confessions of a ren fair actor
I was reading a thread where folks were complaining about their local ren fairs and many of the comments were about how the day wasn't long enough or the cast were not historical enough and the like and I realized that most patrons have no idea what a cast member deals with.
Now I performed with the Colorado ren fair from 1998-2005 so things may have changed a little but here is a glimpse at some of the things we deal with.
9am- morning meeting, must be dressed ready to go
9:45 or 10ish- out in front of the gate handing out programs and working the crowd
11- cannon goes off, help with crowd control
11:10 line up with court to head to the royal area (long uphill walk, interacting, waving the whole way)
11:15 first "break" try to get some water and sit if there is any sitting available (one of the cast use to haul water every morning to our area as there was none available to us, the last couple of years I worked there management started to provide a water barrel in the morning)
11:20 ladies head off to the joust
11:30 stand in Sun watch joust pretending we have never seen the show before (in truth the jousters are amazingly talented but they are contracted to give the show the management wants and while they sometimes get a little wiggle room often they are stuck giving the same show)
12 start heading back to the royal area, "shopping" the whole way there (now shopping is when the court moves from shop to shop ohhhing and ahhing the goods inside careful not to block the entrance trying to encourage the patrons to go inside and buy things, we do this every day of fair and every shop must be visited by the royals every day
1ish meet up with the men, split up in little groups to get lunch, since we have no where to store our own food this means we most often buy our food at the vendors, full price. And don't think about sneaking into the back to eat, you need to eat and be available to interact with the public. Also this is the time to try to fit in a bathroom break, so expect to wait in line and interact with the folks waiting with you
1:45 meet for parade, desperately try to drink water, find some shade and sit while you can.
2 death March, this is what we call the parade, it's killer, stop and go uphill until the one very steep down hill bit at the end where you just know you are going to slip...
2:45 hopefully the parade is done, get water, sit, go to the bathroom, get lunch if you haven't already
3 full court goes to joust, again standing in the sun, very crowded as the stairs are not big enough to fit everyone let alone adding the sizes of the hoop skirts. Pretend you have never seen the show before
3:45 head back to royal area shopping the whole way, once there find out if you need to be at one of the stages for a promo (which you will not have a script for and are lucky if you knew about it before now) if there is no promo groups will go shopping while others will stay behind because folks will want to take pictures, interact and be knighted (this is also when the drunks come out to play so you are a little paranoid as someone is going to try something, from trying to get too friendly ,to spilling a beer on the costume, to possibly wanting to attack the actor who is the king)
4:30 regroup and head to the joust
5 joust
5:45 book it to the front gate, good bye stuff, singing, dancing maybe a skit
6 cannon, start heading to backstage area for check out, but you must stay in the public areas interacting as you go
7 check out
That's a pretty normal day, add high heat or rain and it can really take it out of you.
The court are not allowed to ask for or take tips and the average person on court gets paid about 300$ total so you figure working 9am to 7pm is 10 hours, for 8 weekends (cause you don't get paid for the rehearsals you have to go to) and you are making $1.87 an hour
Most of the court provide their own costumes many costing $100+ expect to spend at least 20$ a day on food. Then you also need to figure gas to and from fair.
Now I performed with the Colorado ren fair from 1998-2005 so things may have changed a little but here is a glimpse at some of the things we deal with.
9am- morning meeting, must be dressed ready to go
9:45 or 10ish- out in front of the gate handing out programs and working the crowd
11- cannon goes off, help with crowd control
11:10 line up with court to head to the royal area (long uphill walk, interacting, waving the whole way)
11:15 first "break" try to get some water and sit if there is any sitting available (one of the cast use to haul water every morning to our area as there was none available to us, the last couple of years I worked there management started to provide a water barrel in the morning)
11:20 ladies head off to the joust
11:30 stand in Sun watch joust pretending we have never seen the show before (in truth the jousters are amazingly talented but they are contracted to give the show the management wants and while they sometimes get a little wiggle room often they are stuck giving the same show)
12 start heading back to the royal area, "shopping" the whole way there (now shopping is when the court moves from shop to shop ohhhing and ahhing the goods inside careful not to block the entrance trying to encourage the patrons to go inside and buy things, we do this every day of fair and every shop must be visited by the royals every day
1ish meet up with the men, split up in little groups to get lunch, since we have no where to store our own food this means we most often buy our food at the vendors, full price. And don't think about sneaking into the back to eat, you need to eat and be available to interact with the public. Also this is the time to try to fit in a bathroom break, so expect to wait in line and interact with the folks waiting with you
1:45 meet for parade, desperately try to drink water, find some shade and sit while you can.
2 death March, this is what we call the parade, it's killer, stop and go uphill until the one very steep down hill bit at the end where you just know you are going to slip...
2:45 hopefully the parade is done, get water, sit, go to the bathroom, get lunch if you haven't already
3 full court goes to joust, again standing in the sun, very crowded as the stairs are not big enough to fit everyone let alone adding the sizes of the hoop skirts. Pretend you have never seen the show before
3:45 head back to royal area shopping the whole way, once there find out if you need to be at one of the stages for a promo (which you will not have a script for and are lucky if you knew about it before now) if there is no promo groups will go shopping while others will stay behind because folks will want to take pictures, interact and be knighted (this is also when the drunks come out to play so you are a little paranoid as someone is going to try something, from trying to get too friendly ,to spilling a beer on the costume, to possibly wanting to attack the actor who is the king)
4:30 regroup and head to the joust
5 joust
5:45 book it to the front gate, good bye stuff, singing, dancing maybe a skit
6 cannon, start heading to backstage area for check out, but you must stay in the public areas interacting as you go
7 check out
That's a pretty normal day, add high heat or rain and it can really take it out of you.
The court are not allowed to ask for or take tips and the average person on court gets paid about 300$ total so you figure working 9am to 7pm is 10 hours, for 8 weekends (cause you don't get paid for the rehearsals you have to go to) and you are making $1.87 an hour
Most of the court provide their own costumes many costing $100+ expect to spend at least 20$ a day on food. Then you also need to figure gas to and from fair.