# Flying Peter Pan



## gafftaper (Mar 21, 2010)

This is a long story... Sorry. However I think reading through the process may be useful and I hope you find it interesting. My son started Kindergarten at a small private K-8 school this year. At the end of August all the incoming families got together for a barbecue. I was talking with the principal and eventually we got around to the question that would complicate my life for the next 11 years (My 3 year old starts preschool there next year). "So... what do you do for a living? Ohh well we do these amazing school musicals... you have to meet Liz the director!" _Fast forward to dropping off my son for the first day of school_ "Hi, I'm Liz we are doing Peter Pan this year and I want the kids to fly." _ You see where this is going_, Right?_ First words out of my mouth_, "I can make that happen but it's going to be expensive... somewhere between $5k and $10k"... She never blinked _and we were off on a grand adventure. I

_Fortunately because of CB I had a friend who is a rigger. I immediately started e-mailing and texting him questions. Right away I knew that Venue was a huge problem that had to be addressed before flying. They had been performing all their shows in the school cafe-gym-atorium. They were paying nearly $3k just to renting lighting and sound equipment. If you are doing Pan... you can't fly in a cafe-gym-atorium. Well a lot of phone calls and a lot of favors called in and I got us a week at a nearby college theater for a fraction of the cost they had been paying. The schedule would be insane, with other events in the theater nearly every day (including another group doing show at 11am today BEFORE our 2pm matinee :shock. But we had a 375 seat real theater with real stage lights and sound gear... and I had save a couple thousand bucks off the budget so I had more money to throw at the flight company. 

But would the flight company be able to fly pan in the rented space? How would we make it fit the tight rehearsal schedule? Many trials were ahead. So the first questions you get when you call the professional flight company is about your space. And this is where my real headaches began. I had assumed the grid was perfectly stable. However I got up there and discovered it was the most frightening and convoluted thing I've ever seen. There is a plaster ceiling above the stage. Emerging from the plaster are these 3/4" long x 3/16" bolts. Bolted to each bolt (using a standard nut, not a lock nut or lock washer) is a small piece of angle iron with a hole in it. Hanging from this hole is an S-hook... no shackle or quick link.  From the S-hook hangs some chain link that looks like they got it on special at Wall Mart, NOT grade 80 approved for overhead lifting or anything even close. Using the "grid" was not going to be possible. ZFX essentially told me the only way they would touch the job was if they were allowed to punch holes in the plaster and find some real steel to hang their track from. Fortunately Hall Associates didn't give up on me. 

Over a period of a couple weeks of pictures, measurements, and phone calls the team at Hall and myself put together a plan. I would install two free standing trusses 16' tall. Then we would connect them together for stability and the guy from Hall could install their system underneath it, completely bypassing the frightening system overhead. But how to make that fit in the theater... you see it has NO wing space. the proscenium opening is 37' wide with a BRICK WALL on each side of the stage. Another couple of weeks passed negotiating with the local rental house, Hall, and examining the space. In the end we found a way for it to work. Renting it would add an extra $1500 or so to the bill. It would also greatly complicate our load in, our installation, and rehearsal. 

No wing space created operational issues. You need to have 5 flymen working at the same time for the opening scene. They need to have full view of the person they are flying. So we would have to mask off a good portion of the stage in order to make this work. In the end we gave up and left the curtains back a bit (allowing some seats on the right side of the house to have a view of back stage). We just had to say... it's a school show, not a pro show, let it go. 

Finding the right truss to meet our needs in Seattle was complicated. Some companies didn't have enough gear and one wanted us to pay an extra $500 to pay their rigger to come supervise the installation. Fortunately my regular dealer was able to put the order together combined with a sub rental. They also trusted me to supervise the installation. They won't rent truss to just anyone. It's quite dangerous. It's sort of like buying M-80's at an Indian Fireworks stand. You have to pass a little test to prove you are safe before they will let you see the merchandise. Once again this added a great deal of time to the process. I had to find a large enough and strong enough truss that would fit PERFECTLY within the brick walled confines and UNDER the other "grid". 

