The Theater Techie Thread

Hi Everyone!

I was just wondering if there's anyone else on here that does tech theater in school or professionally (p.s. if there ARE any professional techies, that'd be really cool!).
I thought it might be fun to discuss shows that anyone is working on, the random things that happen there (try to keep it PG kids! ;) ), any tips you might have, crazy director stories (I have some friends who have interesting ones about the old drama teacher), anything.
So, I guess I'll start.

We're doing the Neil Simon play "Rumors" at school this year, and we've just started building the set. Last year we did "Annie" and "Little Women." "Little Women" was NOT FUN because we started building late, so we were still building and painting the set less than a week before the show. "Annie" was better because we had learned during "Little Women" how to work fast :)

Um, not sure if this counts.... but I'm about to be an actor in my school's production of a student-written movie called "Bus"

Should be interesting...

That's cool. Are you going to do behind the scenes stuff as well?

Maybe I should clarify: a Techie is someone who does stuff behind the scenes in stage production (probably movies too, but I don't know). By behind the scenes I mean Building Sets, Sound Design, Set Design, Lighting, that kind of thing.

I'm not a techie, but I have great respect for them. I have been in many many school musicals, and I think techies don't get nearly the respect and praise that they deserve.

I used to do tech crew. It was really mostly moving the sets on and off and that sort of thing. I tried to do it last year at school, but to much other stuff interfered. But when I did do it, it was really fun, I loved it!

Actually, my uncle majored it set design or something like that in college. He doesn't do it any ore, tohugh, unfortunately.

That's really cool. I have a friend who wants to major in Lighting design or Stage management or something along those lines.

Did you just do floor crew then, and not help with the building? I honestly think the building is the best part!

I'm not a techie, but my sister is one her way to being one. Her dream is to to do the lighting creation on a big new production. But luckily her feet are firmly on the ground and accepts that she will probably end up in a regional theatre. I get the impression she doesn't really care as long as she is in a theatre!

She is looking for a uni that does the degree she needs.

Most of the techies I know are like that...as long as they get to do it, they're fine.

Did you just do floor crew then, and not help with the building? I honestly think the building is the best part!
If you meant me, then yes, I just did floor crew. Even though it was only youth theater, it was really... elaborate, I guess, so the parents actually built most of the sets and things. I have helped build and paint, etc., for school, though.

I've come into being a theatre techie over the last year because I haven't made any shows at my school (I prefer being onstage, but that seems unlikely to happen).

Last year I was on run crew and I was Props Mistress. This year I've already been Props Mistress (and on run crew), and apparently I'm Props Mistress until I graduate. However, I'd really like to be in at least two shows this year, or I'd really like to Stage Manage one of them

houseelf25 wrote
"Little Women" was NOT FUN because we started building late, so we were still building and painting the set less than a week before the show.
I've worked backstage in amateur theatre for years and that's not late - late is painting at 3am. after the dress

lol well it's late for school theater. everyone was ****** because the actors were working around us. and we were actually building the set when the actors were on stage. they didn't even have stairs to the "2nd floor" until about 5 days before the show.
but that does suck. what show were you doing?

We did "Kiss Me Kate" my senior year of high school and we were definitely late... and short of hand.

I painted the revolving "dressing rooms" by. MYSELF. Yellow and green stripes for the walls on the guy's side, yellow and purple stripes on the walls on the girl's side... not to mention the joys of painting the floor of the entire thing black.

I was still painting during dress rehearsal. I think I still know all of the songs and some of the lines of that play...

Ugh. Stripe painting. During Little Women my "birthday buddy" and I spent all day (3pm-9pm) painting the stripes in Beth's room. Which was eight feet above the ground. While some of the others were fixing doors and moving things around. We've come across the flats that we painted both during Annie and Rumors and we're always like "Do you know how long it took us to paint that??? Don't paint over it!!!" but they always do. :(

We've come across the flats that we painted both during Annie and Rumors and we're always like "Do you know how long it took us to paint that??? Don't paint over it!!!" but they always do. :(
Yeah, one of the times when I did it for my school, my friend who had done it the previous show was looking at this one section that she'd had to paint tiny, metuiculous little lines to look like a fence, and we had to paint it this weird purple-y color, and the whole time she was like "God, do you remember when I painted this!? This is killing me!?" And sense we had to make the color from comining 2 others, that was also when I learned the ever-important lesson of 'You can never run out of paint.'

houseelf25 wrote
what show were you doing
Almost every pantomime I've been involved in has gone to the wire for the set. But I was thinking of a Man for all Seasons where the paint was still damp in places at curtain up.

