shocked by lamp

My college TD, while teaching us Stagecraft, had this to say about electricity, " You turn on the switch there, the light comes on up there. It's magic. Any questions?"

**copius amounts of laughter**
 
Van's story reminds me of a quote from my favorite theatre book: Stage Design, by Howard Bay, Drama Book Specialists, 1974. Out of print, but available used on Amazon. Buy it, read it.

“Most texts go on at length about the physics of light, which is about as profitable as going out into an electrical storm with a kite and a key on the end of a string. Let us acknowledge we are in the second half of the Twentieth Century and the juice is being provided by the power company. If something goes awry you’ll have to contact a licensed electrician anyway. If you have a thirst for electrons, ohms, and such, see…[other out-dated textbooks].”

Perhaps because it was the first, and maybe still only, text book to “tell it like it is,” I find it charming. Although I never met Bay, I infer from his writings he was a bitter realist, who did not keep current with technology. He died in 1986, having designed 150 Broadway shows and teaching at Yale, Purdue, Carnegie-Mellon, and most notably Brandeis University.
 

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