Skipping ahead past details to dangerous to post. Truss installed with an army of parent power at my disposal. Contracts signed, extra insurance policy taken care of, hotel booked, I picked up our flight director at the airport. What a great guy! He's a T.D. from Indianapolis who does this occasionally on the side. Good news, the delivery company got us the gear just in time. Bad news... the airline lost his tool kit. Remember that insane schedule of other events in the space? Well in order for us to not lose a day of rehearsal, we have to get the system wired up between 11:30pm and 8:00am his plane lands at 10:30pm, and he has no tools... "Do you know a 24 hour hardware store with High quality tools?" Fortunately my theater is well equipped and I had all the tools needed at my theater. So we don't start instaling the gear until 1:30am. Long night. The guy began by spending several hours running guy wires all over the place to prevent sway. This was one of those points where you see that it really pays to hire a pro. Many would not have thought of this, then been disappointed when the thing starts rocking and squeaking. In the end we can get all four kids flying around at top speed and not hear a thing. 

So there are two systems they usually use. One is a complicated track device which allows the flyer to travel all the way across the stage and to maintain a level height. How it works is a trade secret. They take it very seriously. Given the limited rehearsal time, budget, and limited space on stage we went with a simpler all pulley system approach. They use this AMAZING cable. It has 9 bundles of wire woven together. Each bundle contains 17 strands of steel cable... that's 153 strands of wire all in a 3/16" cable. You can lift an elephant with the stuff. From there the system is quite simple. As he was installing it, it was very tempting to think, why do I need this guy, I know where to buy this stuff myself. 

But there was something else you get for your money, experience. The guy knew exactly where to place the pulleys to get just the right swing. Even though you only have a simple line going up and down it's AMAZING the types of tricks you can do. Peter can leap onto furniture, swing long distances, and fly through the air half way across the stage and grabs the bomb out of Hook's hand in the air. As we were trained we began to see the physics. It's really simple. If you pull a pendulum back two feet it will swing two feet past center... then back again. But the knowledge of where and how to do it so that the actors stay safe is what you really pay for. We had one minor crash where Pan crashed into a bed, but beyond that the flights have been injury free. Over time the actors have grown more comfortable and we have grown more skilled at our control. 

After three days of rehearsals, our flight director got on a plane and headed back to the other side of the country. Tonight we just completed our 3rd of 4 performances and it was great! 

What did I learn: 
-Flying is REALLY fun, really cool, and a LOT of work. There is no mechanical advantage involved. You've got to pull down with 100 pounds to lift that 100 pound kid up in the air. This means you get tired. On the flying end, it's quite the ab workout to stay properly positioned while flying. After a long set of rehearsals out Pan was wiped out. Plan for this and build breaks into the rehearsal schedule. 

-Even though I now know the "secrets" of primitive flight systems, I would never consider installing it myself. It's much to dangerous. It's so easy to make a mistake and cause someone crash and get injured. So call a flight company. I've got nothing but good things to say about Hall and Associates (flyingfx.com). Our flight director told me so many scary stories about people who thought they could so easily do a flight on their own. You could, but would it be TRULY safe? No. 

Total cost: about $7,000 including the truss rental and hotel. If you have a good grid and don't need to rent truss, plus space to use the fancy track device to do the best tricks, you'll end up paying a little less. Profit: We sold out 375 seats for 3 of 4 shows. Not only did we make our money back, we made a profit! 

Audiences Love flight. It's amazing how they cheer with Peter and the children all start flying wildly above the stage. Heck we had a necklace break on stage and I got cheered for going on in a scene change and sweeping the stage. That was new. 

One thing people take for granted is the harnesses. They think any fall protection harness will do. That is NOT the case. These harnesses are custom made and have a very specific fit to them. You can't sing a song while flying through the air unless the harness has a perfect fit. 

Communication is critical. From the early stages of booking the flight effect company, to the training itself, and maintaining safety through the performances, communication is critical. If you don't have a great support staff and good people to work with on your crew, flight is not a good idea. 

-Want to learn more about rigging and flight? The owner of Hall (Tracy Nunnally) teaches it. Learn more here.


