OCT
26

Horror in the House of Theatre

By Grey Pratt, Customer Service Rep, Pioneer Drama Service 

Grey Pratt has been involved in theatre for 15+ years, starting from when they were a small child.  Through the years, their participation has included acting, tech, directing, designing, writing, construction, and much more.  The theatre arts have a special place in Grey’s heart, and they invest themself in any facet they can, which has led to the exciting opportunity of being employed with Pioneer Drama. 

We all have our own horror stories of the mishaps that happen during theatrical productions.  Missed cues, breaking character, someone’s mic is on backstage, and so much more!  But what about the even scarier moments that haunt your memory forever?  Like when a weight falls down from the ceiling during rehearsal, or part of the set gets destroyed during a performance, or an actor has an allergic reaction onstage?  Only (long) after the fact can we look back and laugh at these near-tragedies.  So in the spirit of Halloween, I’ll share below some of the horrors I’ve faced in my lifetime of theatre.

Lights Out

On a dark and stormy night, a performance of Little Women took to the stage.  The performers were warned that the power might be at risk due to the storm, but the show must go on.  You could hear the thunder rumbling outside the theatre walls, the rain pounding on the roof.  Then, near the end of the first act, unbeknownst to the actors, a bolt of lightning struck nearby, causing a surge of electricity to go through the theatre’s lighting systems.  The lighting technician attempted to go into the Act One blackout, but a set of cheek lights stayed on, illuminating the actors as they internally panicked.  Beth had just died onstage, lying on top of Jo.  They couldn’t simply get up and leave.  In an attempt to salvage the scene and the show, the actor playing Jo decided to carry Beth offstage.  Jo proceeded to push her off, then pick her up and drag her off.  The actor playing Mother saw this and attempted to help as well, grabbing Beth’s feet.  Reacting to how this was playing out in full view of the audience, Jo had no choice but to go along with their cast mate’s decision.  So the two actors dead-body carried Beth up the stairs on the set to Beth’s “room,” all while the lighting technician and the director scrambled to find out what had happened.  The audience had no clue that anything had gone wrong, but the cast will be forever haunted by the memory of that night...

The Vanishing

During a production of Sister Act, the actor playing Eddie was not pulling his weight.  It was almost show time, and he was still not off book, he didn’t know his songs, and he had a terrible attitude with his superiors.  All of a sudden, at the last rehearsal a new actor was playing Eddie, but no one in the cast knew what was going on.  The only thing that was said was that Eddie 2.0 was here to stay, and the other actor was taken care of...

The Scottish Curse

Every thespian knows that the curse of the Scottish play will wreak havoc upon any who dare to speak its name.  A play that was filled with so much violence, that nary a single performance of it came away unscathed.  Those that know the curse dare not speak of it, if but only to relay the warning:

The curse is so strong, in fact, that it can reach to other shows beyond Shakespeare’s tragedy.  One night, the cast of Anne Frank took to the stage.  A naïve actor playing Peter wore “M” brand shoes.  Thinking of the curse, a cast member pointed out the brand name, to which the actor unknowingly replied, saying the name aloud...  and dooming their performance that night.  Props broke unexpectedly.  An entire scene was skipped out of confusion.  The actor playing Mrs. Van Daan fell down the stairs on set on her already broken foot.  And in the last scene of the play, this young actor playing Peter was pushed into another actor onstage, breaking her nose upon impact.  With blood gushing, she still finished the show, but not a cast member came away from that performance unscathed.  And that young boy learned his lesson that night.

The curse apparently extends even to the point that writing the name can bring trouble.  A crew member wrote the name of “M” as a book in the library set of Beauty and the Beast.  During the dress rehearsal three days before opening night, a terrible train of events befell the cast.  The actor playing Gaston saw that the theatre finally had a landing pad to catch him after his fall off the balcony.  Granted, nobody told the actor to jump since nobody had been assigned to put the landing pad in place.  But he did anyway...  The cast stood in shock as the actor flung himself off the 10 foot high balcony onto where he thought the landing pad would be, only to be met with the cold hard surface of the stage.  You could hear the crack of his ankle echo through the entire theatre.  After escorting the actor to the hospital, the dress rehearsal continued, but so did the curse.  Gaston’s understudy was knocked out cold by a falling 2x4 plank from one of the set pieces, giving him a concussion.  With both cast members down, there was no other option than for the director to take the stage as Gaston, with only three days to memorize it all.  To this day, the actor who took his fateful leap is still trying to blame the theatre company for his actions, and the understudy still has no memory from that night...

In the spirit of Halloween, I hope you enjoyed these true theatre horror stories, as I’m sure you relived some of your own nightmare rehearsals and performances.  The beauty and curse of live theatre is that anything can happen, and yet, somehow, the show always goes on.

Be cautious, be safe, but have a good time.  Happy Halloween...