In our recent production of Guys and Dolls, the Save-A-Soul Mission consisted of 2 12x8 flats, and 2 4x8 flats all on wagons. One
flat had a door, while the other had a giant 9x3 storefront plexi window with Save-A-Soul painted on it. The two 4' sections were set at an angle to help define the interior space. The whole thing was masked by a
traveler on the ends. I was a
bit hesitant with the plexi and lighting, but it worked out incredibly well.
In this case, we mounted the flats flush against a long
edge of a 4x12
wagon (4x8 + 4x4 married together), which became the interior. On the exterior side, the
wagon was painted to resemble a sidewalk, the wall brick,
etc. Under the
wagon we added some extra 2x4 support members then
lag bolted the footer of the
flat to the
wagon before skinning the other side. We also used metal L-braces on the ends to help stabilize it vertically. Because they needed to join together, we put two strips of 1/2 plywood attached to one of the two, to create a
channel for the other wall to slide into. This also gave some added rigidity to the finished piece, which was needed with the amount of people storming and and out of the door. A massive wall loses its
effect when it starts swaying! The
channel was painted to resemble a pillar on the inside, and just became part of the brick outside.
The framing was 2x4 construction, skinned with lauan. Because of the window and door, we had to make this wall a
bit more rugged than we normally
build. Most of our hard "wall" flats, have a 2x4
header and footer, but use aluminum studs for the interior to keep the weight down. These get put on wagons, flown, or just moved on
stage and L-braced depending on the situation.
It only took 2 bodies on each of the 12' rolling walls and one on each of the 4's to do the changes, which was reasonable with the side of our
deck crew.
The 12' flats were recently resurrected, but placed center on a 4x8
wagon, rather than on
edge, for a production of A Christmas Carol. They were used one or both at a time to define different "areas" on
stage.
Using wagons is the easiest way I've found in many high school theaters, depending on their capabilities in the space. If your set doesn't need to be two-sided, you're at an added advantage. If you do put a wall on
edge, double check the balance so that it's not going to topple upon someone. It was never an issue for us. If you need to, you can secure some form of weight under the non-wall side if it needs to be hidden, or just place sand bags or weights if not. Obviously a center mounted approach is more balanced than an
edge mounted approach, but it depends on the needs of the production.
I'll see if I can pull up some photos as examples. Hope this gave you some insight, and good luck!