Willy Wonka Jr.
Director/Choreographer: Travis Kendrick
Music Director: Seth Davis
Scenic & Lighting Designer: Bill Webb
Costume Designer: Jessica Gaffney
Projections Designer: Wylder Cooper
Sound Consultant: Ayme Gierchak
Photos: April Parker, Josh Walker, Alicia Varcoe, Richard Maddox
Willy Wonka Jr. was a Mill Mountain Theatre production in Roanoke, Virginia during the summer of 2017. There was a cast of 34 ranging in ages of 6-years-old to 18-years-old. I was one of two assistant stage managers on this production. Some of my primary responsibilities included props tracking, assisting with child wrangling, getting actors mic'd for performances, and presetting Charlie's golden ticket in the correct candy bar.
During the Invention Room scene, the 15 Oompa Loompas were supposed to hold the blue fabric pictured and pass three balls of various sizes down the line to create the piece of gum that Violet would eat. During the transition from rehearsals to stage, tracking the passing of the balls and how the children executed the task became critical as they adjusted to the numerous changes the come with the transition.
Most importantly, the golden ticket had to be wrapped in the Whipple Scrumptious Nut-A-Riffic Totally Twisted Combo Bar for Charlie to find every performance. This bar was an edible chocolate bar, the stock of which was refrigerated throughout performances and my responsibility to oversee.
These three candy bars were unwrapped every single performance. It was a part of my duties to rewrap the chocolate bars and make sure that each one was preset in the appropriate location as each had a specific label that was referenced in the text.
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During this process, I handled various aspects like having the wagon (pictured right) move in and out of the wing with children going to places at the same time. This was a particular safety concern as my headset had a cable connected to the backstage wall. I worked with the children on minding the cable as they got to places and I paged curtains for their entrances and exits.
I also assisted with micing the cast. I learned how to handle mic packs, cables, and microphones as well as to troubleshoot mics that malfunction during performances. When micing the actors, I and the other crew member worked to mask the mics and their cables, as shown to the left where I braid the cable into one of the girl's hair.
There was also whip cream used to conduct a "pie in the face" that required consistent cleaning and vigilance for safety. During some performances, the whip cream would fall onto the stage where children would later run on for an entrance.
Below I have included samples of my paperwork from this production:
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This production had a large number of children for the cast which required child wranglers during performances. There were different wranglers for each of the performances making concise and specific tracking critical.
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My run sheet for this production covers my responsibilities (as can be best dictated for live theatre).
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The last PDF displays the prop tracking completed for this production. It was intended to be as specific as possible due to the fact that the cast was all children and tracking lots of details can pose a challenge for young children at times.