h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I haven't written a journal entry for some time. In brief, since the end of Jekyll & Hyde (in March 2007), I have been both chosen and rejected.

I was rejected after auditioning for a reprise of Back to the 80s that the Ops are doing in August. One reason I hadn't gone for the original production was that it was very much a dance show, with lots of pop choreography - not playing to my strengths. So when the audition committee broke it to me that not only wasn't I being cast as the minor principal I had tried for, but not being cast in the company at all, due to my age, I was quite relieved.

I was chosen by the outgoing chairman of the Society as a potential Secretary - this was back shortly after J&H finished. It came to pass at the AGM that I was the only candidate, and a little relunctantly I have shouldered the job.

I'll go into a bit more detail in my next post.

*waits patiently for more detail*

Is being the secretary a lot of work?

In my experience, it's the Secretary who actually runs things. You get to do all the stuff like organise meetings, agendas, distribute minutes, chase up people who've said they'll do things but haven't, and so on. Brave of you Pimms

Take it from me, being the Secretary is a lot of work. Luckily for me, my Society has a Clerk who does the minutes, but there's still a lot of letters to be written, phone calls to be answered, people to chase with pointy sticks and ruffled feathers to smooth. But it's very interesting at the same time!

And I imagine it is rather a thankless job, which makes it even more stressful.

Yes, so the Secretary position was suggested to me, and my concerns were what were the expectations, and how well organised was what I was taking over? I asked for a job description, which as you may guess was daunting, and had the chance to discuss the role with the Secretary who was srtanding down when I met her unexpectedly at the blood donation clinic.

My hopes were raised for a reprieve when the Chairman said there was another member who had also been approached about standing. Unfortunately that person declined to stand As I've said in the past about being offered opportunities to play roles, I find it hard to say 'no' to requests, and despite selfish misgivings that I didn't really want more responsibilities I agreed to do it.

It turns out that it has been possible to hive off some of the tasks to other members of the society.

For instance part of the role can include Librarian, the name given to the person who distributes the scores and libretti (taking deposits and recording book numbers), takes the register each rehearsal, and fills in the preplanned other commitments of all members in the register. This is clearly a role that should be taken by a person who will be at the rehearsals - like someone in the cast. Since I was not selected to be in the cast of BTT80s I have been able to give this task to the person who, coincidentally, was cast in the role I auditioned for.

The role could also include Minutes Secretary, who records actions agreed at committee meetings, and provides minutes of previous meeting to be agreed at next meeting. Fortunately this has always been given to the newest member of the committee over the last few years, and was given the the new member who was not at the short inaugural committee meeting immediately aftyer the AGM, and thus couldn't decline. Sneaky.

It took a while to get the handover of secretarial stuff sorted, and before it had all happened I had to undertake my first duties. The role appears to be principally to organise contracts, bookings and correspondence. My first job was to to book hotel and flights for the director for his first visit since the auditions. This was complicated by the fact that he is also directing a second show on the Island concurrently, and I have to liaise with them too to ensure everyone knows what is going on with his visits. As a potential cause of conflict the other (smaller) group is partly composed of members of our society, and also funded by our patron. On the other hand we do know them, and it mayn't be too divisive.

The first proper committee meeting was an eye opener . It lasted over three hours as we had to elect a new chairman from three contenders (chairman being a decision made by the committee, which consists of seven general members elected by the society at the AGM, plus the Treasurer and Secretary). One reason I had wanted to get on to the committee was to discover how the society is actually run. AGMs are all very well, but committee discussions are a closed book. The arguments for this appear rigid, with some aspects being understandable.

The point in having an elected committee is to restrict the day to day decision-making down to a workable group, rather than floundering with unneccessary group discussions. One of the most important decisions the committee make is choosing the next show, and this apparently can't be freely discussed due to the alleged touchiness of rights holders, and danger of other local groups getting wind and acquiring the performance rights ahead of us.

2nd proper Committee meeting attended. Discovered I'd missed a 'snap' meeting called before one of the rehearsals, but had to point out I wasn't there when it came to signing off the minutes, as the chairman had marked me as present

The director makes his first re-blocking week next week. As I volunteered to be the prompt at the first proper committee meeting I will need to attend, so I shouldn't miss any snap meetings next week.

