Category: Stagehands

Part 471: Stage Hands – “Theatre People You Don’t See”

Today’s installment is a little lengthy, but I have seldom encountered descriptions about the backstage process. It is easy to find information about the performers or artists, however, insight into the activities of a stagehand during a turn-of-the-twentieth century show is rare. Months ago I encountered an article about “Stage Hands” in “The Chicago Tribune” (11 June 1902, Page 4). It was republished across the country in 1902, including “The Boston Sunday Globe (22 June 1902, page 51).

Once again, I was astounded at the sheer number of individuals employed working in the backstage area; moving lines, lights and scenery, all at the stage manager’s cue. It’s the highly organized process from start to finish. I think that sometimes we forget that the complexity of the backstage activities over a century ago. Here is “The Chicago Tribune” article in its entirety:

“Stage Hands.

Behold now how many and what different results a little thing will accomplish. A fat man in soiled white shirt sleeves, standing just beyond the right edge of the curtain, presses three electric buttons, one after the other, with his pudgy forefinger.

One of the buttons rings a bell up above in the electrician’s gallery. The electrician, whose blue shirt is open at the neck — it is hot behind the scenes — throws three or four switches and all at once the auditorium lights flame out, the footlights blaze up, strip lights hanging in the scenery are lit, and bright spot lights, at each of which a man is stationed, begin to make circles of especial brilliancy in various places on the stage.

The second button pressed by the stage manager rings a bell down in the musicians’ room under the stage and a dozen hot and perspiring men stop their games of pinochle, put on their coats, and climb up the stairs which lead to the orchestra pit. For answer a red electric bulb glows on the little shelf before the stage manager and he knows that order has been obeyed.

The third signal summons all the stage carpenters to stand by the pieces of scenery to which they are assigned in readiness for the quick change at the end of the first scene.

Meanwhile, a tall youth in an evening coat that is far too long for him goes running down into the deep basements, where the supers dress, and up three or four or five flights of stairs by the dressing-rooms of the principals, wailing, “Overture! Overture!” He is the call-boy, and it is his duty to sound the warning to every actor half an hour and fifteen minutes before the performance begins and also when the orchestra begins to play the overture.  Meanwhile the actors and actresses in fashionable clothes and lacy summer costumes begin to gather in a crowd on the stage. Mingled with them are property men, clearers, grips, and carpenters, giving the last touch to some detail of the stage setting. The stage manager gives a final glance at the big clock. He notes the exact time on the blank schedule hanging on the wall before him, claps his hands, calls, “Clear the stage” and all the people you don’t see vanish into the wings.

But they work behind quite as hard as the actors are working before the scenes. A property man sets down a bottle of beer and two glasses in the wings, just where it can be found by the stage waiter, who will need it in five minutes. Nine stage carpenters are standing, each with a firm grasp on a certain piece of scenery. Other property men are placing a lot of furniture and made pieces in an orderly row behind the last set at the back of the stage so that they may move it all forward when the time comes without an instant’s delay. High up in the fly gallery, fifty feet above the stage, nine husky men in overalls and shirt sleeves are pulling away at a long series of big ropes that run up as high as the rigging loft and down again over pulleys to the corners of various heavy pieces of scenery. Something like the ringing loft of a big church belfry is this fly loft, with its orderly rows of huge ropes and its men pulling and straining as they raise and lower heavy canvas ceilings, walls and flies into position.

Presently an actor speaks the last line of the first scene. At the cue the stage manager presses some more electric buttons. Every light in the house, back and front, goes out for a moment and a light auxiliary curtain drops down and cuts off the stage. Behind this curtain some dim lights are turned on. But even while it is still dark the fifty men who help to make the show a success, though they are never seen or heard, have jumped into their proper places and are hard at work. One gang pulls the old scenery out of the way and piles it up against the walls of the stage in certain defined places. Others rush forward, each man carrying a certain piece of new scenery to exactly its proper spot. The clearers carry away the old properties and the property men set in place everything that is needed for the second scene. The flymen have hauled up the old stuff out of sight and let down the new, and the electrician has rearranged his spot and strip lights.

The stage manager claps his hands again, cries, “Clear the stage!” presses the buttons that turn on the lights and raises the curtain, and the second scene is on.

“We’re a little slow today,” he says, as he writes down the exact minute on his schedule — which is like a railroad time table. “It took us a minute and a half to make that change.”

Now there are some fifteen minutes to pass before either property men or stage hands will have anything to do, and they scatter to spend the leisure time in different ways.

Altogether, for the handling of an elaborate product, like “The Suburban,” fifty-five stage hands and property men are required. The stage hands are under the direct command of the stage carpenter and his assistant. They are divided into carpenters and grips and flymen, there being eleven of the first class and nine of the second. There are two property men and ten clearers, the duty of the latter being to clear away in a hurry what the property men have placed with care. Then there are an even dozen electricians who have to look after all the many different electric and calcium lights, which are used in various scenes. Add the call boy, the stage door man, and half a dozen minor positions and it is easy to count up the company of fifty-five which the stage manager has under his command.

When there comes a wait which gives stage hands a little leisure a crowd of them are likely to get together in the carpenter’s room under the stage, where a game of lotto, a first cousin of keno, or some other game is in operation. They pack the little room to suffocation and the excitement sometimes runs high, but the instant the stage manager’s warning bell sounds everything is dropped and each man gets into position without delay, for delay is the one thing which can never be forgiven in a stage hand.

On hot afternoons and nights others of the stage workmen go out into the alley about the stage door when they get a minute’s rest and get a breath of fresh air and other cooling refreshments. But always they are in sound of that warning bell.

Some rivalry exists between the property men and the stage carpenters, or at least the line between them is closely drawn.

Not for his life would a stage carpenter or grip lay his hand on any of the properties, even in an emergency, nor would a property man or clearer touch a piece of scenery, though it never were moved into place. The union rules and the pride of the profession both forbid such intermingling of functions.

Severe and unsparing critics of the speaking actors are these dumb and invisible “artists” of the stage. Let a new star go on for the first night and there will be enough biting and uncomplimentary things said about him and his work by the critics in dirty shirt sleeves who look down from the flies or stand in the entrances to make anything the newspaper may say the next morning sound like the sweetest flattery. They spare nobody. A great reputation will not cover faults to them. And as that many of them rarely if ever see a play from the front of the house. They look at bits of a thousand plays from between the wings and form their opinion from what they see.

Most of the responsibility for the stage effects rests upon the head carpenter and the property man. Every morning the stage carpenter has to make what is called a “pack” of all the different pieces of scenery. That is, he has to arrange it all in its regular order in a great pile leaning against the wall, so that the next piece wanted will always be next in the pile. On the outside of the pile stands the first piece needed in making the first change. On it in big letters are printed the words, “Keep alive,” which is stage talk for, “Don’t bury this piece under anything else.”

If there is a matinee the stage carpenter has to make a second “pack” between the afternoon and evening performances. The property man is charged with seeing that every little thing that is needed during the play is on hand and ready for instant use. Over them all reigns the stage manager. After each scene is set he casts a rapid and critical eye over it to see that everything is in exactly the right place and that carelessness has not marred any of the effects.

To be continued…