Author Archives: Margaret Admire

Mopping a Theatre Floor

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Santa Fe, New Mexico
Performance Date: April 29th, 2013
Primary Language: English

“Mopping the floor after every strike is supposed to symbolize the completion of a show and the allowance of another one to be built on the same place. That and it makes everything all shiny and such.”

This cleansing ritual is used as a transition between shows performed in the same theatre. In my high school, the honor was only performed by seniors, but in the informant’s theatre it is open to anyone and everyone who wants to help ease the transition between shows and mark the liminal phase. It probably started out of the necessity of cleanliness, and stuck around as a transition  ritual.

Ghost Lamp Superstition

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Santa Fe, New Mexico
Performance Date: April 28th, 2013
Primary Language: French

“Second, we have, much like most theatres, a ghost lamp that stays on at all times. The original purpose of a ghost lamp was to protect any from gas leaks that may have occurred throughout the night by igniting it before a stagehand had a chance to get in the building and do it in the morning (It destroyed the theatre, but no one was in it at least). Now, we just use it as a superstitious way of keeping things well within the theatre when everyone’s away.”

This superstition apparently is in practice at many theatres, as two other friends also mentioned it during their interviews. they, however, were less eloquent in their descriptions, but basically said it’s a light left on the stage  that used to be for safety and is now just superstition. In my questioning, no one was able to explain why it’s called the “ghost” lamp, since no ghost seems to be involved. Perhaps it is supposed to be a light for the ghosts in the theatre?

 

Theatre Energy Circle

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Santa Fe, New Mexico
Performance Date: April 28th, 2013
Primary Language: English

“Before every show, we do an “energy circle” where we start by joining hands and sending a pulse around. Then when we feel everyone is ready, someone starts a hum that we all join in on. It builds until we all open our mouths to a yell and basically let all our energy explode vocally. The purpose is to center the energy as a group instead of just individually.”

Collected from a freshman Theatre student at Santa Fe University of Art and Design. She said the students there have lots of rituals passed on to freshmen during their first year, and no one knows how they started, they just do them to make the shows better. In my experience, theatre students are very superstitious about what preparations will create a good show or not.

Crazy Peacock Guy

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: USC Student
Residence: Palos Verdes, California
Performance Date: April 29th, 2013
Primary Language: English
  1. “This story was definitely changed by children trying to make it scary… There was a guy who lived a few houses down from my friend. In Palos Verdes we have a lot of peacocks; that’s like our animal, the peacock. She had heard that he would kidnap the peacocks and place them in cages in his house and that he was arrested for doing so. He was definitely arrested for something, but I don’t know if that was real.  He like was crazy.”
  2. A local legend which circulated among children in Palos Verdes, California, in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. The man certainly existed, but whether or not he kept illegal pet peacocks and was crazy is questionable.

Lamb Cake

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: USC Student
Residence: Palos Verdes, California
Performance Date: April 29th, 2013
Primary Language: English
  1. “For Easter my mom has to make a lamb cake every year because it’s what my Grandma wants her to do. It’s a tradition that the Monge women have to make a lamb cake every Easter and it’s one of those things you have to do cuz your mother-in-law makes you do it and it’s the ugliest thing ever and my mom agrees but she still does it… I won’t have to do it because I’ll have a different married name. It’s only if you marry into the family.”
  2. This is an example of a tradition solely because it’s a  tradition, while disliked by those who participate. Apparently no one in my friend’s family enjoys the lamb cake, but the grandmother bullies her daughter-in-law into making it every year because it’s a their traditional cultural foodway for Easter. It probably has something to do with Jesus Christ being known as the “lamb of God” or the sacrifice that saved humanity from sin. It also might have to do with fertility.