[SML] Break-away table

[Dougherty, Jim]

 Let’s start with the obvious, but since it hasn’t been said yet I will: get a fight choreographer in there and make sure you don’t actually use the actor’s head.  You’ll chew up your understudy budget otherwise.

We’ve had to do a set full of break away furniture, mostly chairs but also a wardrobe door. The chair technique could work for the table – they were built of pine, using mortise and tenon construction but no glue. Joints were either just friction fit or held with bamboo cooking skewer pins.  Shifting weight was enough to make the whole thing collapse.  They were fairly straightforward to reassemble for another night’s run, too. The wardrobe door breakage might work for a table top – using ¼” lauan for the top, but scored and cut on the back.  We routed an irregular shape on the back, almost all the way through, so that a hole could be knocked into the door but a break or other damage could easily be done by changing your pattern. Scoring with utility knives on the back where you want it to break can also work.

Good luck!

- Jim Dougherty
ATD, Middlebury College Theatre Dept.