In the midst of settling in with a fresh from the hospital baby, I received an e-mail from the musicals/plays director. Actually the email went to all senior parents. It was asking for parent volunteers to come work on the set. There was no-way I was going up, I had a baby who was less than a month old, we were to avoid large crowds, and learn how to get on at home, with a monitor, a newborn, a preschooler, ballet, school, basketball, trial team, and 7 children. I had a trump card I did not have to go it! But to be polite I responded to the email, letting her know that IF no one else volunteered to let me know and I could go in and work on it. Days later I once again received an email, no one volunteered to come work. No one. Seriously, not a single senior parent sent back an email. Ok time to pull up my boot straps, tie the baby on, and give it a go. Once a loyal set worker learned I was going to do it, she replied that she would work, but not be in charge of the set. {Whew} I did have 2 more people volunteer, one who her schedule never lined up with our work days, and a dad who came and painted 2 of the walls for us.
This set was easy, the entire production would take place in the family room. We only had to design and decorate 1 room, well two if you consider the family was “remodeling” the dining room so there was also a table and chairs in the room. A 1940’s style family room that would be shared by both the high school and middle school productions of Don’t Take My Penny.
AV and I worked together on a few other sets, we think alike on set work, we make quick decisions, we don’t second guess or re-do our work, we do it right the first time. We met at Chick Fil A both of us with pictures we had pinned on pinterest of rooms, accessories, decorations, and paint colors from the 1940’s. After eating, chatting and coming up with a plan we headed to Hob’Lob looking for a template for the wall paint. The family in the play had money, so we decided to have their house as up to date on the fashion colors and design.
We choose a geometric pattern, we found this to be quite close to the popular patterning from the 40’s.
From Left to Right
We were going to go with a lovely green shade but when I went into the cafeteria/auditorium I noticed that the whole room is shades of green {sea-foam green to be exact} we did not want to lose the set in the green, we decided to go with our 2nd color choice. PINK which if you will look it up was quite popular in the 40′. Who knew?
{We used bolts of fabric to show that they were “redecorating the dining room”
The door on the left the middle school used for a kitchen door, the high school did not use the door}
We copied the designs of having only 1 wall “fancy” while the rest were simple and plain.
{The table and lamp were from AV’s house, the chairs were up there when we started,
the large artwork was loaned to us we found the broken violin in the storage room}
Because PS did not want me to paint, AV did the entire back wall, it took her a few days of putting in a few hours each day. The hardest part was the lining up the template, the wall is actually cardboard walls that have been used in MANY productions, we had to cover our walls from Peter Pan, there was also a wall from years ago when we did Seussical the Musical Jr, there was even one from Cheaper by the Dozen that was wall papered with textured paper. Needless to say they are wavy, warped, and some were textured, she had to line up the template to be straight even when she felt it was wrong. It looked amazing!
{The table was loaned to us the radio was found in the costume room, we purchased the bird cage at GoodWill and used gold spray paint to dress it up, the birds were hot glued on from Hob’Lob the window was painted on to fit the treatment that was loaned to us}
The right wall, the window opened to the “terrace” and one of the kids came in and out the window.
{We “found” the grandfather clock up in the storage attic, the window seat is built in an the hat rack with phone were from AV’s house. The furniture were also loaned to us, most of the pieces were gathered from our houses or purchased at GoodWill}
We were thankful because it added character, took up a large space and we did not have to build it out of cardboard.
Actually this is the very first set I have worked on where we did not build anything out of cardboard.Can you see the texture wall border in the window? That was difficult to stencil over.
TaDa
The finished product.
Sorry it is a little blurry.
{The table was set with dishes not the bags and boxes we took home}
We were able to have the set finished {except for the foods stuff} well before the dress rehearsal. I know C was thankful they hate to have dress rehearsal when the stage is not ready, they can’t practice when they have walls or big pieces missing. Our goal was a great looking set, finished quickly, and for cheap.
Tomorrow I’ll show you pictures of the actual play.
What about you? Did you do “Don’t Take My Penny” in high school or college? What part did you play? O worked back stage this production and had a great time! Did you work back stage?
Go hug your kids, they need your love.
jen
I know a lot of my readers don’t find the play sets interesting but a few people have found ideas when searching for their own set designs, this is mostly for them, hoping to give ideas since we have copied others ideas on our sets.
(A picture I had in my Media File on WordPress, the computer is still broken and holding my pictures hostage)
overholt8 