UW Whitewater Theatre/Dance Department

Last night was first dress! Things are going a little slowly, but smoothly. Here are some photos from the last couple of days:

First, here’s student set designer Megan working on painting the edges of the platforming;. She’s tracking the plank colors down onto the sides to make it appear as though the planks have thickness:

One of the props is an aspergillum. Here’s co-props manager Abby proudly holding up the in-progress holy water wand, which is part whiffle ball:

Nathan adds black lines between the planks while Byron paints platform legs:

And a broader shot of the stage from Friday afternoon, with Nathan and Byron painting stage right, and Mary painting more center, and Megan down there working on her platform edges down left:

The view from behind the tech table at last night’s dress. Student light board operator Siena, with guest LD Noele Stollmack, and student SM Michelle at the far end:

Megan’s in the house, taking notes:

Taking a pause, and using the opportunity to fix a cravat (costumes are designed by Student Grace Rausch):

And here’s Malvolio reading the fateful letter:

Tonight is first the first night of technical rehearsals, and as usual, a lot has been done and a lot is still to be done.

First, here’s a pic from the wrap up of focus, with student ME Nick talking to guest LD Noele Stollmack about the history of the Autoyoke:

One of my tasks was to frame up and paint two hedge pieces. Here’s one of them drying against the wall in the Hicklin theatre:

Student scenic designer Megan paints the small patio table:

Here’s student Sam P., working on Megan’s fiendishly angled stairs:

Abby is co-Props Manager (with Siena). Here she is repairing the bread:

And Megan, once again, working out paint recipes for her pier floor treatment:

Today, KG painted the angled stairs with Megan’s lovely violet ‘slate’ colors:

And then went on to help me paint in the pier planks. Here’s a pic of the stage at the end of the shop session:

A bit further on the painting for “Twelfth Night.” Got the brown beach areas laid in on the main deck:

Megan (the student set designer) is getting me the flagstone paint treatment for the platforming later today, so the plan is to start basing those areas either this afternoon during focus, or Monday before class.

Here’s the mountain groundrow laid out on the Hicklin theatre floor and base painted. Our TD stitched it together with old painted flats, freshly muslined flats, and luaun profile pieces — lots of different textures that all grab paint differently, so I’ve had to put down extra coats of the base to even things out. Not all that happy with it at this point. . .

Hard to believe we’re two thirds of the way through the Fall semester! Still, that means it’s time to present the final scenic design projects for Intro to Theatrical Design!

In the five weeks we work on scenic design in the class, the students analyze a script, do scenic breakdowns, work up a design metaphor, gather visual research, create a groundplan, and build an experimental white model. All this work was presented this morning.

Here are some photos of the students pinning their work to the hallways bulletin boards, in preparation of their presentations:

The big pile of furniture and props at the end of the hallway there belong to “Resort 76.” We’re waiting to hear back from KCACTF on whether we’ll be invited to present at January’s festival, and since we don’t have our store rooms back on-line (because of the print room expansion project) there’s not much any other place to keep things. . .

Next week, we dive into lighting design!

We’re a week from dry tech. Focus starts tomorrow! Here are some photos from the past few days of work on “Twelfth Night!”

First, the platforms have all been put into place, and here’s a pic of the electrics crew wrapping up hanging and circuiting the overstage battens:

Our guest designer is using all of our automated fixtures, which means they’ve required some long overdue checkups. Here’s student ME Nick doing some trouble shooting on the iris of one of the Autoyokes.

Sharva, one of the Intro students, looks very happy to throwing a quick coat of primer down to prevent the new masonite from being a slip hazard:

Megan, the student scenic designer, gave me two images of the mountain groundrow and asked me to combine them. Here are my first experiments:

After consulting some of my watercolor technique books, I tried again, and came up with something that worked better. Megan said to go with this approach:

I popped in this earlier morning to prime the deck and platforms. During shop hours I was able to lay in the blue ‘water’ area as per Megan’s instructions (she was at class this afternoon):

And then finally, since we are heading into focus, the tech tables need to get set up. Here’s Nick working with Harry and Jeremy on disconnecting the lighting control console to move it down to the table: