Never be Afraid to Ask...Malt Glasses

When I was working in central Pennsylvania, props shopping was much more difficult than it is in Chicago. Shopping selections were limited, some of the most basic stores were an hour away, and there were very few other theatres in the area that I could count on as sources.
On top of all this, we had incredibly short rehearsal periods. If I knew of an unusual prop ahead of time I could plan to order it online and have it delivered,but if something was added late in the process I was often left scrambling. Unfortunately this happened quite a bit, both because I was a new props master and was not as skilled at predicting what might come up, and because, with shows rehearsing for a maximum of three weeks, anything added after the first week of rehearsal was already cutting it close.
One such scrambling incident involved old fashioned malt glasses. The director decided they would be just the thing he needed about 5 days before the show opened. I searched all of my usual sources and called everyone I could think of, but I was getting nowhere. Then one night, after coming home from work, I was sitting watching TV and happened to see a Red Robin commercial (my coworkers and I went to the nearby Red Robin pretty regularly), and it dawned on me that Red Robin serves their shakes in the exact old fashioned malt glasses I needed.
The next day I drove to the Red Robin in the early afternoon (when asking for something at a restaurant always try to go during a downtime, after the lunch rush and before the dinner crowd). I asked to see a manager, explained that I needed the glasses for our production and asked if it would be at all possible to purchase four of them. He went into the back, brought out a box of glasses and offered to sell them to me for $5 a piece. Done! It was the first time I had used this method, but is the source of a rule I now use regularly when brainstorming sources; "Remember, places that sell things are not the only places where you can buy things".

Quick fancy glasses

These glasses were also for The Double at Babes with Blades. I needed lots of rocks glasses for the bar scene and wanted them to be a bit unique and special (as a reference, the play is based around a lot of classic hollywood and we had decided that we wanted the props to all look a bit "proppy").

The director picked out some glasses with a silver rim from some of the research images I sent her. I didn't have the money to go buy nice cut-glass rocks glasses, so instead I altered some that I found for about $1 a glass at Marshalls.

For the silver stripes I used aluminum foil tape I purchased at Home Depot (you can see this roll was only $6.58 and it's a 50 ft roll). 

I trimmed the tape to the width I needed using my x-acto knife to cut along the edge of my metal ruler. 

Then I carefully smoothed the tape onto each glass. Aluminum is an incredibly soft metal, so wrinkles and creases smooth out fairly easily (at least until they are small enough that they are hard to see from any distance). Also the tape is used for sealing HVAC systems, among many other industrial uses, so the adhesive  will stand up to low temperatures and condensation, both of which are issues that would have come up with putting cold liquids into a glass. 

And there they are. Cheap, easy bar glasses that have a little something special about them. 

This is my job...prop porn

I was talking to an acquaintance the other day about how strange my job can be at times, and told her this story. Her response was, "That's hysterical, you should write a blog about all of your props adventures." I thought it was kind of funny. I do write a blog about props, but I never think to include day to day adventures, just interesting projects and step-by-step how-to's. I don't know if it's going to stick, but I'd like to experiment with changing that.
So to start out my posts about the mischief I get myself into daily, shopping for prop porn.

I rarely turn down help when I am out shopping unless I know exactly what I am looking for and where to find it in the store (like when I go to buy hot glue at Michaels or screws at Home Depot). Employees beware, you may be asking "Can I help you?" just to be polite, but I am going to take advantage of that and ask you, not only where I might find something, but also how to use it, or what it's traditional purpose is, or what it reminds you of. Some stores are especially fun to ask for help in, because almost no one asks for any help. To illustrate my point...my adventures porn shopping.


(door bell rings as I enter)


Friendly Adult Bookstore Cashier- Hi


Me- Hello (looking him straight in the eyes and staying at the counter) 


Cashier- Can I help you?


Me- Actually yes, I have a sort of strange question for you. I am a props master working on a play and I need to find a piece of fairly specific porn that they describe in the script. 


