Stanislavsky data center: how DataLine corporate theater works
You know, here from Sunday they promise spring at last, and so lyrically at heart, that they have decided to offtop: tell about the DataLine Theater. We are not only valuable data centers and clouds, we also have a small serf theater.
Some are shocked. One of the clients, having received an invitation to the premiere, forwarded it to his account manager with the question “Have you broken your mail server?”. That's when we invite to poker, no one asks for some reason again ...
The DataLine Theater is already 8 years old. It arose as an internal, very “home” story for its own - and almost immediately became the main annual PR event of the company. Here it would be nice to wrap up a successful synthesis of internal and external communications, but I want to say something else: The DataLine Theater is our “where the heart is”. Perhaps, therefore, the synthesis was set.
')
The 7th premiere of DataLine Theater - “The Cherry Orchard”, 2016.
The real ones in our theater are the director, the choreographer, the sets, the costumes and the stage - and we play ourselves, from engineers to general. None of us finished (and did not start) either Pike or GITIS, but, as our (real) director says, “the main thing in the theater is a living person on the stage”. Here we are trying to be alive, and just work a lot on each story and each character.
We put one performance per year, we play it first for colleagues and friends, and then for partners and customers. The last, “Cherry Orchard”, was played already three times: our favorite playground, even the hall for 450 people, no longer accommodates all the guests.
By the way, for those who love numbers: our first performance was watched by about 200 people, the last one is more than 1200. We are growing.
Preparation of each performance takes a little more than six months.
We choose the play in the spring (I just decided on the repertoire for this year), the troupe of the previous season takes part in the discussion. The task is to find a story that will both inspire us and the director at the same time, because real theater is possible only for love :). For 8 years, we re-read and discussed several dozen plays, “snacking” on the most varied authors from Moliere to Antonpalych, and put something in the “our all” category for future anniversaries.
We had, however, such a case: we chose the “Inspector”, assigned roles, began to rehearse, and even received the first sketches of scenery, when they suddenly realized that it hadn’t even gone. That is, the director has gone, but we are not. At first they were confused, after all, the author is a genius, and the canonical play, and the sketches here, and time is running out ... But the soul does not lie.
Well, we gathered with the spirit, gathered with the director, discussed, cried at each other's shoulders - and unexpectedly put “Cherry Orchard” for themselves.
If everything goes according to the scenario, then in April, having decided on the play, we launch a nationwide casting for the company. Listening lasts a couple of weeks, and somewhere by May the director finally assigns roles, in the process finding new friendsand enemies in the company.
In parallel, work begins on the sketches of scenery and costumes. Ah, this time blessed for the director, when dreams have not yet broken on the budget: here we will have a record player with a record in the whole scene, there is a podium going into the auditorium, and here a couple of fountains ...
Rehearsals start in May. We rehearse in the meeting room or in the office kitchen, so that, closer to the machine and at no extra cost. We start with a couple of meetings a week, in June we move to three or four, and since September, rehearsals take place almost daily (well, except for weekends). Each rehearsal lasts from one and a half to two hours. The load turns out decent, after all, and no one has canceled the work, but, as they say, the hunt more than bondage.
In August, multiple dressing and dance lessons are added to the rehearsals. Along the way, the performance begins to overgrow with scenery and props (the soundtrack from the movie “Requiem for a Dream” sounds especially for the director). The work on the characters and the stage scenes does not stop until the premiere, as well as the attempts of honored actors of the scene to finally learn the text.
The repitational base for "Zoykina apartment" in one of the negotiations.
I put on all the best at once: fitting suits to the “Zoykina apartment”.
From about September, the participants in the troupe begin to talk with quotations from the play at working meetings and in business correspondence. Then November comes suddenly, the director begins to twitch an eye - and now the general run on the stage, and after a couple of days the premiere.
Antopalych and I thought here ... In general, the text of the role looks closer to the premiere.
In general, we are modern people, devoid of prejudice, so around the premiere we have a couple of sacred rituals.
