The SHS theatre department is home to a tremendous amount of on-stage talent, but have you ever thought about the talent behind the scenes? SHS tech theatre students are the unseen heroes of every Aves Theatre production. These students make stage magic happen.
Tech theatre students work on six categories of tech. The costume, lighting, sound, makeup, props, and run crews are all full of SHS students working hard to put on each main stage production. In each of these categories, the students do everything from painting sets to running lights or sounds. The focus of Aves Theatre is to teach students as much as possible by giving them hands-on experience in any tech field that is of interest to them.
The costume crew is run by Patt Zurlinden. Zurlinden has been a part of running productions at Sycamore since 2000 and was the head of costumes for the fall play “She Kills Monsters.” Zurlinden works with a team of students to come up with a creative vision for a show and make that vision come to life through buying, borrowing, altering, and sewing costume pieces into existence.
Long before opening night, the team of students is hard at work transforming carefully curated designs into reality. John Kinsinger is the head builder and master carpenter for each production and supervises the team of student builders. The set building process starts about 10 weeks before the production is in front of an audience. Students work on the set during and after school throughout those weeks, constructing large set pieces and setting the scene to make the show come to life.
Last spring, Aves Theatre purchased a new addition to the collection of tools that makes putting together these shows possible. According to John Whapham, director of Aves Theater, the CNC Router is essentially a “robot saw.” The router automatically cuts the wood into a design that Whapham previously created. This was first used in the most recent production of “She Kills Monsters” to make detailed signs. “These signs are only scratching the surface of the capabilities of this machine; the level of detail and artistry that we can bring out is amazing,” said Whapham.
There is so much going on behind the curtain that the audience does not see, and there are many talented students and staff that help to put up a fantastic production.
