We opened, lighting

Our show opened. Golden Time paid off -- by the night we opened, we had a show, which has been settling, growing, and finding its groove ever since.

I'm running lights. We have a two-scene-preset mixer board, which means it's manual. No memory, no presets, just live flying faders. It takes me back to college-audio days, at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music.

There are two banks of 24 faders, one above the other. You move the top 24 faders into position, then, while that scene is running, you set the 24 faders on the bottom row. When it's time to change lighting, you slide a lever, and it dissolves from one scene to the next.

This only becomes a problem if one scene is very short. Our play's structure is: scene, revolving door, scene, revolving door, etc. Which means that, you start the doors, then race like mad for three seconds to set all 24 faders for the next scene... and fade in.

After watching me run the board two days before we opened, Sasha, our laconic, experienced, high-school-senior, track-captain, sound-board operator showed up with a high-school-junior guy.

"This is Lighting Jeff," she said succinctly.

Lighting Jeff was a godsend. He stayed for dress rehearsal and opening night. I flew the door lighting, he flew all the other faders. He also helped define the looks for the different time periods -- Yellow for 2025, Blue for 2005, and Red for 1985. When Gwen, the light designer, came back to refocus a few lights, Jeff scampered up the ladder and added the red fresnel to give us the third time period.

On opening night, he brought light-board sheets he had made of our light board, and recorded the settings for each scene.

As I stood there, flanked by small, silent, unsmiling, elegantly-black-clad Sasha running sound on my left, and small, friendly, wiggly black-clad Jeff flying the scene lights on my right, I sent a huge prayerful "thanks" upward to god. And to Gwen, Jen, Sasha, Jeff.

Come see the show. Tickets are available online at ticketwindowonline.com, or call 206-325-6500 noon-6pm Tues-Sat. Or just show up -- we are not sold out, and would love to have you. More info in next post, or at nextsteptheater.com.