In the morning, we meet in a reserved coffee-house, nervously joking about lack of sleep and soufflers, and, after half an hour, we go for a technical run and make-up. And just before going on stage, we roll “popiiysat” and, holding hands, publish a battle cry, designed to convince ourselves that right now we are not afraid, and even fun at all.
In the interval between these compulsory procedures - the technical run of the performance itself with the adjustment of light and sound, the arrangement of scenery and other organizing measures.
There is a separate story with sound: none of us are trained in stage speech (this is when even the quivering whisper is heard on the last row), therefore we are performing in buttonholes. But we rarely speak, there are no habits for handling the device, but there is a distinct risk that someone will forget to turn on the microphone when entering the stage or, worse, forget to turn it off, going backstage. In this case, we have specially trained people whose task is to frantically wave their hands from behind the scenes, reminding the actors about the incl. and off
The scenery is mounted on the day of the premiere. Sometimes some important details come to the site an hour before the performance, and they still need to be installed correctly. So, in front of “Zoykina’s apartment” a garland of Chinese lanterns was collected by the entire male cast with reinforcements from the engineers of the data center operations department.
The technical run is a good thing, but, as they say, the theater magic has not been canceled yet. In “The Cherry Orchard,” for example, there is a scene in which the maid Dunyasha with a fright drops and breaks a porcelain saucer. So, this damn saucer regularly scattered into pieces on all general and technical runs, but it did not break on any of the three performances. They wrote it off on the mystical “obratka” from Nikolai Vasilyevich for the “Inspector” thrown halfway
After the technical run comes the turn of the makeup. Mustaches, wigs, curls, the exchange of compliments in the spirit of "and why are you always in these tanks do not go," that's all.
An hour before the performance, the actors disperse behind the scenes to repeat the text and tune in to the wave. Everybody has his own method here: someone valandes on the stage, physically getting used to the site, someone turns on a “thematic” playlist, someone strokes his shirt for the hundredth time, while a number of art companions perform a series of “entourage” selfies, someone is sitting on the phone to the last, settling working questions, despite the director's pleas to put things off until tomorrow and focus on the role.
“Theater is this temple. Be holy or get out. ” The last instructions of the director before the premiere of “Night of mistakes”, 2014
To hell! “Zoykina apartment”, 2015.
The third call. According to tradition, the general takes the blow upon himself and first goes to greet the guests and tell them how we will surprise today.
Actors on dispositions. The curtain is about to open.
Go!
“Lies on long legs”, 2013.
“Night of mistakes”, 2014.
"Zoykina apartment", 2015.
"Zoykina apartment", 2015.
"The Cherry Orchard", 2016.
Behind the scenes, the movement is not less than on the stage.
In October 2010, when we were just about to conquer the world, the general director and the director of personnel discussed the options for the New Year party. We didn’t want to lead people to the pub or bowling, because it was beaten and without any ideas. “Why not put on a performance?” Suggested the general. Or director of HR. In general, the first one dawned on, the versions differ, so let's stop at reconciling great minds think alike.
A few days later they found the director, chose one of her finished (worked out to the point of) plays, gathered everyone, assigned roles - and rushed. This first performance, “The Doctor Involuntarily”, was staged a month and a half. Everyone, of course, burned a little bit in hell, and at the premiere there was a couple of reservations in the spirit of “He fell ill, that is, he died,” but the success of colleagues and friends was such that they decided to invite the customers and partners to the next production ... In this regard, the preparation of the second performance started already in September, and marketing was involved in the whole process.
The very first premiere of the DataLine Theater - “The Doctor Involuntarily”, 2010.
After the third season, DataLine Theater finally migrated from HR to marketing, we had a new - partly ingenious - director, and in general we somehow decided for ourselves to do not just a home theater, but a really good theater.
In practice, this inevitably led to an easy conflict between the internal task of the Theater - to rally everyone around the beautiful, and the external - to create a quality, sorry for the expression, product that not only our mothers can watch for two hours in a row. We honestly tried to combine business with pleasure, but still had to choose - and we chose quality.
This made the Theater, in general, a niche history within the company, but allowed us to “grow” to Bulgakov and Chekhov - and create performances that are expected and told to friends and acquaintances.
