Production

I want to be a producer.

I'm sure it has a lot to do with the movie, and the musical, "The Producers". And my weirdly obsessive love of musical theatre. And my fascination with all things campy, glittery, and otherwise over the top. And the fact I like to PRODUCE things. To make a bunch of weird, unrelated stuff into beautiful things. Like office supply sculptures. Etc.

I only recently realized I discovered my future profession when I was in middle school. I was under the impression I discovered my passion upon realizing that I was no good at graphic arts, set design, broadcast news writing, or stage management. But no, it was in the 8th grade at Blackmon Road Middle School.

It all started in the 7th grade in our class production of "Oz!". "Oz!" was a lame, cheaper version of "The Wizard of Oz" with bad songs, but the same general plot line. The show was poorly rehearsed, poorly produced, and all the students forgot their lines by the end of the second act. But it was fun, and the parents loved it. And in middle school drama, the parents are the ones you are trying to reach.

After a few kids dropped out due to their math grades, transfer ed schools, or got grounded, I understudied my way to the role of the Tin Man. I am obviously a girl, but no one seemed to notice. I worked hard and became the star performer of the show, even if I can't sing, dance, or act for the most part. I was PASSIONATE. And I guess it showed.

Everyone involved had a great time, and we all couldn't wait for next year's play.

But the next year, the English teacher who sponsored the drama club moved to another school. Or got pregnant. Or died? I don't know exactly, but the point is there was no more drama club sponsor. Every other student sort of went about their business and headed off to cheer leading or chorus, or where ever else dejected middle school drama club kids go.

But I wouldn't have it. I talked to every single one of my teachers about sponsoring the drama club. I begged them to commit just a few hours of their time to supervise the club after school but no one wanted to. I still wouldn't give up.

I refused to be a dejected drama club kid settling for a chorus concert instead of the big end of the year musical, filled with glittering card board cut outs, faulty sound equipment, hot glue gunned costumes, all staged in what the school refereed to as the 'cafetorium'.

I started research about small theatre companies in my town. I found a few that couldn't do anything to help, but I found one that seemed perfect. Family Theatre was a small one woman theatre company run out of the basement of an Episcopal church. Every year they would do a few classic productions of things like "Cinderella", "The Sound of Music", or "The Secret Garden". Everything was educational, and they mostly included the same home schooled middle school aged children.

I put on my most professional eight grade outfit, 'nice' jeans and a button up shirt from Abercrombie and Fitch, and a white hair ribbon and met with the head of Family Theatre, an older eccentric woman, at her home. She said she would love to do a production at my middle school, and pull from the drama club for the cast and crew. I was ecstatic and I agreed at once. She gave me a few fliers and I brought them back to school with me.

I made my own fliers and hung them up all over school advertising an important meeting of the drama club, on the cafetorium stage. What seemed like hundreds of kids came, and I stood up and spoke to them all. I told them about the woman who promised us a end of the year play like we had before, and we all agreed that it sounded perfect.

In an impromptu election I was immediately nominated and elected president of the drama club. I did not have a prouder moment in my life, previous to that one.

In the next few weeks I met with the eccentric almost elderly women at her home, at her church, at her friends church, and so on to discuss details. She decided on the play, "The Diary of Anne Frank". Hardly as magical or exciting as our previous production of "Oz!", but I figured it would do.

Before our first production meeting and auditions, the women told me that as cast members, we were required to sell at least $200 worth of advertising space in the program. I found this odd, and fairly extreme for a middle school program. But, again, I figured it would do.

I went to every business I could think of to sell ad space. I spoke of our hardships, and how many people would surely come to our play. I talked about the promotional opportunities for their business, and how much we needed a sound system to play the sound effects of the Nazis coming to get us. I sold my $200 in a week.

Other cast members didn't have such an easy time selling theirs. They saw my success, and after two months of not selling anything, the director assigned all the sales to me. I was 13.

So I put my most professional eighth grade outfit on again, and hit the streets to sell the rest of the casts $1,200 in ads. I was a full fledged, yet poorly guided, 13 year old producer.

Rehearsals were long and depressing, ad sales were impossible and demanding, and this women, our director, seemed to get crazier by the day.

I ended up selling every single ad to fill our 14 page program, but I was never in the final production. I had to drop out within the last week because I got the flu, or something, but fortunately I had an understudy.

And fortunately, I dropped out just in time to have my name removed from the program. But my $1,400 in ads went in with no problem.

While this wasn't a personal success for me, I still knew that production was great because of me. I was uncredited, unpaid, and unfulfilled, but I made a play happen. And god damnit, that felt good.

They had their $200 sound system, their $150 worth of material for costumes, their $50 cast party, and their $75 backdrop. I must have been poorer at math than I thought at the time, because I didn't notice the difference between the cost of materials and the amount of the checks I had delivered to our director. So in addition to making a play happen, I might have paid our directors rent for a month or so, but I still feel okay about it.

I didn't see the play, but I heard it was pretty bad. The girl playing Anne couldn't remember her lines, and the boy playing Peter refused to accept the iconic kiss from Anne in one of the scenes.

But today, when I loose hope about the future of theatre, my career, slow ticket sales, or absolutely no revenue I know that I achieved the impossible.

I turned a non existent drama club in a middle school in the early 2000's into a functional theatre company that embezzled money from preteens and produced depressing classic tales into poor quality theatre.

And that's the stuff dreams are made of.