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A near-disaster with the Darke County Civic Theater
By Georgia Wetzel
Edison State Communications Student
I love acting with the Darke County Civic Theater. We always have fun,
we make each other laugh, and even though we’ve had some near-disasters
backstage, we always manage to pull through in the end. One
particularly memorable incident happened last year during our
production of Stuart Little.
We had a small cast playing about thirty-five different characters.
Everyone except Stuart Little had multiple parts; I had seven. It was a
lot of fun, but all those characters meant a lot of costume changes and
a lot of props laying around. Adding to the insanity, we had tables
covered in stuff off stage left and stage right. It was a constant rush
to find what you needed, get ready, and help everyone else get ready,
all while listening to the play’s progress to know when it was time to
go out and help with a scene change or head out to play the next part.
The final piece of added difficulty was that it was very, very dark
backstage during our first performance.
Near the halfway point in the show, my sister and I walked backstage
after our scene as two idiotic garbagemen. I slid off my reflective
vest and stepped out of the way so her designated assistant could help
her with her complicated bird costume. It had to be quick, as there
were only a few lines before she had to go back out. Not long after
that, I went on to help move the blocks to set up the next scene. I
went off to the left, then realized my next costume was on the right
side.
No big deal. It wasn’t like the year before, when we’d had no way to
get from one side to the other without going across the stage. All the
same, there was only a narrow passage behind the stage to get from one
side to the other, and we had to walk slowly and carefully, or else the
curtain hiding the walkway would create a distracting wave.
No problem, I thought, I have time.
I got across and looked around for my Snowbell costume. It wasn’t a
complicated costume; it was just a white sweatshirt, a pair of matching
sweatpants with a tail sewn on, a pair of white gloves, and a white hat
with a pair of cat ears on it.After a brief search, I found my costume
under a pile of used props. I pulled on my things, swift and silent,
and tuned my ears in to what was happening onstage. I still had time.
There were still a few more lines and a brief blackout for the others
to exit the stage. As my sister said the line I’d been using as a sort
of “pre-cue,” I moved to take my place by the entrance.
It was there, in the faint light coming in from onstage, that I noticed something was horribly wrong with my costume.
My pants were on backwards.
In any other costume, it wouldn’t have made a difference, but with a
tail sewn on? Nope. That wasn’t right, and it definitely wasn’t
appropriate for a children’s show. Even worse, the scene onstage was
coming to a close.
Oh, crap! I thought. Crap! Crap! Crap!
I backed up so quickly I almost tripped and frantically yanked my sweatpants down.
“What are you doing?” our stage manager asked in a whisper. “It’s almost time for you to go on!”
As I hopped on one foot and tried to get my pants the rest of the way
off, I hurriedly explained how I’d almost gone out onto the stage with
my tail in the front. She laughed, then used her walkie talkie to tell
lights and sound not to bring the lights up too fast.
I spun my pants around the right way, tail in the back where it should
be, and put them back on as fast as I could. My shoe caught in the leg
a couple of times, but I got the pants on, I made it out to my place on
the stage, and the audience remained blissfully unaware as I started
the next scene.
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