The Ego Orgy

My first paid gig. A show called Hannah.  It was about a jewish POW camp prisoner.  After 10 hours in the black box, I was starving.  I tried to break off a piece of someone’s home baked pear loaf and the foil crinkled.  I was mortified.  As I chewed the morsel I managed to get away with, I laughed silently thinking to myself I’m the prisoner not her.  This notion tickled me but not for long.  Two seconds pass, the playwright was in my face whispering “If you laugh again you are fuckin out of this theater, you got it?”
In all fairness I wasn’t the only person told that.  And to be even fairer, I’ve heard much worse.  In all honesty its something we as a part of this industry have come to know.  In fact we continue the cycle waiting to climb the ladder so that we  may take our day and personal feelings on other subordinates.
This may exist in any other professional facet in the real world but there is something organically unique and obvious about this kind of behavior.  It’s completely unapologetic and most times if you are the right person it is inconsequential.   The is theater.  When something as amorphous as theater, a place where extremely passionate people have to collaborate their work ethics with their emotions, things can go awry.  In fact they always do in some form.  And the best week to witness these breakdowns is one of my favorite weeks: Tech week.
First a brief outline on how a show roughly works:
A person decides to perform a show.  A director gets involved.  People are brought on board for ideas.  Other members are added ahead of time to establish a crew.  Auditions are held.  Rehearsals are held.  A production crew is established, a board of designers advisors, choreographers, etc.  Finally all of the crew that has been established starts getting to work based on the design.  It’s a tricky position no matter what your contribution to the production is.  Depending on who is who, the rules change continuously.  Also, some people are allowed freebies depending on who they are and how close to the opening night the incident happens.  I once worked on a show in which the musicians left after an hour and a half of playing.  The director said allowed for the student actors to hear “That’s Union Folks”.  The Cellist snapped back “It’s not union it’s called getting a fuckin baby sitter.  Do you wanna pay for it.?”  I was shocked.  However, I was even more shocked to see her return and play the entire run of the show, being just as mean and bitchy throughout the run.  In retrospect it was a pretty smart move.  The Cellist shows her true colors.  She says and does what she wants.  She still gets paid.  But she will not get work again from the same people.  No. Not ever.  Why? That’s where the ego orgy comes in.  In order for things to run copasetic, you must be stroking everyone’s ego constantly.  Make everyone feel good about themselves and their purpose.  Let no one feel insignificant or underminded.
In theater it isn’t just enough to do your job, not even if you do it well.  The Cellist was magnificent and had no problems once she started playing.  And even if the Cellist hadn’t gone on a verbal rebellion, she still wasn’t very much appreciated.  She forgot to play the game.  The game is all about stroking egos.
Let’s start with the presumably most obvious touchy person: The actor.  William Ball claims that the actor sees his job as sharing a piece of the universe that only he understands.  He believes he’s shedding light on a knowledge that no one else has: “The actor sees himself as potential universe…He may have holes in his socks but he has an unlimited power of belief…There is no power on earth that can shake the actor’s belief that he is, in fact, Universe revealing; but he never says it out loud.”  This self proclaimed purpose in the world and in life, taking the responsibility of revealing the universe can make an actor sensitive.  More often than not, they are the refusers the, “No I WON’T” guys.  Many of us have heard of the divas, the crazy actors, their weird demands, and theater is no different.  They will dictate costumes, their own character against directors will and actors more than anything, upon trying to share their knowledge always try to dabble in something that isn’t their job.
“Maybe you should make the lights brighter,” I’ve been told, “It will make things pop more the brighter it is.”  Shutup dumb cow and get on the stage, you don’t know what you’re talking about.
“We’ll see if that works, I’ll go ask the director.”

While working on a show with a man I will exaggerate the height to be 7 foot 11, I asked for him to come on stage.  After calling his name from about 10 feet away at various volumes, he finally snapped at me. “WHAT?!”
“Can you please stand over here?”
“WHY?!”
“So I can light your beautiful face,” I explained with a light in my hand on top of a 10 foot ladder facing toward the set.  What else could I possibly need from this sasquatch that was 2 billion feet taller than the rest of the cast?
“Just wait a second.”
“Listen dude, you don’t have to get up there.  You’re face can be in the shadows.  It’s no skin off my back.”
“You didn’t have to say it with an attitude.”  This came from the man who repeatedly ignored me several times before yelling at me in order to acknowledge me.
But it isn’t about blame.  It’s about both of us failing to play the game.  Had I approached the actor in person and given his ego the blow job he believed it deserved then we wouldn’t even have this problem.  He probably would have blown my ego back stroked it till I felt like a partial owner of this world, this show.  Of course actors aren’t the only ones who believe in their positions as the most important or highest respected.  I was once belittled myself by being told I was ONLY the lighting designer.  And every actor always blabs about Aristotle’s poetics claiming spectacle to be the least important.  Yeah Aristotle would probably say that but when was the last time Aristotle was forced to put on a show at night?  Or in a blackbox?  Or in any theater?  What did Aristotle do if he had a play and it rained?  Being visible is part of spectacle and my self proclaimed purpose is to make sure that no one is acting in the dark.  That whatever the actor’s oh so important message (no matter what I think of it) gets portrayed, gets seen, and understood.  I have bounced back from feeling insignificant by arguing with actors in my head.  Listen here Cow, if it weren’t for me, you would be acting in the dark!   It helps.  My little secret of controlling visibility is my power trip.  And everyone has one.  That’s why stroking egos is so important.  The more we all touch and tickles everyone’s little self righteous bones, the better the production gets.  As long as everyone is on the same page with the ultimate vision and as long as there’s always someone who acknowledges each person’s importance, things will go beautifully.
For tech week the most powerful thing to say is “Yes.”  It’s a wonderful thing to hear.  More importantly if you say yes to enough things it gives you the opportunity to say no.  Depending on your intentions, you can successfully cut someone back down to size or simple just get what you want.   I haven’t nailed it to a science but for every 5 YES’s, I think a NO is allowed.  If you are in theater this applies for you and to you.  Yes and no’s are where your power lies, but all of your power needs to be masked in that generous petting.  You must always be an active member of the orgy.  This allows your NO’s to be heard and accepted.  I never worked well by always being told and no one in the industry does.  But I do know the height of my excitement and the results of hearing the Yes’s.  Each yes is an opportunity to spread creative wings.  The “yes” in itself its own stroking.  Combine that with the flattery and consideration for each crew member and you create a rhythm.  You create the rhythm and everyone falls into it kepping up with the tempo, following suit with all the ego pumping that is going on.  It just works.   It’s like good professional sec.  After enough stroking we all climax together to the creative orgasm that is opening night.   And you can always tell how good the orgy was by the product left behind the curtains.