Between the meetings I sent a condolence card to the father of one of our long standing members who died unexpectedly. As far as I know he had had a fall and was on crutches for a couple of weeks then suffered a fatal cardiac arrest, possibly caused by a dislodged clot. All the committee and several members attended the funeral. It was well-attended - the church kept filling, and they ran out of chairs. In addition to his backstage work for the Manx Ops he had also been involved with the Manx Amatuer Drama Federation, local Gilbert & Sullivan society, and the 'rival' musical group. He also found time to help his local church and on his days off worked at the local Hospice . He was an unassuming often quiet man, who didn't seek the limelight. I performed with him in G&S productions - pirates in Pirates of Penzance, Pontevedrian gentlemen in The Merry Widow


I also invited the Governor and his wife, and the Mayor to come to the summer show. The Governor's secretary declined on his behalf. They usually attend.

Shortly after the first proper committee meeting I also received from the previous secretary the society laptop, files, and mobile phone. The phone was a fiasco, as it turned out that it hadn't been used to make an outgoing call in nine months and the SIM had expired. A new SIM card had to be purchased (with its own new phone number), and more credit. The the first call (a text) I got on it I didn't notice until after the message was out of date (it was to alert the AD that the person would not be at the rehearsal). I have my own phone, a second one is not much use.

Trying to organise the electronic documents has been a trial. They were well organised by the previous secretary, but transferring them to folders on computers I actually use, including making updates to headers with current committee on, and being able to recognise what a document contained from its title were

Blimey Don't you just love voluntary committees? I still say rather you than me Pimms.

Oooh, reminds me, I must photograph elephants

Where are you going to photograph elephants? Kangaroos I could understand. Ah... could it be that these elephants have notably thin skins.

I'm a bit tired I was out last night at the 'welcome' meal, welcoming both me to the committee and the director back to the Island. Busy day. I was in work (on a Sunday ), then at a rehearsal (just watching (as prompt) thankfully, as the repeated dances clearly fatigued most of the cast).

The meal was a Chinese banquet and lasted some hours. I was the only participant drinking tea with the meal. I can't understand people who imbibe diet coke through preference with a meal. The director partook of a few whisky and cokes. Disappointing how much better some dishes taste served at the table rather than taken home as a takeaway (I use the same restaurant for my sporadic chinese takeaways).

Not all the committee could make the meal unfortunately. One who missed it was N, the former chairman, who last week also fell and hurt her legs, now nastily bruised apparently. She tripped over a temporary fence panel footing outside a beer tent, but the teasing rumour has been spread that she was pushed by the person behind her (a lady named Mandy I am unfamiliar with).

I shall try not to make this a tale of Society legs, but this anecdote came on top of the current chairman's misadventure which I also saw yesterday, caused by falling asleep in the sun - the back of his legs are a distressing sunburnt lobster pink.

Another incident that took place at the rehearsal was when the girl playing Debbie landed on the floor after her chair had been pulled from behind her during a classroom scene, causing aghast looks at the puller of the prank. This sounds cruel, but it was an understandable accident. The puller, a nice young man, was correctly repeating the action set in the previous production of the show. Unfortunately this was a new person playing Debbie, and she was unaware it would happen.

Yesterday attended my first Production Meeting. It turns out that I am there due to a confusion of roles. It is one for the minutes secretary, but I was roped in instead. I set up the laptop and took the minutes - much easier to amend and read than handwriting would have been. Printed out today for distribution to those present at meeting. I can't be doing with minutes only distributed at next meeting - that only leads to forgetfulness "oh, was I supposed to do that?"

One positive outcome was I am ahead of the game for an action that will be coming my way - sending out contracts for the band members (once I know who they are). So I have dug out an old contract and am going to edit it to current show, ready for when I receive the band details.

I quite agree about making sure that minutes are available asap - otherwise why have a meeting?

Are you enjoying it?

I think I'm doing a good enough job, and that generally leaves me pretty

Yesterday the injuries went from legs to arms. The AD the day before had slipped and hurt her wrist and banged her head , and probably was suffering from concussion as she threw up later. So her wrist was bandaged. The former Chairman's daughter (who could probably be called a junior member [age about 10] as she was in Scrooge) had her arm newly in plaster as, despite being told not to, (as it wouldn't support her weight) had sat on a toy shopping trolley, which had collapsed under her and she had put out her arm behind herself to break her fall and snapped a bone. She tearfully said she would listen when adults tell her not to do things in future.

As Secretary I have sent out two contracts to band members (who get paid Musicians Union rates, whatever they are). As Prompt, my other role for this production, I had a photo taken for programme and dictated a a brief spiel, based on the one in the last programme. That spiel went on about the likelihood of my character dying (the only sorts of parts the society tends to cast me in), so I was able to say I was glad not to be likely to die in this production, with a changed emphasis on preventing the cast on stage dying instead

The prompt gets a biog in your programme? Only a dozen people at most get them hereabouts.

