The Hideout Theater

Kaci here, Your Director of Design at The Hideout Theatre!

One of my on-going jobs here at The Hideout is to paint the stage backdrop at the theater every 2 months. Perhaps it would be better to phrase that “re-paint”, because that’s what I do. I paint over the current backdrop over and over again.

I got started painting the back walls when we did our first season of Improvised Shakespeare in 2008. Andy Crouch (our Director of Education) was directing the production and he wanted to do a faux rock look. I was an undergrad at St. Edward’s University studying scenic design and art at the time, and he asked for my assistance in creating the look. I ended up enjoying the work and especially enjoyed the final product. I was a cast member in the production and it was so nice to have a specific new look on the stage for the show.

2008 Improvised Shakespeare set during tear-down

It was soon after that when other directors and producers began contacting me about painting backdrops for their sets. I did work for the Out of Bounds Comedy Festival, Asaf Ronen’s KABAAM!, and Improv For Evil’s Cochise. In early 2009, The Hideout decided that I would be in charge of painting the sets for the theater and have final say on what the stage backdrop would look like. When we finalized a rotating schedule of what we now call Mainstage Shows (the Saturday 8pm shows), we decided each production would get its own unique set painting, designed to fit that show. It was also important that the design not be too disruptive for the shows during the rest of the week – hence the reason why our sets rarely utilize extra furniture or 3D elements.

Because we don’t have a lot of storage or building/construction space at the theater, it made economical sense to just paint over each design when the show run was over. So that’s what I do. People often ask me, “Does it make you sad to have to paint over the sets?” At first, it did feel somewhat strange. I always spend several hours (anywhere between 10-30 hours) working on the sets, and some of them are for shows we might bring back (Like Charles Dickens Unleashed). But it doesn’t really make sense to keep them, and just like the improv we present, the sets have become temporary. A huge bonus of this is that it keeps me from being lazy in my designs. We don’t leave any backdrop up for longer than just a few months. I get to re-imagine the same space a hundred different ways. Making a very complicated and detailed set makes me want to turn around and try a more minimalist set. Or painting a colorful set makes me want to try out a monochromatic approach. Each piece feeds the next. So these days, I mostly enjoy creating each new design, and painting over the old is bitter-sweet.

Painting over the bright Spirited set for the darker Dickens set.

I always work with the director of the current Mainstage production to come up with the design. Sometimes they already have something in mind, sometimes we come up with the design together, and sometimes they give me completely free reign. I’ve also approached painting them in many different ways. Sometimes I’ve improvised the entire design while I was painting it, sometimes I work off a sketch or plan I’ve made, and sometimes I change what I’ve planned after I’ve started working.

We have shows here pretty much every single weekend, all year long. We also teach classes on all the nights when we don’t have shows. Because of this, I can only re-paint the set during the day (when we don’t have kids classes or renters) and more often, at night after 10pm. We only have one week in-between the closing of one show and the opening of the next, so the time-frame for re-painting is tiny. Believe it or not, my improv training has helped me immensely in the way that I work.

I have to trust myself and keep pushing forward toward the end. I often feel pressure and fear when I’m working (is this going to look right? are people going to like it?), but I know that the only way to get out of those feelings is to push through them and keep working.

Now that we’ve premiered our 2012 Season, I’m starting to get pretty excited about all the upcoming opportunities for new designs! But enough of this boring chit-chat…Do you want to actually see what I’ve been talking about? Watch this video!

And for reference, this is the current set that is up:

Charles Dickens Unleashed Set, 2011 (Photo by Michael Yew)

And here is the Charles Dickens Unleashed set from season 1 in 2009:

Charles Dickens Unleashed Set, 2009 (Photo by Christa Gary)

Only a couple weeks left to see the current set before it is gone forever. But stay tuned for what should be a very interesting and challenging Start Trekkin’ and Twilight Zoned set for the Sci-Fi Comedy Double Feature, premiering in January!

Cheers,

Kaci Beeler, Director of Design

Like the sets? Want something like them for yourself? Kaci is a freelance artist that also takes commissions for murals and artwork for businesses and homes! Just visit her at KaciBeeler.com to find out more.

