Tag Archives: north carolina school of the arts

Interviews

Interview with Adriane “Binky” Donley

The following is one of several interviews conducted by students of Ron DeMarco’s properties class at Emerson College.

Adriane “Binky” Donley

by Sarah Patterson

Binky Donley
Binky Donley

Adriane “Binky” Donley began her career at the University of South Florida. She received a Bachelor’s in Arts degree in design, but realized quickly during her education that she liked to do a little bit of everything. She started working in props, taking any classes she could within the small department she was in, and working in summer stock theatre and regional theatre for extra experience. Because of the limited amount of props classes she was able to take, she found that she had to immerse herself in the field to receive an education in props. She worked in the field for three years and later decided to get a higher education. She decided to get her Masters of Fine Arts in Properties Design and Management at the North Carolina School of the Arts. At the time, NCSA was one of three schools in the country that had a props program and Binky was lucky enough to be a part of it. Continue reading Interview with Adriane “Binky” Donley →

Education

Bland Wade at SETC Theatre Symposium

Bland Wade gave the first keynote speech at the 2009 Theatre Symposium. He spoke about what it means to be a properties director. I thought I’d share a few highlights.

Bland is the props director at the North Carolina School of the Arts. NCSA does about twenty shows per year. He began working as a props director in 1976. Part of NCSA’s philosophy is that the teachers keep tabs on the industry, so in addition to teaching, Bland also works in a professional capacity throughout the year. For instance, he did the set decoration for The Color Purple. The general store is almost entirely his work.

Bland is a member of the Society of Properties Artisan Managers, or SPAM. SPAM began about fifteen or sixteen years ago. In the old days, the props master worked under the technical director. These days, a props director has his or her own shop. SPAM is pushing for the “prop director” terminology, rather than prop master. In my own experience, it seems a lot of theatres are using the prop director term (or prop supervisor, prop head, etc) for the head of the department, while using “prop master” for specific shows.

Bland asked what a prop is, and used his definition in terms of the practical usage of the word. He refers to his “house” analogy. Scenery is the walls and floor. The scenic designer is the architect and interior designer. The technical director is the contractor. The props director is the interior director.

A props director needs to read between the lines of a script. If a play has the line, “Bob walks in with a cigarette,” what does that entail? First, where does the cigarette come from? Is it in a pack? A case? Is he already smoking it? If so, where does he dispose of it? In an ashtray? On the floor? And of course, there is the actual cigarette itself. What brand is it? What color? One stage direction can turn into a whole page of notes.

Bland mentioned a number of skills and responsibilities of a properties director.

  • A prop director must always look at safety. This is true not only of your artisans at work, but also of the actors. This is true in food preparation and keeping the dishes clean. This is also true of weapon safety.
  • A prop director is an historian, a researcher, and inventor. Heron of Alexandria is one of Bland’s favorite inventors. One of Heron’s secrets was the simplicity of his mechanisms. A props director should always keep things simple.
  • A prop director is a problem solver.
  • You need to help the actor create a character.
  • There are many other random skills a prop director needs, such as plumbing and sewing.

“If it looks like crap, the actor’s going to treat it like a piece of crap,” Bland said. This is something I’ve been mulling over for awhile; I’m going to go into this in more depth in a later post.

Bland mentioned the Prop Directors Handbook, which I’ve posted about previously (Properties Directors Handbook), and link to in my sidebar. This book, written by Sandra J. Strawn, could not find a publisher, so she put it online for free. She is also a member of SPAM.

Stay tuned for many more highlights from this year’s Symposium. I also have some photographs once I dig out my USB cable.

Education

SETC Theatre Symposium Day 1

You’ll notice I didn’t have a post yesterday. I flew down to Winston-Salem to attend the 2009 SETC Theatre Symposium. This year, the topic is props, which is very apropos for this blog.

It was a long but fruitful day. I presented my paper. Bland Wade, the props director at North Carolina School of the Arts (NCSA) gave a tour of their props shop and a speech on what a properties director does.

I forgot my USB cable, so I cannot get the pictures off my camera at the moment. I’ll have a more in-depth summary of this weekend when I get back to New York. Today, in addition to more papers, we have a speech by Andrew Sofer, author of The Stage Life of Props.

It’s all very fascinating stuff, and I can’t wait to write it all up for this blog.