Anatomy of a production

This is part one in a series on the anatomy of a Four County Players production. In this series we will follow the Barboursville theater's March musical, "The Scarlet Pimpernel," from conception to the opening curtain.


Beyond the actors, the lights, the sets and costumes, the stories and songs and laughs, theater is an art of time and space. Where film, books and even paintings sit, waiting for audiences to press their respective "play" buttons, drama exists somewhere in between. From thousand-seat theaters on Broadway to small community theaters across the country, plays and musicals present a unique marriage of literature, performance art and craft, where audiences and actors inhabit the same space, breathe the same air, admire the same fake trees. Theater is akin to reality in that it can not be paused or its volume adjusted, but confined to fiction in that at some point its contract with the audience will expire, its lights will come up and its forms will vanish.
"That's the great fun of theater," said Bob Weir, the director of Barboursville's Four County Players' next production, the musical "The Scarlet Pimpernel." "It's always starts with a blank stage. Then you populate it for three months with sets and lights and characters. Then it goes away."
As Weir sits in the back of the Four County Players theater, the main stage is under construction. This year's holiday production, "It's a Wonderful Life," lays in pieces around the room. An overhead projector casts the outline of the play's downtown, which a set designer on a scaffold traces onto a canvas backdrop. Door frames and windows line the rows of seats, along with planks of wood, paint cans, a bin of Christmas ornaments.
But Weir is hardly aware of any of it. Since being tapped to direct "Pimpernel" a year ago, his mind has been filled with song and dance and the French Revolution, a curious mix for sure, in preparation for the March show.
Each season, FCP puts on at least four main stage productions, plus a few shows in The Cellar theater downstairs. Last December "The Scarlett Pimpernel" was selected to be in the 2011-2012 FCP season, with Weir as director and his wife Wendy Novicoff as producer. A typical season at the theater's main stage consists of a spring musical, a spring non-musical comedy, a summer musical, usually involving children and teens and a Christmas or holiday production.
Gary White, the co-chair of the theater's selection committee said that seasons are generally built based on submissions from directors, which the committee then narrows down to a handful of productions each year.
"[Reviewing the submissions] involves reading plays, listening to soundtracks, applying for royalties, and talking with the director," said White. "After we find out whether or not we are able to get the royalties, the committee decides which of the shows the director has submitted would be the best fit for the theater, then take it to the board of directors, which makes the final decision."
"The Scarlet Pimpernel" had been on the theater's shortlist for a while, said White, and this season seemed to be the perfect time.
Weir said that he doesn't like to direct a show every year, his last being FCP's 2005 production of "1776."
"I'm someone who's much more comfortable on stage," said Weir. "Directing makes me really nervous. As a director there as so many things to worry about. I'm usually in panic mode, but if I didn't have that feeling, something would be wrong."
"The Scarlet Pimpernel" was Weir's suggestion to the selection committee and the only production he said he was interested in directing at this time.
"I believe this will be the show's regional premiere," said Weir. "It's a big set, big costume production that I think people will be excited to be in and come and see. This will be a challenging production compared to most at the theater, because of the physical constraints of such an intimate stage. I think this is an experience you wouldn't normally see here, which is what I wanted. I want people who come and see it to say, 'Can you believe FCP put that on?'"
Some past FCP productions include "Cabaret," "Little Women," "Othello," "Fiddler on the Roof," and "A Christmas Story," all on the main stage. More experimental productions are housed in The Cellar and include "The Tempest," and "Endgame."
White said that the budget for each production varies, but that musicals are the most expensive because of material rentals and musician fees. The cost of royalties factors in during the selection process and is one of the main forces controlling whether a particular show is selected or not.
"Royalties are determined by the size of the theater, the average audience size, the ticket price, and the location," said White. "If we decide the royalties are feasible, we sign a contract with the licensing company. Then each production is assigned its own budget. This budget is determined by the size of the cast, the era it takes place in, (mostly for costume purposes,) the set requirements, the prop requirements, stipends [for directors, producers and designers], and most importantly, what kind of show it is."
The royalties for "The Scarlet Pimpernel" are $3,200, said White. Musicals, he said, typically run about $3,500 and straight plays are around $800. White said that royalties approaching and exceeding $5,000 become cost-prohibitive for FCP to produce and are generally ruled out of consideration when scheduling a season.
Beneath the rotating sets and parade of area actors, FCP's theater is itself in a kind of disguise. The Barboursville theater began as Barboursville Elementary School, but a fire completely destroyed one of the two main buildings, eventually creating the need for the current Gordon-Barbour Elementary School. In 1973 two Barboursville residents, Bill Thomas and Lillian Morse, led the group that founded and repurposed the vacant school as a theater. The main stage is the former school's auditorium, the Cellar the former cafeteria and the office and concession stand are former classrooms. The original wood floors and chalkboards remain, advertising beer, wine and popcorn, where they once bore parts of speech and multiplication tables.
"I love that the theater was a school and still feels like a school," said producer Wendy Novicoff. "I love the creaks of the old floors in the building and how the place continues to be a place of learning."
While talking, Weir quickly mentions that he's a professor at the University of Virginia, but it takes him more than 15 minutes to reveal that it's not in drama. Weir teaches climatology, not acting, using FCP as the means to stay connected to theater rather than a step in pursuit of Broadway dreams.
"It does surprise people when they find out that Bob is a professor of climatology," said Novicoff, who is herself an assistant professor in UVa's medical school. "He doesn't agree with this, but to me he looks at teaching as an acting role. He uses his drama experience to engage students in what he's teaching, which enables them to better relate to the material."
More than anything, those at FCP believe the theater's role has never changed and that first and foremost a community theater is about education.
"A community theater builds and enhances your community," said Laura Mawyer, marketing director for FCP. "It educates people on theater, as actors and technicians and also the community on theater itself. The community theater can be a center."
White believes that community theater can create more invested and involved actors and crew members, since everyone is a volunteer in the production.
"In professional theater, every person is hired for one specific task. If you're an actor, you are there to act and then go home. If you're a costume designer, you are there to work on clothes, and then you're done," he said. "In community theater, where no one is paid, and therefore there are no job descriptions, those lines are blurred. Actors may double as stage hands, or set crew. Costumers may enlist help from volunteers to sew costumes. Personally, I think that when you work in community theater, you tend to be more invested in every aspect of the production as a whole."
The next installment in the series will introduce the actors in the production as they audition and begin rehearsals, as well as the crew members who construct the world populated on stage.