News Staffer Abigail Holloway uses the light board in E.B. Mell Auditorium on April 15. With no prior experience, Holloway started using the Mell light board for the Drama Club when no one else knew how and slowly taught herself. “When I first started in my freshman year, there was no one who understood how to work the board, ” Holloway wrote. “We had a new theater teacher, and whoever used the board before me must have graduated.” Photo courtesy of Abigail Holloway
News Staffer Abigail Holloway discusses the technical work she does in the CCHS Drama Club, and its importance in her life.
Understandably, if a person attends the upcoming musical “Mamma Mia!,” showing April 17 19 in Clarke Central High School’s E.B. Mell Auditorium, they are going to be focused on the actors. Those are the people on stage after all, the people making the most direct impact on the audience.
But that doesn’t mean there aren’t people working hard behind the scenes.
I’m a CCHS junior, and for the three years I have been here, the CCHS Drama Club has put on six shows. I’m proud to say I have run the lights for all of them.
When I first started in my freshman year, there was no one who understood how to work the ETC Element light board. We had a new theater teacher, and whoever used the board before me must have graduated.
Most of the board was programmed wrong. The instructional manual we currently have, which definitely isn’t for this model, wasn’t applicable. However, it quickly became my job to figure it out, so that’s what I did.
I wanted a fresh start, so I created an entirely new file, and I named it “Abby’s lights.” This file is still in use in the auditorium, running all of the lights.
“I’ve worked to perfect my craft, to use lighting as a tool for storytelling and not just to light the stage.”
— Abigail Holloway,
News Staffer
Looking back at my first show, “Our Place,” in Oct. 2022, there are many things I would change. I hadn’t quite figured everything out and there was still broken software. I wasn’t confident in my ability to make lighting choices, leaving most of it to be done by fine arts department teacher Kayla Griffin. She told me the very simple lighting she wanted for the upcoming show, and I found a way to do exactly what she wanted, nothing else.
My confidence had tripled by the spring of that school year. We did the musical “Little Shop of Horrors,” and when I overheard fine arts department co-chair Dr. Eunice Kang ask Griffin what adult was running the lights, I felt amazing. That comment solidified my passion for the technical side of theater.
Since that show, I’ve learned way more about the board, and I’ve done a lot of fixing. I’ve worked to perfect my craft, to use lighting as a tool for storytelling and not just to light the stage.
Coming up on “Mamma Mia!” I’ve put in countless hours working on various technical aspects of the show, and working hard to design the lighting for every single scene, including incorporating multiple spotlights into some.
At the end of the day, no matter how much is done in the theater, it still goes back to my “Abby’s lights” file, a contribution I take great pride in.
