The stage crew takes care of countless technical details during every performance to keep the spring musical running smoothly.

Sometimes, though, the unexpected just happens — like the time the lead actor was singing in the bathroom backstage, unaware that his microphone was still on. Stage crew members had to hurry to silence his mic.

Junior Hannah Kadrie, stage manager for this year’s musical, had another such moment two years ago.
“My freshman year, with Zorro, I was in charge of hooking Nick Cortazzo into his fly harness to fly, and we were in such a rush that I let go it and it launched into the sky and Nick couldn’t fly,” Kadrie said.

“My freshman self was mortified.”

Cortazzo had to improvise and act out that scene from the ground. When it was time for his character to fly again later in the play, Kadrie hooked him into the fly harness without a problem.

Fortunately those unexpected moments are few and far between, thanks to the efforts of Kadrie and the other members of the stage crew.

The stage crew consists of the run crew, who set up the scenes on stage; the sound crew, who control the microphones and music; the light crew, who work the lights on stage, including spotlights and blackouts; and the costumes crew, who help out with hair, makeup and costumes.

Kadrie oversees all of that as stage crew manager. Kadrie calls every cue that happens during the show over a headset to communicate with the rest of the crew.

“I oversee all actions taking place with the pit, the crew, and the cast. It’s a lot of pressure, but if you are organized it can be fun,” Kadrie said.

Kadrie is the most closely tied member of the crew to the cast, so she is at every rehearsal and also every crew meeting/build session.

“The time commitment is one of the most intense parts of it,” Kadrie said.

One of the people right there with Kadrie is junior Veronica Briones, the assistant stage manager.

Briones believes that she has found her place at Baldwin working in the stage crew, while her twin brother, Paul, acts on stage.

“My brother Paul is the one of us who is well-known throughout the school, and I just like to be in the background,” Briones said.

Kadrie also loves being backstage. Some of her favorite high school memories have been made through stage crew.

“I have met some amazing people through crew. As a crew we spend so much time together, we become a family,” Kadrie said.