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Also, here is a note from my stage manager to show that I was, in fact, there for the rehearsals and shows after 9/19. The reason for this note is because the other sign-in sheets are unavailable. If you need to contact her I will gladly pass on her contact information. I did not want to post it in a public discussion board.

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Here is the rehearsal sign-in sheet for 8/31 through 9/19. The days that I was not there were days that I was not called, and you can confirm this by going back and looking at the ASM Schedule in the first section.

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Here is another image to show what it took to get the wall down. After the walls were taken care of, the show was done. It had been struck and we signed out and went home. Another show well done. :]

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Here is an image of a team striking the walls of the set. I was not a part of this portion of strike, but it is another example of something that had to be done at strike.

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Here is another image of me still striking the same light. (The bolt didn't like me.)

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Here is an image of me striking a light from a precarious position underneath one of the catwalks, and above a section of the audience.

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After the closing night performance we got to strike the show, and as an ASM, after I finished my post show duties, got to jump in and help wherever I was needed. Now, since I am a Lighting Major and am a part of the lighting theatre practice, I jumped in and help strike all of the lights and the lighting cable as you can see here. This image actually was taken from up on the grid way above the stage, which is pretty awesome.

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After each show ended and the audience cleared out, my main job was vacuuming up all the bits and pieces of the broken cups from the beginning of the play. (During a scene change I sweep off most of them into the grass, and during intermission I sweep off whatever is still onstage.) Yes, that is the props vacuum you saw in the props table photo. After I vacuumed everything up, I was also responsible for emptying it out and putting back with all of the other props. (It was charged before each performance as well.)

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(Props table was over here /) And here is the view of the stage from House Right.

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Here is the view of the stage from House Left. (I was backstage in this corner over here /)

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Here is the view of the stage from the middle of the audience.

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This was my view of the backstage entrances and exits when I stood in front of my station. This view was important because it allowed me to keep the stage manager updated as to whether actors were ready to go on or not. (Mostly important for the top of each Act and for certain scene changes.)

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This was my view of backstage when I sat in my chair at my station.

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This is what my station looked like when I turned on my camera's flash so you can see it better.

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Here is an image of my little station backstage. This is where I sat during the run of the show. This is what it looked like in the actual light that was backstage, through my phone's camera. I will also show you some other images of what my view was from this station. During the show I would follow along in the script and stay on headset to be in constant communication with my stage manager, who was in the booth calling the show. You can also see my prompt book in this image, and that has everything that I might need for the process of the show. (A stage manager deals with a LOT of paper work.) During the show I would also keep things quiet backstage, help solve any problems that arose during the show, and cue for a few things to happen. A few cues that I had to give was a cue to Nina towards the end of the show for her entrance, I also had to give our runner ASM a cue to go cue the costume crew backstage that the big snow white change was coming up, and I also cued our runner ASM when certain scene changes were about to happen. Now, the way this cuing worked is that the stage manager would cue me, and I would cue which ever person it was for. For Nina's entrance, the stage manager cued me with a 'GO' and I would point at Nina which cued her to go onstage. The reason for this cue was because Nina couldn't see the stage from backstage and had to enter off of a visual cue from Spike, who was already onstage.

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My main job before the show began was sweeping the stage, and giving calls to the actors. What that means is that I would keep track of what time it was, and warn the actors at certain intervals as to how close we were to starting the show. The call I was about to give in this picture was that house had opened and the actors had 25 minutes until places. The other calls I gave was 15 till house, House open and 25 till places, 15 till places, 10 till places, 5 till places, and places for the top of act 1. As you may notice, the call for places is 5 minutes before we are actually supposed to start. The reason for that is that it allows the actors to quickly finish any last minute things and then get to their place backstage. Now, the reason for giving all of these calls is actually as simple as keeping up communication. It lets the actors know where we are at time wise. I also would tell them if we were holding house for whatever reason, and that just means that we are delaying the start of the show so people can finish coming in. Again, these calls are important because the actors get ready downstairs in the dressing room and are focused on preparing for the show, so these calls keep them updated and keeps us all on the same page so we can start the show.

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Now, this image is what the props table looked like when I used the flash on my phone's camera. I have included this just so y'all can see it better.

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Now we fast forward to the run of the show because I was so busy during rehearsals that I didn't remember to take a whole lot of pictures. Here we have our prop table backstage. This is how it was organized and typically looked like during the run of the show. Now, I was not responsible for keeping track of all the props, however I did help out my fellow ASM before the show with presetting props and with striking all the props after the show. This image is how dim it actually was, through my phone's camera.

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This is an image of one of our actors after arriving at rehearsal. Yes, that is also a scarf in his hand. Now, the reason he is dressed this way is because when we were rehearsing in the studio theatre it was always freezing cold. I do not know why, but I've had a few professors tell me that it is because all of the A/C for the building goes into the Studio Theatre before dispersing anywhere else in the building. Now, when you don't have a lot of people in there, or you don't have any of the stage lights on, it is a total ice box. So, that is why he is dressed like this.

