A theatre company is made up of several people who need to work together in order to display a successful performance. With this in mind the company met to assign a role for each member. For STAMP I have been elected Stage Manager, as well as an actor, though I shall be discussing the role of Stage Manager in this post.
After the meeting I researched what my role entailed. In the book Stage Management and Theatrecraft Hendrik Baker states that the Stage Manager “can be described as the link between the creative idea and its translation to practical reality” (1988, p.1). From Baker’s statement I have concluded:
The company wishes to focus attention on the actual script and how we perform it rather than emphasising the technical side, meaning our production will feature a significant amount of props. Through past experiences I have learnt the importance of requiring props as early during the rehearsal process as possible. As Bruce Miller states in his book The Scene Study Book: Road Map to Success props “can and will help you communicate the story of the scenes, as well as the story of your individual character” (2010, p.116). Communicating our story to the audience is incredibly important for this performance and using the props at an early stage will allow the actors to play with the different uses of them.
Organisation will also be significantly important in this role and as such I have drawn up a rehearsal schedule to ensure the company have advance knowledge of when they will be.as well as allowing us to begin working on the production.
Here is a copy of STAMP’s rehearsal schedule:
Thanks for reading,
Larissa
Work Cited
Baker, Hendrik (1988) Stage Management and Theatrecraft, Routledge.
Miller, Bruce (2010) The Scene Study Book: Roadmap to Success, Limelight Editions.