Lois Backstage A Look at Life Behind the Scenes

Three to See: February 2010

Monday, 1 February, 2010

February 2010 will forever be known as the month the Olympics came to Vancouver.  With that in mind it is no surprise that there are a number of “big” shows in town while many of the smaller companies have gone dark for the month.  But in the midst of the sport frenzy be sure to [...]

New SM Tool for iPhone

Friday, 29 January, 2010

from http://isquint.net/2010/new-iphone-app-for-stage-managers-showtool-sm/
Features include:
SHOW TIMER
Easily time a show, including intervals and email directly from the app. Makes your show report faster and more accurate.
MARKS / SPIKES
Create a database of all your marks simply and quickly. Select from a wide range of colours for your spikes, and save additional information for each entry.
CHECKLIST
Create a quick checklist [...]

In Search of a Stage Manager – 20 Something Theatre

Friday, 29 January, 2010

This just in from Sabrina Everett, the Artistic Director at 20-Something Theatre:
We’re doing a spring workshop production of a new play we’ve been developing that goes up at the Havana April 26-May 2. I’m pretty sure you are busy with Pacific Theatre but I was wondering if you knew of any other young/emerging sm’s/asm’s that [...]

3 To See: PuSh Festival

Friday, 22 January, 2010

Two day ago was the official opening for Vancouver’s PuSh Festival, but I’m running a little behind (Sorry!).  The PuSh Festival is one of my favourite yearly events because of the high caliber & variety of artistic performances that they bring to town.   I also volunteer with them – this is my third or fourth year doing [...]

10 Things Actors Can Do To Get Off To A Good Start With Stage Managers

Wednesday, 13 January, 2010

Compiled with Travis Bedard of Cambiare Productions.
1. If you’ve never worked with the Stage Manager before? Don’t assume you know how they work
2. Remember that Stage Managers work in your interest. They don’t work for you
3. They don’t get you coffee, you should think about getting them coffee
4. Bring your own pen, pencil, & eraser. [...]

Three to See: January 2010

Friday, 1 January, 2010

I’m changing things up a bit. I figured it’s a new year, so I might as well.  The first change is right here.  Instead of what I have done for the past year where I list all the shows I want to see in a given month I am going to list the three shows [...]

2009 In Review: Top Ten Theatre Experiences

Thursday, 31 December, 2009

Tuesday The Globe & Mail published their Top 10 Productions of 2009. Wednesday The Vancouver Courier followed suite with their Top 14.  Today it’s my turn.
2009 was a big theatre year for me.   I saw 68 shows. I worked on 12 shows. Picking a top ten was hard, but I love that it is a [...]

2009 In Review: Top 10 Tweets

Monday, 28 December, 2009

On twitter this afternoon @tinarasmussen asked:
“Has anyone done a top 10 best tweets list of 2009?”  And so I put one together based on the tweets I have added to my “favourites” page over the course of 2009.  In chronological order, I present to you my top 10 tweets of 2009.
1. SarahMclellan: Took my to-do list, grabbed [...]

2009 In Review: Blogging

Sunday, 27 December, 2009

Six months ago I took the plunge into self-hosted  WordPress.   I  had spent six months with a blogspot.com account which began as “Lois in La La Land”  and evolved into Lois Backstage.
At times my blogging has been frequent – there were periods in the past year where I wrote on almost a daily basis, [...]

2009 In Review: Shows I Saw

Saturday, 26 December, 2009

One of my New Year’s resolutions last year was to start seeing more theatre.  I had decided that if I was really passionate about this, I probably needed to see more than 2 shows a month.  I settled on 3 per month, figuring that to be a fairly easy place to start.  I did, of [...]