Junior enjoys working behind-the-scenes

While skeptical at first, junior Jake Henry now appreciates his experience working with the theater light crew.

Henry said his interest in joining the lights crew became relevant after not being cast as a character in a show his freshman year.

“I (joined the light crew) because I wasn’t cast (in the show) and I was really bitter and I wanted to make sure I was apart of theater no matter what,” Henry said. “I ended up really liking (the light crew) because it is really cool.”

Henry said he has a lot of responsibilities to do before the show can be run through.

“I have to make sure all of the lights are clean and working before we can run the show because we need all of the lights we can have because we don’t have a lot of lights,” Henry said.

According to theater program director Jodi Hatzenbeller, the light and sound crew work together on how to polish the show.

“It is particularly (stressful) on tech day, which is the day where we bring (the show) all together. The cast is on stage, and Jake (Henry), Devin (Raynor) and I are back at the booth conferring with Don, the tech director,” Hatzenbeller said.

Henry said he has been a part of the light crew since his freshman year.

“I have been running lights for about a year and half right now, and I have been on light crew since the spring show of my freshman year,” Henry said.

Henry said the people who run lights must go through informational training.

“(Informational training is) teaching people how to clean lights, run maintenance, aim lights and how to use a board, so recording and cues,” Henry said. “(Training also teaches) what to do when you are really stressed out on tech day.”

According to Hatzenbeller, tech day has a lot of pressure to make sure all of the decisions have been made.

“We decide we need this for this scene or this for that scene and it’s a very stressful day because that’s when all those decisions get made,” Hatzenbeller said. “We sort of have to fine tune to make it look right.”

Henry said working with the light crew proves a fun job but can be stressful at times.

“I have a blast (but) tech day is when it gets stressful,” Henry said.