Tag Archives: history

News

This blog is three years old today

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Dear blog,

What a year it’s been!

But seriously, It’s hard to believe this blog has been running for three years already. I began a tradition where I would sum up the posts from the previous years, starting with the first 162 posts, followed by the next 151 posts. I’m now up to 461 posts, at a grand total of over 218,000 words. If you’ve been reading this blog for awhile, I would love to hear from you either in the comments or in an email; of course, if you’ve already left a comment in the past few years, feel free to leave another!

Screenshot of Props Agenda during the first year
What this blog looked like in 2009.

Probably the biggest news for me this year was that my book idea was picked up by Focal Press. It will be called The Prop Building Guidebook for Theatre, Film and TV and appear in bookstores in February, 2013. I submitted the first several chapters back in November, and my next partial deadline is this February. The other big news is that I left New York City to move to North Carolina.

I was interviewed by Angela Mitchell at About.com. I had two articles appear in Stage Directions this year. “From Agave to Zeus” was about the dead body and head we created for The Bacchae in 2009. “Intelligent Design” was about the breakaway wall(!) we made for The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to Capitalism and Socialism with a Key to the Scriptures.

Some of the feature articles I wrote just for this blog include a comparison of recipes for Scenic Dope and Monster Mud; what’s in a Prop Bible; why you should always be photographing; defining the scope of a project with Design Briefs; what is Pepakura; taking baby steps and jumping in; a brief discussion on period props; clearing up some confusions in the world of plastics; how Bad Props make Bad Shows; a union propmaker’s tool kit; product versus process; how your labor is a cost, not a profit; an imaginary conversation on whether the soldiers have swords or guns; how to work with what you have; making a fake newspaper; making fake but edible food; making fake drinks; a case against metric; and finding a job in film (for prop makers). Some of my articles deal with the important issue of safety as well. I wrote about safety goggles, the real dangers of MDF, how you should breathe nothing but air, and what happens when actors drink chemicals instead of fake drinks.

At the end of 2011, I shared what I felt was the top prop news of the year. I wrote about more news that happened, though what I wrote is more of what happens to me personally. Stories included a round-up of USITT 2011 in Charlotte, NC, a fire drill at the Public Theater, some new miracle materials, the 2011 Tony Award for Best Scenic Design, a tour of the Childsplay Theatre shops (see also part 2), Rebecca Akins’ work and speech at the 2011 S*P*A*M conference, how the backstage community helped out on September 11th, 2001, attending Maker Faire, guns seized on the set of Brad Pitt’s latest film project, and a salon discussion on “Being Green” in theatre.

Some of the projects I’ve worked on which I shared this year include a set of Art Deco footlights for Sleep No More, made on a homemade sheet metal brake; a set of chairs for an opera called Tea; food in Timon of Athens which I prop mastered at the Public Theater; letters for a Starbucks scene; Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson; a Yoruban ceremonial sword; a new prop (a replica of a French 75mm artillery gun) for Shakespeare in the Park (one of my favorites); the set dressing in The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to Capitalism and Socialism with a Key to the Scriptures, props in King Lear at the Public Theater, including a fake dead pheasant; a severed hand in Titus Andronicus at the Public Theater, molded from Jay O. Sanders’ hand (one of my other favorites), and a cast iron park bench.

I sometimes make my own illustrations, and this year I shared the parts and types of a hammer, parts of a table, and the parts of a cigar, cigarette, pipe and matchbook. I also shared helpful illustrations by others which included the history of the US flag, analysis of a chair, Ancient Egyptian weapons, Ancient Greek helmets, Ancient Greek weapons, Ancient Roman weapons, theatrical ads from a hundred years ago, and olde time woodworking machines.

I also shared some videos: American Theatre Wing featured the prop master in their “In the Wings” series; the USITT 2011 Tech Olympics; Jim Henson making Muppets in 1969; a screen test video for snake puppets in Stargate SG-1; a Tour of an Animatronic Workshop; John Sanders and The Walking Dead props; Seán McArdle and Faye Armon; Props in True Grit; the NYC Christmas Windows; and the automaton in Hugo.

I continued reviewing books which I find useful for working in props. This year, these included A Guidebook for Creating Three-Dimensional Theatre Art by Ann J. Carnaby; the Backstage Handbook by Paul Carter and George Chiang; Grande Illusions 1 and 2 by Tom Savini; The Business of Theatrical Design by James L. Moody; The Complete Illustrated Guide to Joinery by Gary Rogowski; and one of the most important, The Health and Safety Guide for Film, TV and Theater by Monona Rossol.

