Designing theater sets a change of scenery for ex-engineering major

Originally published Saturday, July 25, 1998

By JON HAHN  
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNIST

In the theater world, no one steals a scene from Chuck Schultz -- because he's the guy who builds the scene and bolts it to the floor and walls.

We can sit in the comfortable confines of the Taproot Theatre in Greenwood and be miles away on a baronial country estate, thanks to the crafty skills of Schultz, the 29-year-old technical director of the resident company.

It was Schultz, after all, who built the massive stone fireplace of carved Styrofoam glued on plywood and who designed and set into place the 20-foot-high massive beams for the company's recent showing of "Busman's Honeymoon," a Lord Peter Wimsey mystery. The dawns and twilights of the English countryside filter into the great room through an exquisite stained glass window built by Schultz.

In this world of illusion, the man with the variable-speed driver drill and pneumatic nail driver is the principal chef, operating at times from a sketchy description of scenes and trying to bring it all together -- and apart again, for scene changes. And all within budget.

"We have an account with the local lumberyard, and we try to keep as many flats as we can store," he said, nodding toward one side of the not-big-enough workshop that is his domain. Not one tiddlywinks pitch behind Lord Wimsey's phony fireplace are Schultz's table saw and work tables on which the fireplace was built.

Chuck Schultz, 6-foot-4, bearded and athletically trim, came into the theater world through the back door and stayed behind the scenes. "I was an electrical engineering major and looking for a part-time job on campus at Seattle Pacific (University) when I found a production-assistant job. I think it paid $4.25 an hour," he said. "The first day, they showed me how to wire extension cords."

He had some familiarity with tools ("I helped my dad build a house") but learning theatrical scene construction was a real challenge: building something that looks like it will last forever, but can be torn apart next week to become part of something else. And always on a tight time schedule. Schultz cannot remember quite how he managed to slice open his thumb on a university table saw while building a set.

Next scene opens with Schultz, changing majors to theater and drama and taking courses ranging from acting and directing to the literature. "But I took as many technical electives as I could, and I landed a summer internship with Intiman." By that point, he felt destined to be behind the footlights . . . far, far behind, but never far away.

It's not all done with clarinet reeds and Scotch tape. Some of the sets he's built involve 30-foot cornices at the top of a 20-foot wall. And many of the productions involve multiple scene changes which, in turn, might require turntables. And sometimes the turntables don't function properly and have to be helped along and readjusted.

Once something is built, someone else comes along to paint or stain it and it's "almost always all together by opening night." Of course, that's after a couple of preview performances, where stage platform facings get kicked off or things come loose.

Never once has he actually had to stand in for a missing actor, "although there was one time things got pretty close," he recalled. He is most comfortable behind the scenes.

And once a production is up and running, there's precious little time to relax ("I usually will be here in my office or shop during the technical rehearsals, to be around, just in case.") before he begins mentally building the next production's sets.

"Five a year, plus an extra for the Christmas holidays, and some incidentals such as recitals or readings. I will do drawings, as needed, but mostly I build out of my head."

Some sets must go up and come down quickly for scene changes. Some are all appearance; some must hold up under the repeated jumps and bounds of actors. Sets that are both glued and fastened together are pretty well lost for salvage potential.

"We needed a Hide-a-bed for 'Lost In Yonkers' and we found a really ugly one over at Thriftko (a local thrift store) for $20 and I just re-covered it with new fabric . . . didn't even bother taking the old fabric off," he said.

But it all comes together and looks just right for just long enough. "And it all comes down a whole lot faster than it goes up!" Schultz noted.

He's already at work on the next production's set, but there's a larger role just off stage. He's enrolled in a three-year graduate program in technical design and production at Yale University, leading to a master of fine arts degree.

Which is a long, long way from Greenwood and the Taproot Theatre. But the whole world's a stage, and there are only different sets. Chuck Schultz's life in the theater will be pretty much the way he designs and builds it.

Jon Hahn is a staff columnist who writes three times a week in the P-I.