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## firewater88 (Mar 22, 2010)

Gafftaper,

Thanks for the long story, yes I read it all and didn't just skim. I am currently in production of Wizard of Oz and we hired Foy to fly all the parts in the show. About three years ago we did Peter Pan and hired Foy to fly them as well. I can not agree with you more that if you want to fly actors, HIRE A PRO COMPANY! I have used Foy twice now and have been very pleased with the competence and knowledge of the installer. I have not worked with other companies, so I can not tell of those experiences. One thing about the system I have here now, is that it has a slight mechanical advantage, about 2/3's. Not sure if it was just how it was put in in your venue or if that is just their system, if that is why you don't have any mechanical advantage.

I did ask the guy when we were installing the system about stories of horrible installs. (I have a full stage with fly space, an easy install- but still takes 2 days) he said they can fly in a s little as 9' of headroom. I thought that was pretty amazing. The concept of that show was to "see" the operator and the rigging. He had other stories, but no need to get into those here...

Those trade secrets are just that. secrets that don't need to be duplicated by those untrained. I hope people read your post and truly decide to hire a pro instead of trying it themselves.

Thanks


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## venuetech (Mar 22, 2010)

I have had three shows with flying, Pan with Foy, scrooge and wizard of oz with ZFX
each and every time we have had excellent results..
I think in all cases we did have a mechanical advantage of 2/3 or there abouts
zfx had a great tornado effect that ran upstage for OZ
each of the flying directors brought a great artistic touch to the production and with rehearsal all went very well.
Hire a Pro company for the effect you want it really is a great price.
The biggest problem is that they made it look too easy, the director starts thinking we can do it in house... Just say no, flying persons is not covered by my contract and it is certanly not covered by my insurance.


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## Les (Mar 22, 2010)

I've worked with FOY on Oz and Pan also. Great company. I even got to be a flyguy for Oz.
Speaking of trade secrets, they won't even allow photos of their harnesses to be taken (for example, you can't take a picture of an actor if their harness is exposed [like in rehearsal shots]; you can only take it if the harness is hidden by the costume).


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## PeytonJr (Mar 22, 2010)

Thank you for an account of how it should be done. Ive always seen just "get a professional to do it," and always wondered about the process.


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## ScottT (Mar 22, 2010)

Wow, amazing story and very informative for those of us who have never dealt with flight before. Thank you very much


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## zuixro (Mar 22, 2010)

Great story. I read it all when you first posted it, I just haven't had a chance to respond yet.

The truss you talked about, was it just standard truss? It doesn't seem like regular truss would have the correct ratings and such to fly a person from.


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## gafftaper (Mar 23, 2010)

The full track system does provide mechanical advantage. However, due to the minimal wing space in the theater we were using (i.e. 6" off stage on both sides there is a brick wall), there was not enough room to operate the track system. So we were forced to use a simple pulley system. While it would have been great to have the added tricks and mechanical advantage of the track system, it wasn't necessary for our production. The audience of parents from a small K-8 school were shocked and thrilled to see Peter lift off the ground at all and didn't care that we had to blackout and close the curtain rather than have Peter fly away. This also saved us around $1000. So for smaller schools trying to do flight on a budget talk to the Professional Flying Company about the possibility of simplifying things and only using an "interrelated pendulum" for Peter Pan. She wasn't able to fly on and off stage but she did fly about 7' up and had a full swing distance of about 25'... which was perfect for our space. In larger spaces I believe you could actually fly higher and wider. But again there is no mechanical advantage so make sure Peter is light weight. They recomend your operators be a minimum of 150% heavier than your flyers. 

As for the truss. It was standard 16x16 box truss rented from a local vendor. A flight director from Hall went over the specifications ahead of time and said it would be fine. I installed the trusses and put schedule 40 cross braces between the two trusses arches. When our flight director arrived on site he spent nearly 3 hours going over my install and attaching guy wires and pick points all over the place to strengthen and stabilize the system. When we started out it was really wobbly. By the time he was done it was rock solid and not a hint of movement (even with four kids swinging 25' from side to side). Without all the guy wires it would have been terribly unsafe. But with it, I had complete confidence. My impression is that when you are in the hands of a master rigger they are allowed to bend the rules in ways that you and I can't.