Finally, I’m always exploring the history of props as it relates to the history of the theatre in general and the rest of the world. This past year, I took a look at the history of women in props, carpentry then and now, the history of props in Kabuki theatre, and more on Ancient Greek theatre props. I also asked some important questions like who invented the hot glue gun?  What is Celastic? Who was Thurston James? I also relayed some biographical information about Joe Lynn, the Tony Award–winning Props Master, and took a look at a man who may have been the first prop master in America. Finally, I shared some old humorous anecdotes about props.

Integral to exploring the history are the reprints of old book excerpts, magazine articles, and news stories from the dusty bins of prop history. This year’s catalog includes Joining a Circus in 1922, Property Resources from 1916, In the Boston Museum’s Prop Room in 1903, The Agonies of a Stage Manager in 1914, Recollections of Dirty Snow from 1916, David Belasco and Set Dressing from 1904, Concerning Stage Viands in 1910, How to be a Great, Not Just Good, Set Decorator (date unknown), A Property Man’s Confession in 1903, the Salaries of US Theatre in 1798, The Old Proproom at the Walnut St. Theatre of 1910, Shams in the Theatre in 1880, A Madman in a Theater from 1893, Rehearsing the “Props” in 1911, How nature is imitated on the stage circa 1885, No Screen for Rehearsal in 1903, Duties of  a Property Man in Utah in 1921, and lastly, a lengthy magazine article from 1878 split up into several parts: Evidence of Elizabethan Props, Props at Drury Lane in 1709 and Theatre Royal in 1776, Real Objects versus Constructed Props, Nineteenth Century Prop Lists, Skulls used in Hamlet, George Frederick Cooke’s Body as a Prop, and Macready and his Deer Skin.

As always, remember that you can subscribe to my blog with your favorite blog reader, or sign up to get all articles through email so you don’t miss anything in the future. I add three posts a week, and as a bonus, the RSS feed and email subscriptions remain advertisement-free.

Features

Analysis of a Chair

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I’ve always thought it might be helpful to have a way of determining the identity and style of a chair by using visual means rather than by memorizing the names of all sorts of periods and styles. Sure, one can attempt to divide all chairs into forty distinct styles, but that is more helpful after the fact. As a props person, we are often faced with an existing chair, or picture of a chair, and we need to discern its style so we can find more like it. “This chair has kind of a Chippendale back, but with turned legs. What is it?”

Well, I haven’t accomplished anything like that, but I have come across a series of plates in the book Furniture Designing and Draughting, by Alvan Crocker Nye, published in 1907. These plates break down and illustrate the variations in each of the parts of a chair. If you remove ornamentation and look at just the basic shapes, you can design almost any chair from Western furniture history simply by picking and combining these variations. Even with the rudimentary distillations of chair design in  these plates, you can create 486,000 distinct-looking chairs.

Chairs - Front and side elevations
Chairs - Front and side elevations

Plate VII above shows variations on how the legs can be oriented. In the top row, we see side elevations of a chair with a straight back and straight legs, an inclined back with straight legs, an inclined back with back legs inclined, and the back and all legs inclined. In the second row, we see the back inclined and legs crossed, than front elevations showing an upright form, an inclined form, and finally an X or scissor form.

Arms, seats and stretchers
Arms, seats and stretchers

In Plate VII, we see the variations a chair’s arms can take. Under the “horizontal arm” drawing, we first see a plan showing how the orientation of the chair’s arm matches the shape of the seat. The two plans below it show how the arms curve out so the space between the arms is wider than the shape of the seat at the back. The two plans under the “receding arm post” show how the arm can be a compound curve or can be a continuation of the curve of the chair’s back. Finally, the elevation of the “sloping arm” chair shows that the arm can be higher in the back than in the front.

The plans of stretchers show how the reinforcing bracing of the legs can be arranged in either a box (trapezoid), an H, or an X (or cross) configuration.

Finally, the last column shows us different seat plans: square, trapezoid, triangle, circle, a circle and rectangle composite, and a circle and curves composite.

Outline of chair backs
Outline of chair backs

Plate IX shows outlines of common chair backs. 1) Rectangular. 2) Trapezoidal. 3) Polygonal. 4) Elliptical. 5) Semi-circular. 6) Shield.

Composition of back
Composition of back

Plate X gives various compositions of the chair back. 1) Paneled. 2) “Splat”, vertical. 3) “Banister”, vertical. 4) “Four Back”, horizontal. Variations include the “Three Back”, or the much rarer “Five Back”. 5) Composite.

In the bottom right corner of the plate are four outlines of top rail shapes: horizontal, triangular, trapezoidal, and circular.

Reprints

Duties of a Property Man, Utah, 1921

The following comes from The Young Woman’s Journal, a self-described “organ of the Young Ladies’ Mutual Improvement Associations”. It was originally published in October, 1921, in Salt Lake City, Utah. I kept in the opening paragraphs so you get a sense of the context which the article was written, then I skipped ahead to the portion dealing specifically with props.