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We actually had to tape out the stage twice for this show, and that is because we had to rehearse in two different spaces. We started out in the studio theatre, but then had to move onto the main stage so the studio theatre could have the set built in it. Unfortunately I was out of town when they did this the second time, but I this still shows you what had to be done. :)

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One of our duties before rehearsal started was taping out the stage. Essentially what we do is take the ground plan of the set from the scenic designer and, using spike tape, tape measures, and an architect scale ruler, figure out where in the space the set will be and tape it out. This allows the actors to practice in a general area of where the set will actually be and it allows them to know where they can or can't go, or if there will be stairs or something.

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This is the scene shift chart that I had during the run of the show. It was a vital piece of information for me, because it told me what happened between each scene so I was able to be ready to execute the changes. A lot of them was just making sure that props were preset before the scene for the actors. One of my big jobs was sweeping up the broken pieces of the cup from the stage, and this allowed me to see at what point it was coming up. I also wrote down notes and changes as the show went on so I knew what was happening. As ASM's our job was taking care of everything backstage because the stage manager was up in the booth calling the show. Two of us were on headset, one of us took care of props, one of us was the runner (the person who actually ran to unlock the doors to the house for our actors one night because they used it as an entrance. He was also the person that went to take care of any number of things backstage so that the other two of us could stay on headset during the show), and then I was on headset as well as responsible for giving calls to the actors before the show, and sweeping. In the next section I will cover what calls are, and it will mostly be pictures of the process.

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Another responsibility we have during the run of the show is creating and sending out performance reports to the production team. At this point, the production team is no longer actively a part of the show, including the director. It is the stage manager's show. So, this report is important because it keeps them updated on what happens with the show from night to night. It is also vital because it is in these reports where we note if things went wrong, how we fixed them, and if something needs to be fixed before the next show. These reports also include the run-time of the show for each night.

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This is the schedule that we had when we finally finished rehearsals and got into tech week (production week). This is one of the busiest times for anyone working on a show because this is where everything comes together. Sometimes it is known as hell week because tensions can get high and people get stressed. However, it is also one of the most magical weeks in my opinion because this is when you work your butt off, yes, but it is when you get to see the beauty of the show fully come together. Now, as an ASM it is a very busy time because we help the Stage Manager run this week. At this point, all of the technical aspects of the show come into place and we as a management team have to make it run together as smoothly as possible, hence a very valuable schedule. Not only so we orchestrate everything, but we also have to learn how everything is supposed to run for the show, because once it opens, we run the show. In a nutshell, Tech Week is a very very busy week where we get every aspect of a show working together to create the final product. This includes actors, the directors vision, the set, show props, costumes, lighting, and sound. Then, we run it.

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This is the second page.

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Here is page one of the checklist that we created for the run of the show. Also, even though they are on here, the costume props were not on the props table. This is because the costume props stayed with the costumes and were in the dressing room, not on the prop table. Also, none of these boxes were checked because I had a different job during the run of the show. One of the other ASM's took care of the prop table and made sure we had everything. Another advantage of having three different ASM's.

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Once we received the rehearsal props, it was our responsibility to keep track of them. So, we created a checklist of all of the rehearsal props that we could reference to make sure that we had all of the props before and after every rehearsal. This is important because on occasion someone might forget to put a prop back on the prop table, and this way we know, and we know who used the prop, and we can then find the prop so we can use it in the next rehearsal. Also, the list did expand beyond what our initial props list was as the process went on. Some of these were costuming props that would no longer be on the prop table once the show was running, but for rehearsals we still had to keep track of the rehearsal ones.

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This is the initial list of all of the props that we would need for the show, as well as indicating which props were panic props. (Panic props are the most essential props that we need to be able to go on with the show. It is either something that is mentioned in the dialogue, or something that is used to progress the scene. This is something that we created after reading the script so we could then send it to our prop master. The prop master would then find or create the props that we needed for the show, as well as rehearsal props for the actors to practice with.

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This is an example of a rehearsal report that I had to create and send out to the production team. This is the resulting form that I used the notes for that I took during rehearsal. It is essentially a line of communication for the production team so that everything can come together as efficiently as possible. This is a very critical part of stage management, and it is also often used as a record of things that went on during rehearsal.

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At every rehearsal we had to take down notes so we could then create the rehearsal report afterwards. Some of the important information that we needed to note was start, stop, and break times, as well as anything that anyone on the production team might need to know. For instance, we would take note if an actor were to stand on the table or chairs, or if there is a question we had, or if there is something that we needed for rehearsal, or if there was something that they needed to be aware of so everything goes smoothly when we bring it all together.

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Here we have the ASM schedule that was created. Since there were three of us, not all of us needed to be at rehearsal everyday. So, we created this schedule that worked out great. We were able to work around a lot of our class conflicts and still have two of us there for any given rehearsal. This also helped us to divvy out who was to do the rehearsal report each night. Even though the Stage Manager took over this duty later, initially it was great because it gave each one of us experience with creating a rehearsal report.