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## DuckJordan (Mar 23, 2010)

from talking with a local fly company i see that our theater was actually built for one thing (or just coincidence), it is set up perfectly for flying, not only is the grid nice and easy to access they built in places for cables to add stability to the flying rig. Its amazing to think that out of all the junk we have to deal with, if we ever do flying it will be the easiest thing to do in our theater (we will always hire a pro to do it). Fortunately the school believes falling kids is more hazardous than frayed electrical cords hanging in the ceiling.


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## DaveySimps (Mar 23, 2010)

Great post Gaff. I could not agree more, hire the pros. I cannot echo your sentiments enough. Another +1 from me for Hall Associates. I have had Foy, ZFX, and Hall Associates out for various productions through out the years. All were great, but I did find Hall Associates to be the most accommodating, easy to work with, and thorough. Tracy (the owner of the company) himself came out this fall for a week for our production of Wizard of Oz. He was fantastic. 

~Dave


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## photoatdv (Mar 24, 2010)

I too will be brief here... but one of the things I find quite interesting is that the flying harnesses don't have to be full body. Any insight into that?

Mods... if you think this is too much feel free to delete, but seeing as thats something anyone working on a flying production would notice, I don't think that in and of itself is a secret.


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## Morpheus (Mar 24, 2010)

photoatdv said:


> I too will be brief here... but one of the things I find quite interesting is that the flying harnesses don't have to be full body. Any insight into that?
> 
> Mods... if you think this is too much feel free to delete, but seeing as thats something anyone working on a flying production would notice, I don't think that in and of itself is a secret.


Hmm... I'm no expert, but i will say that (especially if it was professionally done) there still must've been some sort of inversion protection... How, I'm not sure, and I'd rather not guess, especially here...


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## SHARYNF (Mar 24, 2010)

You might find this interesting to read

How-Tos, Take Two: Flying Performers: What Has Changed in 20 Years?

Sharyn


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## gafftaper (Mar 24, 2010)

The harnesses we were given to use were full body and looked a lot like a simplified version of a good full body riggers harness. If you search around the net there are other harnesses out there, as that article Sharyn linked to points out. Some places appear to sell this stuff to anyone (a scary thought). I have the feeling this is one of those things that depends on who is operating the system. If the flight expert is there they can break the rules for the desired effect. However, when the pro trains you and leaves, you get left with the idiot proof harness system.


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## SHARYNF (Mar 24, 2010)

As the article mentioned usually folks recommend the full body harness with multiple points. A lot depends on what the actor is going to be asked to do and also how much training the actor has. Having an expert is absolutely necessary, it is not just how to do but the expert has the experience on getting the set up safe and working, and the costs if you have a production that has a reasonable budget are really not all that much. 

Shayrn


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## gafftaper (Mar 24, 2010)

SHARYNF said:


> Having an expert is absolutely necessary, it is not just how to do but the expert has the experience on getting the set up safe and working, and the costs if you have a production that has a reasonable budget are really not all that much.
> Shayrn



Very true. This production was done by a K-8 school with about 250 students. We raised prices a few bucks over previous years, sold out a 375 seat house for 3 out of 4 performances and actually made a slight profit on the show. If we can afford it anybody can.


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## Les (Mar 24, 2010)

In Oz, Glenda sits in a big steel hula-hoop type thing with a seat built into it. The hoop is rigged and she sits side-saddle in the hoop. Her only attachment to the hoop is her butt and a lanyard that wraps around her wrist. The lanyard is permanently attached to the top of the hoop.


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## venuetech (Mar 24, 2010)

The flying bicycle was the big hit and we had the balloon gondola was part of the ZFX OZ "package".


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## hyperbuddha (Mar 24, 2010)

Gaff I cannot say how jealous I am that you don't live in my town. If we had a parent as involved and as knowledgable as you our shows would be at a whole new level.


