Hi! How are you? My name is Maria, and I’ve been stage manager for all three Story Theater teen shows so far. If you don’t know what I do or what it’s like to go through the process of putting together a show from my point of view, you’re in luck!
The basic duties of a stage manager are to run production meetings, record the actors’ blocking, and make sure rehearsals and the production schedule run on time. Most importantly though, stage managers are the link between the production teams and the director and actors. The name “stage manager” is a pretty good description in and of itself, because most of the job is literally managing the stage - helping the director figure out where he/she wants the actors to do and then where the different set pieces and props should be placed. After that, there needs to be communication with the props and set department either during or outside of production meetings so they know what the director wants.
Although all of that still proves true for the teen shows, it’s a little bit different. In most shows, the actors have no clue what is going on in production meetings. They don’t know what the set is going to look like until tech week, and the same goes for what props they will be using or what costumes they will wear. Likewise, the production teams also don’t know what the show looks like until tech week. But with the teen shows at Story Theater Company, the actors form the production teams; they are part of the process of building the set, finding props, and putting costumes together. We also have a dramaturgy department, which researches the background of the show and specific details of it so that the actors can have a deeper understanding of where the show came from, helping them to become more invested in it themselves. As stage manager, I get to witness this every year. I get to watch everyone’s excitement when they discover something new about the script or finish a big set piece or find that really elusive prop or costume piece. During tech week, I, along with the rest of the cast and team, get to see the whole production come together. And that’s only half of why I love my role.
This play is set up very interestingly. It is comprised of eight vignettes along with a prologue, interlogue, and epilogue, and each scene only has two main characters. This means that the actors are only interacting with one other person on a regular basis, therefore the communal aspect of theatre was absent. In order to rectify that, we brought everyone together in transitions. Between vignettes, the actors create a community that gives the audience a snapshot of the everyday life of the people in Almost.
But what about during rehearsal? As stage manager, I attend every rehearsal, and in that time I witness all the blocking and tactic changes as well as all the discoveries that the actors go through with Kivan. This year was especially interesting though, because Kivan began with having the actors split their scenes into sections based on the ideas and actions. Then, the actors would just improvise their scenes in order to learn the emotions and become comfortable with being honest and vulnerable. Only after they mastered that would they start to use their scripts, combining the honesty with the correct words. In the end, they would hopefully feel like the only words they want to use are those from the script.
I also send out a lot of emails, but that is almost irrelevant. To me, the most important part of what I do is making sure everything runs smoothly and that everyone has everything they need to do well. I love being able to work with such creative, expressive people, and the most rewarding part is getting to watch all of our hard work pay off during performances.
Maria Werner Anderson
Stage Manager