Cherry Orchard, 2016
The entire video archive of our theater is carefully stored on the Youtube channel .
Some are shocked. One of the clients, having received an invitation to the premiere, forwarded it to his account manager with the question “Have you broken your mail server?”. That's when we invite to poker, no one asks for some reason again ...
The DataLine Theater is already 8 years old. It arose as an internal, very “home” story for its own - and almost immediately became the main annual PR event of the company. Here it would be nice to wrap up a successful synthesis of internal and external communications, but I want to say something else: The DataLine Theater is our “where the heart is”. Perhaps, therefore, the synthesis was set.
')
The 7th premiere of DataLine Theater - “The Cherry Orchard”, 2016.
How does it work
The real ones in our theater are the director, the choreographer, the sets, the costumes and the stage - and we play ourselves, from engineers to general. None of us finished (and did not start) either Pike or GITIS, but, as our (real) director says, “the main thing in the theater is a living person on the stage”. Here we are trying to be alive, and just work a lot on each story and each character.
We put one performance per year, we play it first for colleagues and friends, and then for partners and customers. The last, “Cherry Orchard”, was played already three times: our favorite playground, even the hall for 450 people, no longer accommodates all the guests.
By the way, for those who love numbers: our first performance was watched by about 200 people, the last one is more than 1200. We are growing.
Preparation of each performance takes a little more than six months.
Choosing a play
We choose the play in the spring (I just decided on the repertoire for this year), the troupe of the previous season takes part in the discussion. The task is to find a story that will both inspire us and the director at the same time, because real theater is possible only for love :). For 8 years, we re-read and discussed several dozen plays, “snacking” on the most varied authors from Moliere to Antonpalych, and put something in the “our all” category for future anniversaries.
We had, however, such a case: we chose the “Inspector”, assigned roles, began to rehearse, and even received the first sketches of scenery, when they suddenly realized that it hadn’t even gone. That is, the director has gone, but we are not. At first they were confused, after all, the author is a genius, and the canonical play, and the sketches here, and time is running out ... But the soul does not lie.
Well, we gathered with the spirit, gathered with the director, discussed, cried at each other's shoulders - and unexpectedly put “Cherry Orchard” for themselves.
Distribution of roles
If everything goes according to the scenario, then in April, having decided on the play, we launch a nationwide casting for the company. Listening lasts a couple of weeks, and somewhere by May the director finally assigns roles, in the process finding new friends
In parallel, work begins on the sketches of scenery and costumes. Ah, this time blessed for the director, when dreams have not yet broken on the budget: here we will have a record player with a record in the whole scene, there is a podium going into the auditorium, and here a couple of fountains ...
Rehearsal
Rehearsals start in May. We rehearse in the meeting room or in the office kitchen, so that, closer to the machine and at no extra cost. We start with a couple of meetings a week, in June we move to three or four, and since September, rehearsals take place almost daily (well, except for weekends). Each rehearsal lasts from one and a half to two hours. The load turns out decent, after all, and no one has canceled the work, but, as they say, the hunt more than bondage.
In August, multiple dressing and dance lessons are added to the rehearsals. Along the way, the performance begins to overgrow with scenery and props (the soundtrack from the movie “Requiem for a Dream” sounds especially for the director). The work on the characters and the stage scenes does not stop until the premiere, as well as the attempts of honored actors of the scene to finally learn the text.
The repitational base for "Zoykina apartment" in one of the negotiations.
I put on all the best at once: fitting suits to the “Zoykina apartment”.
From about September, the participants in the troupe begin to talk with quotations from the play at working meetings and in business correspondence. Then November comes suddenly, the director begins to twitch an eye - and now the general run on the stage, and after a couple of days the premiere.
Antopalych and I thought here ... In general, the text of the role looks closer to the premiere.
Premiere
In general, we are modern people, devoid of prejudice, so around the premiere we have a couple of sacred rituals.
In the morning, we meet in a reserved coffee-house, nervously joking about lack of sleep and soufflers, and, after half an hour, we go for a technical run and make-up. And just before going on stage, we roll “popiiysat” and, holding hands, publish a battle cry, designed to convince ourselves that right now we are not afraid, and even fun at all.
