How To Make A Smooth Scene Change During A High School Play

After spending my entire high school career being involved with theatre and having

directed a one-act play myself, I know how stressful it can be to prepare for an upcoming production, especially as anxiety over the details begins to mount.

During a play or musical during which major scene changes take place, you will certainly wonder how exactly to make the transition smooth and efficient.

After all, when the change is made in a disorderly fashion (or is simply noisy, full of scraping and grunting), it breaks the magical spell of the world created onstage.

As you begin planning out scene transitions, you need to consider safety first. That means that you need to have enough people engaged in the process of moving furniture and other set pieces, particularly for the heaviest objects.

If you cannot recruit enough volunteers to make this possible, you may consider incorporating a creative way to get your actors involved. This is part of the ultimate challenge of directing!

Even if you have brawny young men hauling objects offstage, there should be enough of them to easily lift each heavy item. For example, if you have a bulky couch, don't leave the job of moving it to only two people. This could be outright dangerous, especially in the dark of a scene change.

You can certainly make things a little easier by adding mechanical aids. If at all possible, you should attach wheels to large, clumsy objects. Caster wheels tend to be quieter than most, allowing the scene switch to remain as unobtrusive as possible.

Using carts made with caster wheels to transport props also helps contribute to an easier transition, especially because a cart with several shelves will carry much more than an individual with their arms full--plus, this will cut down on dropping incidents.

A worthwhile investment may be the purchase of two-dimensional "sets," that reduce the amount of set pieces you will require. These are rigged to your fly system and can simply be raised and lowered, just like your cyclorama. However, because these tend to be costly, you will want to find some that are more general and can be used for multiple productions.

Finally, practice, practice, practice! We in theatre tend to constantly emphasize the need to have every gesture and every word rehearsed into the ground, but sometimes scene transitions are not as smooth as they should be because the crew has not had enough practice with the routine.

Smooth set changes are as integral a part of your play as the costuming, makeup, and blocking. By implementing this advice, you will surely have a superior production!

by: Art Gib

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