Lingo: The Glossary

	Ellipsoidal: A large, cylindrical light that has a set of shutters which can be used to narrow or widen the beam of light emitted. You can also put gobos and gels in them. These are usually used for specials (like a window-shaped gobo or some shiny spinning hearts on the floor or a bright purple spotlight only used once in the whole show) and washes. They get their name from the reflector (the shiny bit behind the lamp that makes the good stuff happen), which is in the shape of an ellipse. A number of companies make ellipsoidal instruments, but the most popular one is the Source 4.
	Wash: When you've got the whole stage lit up, that's a wash. You can have a blue wash or a green wash or a red wash or whatever. The ideal wash leaves no shadowy spots. For the basic (white or neutral) wash, each area of the stage should be lit by two lights: a cool (blue) light from one side, and a warm (amber) light from the other side. Top light is also good. This both eliminates shadows and mixes colors to create a neutral wash. First rule of lighting: make sure there are no shadows, because actors are magnetically attracted to dark places. They WILL do their entire monologue in the dark if you don't yell at them when they leave the light.
	PARcans and Fresnels: There are only a few differences between PARcans and Fresnels, and I draw them the same way, so they get to share a spot. They're both small, as stage lights go--only about a foot tall. Their beams are weaker than an ellipsoidal's, and much fuzzier. The main difference between the two is the lens: a fresnel light has a fresnel lens, which has a series of radiating circular ridges in it that disperse heat. The PAR in PARcan stands for Parabolic Aluminized Reflector. That means that the shiny bit behind the lamp (light bulb) is aluminized and shaped like a parabola. You can gel both a PARcan and a fresnel, but neither can use a gobo.
	Gels: Gels are pretty simple. They're pieces of colorful, transparent plastic that you can put in a frame and slide into a slot in the front of a light to change the color of the beam. Nifty, eh? Except when the frame doesn't open far enough to get the gel all the way in and you have to bend it and then it doesn't hold the gel properly and then after a while they get really hot so it hurts like a bitch when you try to change them between dances and they're impossible to organize and they get all mixed up and then the dances look like crap and... yes. Gels are satan. My lighting teacher at the college hates all of us for calling them gels, because while they did used to be made of gel, they're now mylar. He prefers "color media" but that's too hard to say.
	Gobos: Gobos are like light stencils. You put them in front of your beam and they change the shape of the light. They're pieces of opaque material, usually metal, with holes cut into them. Holes in particular shapes. You can have a really simple gobo that makes the light shine in the shape of a window, or you can have a more complex one that'll put down leaf patterns if your scene takes place in a forest. You can even have the Batsignal if you want. (Seriously, coolest gobo ever. That was the most fun I ever had in Beginning Drama.) The other type of gobo is a painted glass gobo, which is exactly what it sounds like and is TOTALLY BADASS. Once we projected a neon green and purple brain onto a brick wall for Hedwig and the Angry Inch.
	Electrics, Dimmers and Channels: Okay, here's how it works. You plug the light into the CIRCUIT (the plug) which leads to the DIMMER. Circuits hang on ELECTRICS from the ceiling over the stage, run through the walls of the theater, or even the floors. DIMMERS are located in DIMMER RACKS somewhere convenient in the theater, and their purpose is to control the flow of electricity to the circuits. DIMMERS are PATCHED into CHANNELS in the light board. You can put as many dimmers as you want in one channel, but a dimmer can only be controlled by one channel. CHANNELS are controlled on the board with FADERS, which control individual channels, SUBMASTERS, which can be programmed to control multiple channels, and CUES, which are specifically programmed moments in a show utilizing a variety of different channels at different intensities. So the whole system, from start to finish, goes Lighting Instrument, Circuit, Dimmer, Patch, Channel, Submaster, Cue. Make sense? Good. (That's how I learned it in Basic Stage Lighting. I gave my lighting teacher that exact same blank, stupified look.)