Not just a biog - I'll be in three photos too: one with rest of the committee (in my role as Secretary), one recent head shot, and one from how I appeared in the 80s. This gimmick for the show - two shots from now and then - made the programme last year quite interesting. A few of the cast had to have a 'stork with bundle' image pasted in, as they were not even born in the 80s. In the revised programme for this year's show we will also have a ultrasound scan, as one castmember was *almost* born in the 80s, and didn't want the stork clipart.


I must admit I was surprised to get a Prompt biog. While I know that most of the backstage crew usually get photos in the programmes, they don't usually have to write a spiel too.

Both of the main local groups have quite limited photo/biog lists: main principals (varying numbers: 6 in Me and My Girl, 4 in Kiss Me, Kate, 4 in Barnum), director, MD, choreographer and wardrobe mistress. The group that I'm on the committee for has also added a photo for the rehearsal pianist, and both have general full cast shots.

I'd love to see an extended approach, both with cast and crew, but every extra bit of printing puts the cost up.

I like the 'then and now' concept.

Over the weekend I have also been atempting the tactful prodding of a cast member who has had to miss a few rehearsals due to revision for exams. It was accepted that she hadn't been able to give much advance warning of dates of absence, as the exams dates weren't publishe when we started rehearsals. She had also done her best to let the AD know she would be absent and follwoed it up ith a text to the society mobile phone which I hold.

Nevertheless her absences were makig it difficult to run rehearsals, so I had to let her know she was making it difficult for herself (to learn cues with the changed cast since last year), for the others she was supposed to be providing cues for, and for the AD, who is rapidly running out of time to set pieces in detail rather than rehearse them for slick performance.

Anyway she didn't answer her phone on Saturday (so I left her a text and an answerphone message), I sent another text this afternoon, and finally spoke to her this evening to ensure she was going to able to attend rehearsals this week. I think I did the tactfulness ok (a concern of mine, as like most people I can be unwittingly tactless to my chagrin)

I know a few who can be wittingly tactless

Frantic few days. A few people have let their attention slip on crucial details, and unwittingly I feel I am one of them. It all boils down to commitment forms. These were not vigorously pursued early on and it is now catching up with us.

The next visit of the director is next week, and he left dispirited at end of last visit due to number of unnotified absences from rehearsals and lack of concentration overall. Some of the cast are clearly trying hard, but are being let down by slackness, inattention or repeated absence of others. The director was only prepared to redo the show on the basis that the cast really wanted to do it, but that has not been reflected in the attendance and attention.

He asked for a list of the notified absences from rehearsals next week, so that he could attempt to schedule the rehersals to allow for absences, and this led to me creating one, with gaps, as I discovered that about half the cast had never submitted them, and the Librarian and I (both new to the roles) had not chased this up earlier. Requests of the cast to supply commitments for next week led to late submission of forms, with several holidays being taken that came out of the blue. The Director's visits are key rehearsals, and next week (out of a cast of 30) there is no night without at least 5 missing, and most days with 8 missing - one where 5 of the 8 are principals

Some of the cast have virtuously cancelled their commitments they had neglected to mention on their commitment forms (one, a principal also on the committee (and so a role model), has had to give up at considerable personal cost on a ticket to see Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys ). Others have dug heels in and insisted on absences that they had at some early point discussed with AD, but had never been formally recorded.

The issue of attention during rehearsals was dealt with by taking out groups from last night's rehearsal to praise them for what they are doing right but reinforce the need to not overstep the line from having a laugh during rehearsals to disrupting them and not showing respect to AD. Each group was talked to by a small group of the committee, and reassured that everyone would be spoken to. The last thing we want is people to drop out because they feel they are being picked on unfairly. It had to be groups, because the messages differed according to whether they were newcomers to the show, had done the show before or had been recognised as key good or bad influence on rehearsals. Only a couple seemed to take the criticism badly. Some haven't had the speaking to yet, because they missed the rehearsal...

It reminds me of the song in Kiss Me Kate
FOUR WEEKS YOU'LL REHEARSE AND REHEARSE (if only we had *everyone* at at least one rehearsal)
THREE WEEKS AND IT COULDN'T BE WORSE (for us it is six weeks to go)
ONE WEEK WILL IT EVER BE RIGHT (hope we don't get to that stage)
AND OUT OF THE HAT, IT'S THAT BIG FIRST NIGHT

So you'll be off to Padua next?