Cashier- Okay, what does it need to be?


Me- In the script two teenage brothers are sitting on the stoop of their house and the one is explaining sex to the other. he pulls out a page from a magazine and says something to the effect of, "that's what it looks like down there, except not that big, they call her the Texas Tunnel, most girls don't look like the Texas Tunnel." 


Cashier- (interrupting) They're not really teenage boys are they, because otherwise I can't sell this to you. 


Me- No, they are adult actors playing teenage boys, no worries. If you could let me know which of these magazines might have an image that could pass for the Texas Tunnel that would be great, I really don't feel like looking through stacks of magazines to find something appropriate. 


Cashier- (Leading me over to a rack of magazines) This one might have a few pictures like that, or maybe that one)


The Cashier and I start flipping nonchalantly through porn magazines and showing each other images. 


Me- (settling on one that had three or four decent images for the director to choose from) I think this one will work, thanks! 


Cashier- (as he is ringing me up)- So where's this play going to be? What's it about? Do you have any fliers or post cards?


Me- It's going to be at X theatre and it opens next weekend. 


I tell him a little more about the plot and curse myself for not having grabbed a few more postcards the last time I was at the theatre. 


Me- By the way, this will be tax exempt. 


Cashier- (blank stare) I don't have any idea how to do that...we don't usually have people do that in this store.


And the moral of the story is...you 'll be surprised where you might find friendly, helpful, employees who are theatre fans, and you'll probably just have to eat the tax when buying props from an adult book store. 

Side note- I go into adult stores frequently when I need prop handcuffs. Almost any adult toy store will have a good pair of handcuffs, with an easy safety release, for a decent price, and they will hold up way better than any you will find in a costume store (like party city) or a toy store.

Light-up radio

This radio was created for a production of The Double opening this weekend at Babes with Blades (for those not familiar with Chicago storefront theatres, they are a group of female fighters and stage combat experts who do plays designed to feature women and swords, and they have a great time doing it).

This play is a backstage comedy set in the 1940s. In between scenes, during the blackouts, a radio announcer narrates recent Broadway gossip. During those moments the director wanted the radio to glow.

Side note- pay attention to how much light is going to be on a radio or other electronic device before deciding to invest the time and money into making it light up. If the radio was being hit from the front with theatrical lights, any bulb I had placed inside (no matter how bright) would have been useless and totally washed out.

 I started by pulling off the back cover of this radio I found for $15 at a local thrift store. I smashed, broke, unscrewed, snapped and ripped to remove all of the old radio innards (sorry for no "before" picture). In the process I also, unfortunately, destroyed the fabric that had formed the front of the radio. I replaced it with a heavy orange upholstery fabric for where the speakers would be, and a gold, sheerish, costume satin behind the dial, both of which were scraps from past projects and therefor free for this one.

Instead of working up a totally new circuit for the lights I used a pack of battery powered LED christmas lights (also leftover from a past project). I set the switch on the battery pack to "on" and then cut one wire a little further down so I could insert my own easy-to-use switch into the system.

I attached my switch to the back panel of the radio where it could be easily reached by an actor,

And then soldered the lights and the battery pack to either side.

The lights were taped in place so that when the back panel was re-attached they would sit just behind the dial.

I reattached all of the dials and knobs I pulled off the old radio front. I was even able to remove the decal in the right corner from the old fabric and insert it into the new.

When the lights go out, the glow is pretty cool.

Fake BBQ Meats

And for the final post in my "The Crowd You're in With" fake food marathon, the meats.

For chicken I started with a leftover piece of pink insulation foam. I cut roughly chicken sized squares and then began to round them.

I started by cutting large chunks off of all the corners and edges

Then continued rounding and shaping until I had some chicken-y shapes.

I coated the pieces with a couple coats of liquid latex and left one side unpainted to look like raw chicken.

I painted the other side with glossy wood tone and some dark grill marks to look like cooked chicken. When the actor  places the chicken on the grill he puts them in raw-side up. Later when he flips them he reveals the cooked side.