I've had that sort of experience, too. The place where I do theater is really low budget, so all the props are donated/brought in/made by the actors or their parents, and during my last show, we had a jail cell, and the feet were in a plus shape, and parts of th sides weren't painted, but we thought it would be fine. Then during the first performance our director said you could see the unpainted parts from the audience, so the next day, my mom and I are sitting there backstage, me in costume, using tiny craft paint brushes to get it done about an hour before the performance. Good times.

I'm not a techie, but I have great respect for them. I have been in many many school musicals, and I think techies don't get nearly the respect and praise that they deserve.

Same here. Everyone in the show has to do tech work for the show I'm doing now, 'A MIdsummer Nights Dream'. The director has us building various levels of platforms, which are almost done, and we are building a tree. 20 feet high. that people can enter through. out of PAPER MACHE.

That will be fun. We open in three weeks. And the tree hasn't been started. And we are in the process of cutting out fabric and patterns.

So to all the techies out there, a round of applause! STANDING OVATION! :rockon::rockon::rockon:

Same here. Everyone in the show has to do tech work for the show I'm doing now, 'A Midsummer Nights Dream'.
Oh that's so weird!! My school just did that play, too!! I wasn't able to help with it at all, because I had so many conflicts, but I saw it yesterday, and it was hilarious.

I majored in theater tech, and got my bachelors. I was tech director at a small caberet theater before I joined the military.

I've torn down a show in one morning and put mine set up in the afternoon. I've worked with all sorts of unbearable folk. I've worked for prima donas who can't tell one end of the hammer from the other. But I've also had the time of my life doing some shows. It's been good fun for me.

I did tech in my middle school and in my high school for one year until I moved.


I've worked backstage in amateur theatre for years and that's not late - late is painting at 3am. after the dress

No late is building a flat 5 hours before the opening show. A lot of people were out sick and the majority of the actors didn't respect the concept of tech hours.

I did tech in my middle school and in my high school for one year until I moved.




No late is building a flat 5 hours before the opening show. A lot of people were out sick and the majority of the actors didn't respect the concept of tech hours.

Late is all the actors have paint on the bottoms of their shoes because the floor wasn't dry yet, but the show had to open.

Late is all the actors have paint on the bottoms of their shoes because the floor wasn't dry yet, but the show had to open.
Actually... late is holding house at 7:35 on opening night with 500 VIP's and Members of the Press in your lobby, all after already having a "final dress" and 4 days of previews, while your scenic charge and TD finish masking and dressing the stage and the Director and Artistic Director are on the apron in a near fistfight over curtain call choreography... Regional Theatre is the best.

I'd say late is finding out you still have a set to finish painting after the opening performance. Good times.

All through high school I was on the props crew for all the shows we did. And during my freshman year I was part of a show that won the Finals in a competition called DramaFest. :) Also we had to take part in the set-buildings, so I did many of those too.

I'm sort of a techie right now...I'm working in my college's Scene shop because I took some acting classes and they make you do a number of "tech" hours. So right now I'm helping work on the sets for the school's productions. I don't like it though, I prefer to act.

Do any of the High Schoolers on here belong to the International Thespian Society? I was inducted last spring, and I'm stoked to go to the conference next month. :D

TEch is my favorite part in theatre. I love acting but doing behind the scenes work is super fun!

Do any of the High Schoolers on here belong to the International Thespian Society? I was inducted last spring, and I'm stoked to go to the conference next month. :D

Personally, I hope I get in. *crosses fingers* I started doing theatre late (Junior year) so I'm really cutting it close to get in.

But I was really excited this year to find out that I've been made Head of Properties. :love: It is so nerve racking, because I've only been in two other shows, and almost everyone in my crew is a Freshmen... and then my co-head never got all her set hours for either show last year, so while I *may* make it as a thespian I don't know if she will. So I may have to do the Thespian show by myself. :whistle:

In my high school, there are two types of theater techies: Those who take the offer of going 'regular' (that is, on stage consistently, and in acting classes - I fell into this category) and those who stay techies, not for lack of talent, but for passion for behind-the-scenes work. I started my interest in the stage as a techie.

wimblemimble, i did the same thing, but working on two shows, it turns out, gets you in. at least that's how it worked for me. i was totally surprised to find out that i'd gotten in.
aussieboy, we have kids like you in our theater department too. we call them "techtors." :)

wimblemimble, i did the same thing, but working on two shows, it turns out, gets you in. at least that's how it worked for me. i was totally surprised to find out that i'd gotten in.
aussieboy, we have kids like you in our theater department too. we call them "techtors." :)

Lucky you. We need to be in at least four shows, sometimes three depending on what you do (I think very large acting roles can get you in sooner) in order to be a Thespian.

No, late is when two people are behind set peices with hammers and nails, waiting for thunderous applause so they can finish building the set without being heard while the decorative vines are being painted by people on the catwalk and come down dripping with green paint...

good times. :)

I belong to the ITS.

