Open Forum

Here’s some of my animals on stage stories:

I was working with a community variety show in a high school theatre I was managing at the time. We got through three days of tech rehearsals and we were on the last number on opening night, which was a barn dance. I was engrossed in something in the booth, and I didn’t look up until the last number had started, and there on stage were three llamas standing by the cyc!!! What?! Where had they come from?! Unbeknownst to me they had loaded them in backstage at the last minute without a by your leave. My first concern was that one would spit on the cyc! But then my concerns grew as the llamas were lead forward during the dance, by now obviously freaked out by the noise, lights and people. One llama was being tended to by a young child (I later found out, the owner’s child) and was lead down to the apron of the stage. This llama was prancing around, getting more and more freaked out. All I could think of then was that it would accidentally take a step off the edge of the stage, falling on an audience member in the front row, and breaking its leg. Thankfully none of these concerns came to be, but after that I banned all live animals from the theatre.

When I informed the group that they couldn’t bring the llamas for the remainder of the performances, they complained that they always had an animal of some sort. One time they had a rooster who pooped on the stage in the middle of an act. Who knew it would do that (!), so they had nothing prepared to clean up the poop with and the technicians had to use their hands. But, suddenly there was a cue to take with the fly system, so they just had to pull the ropes, poopy hands and all(!).

On a prior occasion I was designing lights for a high school play that called for a live cat. All through tech rehearsals the cat had been pretty mellow, but on opening night it sensed the audience and became nervous. In addition the owner had changed the cat’s food that very day(!). You can imagine what happened on opening night. Not just poop, but diarrhea. Somehow the cast managed to hold it together during the scene and get the cat off the stage, but they changed to a stuffed toy cat after that.

Here’s some of my animals on stage stories:

I was working with a community variety show in a high school theatre I was managing at the time. We got through three days of tech rehearsals and we were on the last number on opening night, which was a barn dance. I was engrossed in something in the booth, and I didn’t look up until the last number had started, and there on stage were three llamas standing by the cyc!!! What?! Where had they come from?! Unbeknownst to me they had loaded them in backstage at the last minute without a by your leave. My first concern was that one would spit on the cyc! But then my concerns grew as the llamas were lead forward during the dance, by now obviously freaked out by the noise, lights and people. One llama was being tended to by a young child (I later found out, the owner’s child) and was lead down to the apron of the stage. This llama was prancing around, getting more and more freaked out. All I could think of then was that it would accidentally take a step off the edge of the stage, falling on an audience member in the front row, and breaking its leg. Thankfully none of these concerns came to be, but after that I banned all live animals from the theatre.

When I informed the group that they couldn’t bring the llamas for the remainder of the performances, they complained that they always had an animal of some sort. One time they had a rooster who pooped on the stage in the middle of an act. Who knew it would do that (!), so they had nothing prepared to clean up the poop with and the technicians had to use their hands. But, suddenly there was a cue to take with the fly system, so they just had to pull the ropes, poopy hands and all(!).

On a prior occasion I was designing lights for a high school play that called for a live cat. All through tech rehearsals the cat had been pretty mellow, but on opening night it sensed the audience and became nervous. In addition the owner had changed the cat’s food that very day(!). You can imagine what happened on opening night. Not just poop, but diarrhea. Somehow the cast managed to hold it together during the scene and get the cat off the stage, but they changed to a stuffed toy cat after that.

Here’s some of my animals on stage stories:

I was working with a community variety show in a high school theatre I was managing at the time. We got through three days of tech rehearsals and we were on the last number on opening night, which was a barn dance. I was engrossed in something in the booth, and I didn’t look up until the last number had started, and there on stage were three llamas standing by the cyc!!! What?! Where had they come from?! Unbeknownst to me they had loaded them in backstage at the last minute without a by your leave. My first concern was that one would spit on the cyc! But then my concerns grew as the llamas were lead forward during the dance, by now obviously freaked out by the noise, lights and people. One llama was being tended to by a young child (I later found out, the owner’s child) and was lead down to the apron of the stage. This llama was prancing around, getting more and more freaked out. All I could think of then was that it would accidentally take a step off the edge of the stage, falling on an audience member in the front row, and breaking its leg. Thankfully none of these concerns came to be, but after that I banned all live animals from the theatre.

When I informed the group that they couldn’t bring the llamas for the remainder of the performances, they complained that they always had an animal of some sort. One time they had a rooster who pooped on the stage in the middle of an act. Who knew it would do that (!), so they had nothing prepared to clean up the poop with and the technicians had to use their hands. But, suddenly there was a cue to take with the fly system, so they just had to pull the ropes, poopy hands and all(!).

On a prior occasion I was designing lights for a high school play that called for a live cat. All through tech rehearsals the cat had been pretty mellow, but on opening night it sensed the audience and became nervous. In addition the owner had changed the cat’s food that very day(!). You can imagine what happened on opening night. Not just poop, but diarrhea. Somehow the cast managed to hold it together during the scene and get the cat off the stage, but they changed to a stuffed toy cat after that.