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Author | Message |
satur91
Walk-On ![]() ![]() Joined: 5/19/10 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 0 |
![]() Posted: 5/19/10 at 11:11pm |
So, I need some feedback to help settle a policy dispute.
Your input is quite valuable to me... Understanding that ideally, no theater would choose to hold a house from closing / hold a curtain if circumstances were ideal... and the audience were on time... But I need your feedback... please answer a couple of short questions: Do you hold the curtain? or do you enforce an "on-time" Go? Does it happen often (holding)? What are the main / top reasons that you would hold? What type of theater do you represent (professional / community / academic) ? And where are you located? Thanks... |
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gelcat
Celebrity ![]() ![]() Joined: 6/12/09 Online Status: Offline Posts: 106 |
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I currently am involved with a community theater, but have worked with several other organizations, from outdoor opera, summer camp, college venues, and others. The only time I have observed strict 'go' times enforced is when there are several performances for the venue one after the other, such as college and high school competitions and festivals. You can't hold the curtain when there is such a tight schedule, or when campers have to be back to camp by a particular time.
When to hold the curtain-
Weather often plays a part in this- we generally watch the traffic carefully when there is rain or snow or ice. If people are making the effort to get to the show, then we'll make sure they see the whole show!
When you have outdoor venues, you may or may not have delays based on weather. The Santa Fe Opera used to be completely open air, and If it looked like rain, you were warned if you were sitting where you had a good chance of getting wet. If the Opera happened to be on a unit set (very rare), the show would go on with no delays. If there was rain on a multi-set show, then the stage crew had lots of fun trying to keep the sets dry going from the stage to the storage areas and back, and intermissions generally ran much longer than the preferred 20 minute break. (we cheered the night we got a monster set change done in under 20 minutes for the first time in the season- then had to shush immediately, of course)
LIGHTNING will shut down all outdoor performances until the storm has passed (or at least chase the followspots out of their perches)
We have had to hold curtain for technical reasons, and of course it's never an actor who is late, they're late because of a 'technical' problem (when they should have been in costume earlier than 10 minutes before curtain to figure out that jumping around would blow a shoelace).
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www.actorsguildonline.org
Actors Guild of Parkersburg Parkersburg, WV |
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biggertigger
Celebrity ![]() ![]() Joined: 4/16/07 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 188 |
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Since we are (99% of the time) a dinner theater (Amateur Community Theater in Northern New York) we are constantly holding the curtain due to people eating. It usually is not more than 5 minutes. It is the stage manager's call based on the potential amount of noise, disruption of people moving around for potty breaks, and technical reasons. Though the cast and crew (to include the waiters) are very proficient in moving the meal and production through smoothly (at least to the eyes of the audience), but things happen.
If you remember safety and courtesy then you will have your answer if you should hold the curtain or not. Edited by biggertigger - 5/25/10 at 8:53am |
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The two greatest days in a theater persons life, the day you start a new show and the day the damn thing closes.
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KEB54
Celebrity ![]() Joined: 7/24/08 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 227 |
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I primarily work for two community theatres. One has its own parking lot the other doesn't.
The one with a parking lot we nearly always start on time or within four minutes of on time dependent on the stage and house managers.
The theatre without a parking lot, curtain is nearly always 10 minutes late and it is because of parking issues. Of course, the patrons running the latest get the parking furthest away, which makes them even later arriving.
It is far too disrupting seating patrons after curtain. We "cover" by having a curtain speech at curtain time. I'm not a big fan of curtain speeches, but it has been well accepted. We use it as an update of activities, a form of marketing, and occasionally a "shout-out" for special reasons like a wedding anniversary of someone in attendance, but mostly it is so we can seat late-comers.
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KEB
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brandiwb
Player ![]() Joined: 5/03/10 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 7 |
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I have worked at several types of venues, outdoor, community, professional, improvisation, etc. I agree it depends on the type of venue to really make a hardline determination...
My general thinking is that you teach your audience to be on time. The more you start on-time the more the audience gets used to "Early is on time, on time is late and late might not get seated." So, if you must hold, do it sparingly for good reasons (ie. known traffic issues, weather, technical problems, etc) The more your audience gets used to you holding a house just to make sure late-comers get seated the more late-comers you will start to see.
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pdavis69
Celebrity ![]() ![]() Joined: 3/26/06 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 437 |
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I work with a community theatre in Ohio. We are constantly holding the curtain to be able to seat the customers who are waiting in line for no-shows in a sold out show. Sell outs and waiting lists have become a problem we are happily suffering through the past few years.
We recently held the curtain for an intermission because we refused to rush one of the patrons who was chatting with playhouse members at intermission. (She had recently single handedly paid for our renovation. That's worth five minutes of curtain holding to me)
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Patrick L. Davis
Fort Findlay Playhouse |
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JoeMc
Celebrity ![]() ![]() Joined: 3/13/06 Location: Australia Online Status: Offline Posts: 832 |
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Of course the House Rag is held for a Royal Command Performance, untill ol' Lizzy, Noddy [phill] or Big ears [charlie] have taken thier seats. This is also a Royal privilage that is extended in due deference to Governors, Mayors & other representives of the crown or the like.
Edited by JoeMc - 5/25/10 at 7:44pm |
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[western] Gondawandaland
"Hear the light & see the sound! TOI TOI CHOOKAS {may you always play to a full house!} |
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David McCall
Celebrity ![]() ![]() Joined: 1/28/09 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 299 |
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It seems like a lot of people dislike having curtain speeches, but I think they have tremendous value for all of the reasons you mentioned. If you have any expectation of starting on time, you have to just do it as much as possible. It is probably a good idea to make the bums wait until an appropriate moment to let them in (applause at the end of a musical number for instance). There are times where holding the curtain is helpful if there is a good reason. The more you hold it for stragglers, the more stragglers you will have.
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David M
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GracieLea
Walk-On ![]() ![]() Joined: 7/15/09 Online Status: Offline Posts: 0 |
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I work with a community theatre in Central Alabama. Our venue is a little off the beaten path, so we frequently have late arrivals, because they have gotten lost.
We also do not pre-sell tickets - they are paid at the box office and we are loathe to lose the chance to collect that ticket money! Weather can also be a consideration... we try to hold no more than 10 minutes ever, and only until we can seat the most possible patrons. |
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Mr. Lowell
Celebrity ![]() ![]() Joined: 1/30/07 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 269 |
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As a generally observation, I think audiences have picked up bad habits from the local movie cineplex, where they decide to wait in line to get a barrel of popcorn because they know that there will be 5 or 10 minutes of movie trailers...plus more often lately...commercials! So they bring that bad habit with them to the fine arts theatre.
We have never started "on time" at my educational theatre. We generally hold the curtain for 5 minutes after the posted show time. This is an artistic choice on our part, because we don't want two dozen latecomers letting light shine in or banging the doors during the exposition scenes.
Sometimes we will do a pre-show announcement on the "God mic" telling people to silence their phones and not to use flash or video.
Edited by Mr. Lowell - 6/11/10 at 4:34pm |
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Mr. Lowell,
Lighting/Set Designer & Tech Director, for the Linda Sloan Theatre, in the Davison Center for the Arts, at Greensboro Day School |
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