Country Teamwork - Stage Directions Magazine

School SpotlightCountry TeamworkA Q&A with the Director of Theatre Artsat Prosper High School in Prosper, TexasPatrick O’NeilMichael StephensPatrick O’Neil, director of theatre arts at Prosper High School in Prosper, TexasA moment from the Prosper High School 2011 production of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast.Stage Directions: Tell me about the theatre arts programat Prosper High School.QPatrick O’Neil: Our department serves 265 studentsAout of a school population of 1,100 and theatre involvementgrew more than 30 percent over last year. My colleague,Michael Stephens, joined us this school year due tothis growth; our goal is to run everything collaboratively. Hedirected our fall show and I helped with tech; we reversedthese roles for our recent musical.I attribute our program’s growth to this same spiritof teamwork and inclusion. There’s no favoritism—actorsaren’t considered better than tech folks. We all work togetherand it’s a very welcoming department. Auditions areopen to anyone in school—some students in our recent playweren’t in a theatre class.We staged three main productions this year: The Cruciblethis fall, Disney's Beauty and the Beast this winter and ourone-act competition play, Sweet Nothing in My Ear, thisspring.Along with ticket sales and ad revenue, our theatre programraises money by organizing the homecoming dance—we handle everything from selling tickets and hiring the DJ todecorating and clean-up. The last dance raised $6,000.We’re out in the country—Prosper is 35 miles north ofDallas—and many people are surprised to find such a vibranttheatre program out here, in a large, new high school.QHow do your facilities and equipment support yourprogram?I love our facilities—they are hands-down the nicest I’veAexperienced. This is my third year here and eleventhyear teaching. Our lighting and sound systems are state-ofthe-artand expansion-ready. The physical layout of our shop,green rooms and dressing rooms is also excellent.We have both a 970-seat proscenium theatre and 100-seatblack box. We’re in our black box almost daily for theatreclasses, including scene work and monologues.Our department has a wide variety of theatre equipmentfrom Wenger Corp. and I appreciate how versatile it is.Whenever I’ve got a challenge to solve, I automatically thinkof our Wenger equipment.To create scenes, my students use flipFORMS and StageBoxes instead of dragging chairs and desks out of my classroom.Students can easily configure flipFORMs to fit theirneeds.For audience seating in the black box, we use Versaliteplatforms and portable audience chairs from Wenger. Theyboth are fantastic! I like the flexibility of being able to reconfigurethe seating arrangement in the future.Although our dressing rooms have lockers, they lack anyfixed places to hang clothing or costumes. We use threeRack ‘n Roll garment racks to accomplish this. Becausethey’re mobile, we can also roll them out to the loading30 March 2011 • www.stage-directions.com