Lights Burn Blue

Behind the curtain at the stage manager's
desk from which he calls the show

Today is all-day dry tech. That's theatrespeak for a technical rehearsal with no actors present. Basically, I sit at the director's desk about mid-way back in the house with the lighting designer (Rich Streeter) and the stage manager (Tim Endean), and together we set levels and timings (how long a sound or light fade will be, where it will come in the script, etc.) for the whole show. Rich (and later sound designer Bob Johansen) comes with his best ideas, and then I tweak/readjust/edit so that the show looks, sounds, and feels the way I think it should.

Richard III: The Terrible Reign is fairly tech-heavy. Lots of exact timings on lights, doors opening and closing, spooky music, clanging, and so on. There is give-and-take and lots of collaboration. It's a ton of stress (the first three scenes today took three hours), but it's the first time the show begins to really look like a show. I love it.