Tech Crew Creates Magic for Lake Forest High School Talent Show

The hottest ticket in town sold out in just under an hour this year.

5oth annual Talent Show, “Just Warming Up,” is one of the most anticipated shows of the year and its popularity doesn’t show any sign of slowing down.

For the past several weeks the Raymond Moore Auditorium has been bustling with  singers, dancers, musicians, and filmmakers rehearsing and putting the finishes touches on their performances, and the tech crew has been busy planning the lighting, mixing the sound, creating the set design, and more.

And while it’s the performers that the audience comes to see, it’s the behind the scenes tech crew that creates the magic that makes each act extraordinary.

Lake Forest High School Theatre Manager Ben Davidson knows firsthand how important the tech crew is to the Talent Show, but also to the other theatre productions that take place at the high school.

Davidson, 2001 Lake Forest graduate, was a part of the tech crew as a student. He earned his bachelor’s degree in theatre technical direction, set construction, budgeting, and time management from the University of Illinois and a master’s degree from Purdue University in the same area.

Today he manages the LFHS Theatre Department and helps the tech crew enhance the school productions with set design, lighting, sound, and everything else that needs to be done behind the scenes.

Davidson has a great appreciation for the kids in the tech crew because of their dedication and strong work ethic. There aren’t any prerequisites to participate on the tech crew. The kids learn as they go and the upperclassmen train the younger kids.

The tech crew is in many ways like a year round club. Several tech crew members also play sports or belong to other organizations so they may not be able to help with certain shows, although many athletes will come to work with the tech crew after they finish practice.

“We have a lot of kids who come from track to the Talent Show to work on the crew,” said Davidson.

There are approximately25 students working on the show and attending the rehearsals every night.  Some of the kids get to school as early as 6:50 a.m. for early bird classes and they stay until 10 p.m., but they don’t complain," said Davidson.

Tech crew members are always the first to arrive to the theatre before the shows. They design the sets and plan out the lighting for each act, they make sure the music is mixed correctly, and that the running crews who change the sets in-between scenes have the timing down.

They are also the last to leave. “After the final performance, the tech crew must strike the set and make sure that the stage is completely empty and ready for the next event,” Davidson said.

Seniors and Joseph Aquino have been a part of the tech crew for the past three years and agree that aside from the show’s directors and producers, the tech crew has the most time consuming job in the Talent Show. They also agreed that without the tech crew, the show could not go on.

As stage manager, Hershberger coordinates the running crew and makes sure the sets for all 20 acts go in and out on the stage in-between performances. She also designed the sets for two of the acts.

“The most nerve racking part of our job is coordination and communication, making sure that people are on the same page and everyone has the same information," said Aquino, who serves as back stage sound director.

“With so many people it can get stressful being backstage, but, we have a lot of fun,” added Hershberger.

One of the ways the tech crew releases tension is through dancing. “Everyone is always dancing backstage. People try and have a good time during the acts so they can stay focused during the transitions,” said Hershberger.

While Hershberger and Aquino may feel overwhelmed at times during the shows, they point to Production Stage Manager Jenny Alaimo as the one who is multi-tasking at a high level. Alaimo sat behind the lighting board with a big smile on her face as her peers spoke about how much work goes into coordinating a production as big as the Talent Show.

“Sometimes I have like 14 voices in my head at one time. The directors are yelling at me, the crew, it can be stressful. But it’s worth it,” said Alaimo, a junior.

With the help of classmate Rachel Penn, Alaimo was the sole set designer for the show this year, she also calls all of the cues for performances, and “every time there’s a lighting change, sound change, spotlights, video change, she has to call that,” said senior Alyssa Loiacano, the senior assistant and lighting director.

“Jenny has a high stress job,” added freshman Alex Zylka, the lighting board operator.

The hours of work and the labor that the tech crew puts into a stage production are often overlooked.

“People don’t realize the vast things that we can actually do. We can rent high end moving fixtures, and mix to any color in the rainbow with our new lighting,” said Davidson.

People keep coming back to see the show year after year because of the tech crew's ability to enhance the performers presence on stage.

“We’re a very dedicated group of people; we like to have a lot of fun doing hard work that hopefully comes across well. Even though we don’t get a lot of recognition, that doesn’t bother us, we get so much satisfaction out of actually doing it and putting out a good product for everyone to enjoy,” Aquino said.