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Next we get our rehearsal schedule, which is always subject to change. We stayed pretty spot on with this process, but essentially this shows that as an ASM it took up a lot of my personal time for about an entire month. As an ASM I would have to be at rehearsals 30 minutes before the actors are called (The call times are what is on here) and I typically had to stay after rehearsals either to help put together rehearsal reports (which I will get to shortly), or I would stay up late in my dorm typing up line notes to send out to the actors. It was a very time consuming position, but it was well worth it. Anyways, this also shows how the show was broken up for the rehearsal process, as well as important dates like when the actors had to be off-book.

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Another thing that I needed before rehearsals was a list of contact information. I needed this for everyone involved in the show, as well as other important numbers in case something happens. For example, there was one night where the heat was on instead of the A/C, which becomes a problem in a theatre space with a bunch of hot lights on and a bunch of people in the audience, so we had to contact plant ops to get the A/C back on. We had that number. It is also important in case we need to find out why an actor is late, or so an actor can contact us to tell us they will be late, etc.

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Now, there are some things that also needed to be done before we even got to rehearsals. One of those things was organize our scripts so that we can flip to where ever we need to and keep the rehearsals going. So, we got a scene breakdown and a list of french scenes from the director so we are all on the same page. Now, a french scene is basically whenever a character enters and exits. When that happens, you have a new french scene. (No, I do not know why it is called a "French" Scene, I was too busy to ask.) All of this was mostly just for organizational purposes, but the french scenes primarily were useful for when the stage manager had to call actors for rehearsals. The french scenes let us see which characters are needed for which sections of the play, and then we can schedule rehearsals accordingly. This is important because you don't want to call an actor for an entire rehearsal to have them sit there for an hour and then come in for the end of the scene.

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Okay, so y'all remember where I had the M,S, and Sp's randomly placed among my blocking in the script? Well this is what they were for, Line Notes! :D This is an example of the format of how I took Line Notes. (No, I am not showing you an image of the actual line notes. You don't need to know. They are for the actors.) Essentially what I did is, when an actor messed up the line in some way, I would write the page number of the script where it happened, write a note in my script to show me where it happened (which is what the M, S, and Sp were for. I would normally follow them with numbers in order, but I erased the numbers afterwards so I could re-number later and I would know if the mistake happened more than once), write down a symbol to symbolize what happened (an example is P for paraphrased), and also write down what the actor actually said or did. Then, after the rehearsal was over, I would take this paper and type up the line notes in a more cohesive form that the actors could understand and then go back and review what needed to be reviewed. Now, you might wonder why go through all the trouble. Well, we do all this to help the actors learn their lines better, because we typically try to stick to saying the words the way they are in the script in theatre. And those are Line Notes! :D

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This is the schedule we created for which ASM's had to do line notes for which characters each day. As you may see, we each had to do line notes for three characters. Yes, we had to do it all at the same time. Yes, we had to still follow in the script along in case an actor called for line. Yes, it can be very difficult. Yes, we are awesome. You're welcome. (Ignore the scribble. I forgot to erase it.)

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The next thing I had to learn how to do was how to take line notes. Line Notes are when the management team takes down a note any time an actor messes up one of their lines or calls for line. This does not typically happen until the actors are off-book (which means they no longer have a script in their hand while rehearsing) and it is very valuable for the actors because it shows them where they messed up and what they did so that they can go back and look over those lines. These notes are anything from skipping a line to switching a few words around or paraphrasing a line. Also, we only give Line Notes during the rehearsal period. As we approach production week (also known as Tech Week), the actors can no longer call for line, and once tech week  comes along, we stop giving Line Notes and focus on the technical aspects of the show.

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Here is the second page zoomed in a little.

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Here is that first page zoomed in a little.

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Here is a page of the script where I have written in the blocking from rehearsal. (Ignore the random M, S, and Sp's. Those are from line notes, which I will explain more about shortly.)

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Here is all of the blocking notation that I actually used in rehearsals. In all honesty, half of the time you just make up the notations as you go along. There is no universal blocking notation. As long as you can understand it days or even weeks later, that is all that matters. That is also why I wrote it all down in this key after I used it. That way I had a reference sheet.

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Here is another example of blocking notation that I learned.

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This is an example of some of the blocking notation that I learned.

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The next thing I had to do before rehearsals started was to learn how to take blocking notes in my script. Blocking is basically all of the actors movements and actions onstage, whether it is walking across the stage, sitting in a chair, giving another character something, or even turning to look at someone. This becomes useful when the actors are off-book and need to remember what they are supposed to do in a scene, when the same thing happens as we jump around the script going through technical cues, and it also helps some of the designers like lighting and costuming.

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This is an example of the Production Meeting Reports that the Stage Manager made and sent out to the production team. This is what the notes I took during the meetings resulted in. Part of the job is keeping records. Also, the production reports are so the production team has a record of what was said and decided upon, it is also so the producer can keep track of the show's progress.

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The first thing I had to do as an Assistant Stage Manager (ASM) was attend production meetings and take down notes of everything that happened and was discussed. This was mainly to be another pair of ears for the Stage Manager so she could make: -->

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(This is in sections. Each section goes left to right, and the next section is below the first.)