I've never heard of the ITS. I'll have to look it up.

I've done tech for three years, and so far I've been on stage crew, lighting, sound, and props. I usually do stage crew though because I like being backstage during the shows.

And this doesn't really count as late, but having to fix a bench that broke in the middle of a show while the actors were sitting on it is more than slightly inconvenient. (And also hilariously funny...but that was partly due to some good improv. done by the actors)

lol that happened in one of our shows! i wasn't working it (this was before i was involved in tech), but i was in the audience, and while they were singing a song, the bench broke. conveiently, it was charlie brown's bench (we were doing "you're a good man, charlie brown"), so we all thought that it was supposed to happen lol.

Ah ha! I've become a Thespian! *jumps in the air with excitement* This means T-Shirts and Sweatpants!

I'm a techie at my high school, and we recently just did Aida and are getting ready to do the Nerd right now. Lighting and scenic all the way! It's all great fun. :)

Anyone have interesting tech-related injuries? I don't really have any interesting ones, but I got attacked by a drill during tech today (my friend was screwing some wood together and i was holding it together for her and the drill freaked out and attacked my finger...), and that made me wonder if anyone's had any weird/scary injuries. I know no one on our crew has really had any major ones, but it's not like it can't happen.

I personally have never had any injuries, but while I was working on Willy Wonka, part of the candy shop set included real glass jars and during one of the performances one of them broke. It was backstage when it happened, but they weren't sure if they got all the glass cleaned, which was a major problem since all the Oompa Loompas were shoe-less.

Anyone have nights where absolutely EVERYTHING went wrong? That just happened to me tonight, and I'm still getting over the stress. Castors breaking, run crew members hyperventilating, costumes ripping....Everything that could go wrong did go wrong!
Please, share stories!

Complete theatre techie, at your service. Right now I'm working on my BA in theatre, thinking of graduating in theatre education, scenic design, or stage management.

Once upon a time, in a small community theatre, two friends and I built a show up from the ground. We wrote the script, stage managed, and with lots of assistance, built the props and set. We choreographed fights, edited scenes time and time again, and each had an acting role. It was beyond hectic, but lots of fun.

Over the winter I was a dresser for a theatre's production of A Christmas Carol. This theatre was huge and had lots of lovely kurtains/drapes that were used even for the wings. We had SO much trouble with them for that show. The poles that hold the lights up kept catching on them, causing many hazards for the lights, the kurtains, and anyone underneath. During the middle of one performance, a pole bent and had to be replaced before the next show.

The other day some friends and I were cleaning out props storage at our school theatre. We found an interesting number of things.
- A gargantuan stuffed python
- Nineteen glass mugs shaped like cowboy boots, complete with bandanas
- Five fake ceramic vases with slinkies glued to the inside
- Two confederate era swords (*real*)
- Over 120 different, empty, glass liquor bottles
- Manufactured road kill (dead chicken)
- Three stuffed crows
- A gopher marionette
I'm sure there was more, but that's all I can remember. We had a good time even though we were down in the basement all afternoon.

Long time performer, newbie techie here. I took "Tech Theatre" first semester last year. I kinda got forced into it, since no one signed up. I thought, hey, at least it's in the theatre so I don't have to embarass myself in the visual art department!

However, I then went on to be the only one from the class to join our school's tech crew (which has a dwindling number that next year will be down to three seasoned techies and no staff advisor).

Despite that all, I now love tech. Since I'm still in plays and stuff at school, I usually just work school assemblies, but it's fun. I'm backstage as opposed to in the booth (I worked on left side running curtain and setting the mic last year, this year I'm stage manager!!)

I am so glad that my theatrical "career" has lead me to tech!!

I know this thread seems kind of dead now, but if anyone out there is still around i would like to say Hi!

I am a professional Stage Manager/Production Manager. I grew up in the world of musical theatre and then when I went to University (Majored in Theatre and film) I fell in love with backstage. After I graduated I have been working full time as a SM and I love it :)

It has been a couple years since anyone has posted, any progress from those interested in teching? Anyone still around?

I usually just do stage crew, but I was a spotlight operator for part of my school's production of Tom Jones. Dang, those things are heavy. The most recent show show I did was M*A*S*H, which I was curtain operator. Over, 30 cues of pulling a very heavy curtain is not pleasant.

Techies, woot!
I am on my way to becoming a Props Master, but I also love doing spotlight. I have a very steady hand...

TECHIES FTW!


I'm studying to be a professional techie :D
I absolutely love it!
I've worked on so many shows through the years, too many to list... and remember!


Anyways, new around here and just wanted to stop by and say hello to my fellow techies