Technique of Play Production

by Maud May Babcock

The community theatre in the days of Brigham Young, was unique. The Latter-day Saints had an organization with such fine ideals and gave performances of such excellence that there has been no equal in theatrical history, and the theatre of Brigham Young stands today the admiration and wonder of the entire world. Have the mighty fallen? We have sold our birthright for a mess of pottage to commercial theatrical enterprise. Instead of leading, showing how communities could entertain themselves and by so doing develop a taste for only the best in music and drama, we are amused by demoralizing vaudeville, and unreal, sentimental “canned” drama. Today our taste is as low as anywhere in the United States. Verily we are what we feed upon! The Mutuals are making splendid effort to help our communities come back to their own and make their own entertainment.

There is a tremendous waste of time and effort in our Ward societies because of the lack of organization, and systematic procedure in our entertainments.

…

Organization in heaven, in the church, in the world spells efficiency. A successful amusement center depends upon its organization. In our dramatic activities, our organization must consist of the following officers:

  • Director
  • Business Manager
  • Stage Manager
  • Stage Carpenter
  • Property Manager
  • Electrician
  • Scene Painter

The Director and Business Manager should be very carefully selected by the local Mutual Officers, and these should be responsible to them alone. All the other officers are appointed by the Director and responsible to him or her.

…

The Property Man—”Props”—provides, cares for, and places in proper position on the stage all furniture, draperies, rugs, carpets, lamps, telephone, letters, documents, etc.—in fact, all articles needed in the play except the personal properties of the actor. Things only used by a single actor—such as a fan, a cane, an eyeglass, a parasol, a handkerchief, a letter, if it remains with the one person and not given to another or is not left on the stage—these are personal “props.” A small table should be provided on either side of the stage for offstage “props,” such articles as are needed to be carried on stage, or for properties brought off stage. The property man should see that actors do not carry such “props” to their dressing rooms, but that they are left on the table provided. Stage drinks—which are made of grape juice, ginger-ale, or root beer, according to the color needed, are cared for and bought by “props” on order of the director countersigned by the business manager.

The property man should take an artistic pride in his stage picture and spend a good deal of time to secure, by renting or borrowing or making, the exact style of furniture and things needed for the play. A period play with modern furniture which one sees in stock performances is ludicrous. Charlie Millard, the veteran property man of the Salt Lake Theatre made all his properties and furnished the actors in Brigham Young’s time with even personal “props.” The stage manager furnishes “props” with a property plot containing a list of properties needed for each scene in the play.

This article first appeared in “The Young Woman’s Journal”, October, 1921.

Useful Sites

First links of 2012

I’ve been checking out the site Make it and Mend it lately. It does have a lot of “I turned this coffee can into a piggy bank”–type projects, but if you dig around, you can find some great and useful ideas for repurposed materials and doing things on the cheap. Even if you don’t find anything that will help you in work, it can help you in your life too, since props people don’t get paid nearly enough for what we do.

So, episodes of the Woodwright’s Shop are online. In fact, PBS has a lot of their shows available for viewing online, like Craft in America. You won’t find these on Netflix or Hulu.

Wide Angle/Closeup is a site featuring interviews with filmmakers. Of particular interest are the production design and special effects categories (like talking about the blood effects in the Godfather movies).

The Textile Blog has been around for some time now. It talks all about the design, history and art of textiles from around the world.

Useful Sites

Friday Fun Times

I like this article with interviews of the original creators and operators of Jabba the Hut. It’s unfortunate that, these days, he is made entirely in CGI. At least you can still find giant puppets in theatre,.

The Daily Telegraph had an article last year about a flat in Paris that remained untouched since before World War II. There are a few photographs there, and a few more over at How to be a Retronaut.

Speaking of How to be a Retronaut, I’m adding it to the sidebar as a permanent link because it continues to be so incredible. It’s constantly updated with photographs and video from throughout history, in particular color film from periods you didn’t know had color film. At the site, you can search their posts by decade too. It’s not the most comprehensive source for research imagery, but it has a lot of pictures you can’t find anywhere else.

Entrepreneur Magazine, of all places, has an article on Maker Faire and the Growth of Do-It-Yourself, told through a conversation with Mark Frauenfelder. I’ve gone to both NYC Maker Faires (2010 and 2011), and definitely recommend them and Make Magazine for those interested in the geekier side of prop building.

Playbill has an article on Charlie Rasmussen, the oldest active member of IATSE Local One. At 85, he is still running 8 shows a week of Sister Act as the head carpenter. He gives a great answer when asked why he chose show business: “An old-timer told me years ago that if I was going to work with my hands, I should go where I’m going to make the most money.”