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## gafftaper (Mar 24, 2010)

hyperbuddha said:


> Gaff I cannot say how jealous I am that you don't live in my town. If we had a parent as involved and as knowledgable as you our shows would be at a whole new level.



Yeah and my 3 year old starts pre-school there next year... I'm suddenly volunteer T.D. for the next 10 years. Hurray!


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## renegadeblack (Mar 24, 2010)

I did a production of Willy Wonka with the assistance of Foy. Great experience. The flight director was a great guy. I was kind of surprised how much of the installation he had us do ourselves. I was also surprised that they allow you to take it down yourselves as I would think that they wouldn't want you to get that familiar with the system. It would have been nice if we could take pictures of everything that came out of the box so we knew what had to go back... or at least write it down...


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## What Rigger? (Mar 25, 2010)

Gaff! That's a LOT of work! Congratulations on all going well. From what I hear, flying people is HIGHLY addictive.  

Just remind your school that Oz or B & B is best done by middle schoolers. Y'know....7 or 8 years from now!


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## gafftaper (Mar 25, 2010)

I'm campaigning hard for "Once Upon a Mattress" next year. I can build them an 8' high bed on a Saturday and get some sleep. 

We'll save Beast for a few years down the road when I've recovered.


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## Les (Mar 25, 2010)

Slightly off-topic, but when discussing flight cues with a Foy rigger, never ask when you should 'drop' the talent. A crew member made this mistake. Said crew member was promptly corrected: We don't DROP them, we LAND them!


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## firewater88 (Mar 29, 2010)

gafftaper said:


> Yeah and my 3 year old starts pre-school there next year... I'm suddenly volunteer T.D. for the next 10 years. Hurray!



I have a feeling I will be in the same boat as my daughter is in first grade, but not in the school district I work in...


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## gafftaper (Mar 30, 2010)

firewater88 said:


> I have a feeling I will be in the same boat as my daughter is in first grade, but not in the school district I work in...



My son's in a small private K-8 school so everybody knows everybody. Truth is I haven't worked so hard or had so much fun in years and all for no money... at my insistence.  In short I encourage everyone to stop in and volunteer at a local school. Spend an afternoon and teach them to run their light or sound system. Teach them how to safely use the fly system. Teach them to build a flat. If you can scrape together the time. Get involved and work on a show. You'll find it refreshing and rewarding.


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## shiben (Apr 1, 2010)

gafftaper said:


> My son's in a small private K-8 school so everybody knows everybody. Truth is I haven't worked so hard or had so much fun in years and all for no money... at my insistence.  In short I encourage everyone to stop in and volunteer at a local school. Spend an afternoon and teach them to run their light or sound system. Teach them how to safely use the fly system. Teach them to build a flat. If you can scrape together the time. Get involved and work on a show. You'll find it refreshing and rewarding.



And in my experience, as a college student working HS shows, you are often treated as if you were Jesus come back or someone. Or like Jesus while he was on earth. One of the two. However, I have found it to be a lot of fun, and for college students like myself, who work/study at places with well equipped theaters, its often good training for when you need to work a gig without the luxury of 100 odd S4s, 20 Cyc cells, 50 fresnels, 10 PARs, 14 strip lights, etc. Also, you might get some brownie points to call in next time you need a fogger and are on a low budget, not like thats ever happend...


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## Parker (Apr 1, 2010)

We have used Hall for "Peter Pan" at our theatre.
Tracy did a wonderful job and he went above and beyond for the success of the show! Strongly recommended


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## universityTD (Apr 12, 2010)

I have been a TD for a long time and have also done several flying shows. At my university we used Foy about 8 years ago and Hall last year. All systems were safe buy the Foy guy was very rigid and not easy to work with.  He dictated what would happen in the show and when, and the director was very frustrated with it. Bill - the guy from Hall - actually listened to what our director wanted to do and did his best to give him the flights he wanted. No matter WHAT you do, HIRE A PROFESSIONAL, and of the pros out there, I will call Hall back every time. Great company. Great prices. and they seem to want to help you do your show your way.


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