So True!
Not really. In fact, I call BULLSHIT.
I have strong opinions about this.
1) I am what most would call a ‘techie’ and I’m not a fan of that name. I’ve been doing this for quite some time and I refuse to use this name, even when I was teaching, I didn’t call students that, I didn’t allow them to refer to themselves as that, and I especially did not allow the administration or outside groups to call them that. I think it demeans the profession. I think that the term implies that all technical jobs in the theater are performed by tiny, interchangeable people. Techies. Monkeys. Nerds. Plus I hate it. It sounds stupid. We are stagehands, lighting designers, electricians, riggers, etc.
2) Do you really believe that? I told this to students with this attitude about theater. We “techies” are here because someone wanted to put on a show and then they wanted to pay us to do it. The show will happen with or without us.
The person who decided to put on the show was not the TD, the scenic designer or whatever. It was a producer or a department or a director. Theater has existed for a very long time without us. Theater is most certainly something that can happen in a field, in a ditch, in a backyard or a basement.
Theater does not exist without actors. Actors don’t need lights or sets or props. Yeah, they’re nice to have, but by the very nature of storytelling, you need very little.
The “us versus them” mentality, the “actor versus ‘techie’” mentality is stupid. This isn’t a “without us there is no show” scenario. It is incredibly ignorant to think that way. Just because you have a room full of stagehands with all the gear in the world doesn’t mean a show will spontaneously happen.
Without actors there is no show. Without ‘them’… There is no ‘us’.
In essence, actors pay my bills.
via Tumblr http://thenelsontwins.tumblr.com/post/58921046829
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