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makeitpink57 · 1 year

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favorite moments from my first production

i got to be a stagehand + hair/makeup artist (and more) for a local production of Dial M for Murder, it was the first production i've had the privilege of working on, and of course i have many stories from backstage

spoilers for Dial M!! yes its a play from 1954 what's your point

synopsis: Margot Wendice had an affair with american tv writer Max Halliday. after discovering this Tony Wendice blackmails his old college schoolmate into murdering his wife. this goes wrong and he ends up dying instead. shes blamed for murder instead of self defence. Detective Hubbard ends up solving the case in the end, just before Margot meets her demise

for privacy i will be refering to the actors by their character names

Detective Williams

Williams' mic didnt work until the last 3 shows. he only has like 2 lines so it wasn't super noticeable. he did mic check, and then would shut his mic off until his scene, disconnecting it.

Williams forgot that our last performance was a sunday matinee, and only showed up like minutes before curtain (call time was 12:30, go at 2pm. he showed up at like 1:55) fortunately his character doesnt show up until late in act 2 but still. he def missed the cast picture

he was so excited to see what outfit id wear every day, it was so cute (i dress in vintage inspired clothes like every day)

he was watching youtube in the green room at full blast on preview night, which the audience heard

The Cops, O'Brian and Barkley

O'Brian (28) trying to hit on me (20) for my first week (ew?). but he apologized if he made me uncomfortable on closing day so thats chill of him

Barkley giving me a laugh report after any of his bits

Barkley giving everyone scripts he wrote for the sequel after closing (starring him as the lead, of course)

Barkley thanking me for fixing his jacket and tie everytime he went out on stage

me and O'Brian debating musical theater in the green room every show

Barkley forgetting he needs to take the body away with O'Brian during our one and only tryout show, which had O'Brian having to improvise how to get the body offstage by himself

Barkley and O'Brian unable to carry off the body during the final rehearsal, so instead the director came up with a magic disappearing act for the body that they had to learn opening night

(about the titanic (1997) musical) Me: it was horrible O'Brian: didn't it win the tony? Me: yes. it shouldn't have

Detective Hubbard

the Jacket Fiasco. ok so Hubbard, Halliday, and Tony Wendice all have nearly identical jackets (its a plot point). But, Hubbard's jacket had his key in it, which he needs for a scene. on opening night the stagehand on stage left accidentally gave his jacket to Tony. Hubbard became flustered after not being able to find his jacket, and started whisper yelling at me and the other stagehand on stage right (where the fuck is my jacket etc etc). he then went onstage and forgot most of his lines due to being flustered. he accidentally cut Williams lines in the process, which Williams was pissed about. the other SR stagehand didn't talk to Hubbard unless necessary after that.

i was in charge of personal props, so i would typically get the blackmail letters from Hubbard before the show (Margot needs them at the top of the show and they are given to Hubbard in act 2) so this conversation took place every show "do you have my blackmail" "yes i do, stop blackmailing me!! i refuse to pay"

him constantly being confused by the writers decisions "why does the script call for 6 dials? the actual number back then was 7 dials" "but my british dad said blah blah blah"

bonding at the afterparty over the SR stagehand (more on her later)

thinking im talking about the play instead of the musical, and then being surprised that a muscial verison exists (multiple times)

Captain Lesgate/C.A. Swann

Lesgate has 2 coats, one normal one, and one with a safety pack for the stabbing scene. the final act one rehearsal, lesgate enters the apartment, hangs up his normal jacket, continues the scene. he then leaves to get ready for the murder forgetting his normal jacket in the apartment. when i reminded him he was like "no my jacket is here :)" *points to murder jacket*

Lesgate having to reherse the murder and dying alone because Margot didnt show up to rehearsal because of a bomb threat in her area

Lesgate, O'brian and I bonding over the Lea Michelle + Johnathan Groff Desk Lamp Incident (iykyk)

discussing Trisha Paytas

shouting "SUCKING DICK AND COCK" during the 2 day show lunch and you did it at my birthday dinner!

discussing male porn stars at the 2 day show lunch

him rooting for me to shoot my shot with a boy that works in the box office

the director had a trip after opening, and didnt come back until closing. when she did, Lesgate had to tell her all of the box office boy tea. "ooh backstage + box office relationships?? Spicy" - the director

"if you dont date box office boy, i will. he is so fucking hot. i approve 😌"

discussing disney fast pass history

signing left over stabbing pads for each other on the last show

him almost forgetting the murder weapon before going on

him trying to "strangle" margot with the scarf, and missing, during the murder scene

the lighting team messing up a light que and having Lesgate and Tony both turing to me going "THEY FUCKED UP THE LIGHT QUE"

Max Halliday

us having mini dance parties in between his scenes

i made multiple doodles of him dancing while saying his most tragic lines. i gave him the best ones on closing