In the interval between these compulsory procedures - the technical run of the performance itself with the adjustment of light and sound, the arrangement of scenery and other organizing measures.
There is a separate story with sound: none of us are trained in stage speech (this is when even the quivering whisper is heard on the last row), therefore we are performing in buttonholes. But we rarely speak, there are no habits for handling the device, but there is a distinct risk that someone will forget to turn on the microphone when entering the stage or, worse, forget to turn it off, going backstage. In this case, we have specially trained people whose task is to frantically wave their hands from behind the scenes, reminding the actors about the incl. and off
The scenery is mounted on the day of the premiere. Sometimes some important details come to the site an hour before the performance, and they still need to be installed correctly. So, in front of “Zoykina’s apartment” a garland of Chinese lanterns was collected by the entire male cast with reinforcements from the engineers of the data center operations department.
The technical run is a good thing, but, as they say, the theater magic has not been canceled yet. In “The Cherry Orchard,” for example, there is a scene in which the maid Dunyasha with a fright drops and breaks a porcelain saucer. So, this damn saucer regularly scattered into pieces on all general and technical runs, but it did not break on any of the three performances. They wrote it off on the mystical “obratka” from Nikolai Vasilyevich for the “Inspector” thrown halfway
After the technical run comes the turn of the makeup. Mustaches, wigs, curls, the exchange of compliments in the spirit of "and why are you always in these tanks do not go," that's all.
An hour before the performance, the actors disperse behind the scenes to repeat the text and tune in to the wave. Everybody has his own method here: someone valandes on the stage, physically getting used to the site, someone turns on a “thematic” playlist, someone strokes his shirt for the hundredth time, while a number of art companions perform a series of “entourage” selfies, someone is sitting on the phone to the last, settling working questions, despite the director's pleas to put things off until tomorrow and focus on the role.
“Theater is this temple. Be holy or get out. ” The last instructions of the director before the premiere of “Night of mistakes”, 2014
To hell! “Zoykina apartment”, 2015.
The third call. According to tradition, the general takes the blow upon himself and first goes to greet the guests and tell them how we will surprise today.
Actors on dispositions. The curtain is about to open.
Go!
“Lies on long legs”, 2013.
“Night of mistakes”, 2014.
"Zoykina apartment", 2015.
"Zoykina apartment", 2015.
"The Cherry Orchard", 2016.
Behind the scenes, the movement is not less than on the stage.
How it all began
In October 2010, when we were just about to conquer the world, the general director and the director of personnel discussed the options for the New Year party. We didn’t want to lead people to the pub or bowling, because it was beaten and without any ideas. “Why not put on a performance?” Suggested the general. Or director of HR. In general, the first one dawned on, the versions differ, so let's stop at reconciling great minds think alike.
A few days later they found the director, chose one of her finished (worked out to the point of) plays, gathered everyone, assigned roles - and rushed. This first performance, “The Doctor Involuntarily”, was staged a month and a half. Everyone, of course, burned a little bit in hell, and at the premiere there was a couple of reservations in the spirit of “He fell ill, that is, he died,” but the success of colleagues and friends was such that they decided to invite the customers and partners to the next production ... In this regard, the preparation of the second performance started already in September, and marketing was involved in the whole process.
The very first premiere of the DataLine Theater - “The Doctor Involuntarily”, 2010.
How things have changed
After the third season, DataLine Theater finally migrated from HR to marketing, we had a new - partly ingenious - director, and in general we somehow decided for ourselves to do not just a home theater, but a really good theater.
In practice, this inevitably led to an easy conflict between the internal task of the Theater - to rally everyone around the beautiful, and the external - to create a quality, sorry for the expression, product that not only our mothers can watch for two hours in a row. We honestly tried to combine business with pleasure, but still had to choose - and we chose quality.
This made the Theater, in general, a niche history within the company, but allowed us to “grow” to Bulgakov and Chekhov - and create performances that are expected and told to friends and acquaintances.
Cherry Orchard, 2016
The entire video archive of our theater is carefully stored on the Youtube channel .
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/325334/
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