Polaroid Photo

Fri
7
Dec '07

Trouble with the trick chair

It’s hard to be upset about things breaking when you get to have this conversation.

Stage Manager: Hi. I hate to bother you, but the chair isn’t spurting blood anymore.

Me: What’s it doing?

SM: Blood just dribbles out onto the stage instead of shooting across. We really need spurting blood.

I went down to take a look and couldn’t duplicate the problem. So, I fiddled with things. Everyone agreed that it was working. I went home.

After the show, I got another call, this time from the technical director.

TD: It stopped spurting blood again.

Me: You’re kidding.

TD: I figured out why none of us could get it to fail. We weren’t letting the blood sit for an hour before spurting.

The theory is that there’s a hole somewhere in the line that is allowing air to enter and that the chair is spurting air bubbles instead of blood. We got nothing else to work with so I’m going down tomorrow to replace the tubing.

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Sun
11
Nov '07

Trick chair

For the new show I’m working on, Rags and Bones, I have to make a trick chair that spurts blood and hides human hearts. Actually, I have to make it look like an actor is spurting blood, but the chair is the easiest way to deliver said fluid.

Secret compartmentThe harder thing was figuring out where to hide the heart.The chair’s structure is fairly open and we like the way it looks. After playing around with various options I finally decided that I would start by making the heart a little smaller than commercially available options. I’m also giving the seat a much thicker pad than it had originally, which allows me to incorporate a secret compartment.

PaddingFrom here, it is much like a standard upholstery job. In fact, the top layer is the original padding from the chair, trimmed to allow access to the secret compartment.

UpholsteredWhen fully assembled, I’m not trying to hide the seam, but I am trying to make it look intentional. I have to pick up some different material for the seat because the plether I had on hand was way the heck too thick.

Heart in its compartment And there’s the rehearsal heart, tucked away inside its compartment.

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