A word to the wise

How fun is this?

So the halls are still a bit quiet, but the ball is starting to gain speed as it rolls downhill. We now have a number of new writers signing up, so the winter magazine will be full of great stuff. It’ll now fall to those of us who are coming in to start the editiorial guts for the Burlap.

I’ll be posting every few days with commentary on the state of being a regular rennie: more than a newbie, but keeping my head down well below the bustle of the management hullabaloo. A former member of St. Andrews, and later of St. Giles, and then largely independant since school took me away from being able to attend regularly, I still try to keep an ear to the ground and enjoy those times that I make it out to the faires.

My first real post will come after Golden Gate, and then we’ll get down to it.

Pittsburg Faire Review

Well, it was something to be sure. Overall it was a very pleasent weekend. The numbers of “patrons” (which has to be used as a loose term somewhat since it’s a free faire with no gate pricing) were up over last year, and the reports from the vendors seemed to indicate that their sales were up (ranging from nominal to significant). So from those aspects it would have to be reported as a success.

The weather was nice for the time of year, often it’s in the mid to upper 90s, and this time it was a good ten degrees cooler than that along with a steady breeze (sometimes becoming a strong wind, but no damage). It was the first time that Renaissance Productions managed the event and we discovered that it was going to be a bit of a challenge. We’d gone into the event with the understanding that it was the City’s faire, and that we were there to deal with the vendors, guilds, layout, scheduling, and the northwinds aspects of security. However the city was never responsive to emails or phone calls, and actually sitting face to face in meetings prior to the event turned out to be as difficult (or worse) than the former producer had indicated.

We recalled that there’d been issues in the past (police refusing to deal with some situations), but had hoped that new police on the ground would help. Well, not so much. There was an incident with shoplifting children and their mother who worked the site for the day - and when they were finally cought, they were sent on their way. The PD sitting in the bar most of the day (drinking but at least not to excess or inebriated), and kicking back with the other city folks.

The worst element about it was that the groups and vendors look to the production team to give them a safe environment, and the confidence that when things do happen that they can rely that steps will be taken to keep them from happening again. When the PD and city ties our hands so we can’t do almost anything - then there’s a problem of our own reputations going on the line.

How it will all pan out going forward will remain to be seen, but for now, we just finish up the end of event reports and pass them along. I think new ideas and directions are what the faire needs, but I’m not sure that the city is one to want to take the steps nessicary to make it a real success.

St. Andrews has continued to make very good strides towards becoming not the shadow of it’s former glory, but every bit on par for anything it was in the past. From a shaky management reorginization after Ted’s departure a few years ago, to a very healthy court and it’s 4 or so sub-groups within it, they’re someone I think we’re feeling more and more comfortable at using in about any capacity. They do still need to get a better sense of utilization of space and optimizing how they set up those various groups when pitching their encampment, but that’ll come with time.

The battle was…. ok. It has a lot of decent elements, however there’s not been someone to bring all the groups together the way I might have hoped. RB is a good staging of their own battles, and a grand talking head, but doesn’t work as well at getting diverse groups to really fit together to their best combinations. And they’re still hung up a bit much around who’s on what side. They need to learn a bit more that it really doesn’t matter for that 30 minutes or so. The audience is watching the fight, they’re really not keeping track of which clans or individuals are fighting against which side.

Under two weeks now till Golden Gate faire, and I fear that my hope to attend Gig Harbor faire this upcoming weekend will also have to be squashed in favor of playing catchup.

The problems with family…

Faire loves to think of itself as one big extended family, which is a lovely concept and is generally true, but is also one of the Achilies Heel’s in the production of events.

At it’s core faire is also a business, or at the least it’s a form of theater in the round. In both cases you always want to try to cast and use those folks who bring what’s best to the show. But what happens when it becomes painfully evident that a group, person, or business just isn’t cutting it anymore? It could be from their quality having dropped over time, or that other elements of the show has come so far that they pale in comparison.

It’s then that the Family aspect becomes a problem as too often people are kept around or in cast positions because they’ve been doing it forever. But what does that serve in the end? The delicate ego of the person in question, the feeling that if you tell them no they’ll think you’ve turned your back on them and are no longer their friend?

Or a business that has done it’s best, but they have been passed in quality and ability to keep up by other vendors. Where is that line that’s crossed when a mom and pop store just isn’t up to par with the others that are in the competition for the same space?

People need to come to terms with the price that is demanded when you mix friendship and business. The two can be mixed, and occasionally successfully, but not always. It’s when a person falls back on their friendship with another to keep the business side going, then bad things are invariably going to happen.

There’s a case in point at the moment with a cast member of faire who’s well liked, and does a nice enough show, but at this point in many faires, their shtick just doesn’t work out - it doesn’t work in a large venue stage, and faires have few opportunities for small intimate acts for the most part. And so the realization that the audience just doesn’t get into their show as much as they once did is unfortunate, but it’s also a reality. Now comes the time where it’s becoming harder and harder to cost-justify having them, but it’s a personal anguish in telling them that, I’m sorry, but we just don’t need you (at many events). The same happened a few years ago with the Jousting Goats show, their irregularity in performence quality, and upward expectations of pricing of their show caused them to be dropped off the map.

If I had my druthers I’d wish that everyone could leave friendships at the door whenever it came to having business decisions, but we’re seeing more and more the strains of people not being able to do that and it’s causing cracks in the plaster.

The story thus far…

So the season is a bit more than halfway over and we’ve already had Visalia, Valhalla, Fair Oaks, SLO, Willits, and Pittsburg - and now we’re into the tail stretch with Golden Gate, Jousting Championships, Shasta, Folsom, and Ione.

 The year hasn’t been a bad one, especially with the completely awful weather we saw in 2006. The first quarter of the season being up to armpits in wet and mud, and then then next half of the year in extreme heat. Which capped by the ‘Stupid Hot’ temperatures of Fair Oaks that season - when the weathermen on TV are telling people that they shouldn’t stay outdoors any longer than is absolutely nessicary, then it’s by all means time to give it a rest rather than climbing into heavy clothes and running around in 114 degree heat.

Every year it’s something new and different, and here we are in the halfway point and trying to mull if we’ll make it all the way through.