Theatre Design & Technology - Winter 2022 - 32

BOOK REVIEWS CATHERINE MANTOOTH, EDITOR
Working Backstage: A Cultural History
and Ethnography of Technical Theater
Labor
By Christin Essin
University of Michigan Press, 2021, 273
pages
Hardcover, $80; Paperback, $34.95; eBook,
$33.20
Reviewed by Anne Fletcher
Working Backstage: A Cultural History
and Ethnography of Technical Theatre
focuses on the essential labor of contemporary
backstage workers, their unions,
their histories, their identities, and their
pride in bringing live theatre to the stage
with precision and continuity. Christin Essin
historicizes, contextualizes, theorizes,
personalizes, and advocates for these laboring
backstage workers. Drawing on
archival sources and backstage observations,
as well as more than 125 interviews
with theatre technicians, she centralizes
these under-examined professionals
whose silent and unseen skills beat as the
heart of theatrical production. One of Essin's
major goals-and she succeeds-is
to correct the erasure of backstage labor
from U.S. theatre history.
Apart from the essays in Elizabeth
A. Osborne and Christine Woodworth's
2015 Working in the Wings: New Perceptions
of Theatre History and Labor
and Timothy R. White's 2016 Blue Collar
Broadway: The Craft and Industry of
American Theater, few such investigations
exist. It is worth noting that David
Bisaha's forthcoming American Scenic
Design and Freelance Professionalism-
a manuscript that I have read-promises
to dovetail nicely with Essin's work. Essin
and Bisaha represent the current generation
of U.S. theatre historians writing
on the history of design and technology
whose projects seamlessly incorporate issues
of gender, race, class, labor, and theory
with intentionality and coupled with
first-rate archival research in ways that
eluded previous generations of scholars.
There remains tension between
notions of theatre " craft " and " art. " In
confronting this dichotomy through rich
description of moments in production,
Essin illuminates the artistry of skilled
theatre technicians and meets another
of her stated objectives: to " challenge or
dispense with artist/craftsperson binary
designations intended to sustain established
hierarchies. " Throughout the book,
the author endeavors to " make visible
the collective labor necessary [...] and the
combined strength of those who move
scenery and those who stand in front of
it, between those who wear costumes and
those who clean them [...], emphasizing
their mutual professional goals, economic
investments, and political interests. "
Organized thematically and divided
into three parts (Backstage Narratives,
Backstage Histories, and Backstage Dramaturgies),
Working Backstage includes
four chapters and three essays. For layperson,
labor
historian
(even theatre
historian), or general reader, Essin creates
and reinforces an informal lexicon
of backstage terminology and commonly
used acronyms, abbreviations, and slang.
Chapter one offers foundational information
as Essin explores and explains
the spectrum of work opportunities for
theatre technicians, setting the stage
for the forthcoming narrative. The three
chapters in the Backstage Histories section
provide background on IATSE Local
One, ranging from a nod to the union's
website to a deep dive into its archives
(chapter two), as well as analysis of press
bias toward the union(s) in chapter three.
In chapter four, Essin combines archival
research with ethnography in the
form of interviews to reconstruct and
32 | THEATRE DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY | WINTER 2022
interpret backstage labor on the Broadway
productions A Chorus Line, Newsies,
and Matilda. A Chorus Line reminds
readers of the debut of the computerized
light board, and this section includes an
exquisite description of the carefully cued
choreography of the production's follow
spots, executed by New York's most respected
spot ops. Newsies illustrates how
technology can mirror dramatic form and
content, and Matilda reveals the backstage
rigor of laboring child guardians,
who fought for union membership. Essin
consistently addresses underrepresented
segments of the theatre community of
practice, here emphasizing how language
can be gendered even within the field
(e.g., " child wrangler " ) and how essential
labor is frequently feminized. These micro-histories
give life and heart to Essin's
backstage story.
The book's final section, Backstage
Dramaturgies, is presented as three essays
in which Essin addresses metatheatrical
texts: the 55-minute film Sing Faster
(backstage at the San Francisco Opera's
Ring Cycle) and " Focus Tape " created
by the interns at Santa Fe Opera; The
Dresser and Billy Hipkins' one-man show
The Also Ran; Anne Washburn's 10 out
of 12 (reference to the Equity mandate
that actors work 10 out of 12 hours in a
single call); and Theresa Rebeck's Berhardt/Hamlet.
Already imbued with thick,
evocative description and insight, the first
essay is enhanced when coupled with
viewing the referenced films. The second
essay fully examines gender bias toward
wardrobe crews and uses Hipkins' move
from actor to dresser as a case study. The
third essay emphasizes ensemble work
and the interrelationship between those
working backstage and those onstage.
No doubt Essin's early work as a
lighting technician and her personality
helped her gain the trust of the interviewees
who participated in the project.
A notable theatre historian with 20-plus
years of experience analyzing historical
and contemporary stage design and technology,
Essin was perfectly positioned to
write backstage labor into U.S. theatre
history and offer a valuable guide for sub
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