A challenge

[Ludy]

A challenge to the mighty Dopers.

I know that everybody follows their own personal set of logistics. Everybody has their own opinions on right and wrong, but I really can not understand what my co-worker was thinking and I challenge the Dopers to give me some sort of logic to this story.

I work for a theatre company. Right now we are making props for a children’s theatre camp that the company puts on every year. Now one of the first rules of theatre is that if something can go wrong it will. If there is a piece of wood on stage someone will get a sliver and it will probably be the biggest Diva available. So technicians have to make sure that everything that is sent onstage has absolutely no danger to it whatsoever. If an actors injures themselves that could end their career and nobody wants to cause that. So this is drummed into the heads of the technicians from the start. If it is not safe it is not on the stage.

Now the co worker in question claims to be a professional theatre technician who has been working steadily for close to 10 years. He is in charge of the technical aspects in this theatre; it is his job to know what is going on. He is fully aware of the show that these props are being built for, he has watched rehearsals, and knows that the people using these props are children. The props department is falling behind and needs help so he offers his time. He does not claim to be a props person, or overly creative so I give him easy jobs. I hand him a burlap sack and tell him that it needs to be filled with things that will sound like treasure when the bag is rattled. He goes into the store room, and comes back claiming that he is done, what’s next. And the day goes on just like that. After he leaves I peek into the sack to see what he had found.

Now I know that he is not an overly bright fellow, he has proved this to me time and again and every time I think he has done the most moronic thing imaginable he tops it somehow. Well this is the latest topper; I am scared to see what is next.

He has filled this bag (now remember this bag is going to be slung over the shoulder of a child in front of a live audience) with 1 glass drinking cup, 1 glass rum bottle, and dozens of metal hooks with 1 ¼” long screws sticking out of the back of each.
Yes this brilliant fellow, who claims to be a professional, has decided that it is a good idea to give a child a bag full of glass and sharp metal pointy bits to toss around. I have images of the boss’s daughter (who is in the play) impaling herself on his prop.

Please I really want to know how anybody could possible think that is a good idea. I don’t want to think that he is that dumb, but I just can’t imagine any reason why he should think that would bee a good thing.

Please Dopers step up to the challenge and explain this to me.

[fubbleskag]

now remember this bag is going to be slung over the shoulder of a child in front of a live audience

are we sure he was clear on this specific point? if he thought (for some reason) that the bag was just going to be shaken offstage as a sound effect, perhaps… (hence the burlap, to contain the glass if/when it breaks - but that then raises the question of who wants broken treasure?)

[Snowboarder_Bo]

Maybe he hates children? :dubious:

I know this guy. I’ve worked with him. He was prolly my boss at some production or some house I played at on the road or something. But I know him. I swear to Og I know him.

Theatre is a great field, but somehow we always have people like this around.

[Hal_Briston]

I know it doesn’t really answer the question that you posed, but perhaps a bag filled with metal washers would provide good sound quality with a much lower capacity for disaster?

[Miller]

That’s what you get when you hire Irwin Mainway to be your props guy.

[Ludy]

@fubbleskag

are we sure he was clear on this specific point? if he thought (for some reason) that the bag was just going to be shaken offstage as a sound effect, perhaps… (hence the burlap, to contain the glass if/when it breaks - but that then raises the question of who wants broken treasure?)

He watched a few of the rehearsals and saw what they wanted to do with it, so no dice

[Ludy]

@Hal Briston

I know it doesn’t really answer the question that you posed, but perhaps a bag filled with metal washers would provide good sound quality with a much lower capacity for disaster?

Yes, but I think he might have been thinking volume. The bag needed to look filled. The final solution was to get a sturdy plastic container fill it with random pieces of gack (a technical term ) secure the containor so it could not open, and surround it with foam so the bag looked full while being light enough for a child, and safe as well.

[spingears]

@Ludy

I hand him a burlap sack and tell him that it needs to be filled with things that will sound like treasure when the bag is rattled. He goes into the store room, and comes back claiming that he is done, what’s next. And the day goes on just lik
Yes this brilliant fellow, who claims to be a professional, has decided that it is a good idea to give a child a bag full of glass and sharp metal pointy bits to toss around. I have images of the boss’s daughter (who is in the play) impaling herself on his prop.
Please Dopers step up to the challenge and explain this to me.

Since you gave him the assignment tell him that the prop is not acceptable and why. Don’t quite know what the sack should contain. Maybe tin cans and such like. The sack will rattle and not be hazardous, light so a child could carry it.

[ivylass]

I think he probably filled it with things that would clink loud enough for the audience to know what was supposed to be in the sack. I don’t think he meant any harm.