[SML] Fake "Hare" for Stoppard's Arcadia

[Pat Kight]

Dougherty, Jim via Stagecraft wrote:
> Requisite counter point to Pat and John, with whom I actually agree
> completely:
>
> As a prop person I'll say that there are some shows that are practically
> built around specific props, which are almost unavoidable; how many times
> have people asked for the razor from _Sweeney Todd_, or the rear end of a
> deer for _A Lie of the Mind_?  Let¹s say you dodge the hare in _Arcadia_,
> there¹s still the tortoise, all the garden and fractal books, etc.  That
> being said I appreciate playwrights who ask for something nigh on
> impossible but leave enough room in their script for flexibility in
> creating the prop, for acting to help out or to carry the load entirely.

And I agree completely with you, too. :) For Arcadia, we had a 
realistic-if-not-living tortoise, a beautiful purpose-built theodolite 
and numerous other key props, but we had neither the time nor budget to 
fully realize every prop mentioned in the script. Decisions were based 
on the physical and dramatic function each one served, how central it 
was to the play and how much it needed to be handled.

And hell, Stoppard isn't nearly as bad as Sam Shepard, who (having 
propped productions of True West and Buried Child) I am convinced hates 
props people.

-- 
Pat Kight
kightp at peak.org