Interview by: Josephine Clarke, Guest Writer
This interview is a part of The Grappler's Mess Fest Interview Series. Gaby Suarez is the Production Stage Manager for Mess Fest.
What is your role in Mess Fest?
My production practice assignment is the Production Stage Manager, which normally means I would call the show, but in this case, we’ve turned that into more of a Producer role of me overseeing and stage managing the festival. There’s a team of four of us, so the other three stage managers have sort of chosen different shows in the festival to actually stage-manage, so like notating their costumes and props, and the set changes and that sort of thing, whereas I’m overseeing the festival as a whole, of like scheduling what time rehearsals will take place in the rooms that we have available, or getting the tech schedule together to make sure that all the shows have the appropriate time to tech in the space and making sure that nothing conflicts or that if a show is using this prop it’s available for everyone.
How is this different from other production practices for you?
I don’t think I’ve ever done a production like this ever and in comparison to the other productions at TTS. I think this is definitely one in its own, of being such a unique combination of comedy and theatre. And even going forward I don’t think this festival will look the same next year or so forth. I think that generally managing, the skills transfer and the structure being within TTS and since it’s academia, we can’t really change the institution we’re in, so we can’t be like, “surprise! 24 hours of rehearsal today!” We still have the manuals and protocols we have to follow, we’ve just been very flexible with how we are going to execute this rule and sort of be flexible with it to get away with what comedy needs and I think the best way we’ve done that is “what can we take away from this rule and what can we add to this one?”
What has been the biggest challenge?
I think for me personally, the role that I’ve been in has been translating the world of comedy and comedy arts within TTS and how comedy functions as an industry and what comedy needs, and what TTS as a Theatre School has to offer, and how the design/tech students work under design/tech rules. So trying to find a bridge that we can all meet on has been the most difficult, but we’re getting through it.
What have you learned throughout the process?
I have an answer professionally and personally. I think, personally, I’ve learned that I would love to go into the comedy industry and I think exploring late-night TV and different avenues would be really cool for my path as a stage manager. Professionally, I think learning that it’s not that serious. There is no such thing as a comedy emergency and seeing how that translates to “there’s no such thing as a theatre emergency.” It’s entertainment. This should make people happy and be joyful and the processes I think within TTS have been so taxing and demanding on the students and finding ways that I can implement less stress as the manager of the process and playing with the hours that we actually work because we just teched twenty shows in five days, where one theatre production would normally have two weeks. So just seeing, “do we really need a full two weeks to tech one show when we got twenty done in five days?” That kind of thing. I think just realizing what I can bring to the process as a manager to make it easier, more efficient, and more fun for everyone.
Does this project align with your personal practice?
I think this absolutely aligns with my personal practice. My personality in general is very sarcastic and I love having fun and being funny with my friends and family, so I think I really enjoyed being a part of a comedy festival. And again, I think this lines up really well with what I want to do in the future and how I want to manage from a place of joy and having a fun time.
How has working with Comedy Arts as a non-Comedy Arts person inspired or influenced you?
I think that their flexibility and their graciousness has really changed my perspective of working with performers. By no means am I saying that the acting pool is not flexible and gracious, I think it’s just the structure of collaborating to create something themselves. So being given costumes and props they’re like, “we get costumes and props?” and I’m like, “yes! That’s part of a production. Those are the resources that TTS has available.” Whereas doing a show like Shakespeare in the Watts at TTS, they’re like, “of course we’re gonna have props and costumes. What do you mean?” So just the different perspective of the performers has been really enlightening to the process of comedy, and, Liz touched on this talking to me, comedy doesn’t have resources in the real world so having so many resources here and figuring out ways to make the lighting funny or make or make a funny sound, that has been really fun to play with. It’s just been a really exciting process, and I hope that TTS does it again, and I’d love to be a part of it.
Further Comments?
I think that going off of what we were just talking about, about being stressed so much, I think comes from us as a whole, maybe generation or community or institution, not believing in ourselves and also being scared of what hasn’t been done before, or the unknown. I will say, at the very beginning of this process, in March, when we started production meetings for the design team, it was very like, “how can we contain this and stay on top of it so we’re not like, making twenty sets for twenty different shows?” So starting with that snowball and then getting into rehearsals where it’s like, “We need twenty different costume people to help with the twenty different shows and the twenty different props.” So I think a lot of the frustration at the beginning of this was just because we had never done it before, and after only five days of tech and finishing everything on time within the schedule that we’ve created and that sort of thing, I think people are realizing we are capable of a lot more than we thought we were, and that’s been a really exciting discovery.
Josephine (she/her) is a third-year dramaturg. She is incredibly interested in dramaturgy and comedy and how the two intersect. Her practice is defined by flexibility and creativity, and she strives to make dramaturgy as dynamic as possible.
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