerr, the prop maker for their production of Minotaur. She has a fantastic mask made out of Plastazote, which some of us recognize as EVA foam (more accurately, XLPE foam).

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The Scenic World, 1886

The following article first appeared in the 1886 edition of The Cornhill Magazine.

The Scenic World

[F]ifty years ago, scenery decorations and properties were all of the rudest kind… Much of the extraordinary change that has taken place within twenty years is owing to the resources of science being applied to the stage. This is illustrated by the progress made in lighting… It is difficult to conceive the contrast to all this in Garrick’s day, when the stage was lit, not by footlights, but by four large chandeliers, which hung over the heads of the players. This was a rational system, for the faces were effectively lit up, and the scenery left dim and indistinct. But then these were the old foolish times when nobody cared for scenery, but for the play only and the actors.

Then any stuff would do for dresses—the coarsest was most effective—for there was but little light to see the texture. In Macready’s dress in ‘Virginius,’ now in Mr. Irving’s possession, the armour was of pasteboard covered with tinfoil, and the dagger of wood. There was a scarf of red serge, a linen tunic and sandals, &c. The whole could not have cost a couple of pounds. But a rich dress would have been wasted, and now the searching rays would display the poverty of material. Hence the introduction of rich and costly stuffs which makes the actress’s bill for dress now as high as that of a lady of fashion in the season. Hence those superb plushes and velvets of many tints, the brocades, the rare ornaments.

In the pantomimes we see whole bands of young ladies with their helmets, shields, and breastplates—no longer of pasteboard—made of a brilliantly polished silvery metal which reflects the bright rays of the limelight. This metal is costly enough, and these suits of armour cost a good deal. Stage jewellery now is a regular manufacture, and though many actresses wear real diamonds, it need not be said that the mimic stones are more effective. Sham furniture looks more like furniture on the stage than the finest that could be ordered from Maple’s. It would take too long to expound this, but in illustration it may be said that at the Théâtre Français there is a property clock for a boudoir elegantly painted and made of papier-maché, and which cost five or six hundred francs…

Nowadays there are regular costumiers, and when a play is brought out a contract is made with the person who makes and hires out the dresses at a fixed charge, and takes them back at the close of the season. They are then hired again to inferior theatres in town or country. This system is particularly adopted in the case of pantomimes, when some hundreds of dresses are required, which it would be quite too costly a business to buy outright for only a few weeks’ use. At the end of the season they are purchased, with the pantomime itself, scenery and properties, for some provincial theatre. They thus return again and again to the costumier’s store, and can be finally used for fancy balls, private theatricals, &c.

Smith, Elder, & Co., ed. “The Scenic World.” Cornhill Magazine 1886: 281-83. Google Books. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.

Making and finding props for theatre, film, and hobbies