🎶✨🕺🏼🎶She's being Hanged Tomorrow!!🎶🕺🏼✨🎶

him being the only one in the show without an accent, and being the only one backstage who loves doing accents

him singing the WAP in his Christopher Walken voice

him saying a bunch of his lines in a jack sparrow voice

reciting shakespear in his Christopher Walken voice

i have a bunch of allergies and blood sugar issues, so i would bring homemade eggrolls and share them with him. closing night i gave him the recipe

never forgetting a line until the second to last performace, and then forgetting like 1/2 his lines in act 2. "ive never done that before... my soul left my body..."

bonding over being ancient theater history nerds

him being invested in the publix boy saga (you don't wanna know)

him never knowing where his hankerchief was and me bugging him about it every day? iconic. (he left it onstage one night)

me and Max changed our hair the same day, Tony remarked on Max's hair, and both Max and i said "oh thanks! oh you changed your hair too!"

Margot Wendice

i got very good at doing vintage styles on other people while helping Margot, who could not for the life of her figure out how to pin in a pincurl (no shade, its hard to learn initially)

babes had 2 quick changes, one of which i helped with. we got that one done so quick i should win an award

margot also approves of box office boy

the sound crew messed up a sound que for her. she went to turn off the raido and it didnt turn off until she had almost walked to the bar. oops.

at intermission i would do her hair again, in a bun this time, and i would bruise her neck where she was strangled. now i can add bruise makeup to my resume

she also got a signed stab pack at closing

a few times she completely chucked the prop scissors too far, and couldnt find them to stab Lesgate. he ended up dying without a stab wound a few times. the first time this happened poor baby almost had a panic attack :( she then changed to grabbing the scissors and dropping them closer to the floor during the struggle instead of swiping them off the desk, making the stab part less worrisome for her

one time she stabbed Lesgate so hard she almost went through the stab pack

her entire swim team came to surprise her during our closing weekend, as did most of her friends, family, and fiancé. 1/2 of this group also came to see her opening night! we stan a supportive squad

she took pictures of me in my lil black outfit onstage, and hyped me up which was super sweet

her zipper broke on one costume twice, both times the costumer was not in the building. first time i pinned her into that dress, second we ended up fixing the zipper in time

her fiance wanted her to steal the zipper dress (it was really cute, i dont blame her) so at the after party she said that and i was like "good luck getting it zipped up" and she was like "ikr"

one patron came backstage to ask where the bathroom was, margot then had to show her where right before we went into places

me and Lesgate had to explain to Margot what a twink is during the 2 show day lunch

Tony Wendice

Tony Wendice has the most lines (he has like 2 very long monolouges or something crazy like that), and he didnt have them memorized until our preview (3 days before opening). im so proud/impressed that he got all of that memorized in time

i drink rootbeer to help with my chronic breathing issues (idk why but it just works for me) so every time Tony would be like "0mG dRinKiNG 0n tHe J0b?!?" Max did it a few times too.

during the last scene Margots purse exits SR, goes to the phone loft on SR, and then needs to get to Tony on SL, so i was in charge of running the purse in da tunnel. opening night, another stagehand said he looked stressed that i hadnt delivered the purse yet (the phone call hadn't happened yet), so i asked him about if after, got it all worked out. after that he would always do an exagerated *phew* it was super funny. i gave him a cartoon of it one of the nights, and he had to show everyone backstage

during the second act he puts 50 1p notes in his pocket, which i need back in the morning. everyday i would pester him for 50p when returning his personal props. last performance i gave him an extra set of prop tickets with "you owe me 50p" written on the back

me and him bonded over our shared hatred for lil orphan annie

Tony lost a tie one night. Max said "oh i have a spare!" and then came back with Tony's lost tie

Tony lost a prop newspaper article during rehearsals. we got him backups, it was all good. after the last performace i found the lost article

Tony got hot mic'd!!! we were in a blackout about to go to intermission, most if not all actors were in the green room, but the booth forgot to shut off mics. so we just hear "Margot! how was the murder??"

closing night i told Tony "break a leg! i hope your wife dies tonight!" and he said "me too!"

various stories

i quickly became known as the vintage expert, since i dress retro. multiple times i was asked if i was in the show. once i was setting props and the sound tech and set designer were like "she looks like she could be in the show!! its so cool!!"

