Dad would be proud . . .

Scene Shop – Reflective Summary

Any attempt to reflect back on my ‘year’ of work in the scene shop is already marred by the fact that the work I have done has spanned over two years and subject to my lacking memory. Furthermore, the work I have done was mainly in the areas of set striking and shop maintenance, which is distinctly different than the work involved in building sets. Nevertheless, I was afforded the opportunity to do some building, and the tasks of striking and cleaning proved surprisingly educational.
I spent long hours simply sorting screws. This task would be considered menial by many, but represents a necessary part of the team work. Somebody must do the cleaning and, moreover, it is tasks such as these that afford an intimate knowledge of the scene shop that is often overlooked by many. I am now perhaps one of the few that is closely familiar with screw sizes, and where to put them away. It is minutiae of this sort that I found myself having to ask about in my first term, but now I am in the know. Similarly, I have learned how to use the paint rack, and other less glamorous details of the shop.
Even though I missed out on some of the more exciting set building, Charles did afford me the opportunity to help him install the extension of the stage in the Bishop for the fashion show, and to build a dolly for scrap wood disposal. Both of these tasks showed me the simple details of construction that are inherent to any building task. Charles directed me and then left me largely to my own auspices in building the dolly, including the installation of caster, which was both fun and rewarding. Furthermore, the laborious task of rolling wood to the dumpster takes on a surprisingly more fulfilling pride when one is using a dolly that one has built themselves, especially when it works effectively.
Another benign task that proved to be a lot of fun was striking the set for Medea. Ultimately, I spent all of my time unscrewing screws with an electric drill. While the other younger students seemed to revel in the destructive use of sledgehammers for smashing set pieces to bits, I found that I quite enjoyed the task of locating and unscrewing screws. There are small intuitions that one learns in so doing, such as the logistics of where to begin so that unscrewed set pieces do not collapse in a dangerous way, and simply how to remove a screw that has the spindle portion out of the wood already. I actually demonstrated to another student, who had more experience in the shop than I, how to put wood pressure behind it to gain the necessary leverage, and then the screw comes out quite easily. In fact, that and the task of building the frame for the bug screen on the Medea set, I found that many of the younger students looked to me as a senior and surprisingly, my modest skills often proved to be intuitively correct, and occasionally superior to those with whom I was working. As such, I learned to have faith in my own abilities a little more, while still recognizing the need to defer to Charles’ wisdom for some things that should have been intuitive and left me feeling foolish. For example, I learned the hard way that the proper way to hold a ladder for someone is not to place your hand on the foot-step!
Reflecting on the course theory is a wide task. Certainly, I learned more about the details of carpentry than I would have expected, and I did so from the highly interesting perspective of building sets for theatre. I imagine that learning carpentry from the perspective of building houses, or curing wood, would be far less interesting and highly repetitive. Of the many things I learned, some of the most salient, or at least the ones that stick out in my mind include, castering, set movement, types of flat construction, grades of wood, wood strength and the relevance of grain direction, and most importantly, cutting lists. I suspect that all of these, especially the last of them, will prove useful in my everyday workings as a father of a large family, and in my newly improved ability to perhaps build things that previously I would have had to have bought. Most importantly, however, was the opportunity to learn about and use the larger machinery in the shop. It is intimidating and represented a point of fear for me, but knowing the proper usage and safety has certainly bolstered my confidence. Perhaps I will be able to build a set one day, now that I am not so fearful and much more knowledgeable.

See you in hell,
Shakes.