"Standard tale of seniors graduating and the passing of the
torch and all: at the end of that year I asked our director who'd run lights after the guy who'd been doing it graduated, and he told me that I would. At 16 and virtually brand new to lighting, how cool and scary was that!"
Thats eerily similar to what happened to me.
In my freshman year of HS, I was dropped into the "TECH THEA" class for lack of other available classes, and soon "adopted" by the upperclassmen (two seniors and three juniors), who proceeded to teach me most of what I learned in that class. The next year, I SM'd the winter production of 'Rumors' by Neil Simon, and looking back on it, I probably should have been helping the TD with the set and everything, since I would come to need those skills much sooner than I thought. After the production (and the semester) was over, I took the tech class again, with 2 less of my mentors. This time it was for the musical Guys and Dolls. This was an odd experience, as one of my mentors was acting, so there wasnt as much witty banter; and it just wasnt as jovial as it should have been. I still remember having a conversation with the then TD (who was a junior) when she told me "dont be TD your junior year; its a bad idea. Just trust me." so I took her advice, and awaited more training the next year.
One day at lunch this past October, I was sitting there eating (wow, I know right?) and one of the VPs of the drama club comes up to me and he says "follow me." I ask him why, and where are we going, but he wont answer. We go into the small theater, and sitting there is all of the officers for the Drama Club, looking unseasonably solemn. One of them starts speaking; "the TD just quit for whatever reason, and there is nobody to take their place, and as you may or may not know, the winter production is coming up. We need you to be the TD." I was, reasonably, surprised. I accepted, but right afterwards, that past conversation came floating into my mind; "you dont want to be TD your junior year. trust me."
Now, we're starting work on this year's musical, the Mystery of Edwin Drood. It's an odd feeling, being the most experienced person there even thought I'm a junior, since I'm used to having some older people to hang out with, ask questions, all that. Now I'm that person. Anyway, the concern that I'm having currently is about the stagehands, all except 2 or three did not choose to be in the class. So now its only me and three freshmen that have any experience, out of about thirteen people. All for a show that is going to be more complicated than the previous, because we are in a brand new
auditorium with a fly
system, real lights, all that. and isnt fnished yet.
I like doing tech because I like doing things that seem like magic. Or the impossible. Whatever sets a challenge, or when something goes wrong, and I fix it, it feels amazing. I also like working with my hands, which is something that goes back a long time. I can remember my parents asking me when I was about three what I wanted to be when I grew up. I said, to the best of my ability, "a construckshun worker."
Also, I like going places that are a
bit removed and sheltered from everyone else, or places that the general public (I love that term) can't go; like the booth, like the catwalks, like backstage, like the doors in the
lobby that only the crew can go in.
Every Labor Day weekend, there is a large
music and arts festival that I seriously lucked out at getting a job in. I get a
laminate, which allows me to go quite literaly everywhere except on the mainstage and the hot-shot artist lounge. It also gets me free lunch and dinner buffet.