Becky Hawkins

Postcards from the move

Added 2022-10-12 16:00:13 +0000 UTC

The building that housed the theater used to be a Christian Science church, built around 1916. Over the years, it had housed a Christian Science Church, a community center, offices, and a soup kitchen, and we could tell it was TIRED. Every time the color copier blew a fuse or something, we'd pat the walls and say "Just hang on through summer camp! Just another month!"

We finally got to see my deskmate's baby in person!

Packing up the costume shop:

Our last day in the building, we had a little pizza party for the staff and former cast and crew to wander around and say goodbye to the space.

Someone kindly left the door to the roof open.

You can see our new building from there. (We're remodeling and renting the lowest couple of levels. I think it's all offices, otherwise.)

Going up to the roof was one of those legendary activities you might experience if you worked at the theater long enough. The staff members with keys all knew that we artistic types got as excited as kids if we heard "I'm going up to the roof... Hey, have you ever been up there?" I'd been on the roof once or twice before. I had NOT been "up to the dome."

We covered the dome with a blackout curtain, since the children's theater performed during the daytime. One of our long-suffering techies was asked to crawl up and pull the curtain back for the party, so we could finally see it. The stage manager always said it's a dusty, hot, cramped pain in the ass to get up there, so of course I wanted to do it once before we left!

Some former cast members showed me the way.

First you go up to the prop loft:

This used to be full of swords, typewriters, flower pots, fake food, a dozen baby dolls, and I don't know what else. See that thing in the middle that looks like a wooden air shaft? It's a ramp. After that, it's all crawling.