Once Upon A Mattress was the final show, I would help produce at North Port High School. In many ways, this show was meant to be a culmination of the lessons that I had learned during my time as Technical Director a North Port High. This set included some of the largest single pieces we had attempted, but there were several opportunities for us to work on smaller details that would help elevate the final product beyond the work we had done in the past. 

Olde English Architecture 

This set consisted of two large portals with Tudor arches, large wooden beams acted as batons holding curtains on either side of the raised platform acted as the main playing space. On stage right there was a cart that held four small trunks that descended in size. Stage left was home to a raised platform that represented the bed. Everything on the stage was stylized to appear as though the play was taking place outside in a town square. Earlier versions of the portals even included windows, but those plans were scrapped due to the cost of building the flats.  

The portals were made of stock flats with custom flats being created for the Tudor arch. To create the arches, we laid everything out on the stage and used a large swinging arm. to draw the various circles needed to create. onto the lauan and cut them out using a jigsaw.

Due to limited space, we decided to paint the flats before they were assembled. To paint the scumble that acted as a base for this wall, we enlisted 30 students from two different classes to work over a two-week period to paint 30 flats. Having so many different students work on the scumble should have produced any visible patterns, but I failed to make a point to rotate the students enough. and we ended up with students claiming flats as their own project. The results were mixed. whole every student was given the same colors, some used more of one than another, and some failed to create a consistent scumble treatment. To help even out the color, we spattered the wall in grey and purple and washed the entire wall in brown. This helped to mask some of the inconsistencies in the base treatment.

Installing the portals on the stage was scheduled when there was a break in the busy spring schedule. The North Port Performing Arts Center where we built and produced our shows was home to several concert series including the city’s concert band, choir, and orchestra. We wanted to make sure that once we started the install that we had plenty of time to complete the task before we had to prepare the stage for one of these concerts which required the installation of a two-story tall acoustic bandshell. We installed the portals by attaching the top row of flats to the baton and then install the counterweights on the fly system. Once the baton was balanced, we would slowly bring out the pipe until we were able to fit the next row underneath. We would bolt the next row of flats in place and apply any stiffening boards to the back as needed. this process was repeated until the entire structure was standing. Then we made sure the portal was level before screwing it into the floor and applying stage jacks to the back to prevent it from swaying.

Placing trim on the wall was an adventure. We cut two varied sizes of trim for the portals the downstage portal received 10” wide lauan planks, the upstage portal had 8” planks. The planks were all painted before they were installed. This was done for several reasons. Most importantly, not wanting to paint the boards once they were vertical and twenty feet in the air. Placing the planks on the wall was done using the genie lift. We slowly crawled our way up and across the stage carefully making cuts and screwing the beams onto the wall. Screws were chosen for their additional holding strength. We used small pieces of masking tape to cover the downstage screws and used paint to cover them when we were making touchups after everything was assembled. . The last piece we added to the archways were vines growing up from the bottom on the offstage sides. This detail was to help give the set some additional color outside of the earth tone color scheme used in all the paint. It also helped instruct the students about organic patterns.

Trunks

For the traveling theatre troupe to carry their supplies we chose to build four trunks, each one smaller than the last. The trunks would function and would be built so that we could keep them in stock and use them in the future with our set of rehearsal boxes.  

The trunks needed to be lightweight so that the largest trunk could be easily lifted by our smaller actor, and as we were keeping them in stock, we wanted them to be made from high-quality material. We chose 1/2” cabinet-grade plywood. To construct the trunks, I borrowed a technique I learned from watching a video on Tested.com. I built four boxes and ran them thru the table saw to cut off the tops. Once the tops were removed, I fitted hinges and a lock to the top and made sure that everything moved the way it was supposed to before removing all the hardware in preparation for painting.  

Evaluation

Once Upon a Mattress was my final show at North Port High School. It was by far one of the most challenging sets that we undertook during my time there, but the challenges provided our students with experiences that none of their peers were able to have. The Portals were a massive undertaking that allowed us to have in-depth conversations about rigging and safety. The work on detailed props and paint treatments allowed us the opportunity to put three years of growth on-stage. When this show closed, I was able to take some time to reflect on how far our students had come during my time at North Port High. We were able to build larger, complex scenery that opened our students’ eyes to a larger theatrical landscape. I am immensely proud of the work that was accomplished during my time at North Port High School and none of it would have been possible without the support of our administration, my colleagues, and a wonderful group of young artists.