GREASE - The Map

Here is a fun link - one of our stage managers made this google map with all of our current tour stops marked off with a green pushpin. Once we leave a city he will switch it to red. Just another fun way to keep track of where we are...

Google Maps

~Beth

Privacy

I bet most people are wondering why the blog has gone private.  Beth and I came to the conclusion, that due to the "hysteria" that is going to be surrounding the first few months of the tour, it was in the best interest of the cast, crew and others that we make the blog private.  From time to time, we are posting pictures of the places we go with cast and crew, and it would be better to have that information not be public, as you never know who may show up.  So for the time being, we are going to keep the blog private.  Please email us any email addresses that need to be added to the reading list.  We want as many of our friends and family to be able to keep track, but right now, we need to look out for our fellow company members.  

Tech 2

Hello hello!

2nd day of technical rehearsals is over, and things are moving along.  It's great to see the lighting, sound, props,scenery and acting coming together.  Just a few scenes in and there have been some great images.  Its going to be fun to see it all finally come together in a few days once wardrobe, hair and makeup is added.

I want to take a moment to thank everyone for their comments.  It's great to get feedback and questions you have about the tour, the lifestyle, the business, and so on.  Please understand that there are some questions we wont be able to answer out of respect for company members (cast and crew).  Cath, you will just have to wait and see if the cone is the same as broadway ;)  This blog was started to keep friends and family up to date on our travels across the country, so please understand that this blog is going to be more about us, and less about the show. 

Time to relax with some House, and hit the sheets early this evening.

over and out,

brian

Day 7 & 8 (kinda)

Welcome to tech.  Checking in from the spot booth.  This afternoon is our first technical rehearsal.  The cast is in the building, and we are going to begin stepping thru the show.  Monday was a lot of touch up work, checking focus, refocusing, alterations, etc.  Props has began their set up, and we are rocking and a rolling along.  Things are beginning to get tight backstage, but it's actually a fairly easy deck to maneuver around, thus far.  Having been out front a bit in the past day or so, i can say i am loving the look of the show.  There are some very exiting looking numbers.

I'm settled in upstairs now, so it's going to be crunch time, while i continously listen to the show, and learn and tweak my call.  The lovely a.l.d. is going to have a blast listening to me blab on, while i get a feel for this.  Quite a few busy moments it appears.  Its going to be interesting to learn.  

Time to go listen to some more show and do some learning.  I'll check in tomm.

over and out

Load in Day 4-6

Sorry for the delay in updates.  Been mixing sleeping with visiting friends the past few evenings, so i have been slow to type out what has gone down.

Thursday brought nothing.  It was a day of getting settled with the scenic pieces that had been loaded in.  Some required some attention and some added electrical elements.  At coffee, the pieces i needed for my next major project arrived.  So I harnessed up, and with the help of a few local electricians on the ground, i installed the hardware needed to hang a VL2500 spot from the speaker towers.  Then we ran the needed cable to it, and other lights hung with in the speaker towers.  This was repeated for both SR and SL.  We ended the day Thursday with a few more elements to complete on the speaker towers before we could our units up.  

Friday morning, i finished up the Speaker towers, while Jason ran a few illuminators and Dim12's thru their paces, and figured out some problems we hadn't found before.  Dan began sorting thru the patch and creating groups to allow us to move along quickly while checking out the rig.  Some of the big, big scenic pieces arrived, the car, and another automated piece.  It was a game of staying out of the way of the carpenters while they assessed their situation.  Friday afternoon, the associate designer and an assistant arrived, and we began the FOH focus.  We got through both box booms, before the end of the work day.

This morning, we rolled in, with the goal of getting a fair amount of the show focused.  The morning was consumed by the Balcony Rail, which is full of templates, and zooms.  Not a lot of fun to focus, but nonetheless, 5 hours were spent over the rail focusing them.  In the afternoon, Jason focused overheads while Dan went over some console stuff with the ML Programmer.  

Tomorrow is a day off, which will be very nice.  I can't wait to sleep in.  As well as being a day off tomm, it is also Drowsy Chaperones closing day of shows, so i just wanted to take a moment and give a little congrats to them.  It was a pleasure touring with you all for 15 months, and it was a shame i wasn't able to finish out the last 2 weeks before a new project.  I had an amazing time with them, and look forward to working with them all again.

