And for technical directors taking on more than one show at a time, the work can be draining. Beebe light designed “four or five” shows last semester, and she says that though she enjoyed each experience, it was simply too much for one person to handle.

“By the end of the semester, I was like, ‘I never want to set foot in a theater again,” she remembers.

Ma says that she’s still looking for people to fill run crew positions for her upcoming show—which opens tomorrow.

Building the System

The actual requirements under the new amendment haven’t yet been hashed out.

HRDC President Benjamin D. Margo ’04-’05, who is also a Crimson editor, says he wants requirements written before next fall’s Common Casting, the process by which HRDC shows are cast, so potential actors will know exactly what will be asked of them.

He says the writing process will be open to input from members of the campus theater community, by way of at least one more open meeting.

“In some sense this is an experiment,” Margo says, “but it’s our job to figure out fair and enforceable rules.”

Though the amendment passed at the meeting by a wide margin, fewer than 30 HRDC members attended, making it difficult to gauge more widespread opinion. But there are strong opinions on both sides.

Hasty Pudding Theatricals Vice President of Tech Mathew J. Ferrante ’05, who has also served in several technical roles in the Loeb, says he expects the new amendment to result in difficulties at first—but that it will eventually ease the demand for technical staff and give actors another perspective on what it takes to put together a show.

“I think it’ll be a very positive thing for the HRDC,” Ferrante says. “It’ll take pressure off of some of the people who usually do [technical work], but it’ll also make actors that much more vested in the shows they’re working on. They’ll say, ‘I made this show happen in more ways than just by being in it.’”

But the amendment has its naysayers as well.

At the meeting, some HRDC members said they were worried that increased demands on actors’ time would discourage them from participating in theater and might make the community seem too exclusive.

HRDC member Matthew J. Corriel ’05 says he’s concerned by the flexibility of the requirements, since they are not explicitly outlined in the constitution. Though he says he has great confidence in the integrity of the HRDC board, he worries that future boards might take advantage of this fluidity.