Wizards and halflings and dwarves, oh my!
OYE! Don't get me wrong, I'm having a blast on this show, and Matthew (the director) is a good friend of mine, and I love working with him... BUT (oh yes, you knew there was a but coming) this has also been one of the more frustrating experiences I've ever had as a designer. First off the stage manager, Mary, thinks she has a right to direct and give me input on what she thinks i should be doing with the sound, and she's even gone so far as to set levels and patch speakers without me. She brought in her husband, who is a brilliant sound engineer and a nice guy, and started making all kinds of changes. Grrrrr. I put my foot down and got it all changed back, but I hate having to be that guy. I'm pretty laid back, especially when working on a sound gig, and she made me get confrontational on her. GRRR.
Then there's Bobb (that's right, two b's on the end). Bobb is the artistic director, and a very nice guy. But Bobb likes to step all over Matt's toes by directing the show himself. See, from my personal experience the relationship between Bobb and Matt is supposed to be kind of like the President and the military. A chain of command if you will. Meaning you wouldn't see the president giving direct orders to a unit of foot soldiers. No, he'd give it to the highest ranking officers, and the orders would trickle down. Bobb is that President who likes to get in the trenches. He get s on stage and redirects scenes, he gives me and the lighting designer direct notes. The reason this part pisses me off is because
A) It hurts Matt's feelings A LOT that Bobb won't let him run his own show. It makes him feel like an idiot, or that Bobb thinks he's an idiot.
B) All the actors are kids and now they don't have a clearly defined authority on the show. They have two people sometimes telling them two different things and they get confused on who to listen to. Bad way to run a show.
Whew. I just keep reminding myself I'm getting paid a lot of money for this, and then I feel like they can do whatever they want.
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