At the Opera...

Hey Guys,

Today I decided I'm going to do an entry about my summer job! I keep getting lots of questions from all you guys who are out of Cincinnati wanting to know how it's going, what I do, etc...

My official "title" is the Rehearsal Department Intern, which is an internship in the Production Department.

As the Rehearsal Department Intern, mostly I deal with scheduling - I work with Stephanie (who is the Production Coordinator) to obtain, write, publish, and distribute the schedules for any events, meetings, rehearsals, etc. that occur throughout the season. Usually what happens is that the Stage Manager of a particular production will bring the calls for the next day to Stephanie and she will put them into the schedule format. After this (as long as there are no last minute changes!) I take the draft of the schedule to Glenn (the Director of Production) and Marcus (the Director of Artistic Operations) to have it approved. Glenn looks for things like crew hours, space issues, and "production" based problems, and Marcus checks the artists' hours to make sure that no one is rehearsing more than their contract allows.

After Glenn and Marcus approve the schedule, I get to make enough copies of the schedule for everyone in the company - from the business side to the artistic side to the production side to the artists themselves, almost everyone who works for the opera gets a copy of the schedule in some form, and I get to pass out alllllllll of the hard copies.

For the rest of the day, I sit at a vanity (seriously, it's a counter in a dressing room with a mirror surrounded by lights...) in an "office" that I share with Stephanie (my boss)... we answer phones, answer questions about the schedule (and all sorts of random things) from artists, etc. ...

During performances, mostly I sit in my office, but people are always coming to visit - some of our chorus friends, Jared (the Associate Artistic Administrator) and his assistant, The Other Lauren... All kinds of fun people - we always have people coming and going, which makes things pretty interesting once we've gotten the schedule out for the day...

I've only got a few weeks left here, but so far it's been one of the best experiences I've ever had. A couple of summers ago, I sang with the opera chorus, and I had no idea how much work went into the rehearsals, etc.... Now I hope that when I was in the chorus that I was kind and courteous to all of the staff members! yikes!

On another note, I'm totally going to plug AINADAMAR (click on the link for the Cincinnati Opera's website & more info) for all you people who are here in Cincinnati - it's a FANTASTIC modern opera about the life of Spanish playwright Federico Garcia Lorca, Margaret Xirgu, and a few other key players... It's in Spanish and only 90 minutes long, plus the music is BEAUTIFUL - there's a guitar and a flamenco singer. It's completely different than any other opera I've ever seen before. If you've never seen opera, or if you've seen opera but not enjoyed the length/plot/music, AINADAMAR is the perfect opera to come see... 7/9 and 7/11 at 7:30 with a HUGE dance party in the ballroom after the 7/9 performance... send me a message or give me a call if you want tickets at half price!

Also my hair is coming out for real now... every morning for the past couple of days, I've been waking up with a liberal sprinkling of hair all over my pillow - I'm afraid to wash it because I'm worried it's all going to come out at once! My wig is getting it's last styling this Thursday, so I'm hoping a reasonable amount of my hair will stay in until then so I'm not walking around with what my mom and brother call "leopard hair"

Finally, I wanted to thank everyone who has sent me cards/gifts/etc in the mail... I have a whole shelf in my room now with beautiful (and some hilarious) cards that people have sent me... Thank you guys all so much for your support! I really appreciate it A LOT!

Lots of Love,

Lauren