Jungle Book #3 and Final

Where I left off was the week of our pick up rehearsal.

2/15/2012: (Pick-up Rehearsal)

     Today for our pick up rehearsal we started it off with some fun games to get the kids excited to be there.  We did this for about 30 minuets before we started our run through.  For the run through we did a Italian run.  This means that we had no props or set but had them do all of there blocking and say there lines as fast and clearly as they could.  We got through a hour and a half play in just under 45 minutes.  We spent the rest of the time playing more games.

 2/17/2012: (Performance #4)

    For having a week were we only rehearsed the play once this performance went very well.  There were a few line issues but all of the kids covered them very well.  Then at the last scene of the play the switches back stage for the house lights got bumped making them turn on in the middle of the scene.  Other than these few mistakes everything else went fine.

2/18/2012: (Performance #5)

     This performance went great.  The few line mistakes form the day before had been corrected.  The show ran without any major issues.

2/19/2012: (Final Performance #6 and Strike)

    Several of the kids were sad that this was the last performance of the show.  They all however seemed to have a ton of energy.  The kids put on a great last show.  It was one of their best performances. 

     At the end of the show we had to strike it.  Dan and I had the majority of the set piece packed into the truck before the kids were done changing.  We then had to clear the stage so we could take down the set pieces that flew.  That took maybe 30mins.  All that was left to do was to put the lights back to where we found them.  We were done with strike by about 5:30.  all in all it only took us about and hour and a half.

Final Thoughts:

     It has been a really interesting experience getting to be a stage manager for a children’s theatre.  For the most part I greatly enjoyed my experience.  The main thing that I learned was the kids are almost always easy to work with.  The hardest part was having to deal with their parents.  Getting parents to check their Email was one of the most frustrating parts!  They would ask their children instead of checking the emails we sent to them.  Overall I would recommend that every person involved with theatre at some point and time works with a cast of all kids.  It will definitely help increases your patients.