	Mic: Short for microphone. A microphone sends signal to the board, then the amp, then the speakers to make your voice louder. The other one is a lavalier, or lav for short, and they're the little tiny ones that the actors hide in their hair (or cleavage. Don't look at me like that. It's a very convenient hiding place for all kinds of things.) when they don't want to be obvious about using a microphone.
	Masters: There are three types of sliders on the sound board. The first type is the kind you can plug individual sources (places sound comes from) like microphones and CD players into. The second type is the kind you can plug speakers and monitors into; these take the sound from the other stuff and send it out to the audience and the actors (so they know when their cue is coming up). The third kind are called Masters, and they control everything at once. If no sound is coming out of your system, make sure you don't have the master set to zero. (Light boards have masters too. And yes, I have made the aforementioned mistake. On both boards.)
	Level and Gain: These are two different things. The level is the volume of sound that the board sends out, and is controlled by masters. The gain is the amount of sound the board takes in from wherever you're putting sound in--CD player, microphone, whatever--and is usually controlled by a little turny knob dealy near the top of the board. Or, you know, wherever. All boards are different. We're not supposed to discriminate. You can control gain for each individual slider, just like you can control level for each one. (You can also control the individual wavelengths of a sound, generally separated into four categories: bass, baritone, tenor, and soprano. This allows you to make a squeaky person sound normal and a really deep voiced dude make the windows rattle.)
	XLR: XLR means Center, Left, and Right. An XLR cable is a cord with three holes in the female end and three 'pins' in the male end. (Hey, don't look at me like that, I didn't name the damn things.) XLR cables plug in most mics, and can also be used to plug your headset into the wall. The Sentient Sound Board attacks Gabe with XLR cables way back in comic number 15.
	Headset: A headset is a communication device consisting of a very large pair of headphones with only one phone, and a small box with a button on it that you can push to talk. (The reason there's only one earpiece is so you can also hear the terrified screaming of people within earshot of your actual ears.) They're used to communicate impending cues and disasters from light booth to sound booth to backstage. They're also used to make fun of the actors without them hearing you. (Muahahahaha.)

Flat: A flat is named after its shape. It is flat. It's a large frame of wood with canvas stretched over it that you can line up with other flats and paint to create a background. In Rich Gurney's first appearance, he's painting a bunny on a flat. Why, I have no idea, since they were doing Romeo and Juliet at the time, and there are no bunnies on the walls of the Capulet mansion. As far as I know, anyway. But whatever.

Tool Cage: The tool cage is where you lock up your expensive and theftable power tools when you go home at night. (Or in the morning, depending on how sadistic your stage manager is.) It's also a handy place to store hardware like nails and screws, and less valuable equipment like screwdrivers and such. Furthermore it's a good place to keep dangerous things like jigsaws that you don't want the actors getting their hands on. It can also be used to imprison any freakish monsters that might find their way into the theater.

	House: Simply put, this is where the audience sits. You know, with the chairs and stuff?
	Blocking: Blocking means movement. The first rehearsal after the read through during the run of any show will usually be the blocking rehearsal, in which the director tells the actors where to go at any given line. The actors must memorize their blocking as well as their lines, otherwise they forget where they're supposed to be, remember too late, and look like idiots rushing to their proper places at the wrong moment. Blocking is written in scripts using a series of acronyms denoting stage directions. Also used is the letter X, which means "cross", which means "walk across the stage". A typical blocking note might look something like this in the margin next to a particular line: "X2 Juliet" or "Walk over to Juliet".
	Stage Directions: Upstage is the furthest from the House, and Downstage is closest. (They used to tilt the stage towards the audience instead of the other way around, did you know that?) Center is, of course, in the middle, and right and left are from the perspective of the actors (or techies) facing the audience. Therefore, stage right is to the left, from the audience's point of view. These directions can be combined for more precision: upstage left, downstage right, right center. They're usually shortened to acronyms like UL, DR, and RC (respectively). Stage directions like these are used to tell the actors where to go during blockng rehearsals, and to tell the techies where to put furniture, set pieces, and spotlights.
	Costumes and Makeup: Presumably, you already know what costumes and makeup are. Makeup at least I'll talk about. Theatrical makeup is a scourge upon this earth, one that the average teenage girl will thankfully never know the true horrors of. First you have a foundation layer that hopefully matches your skin tone, and then you add highlights and shadows so that your face doesn't look flat onstage under crosslighting. The result is highly attractive from the House but hideously uncomfortable for the unfortunate actor. This isn't even taking into account other effects like wounds (once a buddy of mine did herself up with scrapes and bruises and conviced the whole school she had an abusive boyfriend) or old age.
	Props: Props are anything that the actors carry or hold. Some props can also be classified as costumes, like glasses or canes, but the general rule is that if you can't hang it on a hanger with the rest of the costumes on the costume rack in the dressing room, it's a prop. In every theater I've been in, props are arranged on a large table called, amazingly enough, the prop table. The prop table is covered with butcher paper so that outlines of the props can be drawn on it, so that it's easy to tell when a prop is missing. Examples of props are cigarettes, dishes, weapons, and papers. When I was in high school, my drama teacher made me find the props for the beginning students' little scenes because she didn't trust them in the prop closet, and invarably they all asked for flowers, weapons, tea sets, and telephones.