There are a lot of shows at Wesleyan. You know, “theatre.” After all, we’ve got a whole department for it, yes? Theater faculty put on about three shows a year, plus two or three senior theses. So what about the other 15-20 shows that tend to happen here? Enter Second Stage. Allow me to take this opportunity, dear reader, to officially impart to you when, where, why and what Second Stage is, and who the hell these kids are running around telling you where to sit. After all, it’s likely you’ll at least see one of our shows before you graduate, and who know—ou might want to join us, or work on one of the many productions under our auspices.
What and who are we? We’re a theater production company, obviously, and the ’92 Theater is our headquarters (in fact, some of us occasionally forget to go home). We’re the country’s oldest organization of our kind; when Second Stage was founded in 1973 (I remember it well), no other theatre company was devoted to entirely undergraduate-produced theatre. We’re funded by the WSA, and we let student—ll students, regardless of age, major, or tast—pply to put on shows using our money and resources. We determine what space each show gets (’92 Theater or alternate space) and what weekend the show goes up. The student producers put together their own teams of designers, technicians, and, of course, actors, and we oversee them while they do their thing.
Overseeing entails approving their designs and their spending, monitoring their progress at our Monday meetings, helping to put up risers and to strike each show. (For those not in the biz: “to strike” = “to remove or make go away.”) Basically, we’re equal parts hot-shot producer and unpaid intern.
We have three “liaisons” to the Theater Department, who are in charge of expensive and potentially dangerous things like lights, construction equipment, and money. Respectively they are: Lights and Rigging Liaison, Building Maintenance Liaison and Managing Liaison. In addition, there is the Props Lender. He doesn’t liaise per se; he’s just in charge of, oh, hundreds and hundreds of props. (For those not in the biz: “prop,” short for “property” = anything you use onstage. Anything. A fork. A jar of pickles. A stuffed anteater. A dildo on a headstrap. We own all these things.) Second Stage members shift positions around every now and then and most people on staff have their own area of knowledge, not just as staff members but as theatre people in general. We’ve got actors, directors, designers, stage managers, all of the above and none of the above. Sinéad Mullen ’04, one of our most esteemed Managing Liaisons ever, was a government major who until April of her senior year never worked on a single show.
What does all this mean for you, the theatergoer? You’ll most often run into us in our capacity as Staff Representatives, or, as we cleverly call them, “SRs.” Two SRs are at every performance of every show just to see that things run smoothly and enforce building and fire codes. We know the codes better than most student directors (it being our job and all), so we hang out at each performance making sure no one gets in trouble. In the past this may have been confusing to people, to have plainclothes students asking them to put away their drinks and such. Fortunately, for this year, we have discovered a new invention called the nametag.
More fortunately, we are not alone. We have wonderful support from the Theater Departmen—specially Department Chair Jack Carr, CFA Scenery Specialist Charlie Carroll and CFA Lighting Specialist Suzanne Perr—nd the opening of the renovated ’92 brought us Facilities and Event Manager Ed Chiburis, our newest Guardian Angel.
Want to see a show? Admission is free. Tickets to all performances in The ’92 can be obtained at the Campus Center box office on the day of the performance. The box office is open 10-4:30, Tuesday-Saturday, and tickets are limited to two per person. Tickets are good until five minutes before showtime, and are general admission, so come early. All alternative space shows are unticketed. Want to get involved? Second Stage will soon be accepting staff interest forms. If you think you’d like to be a part of what we do, watch the call board in the CFA Theater Studios for applications, and the Argus for announcements. Want more info? See our website at www.2ndstage.org for our season calendar (the rest is still being updated), or email any staff member with questions. Our first show of the year, “The Game We Used to Play” by the Building Project, goes up this weekend, Thursday and Saturday at 7:30 and 9, Friday at 10:30 and midnight.
SECOND STAGE IS: Jess Chayes ’07 (sound trainee), Becca Josue ’06 (alt space), Chris Krovatin ’07 (make-up), Greg Malen ’07 (Lights and Rigging Liaison), Liam McAlpine ’07 (Props Lending), Jeni Morrison ’07 (costumes), Aisha Soliman ’06 (staff), Logan Starr ’06 (Publicity), Liz Thaler ’05 (Managing Liaison), Nick Weiss-Richmond ’07 (Building and Maintenance Liaison).
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