I made the burgers in almost the exact same way I made the roast beef a few weeks ago. This time though I learned my lesson about how the quilt batting thins out as it is coated. I started with three layers of batting stacked instead of one.

Again I coated the batting with several coats of liquid latex.

I then painted the burgers a raw beef pink color. Like the chicken I left one side of the meat raw.

The other side got sprayed with the same glossy wood tone to make it look cooked. 

Thankfully, even with all the grilling, very little was consumed in the show and we didn't need to worry about working with real meat every night. I'm curious though, does anyone have experience with that, and if so, what did you do?

Fake Corn on the Cob

This corn on the cob is also for "The Crowd You're in With" at 16th Street theatre (opens July 14th by the way and will be worth the trip to Berwyn if you can make it).

I started with a 1" dowel rod, then wrapped it with Crayola Model Magic.

With the cap of a highlighter, I covered the still-soft clay with circular indentations to texture it. I found the the harder I pressed and more irregular I let the circles become, the better the effect was.

After the Model Magic dried , I painted the corn with two coats of transparent yellow paint to give the color some depth.  Finally I cut the corn cobs in half and roughed up the exposed wooden ends a bit.

Then placed them in a tupperware on the picnic table. 

Prop Macaroons

Another piece of prop food from "The Crowd You're in With" was a tupperware full of macaroons.  Because macaroons have a rough pointed texture I thought I might try more of the pre-mixed paper mache I had used for my failed severed head.  For that project the paper mache had been too sticky and I couldn't get the smooth finish when I wanted it. For this project, the rough spikey surface was exactly what I was looking for.

The paper mache I used is called Celluclay. I picked it up on sale when I was working on the head for around $6  and still had plenty left for this project and more in the future). I know paper mache can be almost free if I made it myself, but for the convenience of having everything already mixed and shredded down to a fine powder, when I don't have a blender at home, buying the mix was totally worth it.

I mixed the power with water and formed about a dozen cookie-sized balls. I could have completely let them air dry, but to speed the process I put them in the oven for about an hour on the lowest temperature. The oven didn't dry them all the way through (that still took about a day) but it gave them a good head start and made them solid enough that I didn't have to worry about ruining them as I moved other things around in my kitchen.

I dusted them with a sand colored spray paint, then with some glossy wood tone (If I could do it again I would skip the sand-colored spray, they turned out a bit too dark for me),

and placed them in a tupperware. From a distance they look pretty tasty.

The Magic Smoking Grill

For "The Crowd You're In With" at 16th Street theatre, much of the action revolves around the grill. Over the course of the play raw meat gets loaded onto the grill, cooked meat comes off, and in between the grill is opened and shut multiple times and meat is futzed with and flipped. Because of the very intimate space at 16th Street, all of this happens just a few feet from the audience. Fortunately the grill is set facing mostly upstage (on a slight angle) so most of the audience can't see inside, but being that close the lack of smoke and sizzle from a cold prop grill was noticeable. 

To Fix the problem I made sponge burgers. I cut these rough burger shapes out of an ordinary hardware store sponge. A sharp pair of scissors worked best to shape it.

 I was able to get four burgers out of two large sponges.

 I dusted the tops of the sponges with spray paint to make them a bit more burger-y

 We hid a small hot plate inside the grill, running the cord out the bottom, under the fake grass on the floor and offstage. The stage manager plugs it in before the top of each show so it has time to get hot.

 Also before the show we fill the sponge burgers with water and set them high and out of the way on the grill.

 As the actor is working at the grill during the show, he will periodically take the sponge burgers down, set them over the hot plate and press on them with his spatula. The spatula squeezes water out of the sponge onto the hotplate, which produces the perfect sizzle sound and a convincing puff of smoke (water vapor).

And most importantly, it's all totally safe. We don't violate any open flame laws, or set off any smoke detectors, and the grill (being intended to hold real flames) can easily take the heat that builds up over the 90 minute show.