Fall Comedy Tech Staff: What We Do

By: Josh Riedy '31

What does the idea of tech crew bring to you? Lights? Camera? Or shadowy figures moving around in the backscenes. Let me tell you, all of those are true, and even more!

Tech crew is many things, but the first thing I think of is the sound crew. The sound crew controls all of the mics that the actors use, the sound effects, and the hanging mics on stage. They use a giant sound board with tons of buttons and levers to control the mic levels. If you like tech and having a real impact, you should consider sound crew! Right next to the sound board in the tech booth is the light board, that looks almost like the sound board, with so many switches to control the individual lights on the stage, it’s my favorite job, because people know that someone is controlling the lights, but its not like sound in the way that you can use a bit of artistic freedom to decide what to do. When you are doing sound, you have to click the exact switches at the exact time, or else the actors mic won't be on while they're talking, but with lights you can have a bit more control. If you were considering sound crew, but are put off by the lack of freedom in it, I would say light crew is the one for you! 

This year, we are working on the comedy Fractured, and it's very fun in the tech department. So far we have been working on the sound effects, and the lighting. The light crew has a lot of action because we are advancing our lighting technique by dimming the lights while people aren't in that section of the stage, and we get to control what the entire stage looks like.

One person in the light crew, Tilghman Reichert, said that his favorite part of being in the tech crew was the sense of community. Another person that does spotlights, Theodore Felegy, says that his favorite part is to see the show progress with his effort and other’s efforts.

Another major positive is the sense of community you build, if you're in tech crew, you can make dozens of friends in other grades, and in yours! You also get to go to Applebees and Red Robin after the shows. Besides the tech work, there is a lot of time in the first days to catch up on homework and school work to get your grades up!

Tech crew isn't just moving sliders on boards, it's building a sense of community in the school, it's having a fun time with your friends, it's a chance to get your grades up, and most of all, it's a chance to show your passion with tech. And that's what makes it so great.