no one belived me when i said this was my first production. everyone thought i was a seasoned professional. this keeps happening. sorry guys, im not a professional, just autistic

i also started to gain a reputation for falling. basically i fall over a lot, health issue blah blah. anyways, my second day, i slipped and slammed into the side of the stage, knocking over a script stand. everyone then joked any time i got near anything "not to fall" for the rest of the week. it was a good lil goof

we took a break over one weekend, cuz of a street festival happening nearby, making access to the theater nearly impossible; over that weekend i had a skateboard accident, breaking my pinky finger and skinning my knee and elbow. i came back to the theater monday all bandaged up. this did not help my reputation of falling

the next week, box office boy came to admire the set, and me and him were talking and catching up (we met at guys and dolls, and he helped me avoid anaphylatic shock). anyways, while chatting i tripped and fell on stage. the rest of the day 3 people said "yeah we saw you fall onstage" this was also the start of the box office boy rumors backstage

the sound tech said "yeah i was like whos on stage? and then you fell and i was like, oh its just (my name)"

i got a physical migrane one of the days (a migraine in the nervous system, making the nerves hyperactive. it feels like youre on fire and everything you touch is itchy. basically living hell) and i did not have any of my fixes! and i couldnt fix it until i got home (which wouldve been like 2 hours later) the next day i brought my fixes, labeled them, and stuck them in the staff fridge. fortuantely didnt need them again.

me and the sound tech bonding over both wearing vintage + swapping brand recs

3 days before opening the set was not even close to being ready. like at all so i showed up at 12:30 to help. my call time was not until 6:30, but dammit this set is getting done so im here early. i was at the theater from 12:30pm-almost 11pm. i helped paint, upholster, decorate, stapled the stair carpet, clean out the box office, clean up/get the theater ready for that nights preview, mend costumes etc etc. i got to meet a lot of cool people, and i got a ton of street credit at the theater. the set designer said i was the most helpful person he's ever worked with. we got the set completed opening night.

our set is most likely to win best set of the season at the the theaters lil yearly award show!

because i was there early that day, i got in the opening night thank you speech twice!! once in crew, and once in carpenters. i was only credited once in the program, but that was because they were printed before i helped out lmao. but hey, im in a program!!

the theater was short on ushers 2 times, so they pulled me from SR and one of the light techs until 5 till. the stage manager was like "im going to regret this but heres the situation. who wants to be an usher" so i volunteered. she said "i knew you would. i already told the box office you would. i figured it would be best since they already know you" (since i helped that once day). at this point i should start packing the usher uniform in my go bag

the girl on SR. ok so we had 3 Stagehands total, one girl on SL and me and another girl on SR. she did not show up one of the shows (the first show i had to usher) she wanted to enter the film industry through being a stagehand, despite knowing nothung about theater...bold move but ok. her backup career was becoming a cop. she really did not fit in the theater. she was constantly stressed out about how much we had to do and how much everything changed. she was constantly was suprised how different film was to theater. she would also tell me im doing stuff wrong, despite not knowing how the theater works, and me doing the stuff i was instructed. i wanted to slap her so many times

SL girl was a snowbird. she normally lives in chicago, but lives here in florida for the winter. back in chicago shes a producer. i had to hear sooo many times "but thats not how we do it in Chicago" bitch, shut up. also she was practically forcing me to agree go to college for theater. nah fam im not dropping 40k for something i could learn/do for free. "but at my amature theater in chicago everyone has a degree" good for them. im not spending that much to be involved at an amature theater in chicago. her favorite musical is South Pacific so that should tell you everything you need to know.

we had lots of "liquor" on the bar (ice tea and water). every night we struck the tea to put in the fridge. no one drank the water so it didnt need to be struck. one night SL girl took the water down to the fridge anyways. i said "hey we dont do that" and she said "idc im doing it anyway" she got yelled at the next day. next week, SR girl does the same thing. i said "hey we dont do that". she said "idc im doing anyways". i said "ok, but dont get mad at me when you get yelled at". she got yelled at before she made it to the fridge. SR girl didn't talk to me for 2 days after.

i got to do sound check for the god mic!

since me and the set designer are friends he set up a lil light just for me so i could draw when i wasnt working backstage. i didnt ask him to so he just did it. what an icon

everyone signed a poster i made, and the director and the asst. director both wrote me notes about how much they loved my enthusiasm and that they think im going to have a successful career.

during the first few off book run throughs, when the stage manager had to leave, i was appointed as asst. to the stage manager. so i got to feed lines on like my first day

we're a hit!!! our show got a smashing review from a local art publication, so we had completly sold out shows for the entirety of our extremely limited run. the creative director thought about extending our run, but that would've interfered with the next production so we couldn't.

the stage manager let me keep a ton of paper props on the last day

the stage manager would always brag/advocate for me to the creative director. so he ended up asking me to come back for the next production! this time as an set artist, prop artist, and a stagehand! probably some more stuff, we're going to discuss it further at the staff meeting this week

starting this week, im starting work on Newsies. goodbye Dial M, hello Newsboys!

#dial m for murder #play #local theater #theater #theatre #backstage #cast and crew #stagehand #babys first #my first show #stories #backstage drama #theater experience

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