You Are Here – more painting

You know how when you work really hard to get something done to spec, on schedule and on time, and you have this amazing feeling of exhausted accomplishment …

… then things change and you have to start over?

At some point this past weekend, it was decided that the cyc should come down and all the scrim should come down too, and be replaced with two symmetrical column-like strips of scrim up centre. This meant that the new scrim had to be painted – not just textured, but fully painted then textured with other colours (similar to the treatment we did on the table and chairs – which, thankfully, passed inspection and can go as is). At first, the only consolation Ed and I had was the fact that we’d be painting the scrim on the ground this time, instead of in the air.

Then that changed too.

The scrim would be hung when we came to paint. This meant we’d need to have two people hold it taut while a third person rolled on the sand-coloured base coat. When we arrived, we found that the bottoms of the scrim had been battened down to the stage floor (courtesy of sound designer Angus Barlow and his gf Natasha). This made us very happy. Still, the scrim needed steadying in the middle, so it was most excellent that, in addition to Ed and myself, we also had producers Shelley Cahill and Dinah Watts, as well as Dinah’s partner David, come to help out.

So now we have two scrim columns up stage centre, textured with silver and gold – and even a bit of yellow – with space in between for the up centre entrances and exits. The silver and gold were done with metallic paint, so are very shiny and sparkly. This made us happy too.

There was also beer, courtesy of Dinah and Dave. This also made us happy. And we really needed some happy last night. We even finished a bit earlier than the first painting night, which was nice, since there’s no King streetcar running near the theatre right now (track construction) – and no Hedda Gabler gang to bum a ride from – and there was no frickin’ way I was walking alone to Queen in that neighbourhood, so Ed and I walked to King/Church, where he headed south while I went north.

So, in the end, the new set background got installed and painted – and it looks fabulous. And I sincerely hope we don’t have to paint this show again.

That would make me ecstatically happy.