He Makes Theatrical Scenery Move

Gareth Conner has always been one of the guys behind the curtain.

The 27 County Road resident has been involved in theater most of his life -- but always out of sight of the audience.  His major at Ithaca College in New York was theater production.

“I’ve always liked building things,” said Conner. “I didn’t know you could do it for a living.”

Conner may be better known among smaller regional theaters from coast to coast as Creative Conners, Inc. He makes their scenery move.

“If you make scenery, we can make it move” is the slogan for Conner's company. He provides motion-control devices and machines and the automation software that makes them move.

“It’s a combination of computer work, like writing software, and soldering circuit boards and building control machines,” Conner said about his vocation. “We make software, hardware and machinery to move other people’s scenery.”

Conner said he always enjoyed electronics when he was a kid as well as working with his hands. It wasn’t until the South Side of Chicago native’s parents moved to the suburbs that he found a calling for his talent.

“I was a brand new kid in school with no friends,” he said. “I saw a notice about joining a stage crew. Immediately, I had 30 friends.”

Conner picked Ithaca College because of its nationally renowned theater production program, which includes a requirement that students gain professional experience. As a result, Conner has worked various summer stock theaters and he did an internship with the Santa Fe Opera Company, which used rolling sets.

Conner works principally with smaller regional theater companies or university theaters or scene shops who don’t want to build their own equipment. He provides systems that they can learn to use and operate with existing computers.

“We sell the stuff and they read the manual,” he said. “It all runs on regular computers.”

The Huntington Theater in Boston, the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, the Long Wharf Theater in Hartford, the University of Connecticut and Yale University theater programs are a few of his clients on the East Coast. Most of his clients are out west, he said.

“We make it easier for all theater companies to use movable scenery,” he said.

Conner started Creative Conners about 7 years ago after leaving Mystic Scenic Studios in Massachusetts, where he worked for 8 years. He works primarily behind his house in a converted garage, but builds the actual moving machines in space in an old mill in Warren and at Mystic Scenic, which counts on him for their moving machines.

“We sell many customers a kit of components,” Conner said, “ as well as lines of stock products.”

But he also designs and develops machines to move specialized scenery with more intricate effects, he said.

“The demand for that is increasing,” Conner said.

Conner, his wife and two daughters moved to Barrington in 2007 from the Boston area. He met his wife at the Houston Theater, where she made costumes.

“We both like to make things,” he said.

It’s a fascinating industry, Conner said of the theater business. He’s never wanted to and never performed on the side of the curtain facing the audience.

The next time you see some scenery leave or move across a stage without a stage hand in sight, however, think about Gareth Conner. The control box or circuit board he created in the garage behind his house could be making it move.