They are called “10-out-of-12’s”, referring to the number of hours actually spent on the stage during what is known as Tech Week, when a show nears it’s opening night. The “10” is for those hours spent grinding through the lighting, sound and scenery cues and changes of the (hopefully) well-rehearsed show, and the two hours left over are for the company to take a meal break, collapse and regain the energy to keep going. But, no matter when that break occurs, the entire day is not allowed to go beyond a stretch of 12 hours in total.
So, if the Tech rehearsal begins at 12 noon, the rehearsal must end at 12
midnight, no matter where in the process. The next day, it starts all over again – another 10-out-of-12, as the show labors onward through its entirety until, again hopefully, all the tech demands are solved. The 3rd day of Tech Week is usually mandated as an “8-out-of-10”, in the fervid hope that the show is nearer technical completion than not. A good Tech Week often ends with a full run-through of the entire production, with all the parts working.
Everyone always wishes for more time in Tech Week.
But, the Opening Night Miracle seems to occur no matter how many lighting cues got ignored or scenery forgets to change! It is miraculous, frankly. Astonishing, really. Adrenalin can be a welcome solution to so much.
God Bless Actors Equity! For those are the typical union rules. Before union, a century ago, producers could work the actors and the crew endlessly, with no break at all, so bravo Actors Equity!! because, of course, actors , for the most part, love what they do so much, they’d probably pay the producers to allow them to labor away, but thankfully, our union watches over us with the rules we gratefully obey. I am a union gal all the way.
Once you enter the backstage door to your theater for Tech Week, it can feel like the day never ends, and it soon begins to feel like one huge endless day with no night in sight. Of course it’s dark inside the theater itself, giving the illusion of nighttime, but with all the bright stage lights, the work being done and the blood, sweat and tears expended, it’s just one long work day! It often gets extremely tedious for the actors. FOR this period of time, it is not what the actors do that matters as much as it is the work achieved by all the various designers and stage crew. So the focus is not on the actor much at all. Like, I said, tedious.
So, everyone brings lots of sinfully sweet snacks, treats for the various crew members and the folks running the rehearsal from out front at what is known as the Tech Table. By the time an audience is allowed in, that table magically disappears and the Stage Manager calls the countless cues from their perch above the stage, or sometimes on the very deck of the stage, off left or right.
A theater family in production becomes a very close knit one. Fragrantly, painfully close, sometimes.
When I performed Madame Thénardier in Les Misérables on Broadway for several years, the producers regularly put us into the “Holiday Schedule ” over Christmas and New Years , so all those holiday tourists could see our show and that holiday ticket money could pour in. Usually, we got one day off a week, but during Holiday Schedule there were no days off, so it would mean performing that endlessly long musical for 18 or more shows straight. Of course we would get paid extra salary for the effort, but it was a long slog, nonetheless, and we all began to call it being “On the Barricade” since it was indeed like being trapped by the benign masses that came to see us. Holiday Schedule was One Long Day!
WE’d do anything we could to keep up our own spirits, like spectacular Secret Santa rituals, etc, (there’s an entire book in that alone), but, Show Biz, known for its glamour, dispels all illusions at Holiday Schedule time.
It is hard work.
In case, you’d not deduced that by now.