Beginning this week Local Genius Society takes over the Thursday Threefer with a holiday themed show.  Meet the men and women behind the Society.

This week:  Andrew Pish

Andrew Pish has been everywhere lately – playing the titular role in “The Professor:  Improv Inspired By Dr. Who” at the Institution Theater, creating other-worldly creatures in the Hideout Theatre’s improvised “Spirited,” and embodying Angel in the staged version of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” at the Highball.  Now the senior UT engineering student is prepping for a run at the Hideout Theatre with his improv troupe Local Genius Society.  Here Pish talks about discovering improv and believing in Santa Claus for far too long.

You’re just coming off doing scripted “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” shows, and before that you were doing “The Country Wife” at UT – what’s it like being a performer in a scripted show vs. being a performer in an improvised show?

Andrew Pish: It’s a lot less intimidating to do an improv show, just because everything you’re doing is off the cuff.  When you’re in a scripted show, there’s almost an infinite amount of work to do, learning about your character and taking on that character and figuring out your actions for your scenes, and that’s all beyond just learning the lines.  With an improv show you can just sort of jump in and be whatever, so it’s kind of liberating and freeing.

Improv’s not more nerve-wracking because you have to create everything all at once?

AP: No, it’s completely liberating to be able to do that all at once and to be able to create something that’s sometimes pretty profound.

What first got you interested in doing improv?

AP: I initially got into it because I was in an engineering internship that I hated during the summer and I needed something to kind of breakup the monotony.  I started doing it and I loved it way more than I thought that I would.  And what made me continue the improv classes was realizing that this wasn’t some small little hippie movement, this wasn’t something really inconsequential, it was something a lot more profound that would help me kind of pursue the entertainment lifestyle that I want to now.

What influences your comedy?  Where do you think your humor comes from?

AP: Oh shoot, I don’t know.  I feel like my humor comes from the little quirks of human life.  I feel like I don’t even try to make anything funny on stage.  I kind of just try to do what Iwould do and just pretend like it’s someone else, and then people laugh at that, which I guess is a good thing.

What’s it usually like during the holidays at your house?

AP: The holidays have always been a hectic time just because I have such a big family.  All included, like all the nephews and nieces… there’s 20 of us.  So packing 20 people into a house is kind of ridiculous, with people hanging off the ceiling and over banisters and stuff to sleep.

Is there a particular Christmas that sticks out in your memory?

AP: It was a couple days before Christmas and I was sleeping in my room with my oldest brother, we were in a bunk bed in my room and my mom had been staying up late wrapping gifts and all of a sudden we both wake up in the middle of the night and hear her, like, tumble down the stairs, and she started screaming, and she swears this isn’t true, but I remember very vividly her screaming, “Christmas is ruined!” over and over again.  She said, “Christmas is ruined!” because she broke her ankle when she fell down the stairs.

Does your family have any holiday traditions?

AP: We stay at my home in San Antonio, my parent’s house, every year.  I remember specifically, I don’t know how, but I believed in Santa Claus for a really, really, really long time.  Probably like the seventh or eighth grade.  I was a staunch believer in Santa.  And for whatever reason, I never doubted it, and no one at school ever seemed to talk about it.  I totally believed in Santa, but there was one Christmas, my dad was still playing as Santa and I heard him downstairs go “Ho! Ho! Ho!” and I was like, wait a second – that was dad’s voice. It was just a complete 180.  It tore the roof off of my world.

You were 12 years old.

AP: [Laughs] I know, it made me start doubting everything.  I just believed in everything at that point, but I was like maybe ghosts aren’t real now.  Maybe magicians are faking it.

There’s the idea that “anything can happen” in improv – are there some things that you’re hoping might happen in these holiday Threefer shows?

AP: I hope that we have a really, really dark Christmas show, like there’s a big conspiracy with Santa and there’s like reindeer getting killed… I don’t know, I just want something dark and twisted.

That sounds really cheery.

AP: Without really thinking about it, that’s the first thing that popped into my head, and so what that says about me, I don’t know, but I think it would be really interesting.

Local Genius Society headlines the Thursday Threefer beginning December 1^st at 8PM.  Every Thursday through the end of December.

[originally posted at http://localgeniussociety.wordpress.com ]

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