21M.606 Introduction to Stagecraft, Spring 2003

Abstract

Introduces students to the variety and scope of stagecraft while they learn basic shop skills. Students develop shop vocabulary and learn basic skills, including the safe use of all shop machines, basic handwork skills, names and uses of tools, and an overview of the various activities that go on in each shop. In each seven-week segment, students complete a project that uses all basic skills. From the course home page: Course Description Offered annually in the spring term, Introduction to Stagecraft is a hands-on course that gets students working with the tools and techniques of theatrical production in a practical way. It is not a design course but one devoted to artisanship. Among the many remarkable final projects that have been proposed and presented at the end of the course have been a Renaissance hourglass blown in the MIT glass shop and set into a frame turned on our set shop lathe; a four harness loom built by a student who then wove cloth on it; a number of chain mail tunics and coifs; a wide variety of costume and furniture pieces and electrified period lighting fixtures.