Touring production will Chicago be modified- UKyouth staging

[andrewcraig]

Not only is there going to be a Chicago show and eventually a San Francisco show, there's going to be a national touring production! They are going to need LOTS of Billys, Michaels and Ballet Girls. No wonder they've been holding more auditions.

Thinking about it a little, I expect they'll have to modify some staging, because I don't see how they will be able to excavate under every theater they visit and build the Billy bedroom hydraulic system.

The above was posted by phoebe 6 months ago. I found it in archive but cannot post a reply so have cut and pasted.

I have heard that the hydraulic for Billys bed at least will be replaced, probably the kitchen table and the underground hut in the angry dance. If they go the miners lift in Once We Were Kings surely will not survive.

Elsewhere I have read about the UK youth productions and am very keen to know what modifications have been made for the staging of them as well.

Maybe Chicago is a fraction too early to know unless we know people on the production side. But hopefully
we can get more info from the UK youth productions.

I am happy to receive PM's if info is not for the public ATM. It is important not idle curiousity.

[Billy Whiz]

Regarding the Chicago show and the touring production. I was under the impression, rightly or wrongly, that the Chicago show would become the touring production once audience numbers started dropping in Chicago.

There has also been mention of a production in Toronto so you are certainly correct that they will need lots of Billys, Michaels and Ballet Girls - as well as ensemble members. It can only be good for the talented adults who are looking for work at the moment or are considering moving from another show. To have BETM on your CV must put you in good stead for auditions in the future.

[ERinVA]

The stage of almost every theatre that brings in touring shows has traps and lift capabilities, so I don't think everything would have to be completely modified, but of course the excavation for the bedroom set would be a different matter entirely. However, I don't see why there could not be the option of a "scissor" type of lift from a wagon for the bedroom. It might not rotate, but otherwise, I expect they will manage it some way.

[Steamboy]

Not quite - many roadhouses have traps, but by no means all. There's no such thing as a 'standard' theater, all of them have different widths, heights, depths, sightlines, amounts of room backstage, etc. Even the ones with traps have them placed at different locations in the stage floor, with different sizes and configurations of filler panels, plus there's always the question of how much height is available under the trap.

Any tour that relies on trapped scenery instantly limits itself in the selection of theaters it can consider stopping at, and the show will also have to increase load-in time to deal with the differences (ie: dark time that you can't sell tickets during). It's not just the unit that moves up and down you have to worry about, it's also where and how the trap cover retracts into the deck and slides away, instantly doubling (or more) the square footage you need to think through. One could try to build a tourable deck that had all the covers built in and structure to span varying trap openings, but it would be at least a foot thick, deeply affecting visibility for many of the front rows of the audience, and the challenge of making all the mechanism line up reliably stop after stop would be an interesting one.

The production team will have to decide if they want to retain the trapped scenery, and (like Phantom of the Opera) substantially rebuild each tour stop's stage, with correspondingly long load in/load out times (or even two sets leapfrogging), and stay in each town long enough to sell enough tickets to pay for it all (Phantom generally doesn't stop for less than a month), or redesign the set without traps, and be able to hit any stage in the country, possibly for half-week runs.

I've seen some fairly big and intricate shows be loaded in in a single day (lots of planning and organization), but very, very few that tried to trap anything. An exception is Les Miz, but that was merely a manhole for the Thenardiers to pop out of, and that doesn't really count since it was positioned far downstage center, hanging over the orchestra pit.

[ERinVA]

Good point about the variation in theatre facilities. So they may have to eliminate the use of traps altogether, but regardless of staging considerations, I think it would be hard for BETM to do the kind of tour schedule that would bring them into a venue for only 3 or 4 nights before moving on. I would expect them to do longer stays in fewer cities. No doubt it will all become clear when they do actually begin touring.

[Billy Whiz]

Thanks for the info Steamboy. Very informative.

[CJ-Rochester]

Stage Automation Engineer Chuck Adomanis designs the modern automated system for moving theatrical scenery. He demonstrates the control system on the new set built for the Billy Elliot tour.

http://americantheatrewing.org/inthewin ... n_engineer

This clearly answers the question about the kitchen table. Too bad they didn't talk about Billy's bedroom. That's an even bigger challenge.