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June 2001 Table of Contents
Drama
Avoid Production Burn-Out
Keith McClung
Minister of Music & Fine Arts
19th Street Church of God
Parkersburg, West Virginia
For several years, our local Music Ministry found itself presenting 3 Major Productions per year; Christmas, Easter, & a Patriotic theme presentation. Not only did we find that this schedule was a challenge financially, but the Cast, Choir & Crew involved were experiencing a high level of burn-out; so much that I lost some choir members from our Music Ministry.
At every avenue, our intent and focus was Christ-Centered. Our prayers were sincere and we did see wonderful results from our outreach productions. On the inside structure of our Music & Fine Arts Ministries I found that stress and burnout levels were rising at an all time high. Those involved, like myself, were balancing their family life, work scheduling, and personal time.
After much prayer I decided to ask my local Music & Fine Arts Production Team their feelings on our outreach efforts. We came to the conclusion that we were spreading our gifts, talents, and resources over many different drama presentations. After addressing our members of the Music Ministry we decided to let them choose one annual production that would become our "annual thing!" Overwhelmingly, the Music & Fine Arts Members chose to celebrate the Easter season through Music & Drama.
The year 2001 marked our 10th Annual Easter Drama Presentation. A cast, choir, and crew of over 250 people presented the life of Jesus Christ to crowds in excess of 4,000 people. Our love offering-based drama was presented a total of 10 times guests of our area.
Whew...what a hectic schedule! You may find your Music & Drama Ministry has been in the same place, or maybe still is, as ours had been. I found after many years of presenting musical dramas, it is important to treat your cast, choir and crew with the utmost respect that they deserve. Hopefully, these simply suggestions will help you, as they have our local ministry, in helping to keep "production burn-out" from setting in.
1. When having multiple presentations of a drama, whether it be Christmas, Easter or Non-Seasonal, remember that not everyone will be able to take part. Work schedules and unexpected conflicts WILL TAKE PLACE! Remember that the majority of us are working with a volunteer-based cast, choir and crew. It is easy for us to sometimes sit in our church office and question why those involved are not as "dedicated" as we are. Then we get smacked by the holy 2 X 4 and realize that we need to be thankful to those involved for giving of their "extra" time! Always be flexible with your schedules and have fill-ins ready for many cast roles.
2. FEED THE MULTITUDES! This has been one of our number one ways of reducing stress with our seasonal production. When distributing your Rehearsal Schedules & Informational Material, include a "Fishes & Loaves" menu. Here's what we do!Our Easter drama spans over three weekends. Seeing that many of cast and crew members are arriving at the church, straight from work, with the costume in the car...we now feel the responsibility to "have dinner on the table" for them. Cost is a factor here. To keep costs down, we have instituted different types of menus including: Friday: Mexican Fiesta Bar (create your own tacos) Saturday: Spud, Soup & Salad Bar Sunday: Brown Bag Night (bring your own lunch; we'll provide the drinks) Last Presentation: Ice Cream Social before the Drama (not good for the singers!) Be creative with your menu planning! We always invite Cast, Choir & Crew members to bring their favorite desserts to share.
3. BLOOPERS & BLUNDERS will happen! During your production rehearsals and presentations have a drop off box located where the cast and crew "waits and meets." As these funny things happen (guards tripping, cantankerous animals, forgetting props, etc.) have other cast members deposit those interesting "happenings" in the box.
During the production run, have a Blooper & Blunder Awards Dinner. We hold an annual Bloopers & Blunders Awards Dinner where production members bring their favorite potluck dish and it is there that we recognize our Production Leaders and present the Bloopers & Blunders.
4. Think Outside The Box! This past Easter we had a different variation of our Bloopers & Blunders Award Dinner. Instead of the potluck concept, we rented an entire bowling alley. We blasted Christian Music over their speakers and bowled the night away! This was great since we could have the bowling alley install bumpers on several of the lanes for our children who are involved with the cast.
(In both cases of the Bloopers & Blunders Dinner and Bowling Night, we invited the families of those involved with the production. This proved to be a great outreach to unchurched and unsaved friends and family of our church.)
5. KEEP THEM ENTERTAINED! Our entire crew meets in a large Family Life Center/Gymnasium complex for their make-up appointment times, feeding, etc. If one's make-up appointment time is at 5:30pm and the drama does not begin until 7:00pm, aside from Fellowship with one another, that person has some waiting to be done. We finally got smart and decided to help entertain the mass of people.
Select Women's & Mixed Ensembles of our Music Ministry found this to be a great time to get an hour of rehearsal time in. We also brought in BIG SCREEN televisions and played marathons of "I Love Lucy" - "Laverne & Shirley" - "The Andy Griffith Show" - "Sports Bloopers" and other great family-oriented videos. Many people also bring board and card games to share with others.
6. BE POSITIVE! Each night before your production begins, put your smile on! Some times we don't feel like it. The stress has set in and the nerves are shot. Each night I give our cast and crew an "update" of the sanctuary attendance, testimonies that we are hearing from prior presentations and most definitely, I tell them what a great job they are doing. Before our Cast & Crew makes their way to the Sanctuary, we select a random member of the team to lead the entire cast in a prayer for the service.
These are just a few ideas for you. It's been a great key to our success in presenting our annual Easter Drama.
If your Ministry has some great ideas to help "relieve production burnout" feel free to share them with me so I can share them with others! Who knows? Your ideas may end up in a future "Communicator" article! Feel free to e-mail me at churchofgod@wirefire.com or give me a telephone call at 1-304-428-5625.
Until we "read again"....
Break A Leg!
Keith
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