Over and out

B

Load in Day 3

Today brought another Clark Transfer truck, this time full of scenic goodies, and some emergency electrics supplies.  The carpenters laid the deck for the bulk of the morning, and put up with us calling in scenic pieces to add lighting elements to them.  The entire front of house hang is done and circuited and tested.  Jason spent the day powering up the rig on stage and making sure all the movers were booting up just fine.  It was really a day of filling in odds and ends while waiting for bigger projects to develop.  Sound seems to be at a comfortable place, and carpenters just have a few pieces left to bring in.  Props is the next big department to join the fun on Sunday, followed by Wardrobe on Monday.  Its slowly going to get very tight backstage.  Its going to be nice to hit some of the larger houses on the route (Houston, Philly, 5th ave, jk)

So for now, i'm going to grab some dinner with high school friends.  Tomm is another day of getting the rig up to speed.  Hopefully the parts will come in that i need for my next large project, and that will be finished and out of our hair asap.  

Maybe i will be able to snap a few more pictures of the rig tomm.  I'll try to get a birds eye view from the jump at some point.  

Over and out,

B

Day 2

Another day of load in down.  This morning we dumped a truck of soft goods and some flown scenery pieces, and that was followed by a full sound truck, plus some electrics on their.  We had some catch up work to do on the Truss, because some cables needed to be ran differently.  Between the front of house hang, working on the truss, setting up dimmer-land and refining a few things, we had a full day.  

Came back to the hotel this evening, and grabbed an early dinner with the other electricians, and then moved to a bigger room.  It's going to be a long month here, and a bigger room, for a little increase in rate is welllll worth it.

Tomm is a day off, so i think i'll head back home for the day.  Thats about it for today.  

Over and Out

B

Day 1

Sadly pictures before the post.  For some reason, it wont let me copy and paste my post up here!  Weird.....

1.  Truss, up in the air, with out ladders attached.

Truss, up in the air, No Ladders, but you can see them stage left.
Ladder for 3 truss, SR, SL,  while in the shop.
Truss, as it is stacked for Trucking.
Dimmer land, part 1 of 4.  

For the record, dont expect daily update!  I'll be doing 8-5 days for the first week, but i doubt there will be much worth updating, nor will i have the energy.  Let's wait for the big updates till i am up in the booth, bored out of my mind.

Today, Dan (Head Elec) Jason (Moving Lights) Myself, and Jimmy (Production Elec) loaded in the electrics to the PPAC in Providence.  We had 12 locals with us, and in about 8 hours we got all of the electrics cabled and hung.  Doesn't sound like much on paper.... We did the entire rig on drowsy in 7 hours, but this is our first time.  Jason and I had not seen the Truss setups yet, and most of them needed adaptation to fit in with everything.  So for the first 2 hours, we gave the first truss all of our attention, and we got the system down.  While i finished up the last touches on that, Jason and some crew worked on the 2nd, and then my crew joined in, while they moved to the 3, and then we were pretty much set there.  The next step was to start attaching the Ladders.  We had the Ladders ready to go shortly after lunch.  And after they were attached, it was time to dress all the cable.

Tomm is when things will get interesting.  Sound and Carpentry will start brining in their gear.I'll put up the few pictures i have of things below.  More are certain to come.  

A Brand New Tour.

Brian here, checking in from Providence.  I am settling to my room at the Biltmore downtown.  I'll be here for a little over 4 weeks.  We start tech on sunday.   The electrics will do their "pre-hang" in the afternoon.  We have 3 truss electrics, 2 Strip Electrics, 1 "Practical" electric 6 ladders, 6 roving towers, 2 sound towers, and 63 Front of House units.  Thats not to mention the Car, 4 scenic portals, star drops and other various scenic elements that will have electrics in them.  Everything has been prepped and is ready to go on our end.  We will get a fair amount done on Sunday afternoon with more happening monday.  Tuesday will be a day off, because a major scenic element, the deck,  went haywire and had to be fixed, and won't be there till Wed morning. Then we fire it back up, and go at it Wed-Saturday, with Sunday off.  Should be interesting!

I am looking forward to getting this one going.  The rig looks like a lot of fun, and looks like it is going to be a pretty smooth in and out.  I'll be posting pictures, and things as we progress.  time to settle into the room a little more!

Over and out

B