This allocation began with a coffee meeting with our Stage Manager, Babette, at 9am on a Tuesday morning. In our chat, she outlined for us exactly what she expected out of each member of the team and what help and support she was there to provide us with. Furthermore, she asked us to comment on what we felt our personal strongest skills were and how we felt we could best use them to contribute to the process – be that creatively through making props or using people skills to set up meetings. To have a chat with an H.O.D. like this at the beginning of an allocation was great as it immediately broke down any barriers and informed us of where we stood in regards to our duties. It was also nice to reflect on what we felt our strongest skills were and what we knew we had to improve on; and the free coffee was a perk.
Following this conversation we made our way to the rehearsal studio where we set up for the model box presentation. This gave us a chance to hear from our designer, Kenneth, and director, Andrew, on how they envisioned the show looking, both from a visual and directorial standpoint. It also let the cast become aware of who we were and what we do, a dynamic that would become important later on.
Day two came with the sound of steel deck and drills as we assisted the Technical Stage crew to install the rehearsal platform into the room, so that the cast and creatives could begin to gain an understanding of what space they had available. This experience was also greatly beneficial to us as Stage Management as having a real life representation of a set in front of you immediately propels you into thinking about what the practicalities and challenges of such a huge space could be. The deck, combined with the markup which we then laid down gave me my first realisation of just how big this show would be. The markup itself was not without its challenges, however, as Babette had pre-taken all of her measurements from points that, as it turned out, were not present within the rehearsal room. This led to us having to re-measure the plans from different points and navigating through scaff legs and under deck with our tape lines. I also had to restrain my compulsion to work measurements in millimetres as it led to more communication trouble than was worth the hassle.