Preparing for 'Hamilton': What it takes to bring traveling shows to Omaha's Orpheum

With the sound of rolling road cases, members of local IATSE 42, a union of theatrical stage employees, unload a truck in front of Omaha’s Orpheum Theater. The cases contain all the different pieces of “Hamilton” merchandise -- pins, shirts, posters -- you name it.

Once all of that is loaded in the front, the truck driver brings the truck around back to one of two loading docks behind the theater.

“Hamilton’s” advanced load-in arrived at the Orpheum Theater on May 4, while the show did a performance in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Four days later, the award-winning musical began its run in Omaha.

How does this happen? How does a crew of 70 move a whole stage production over 12 hours and have it ready to run again within four days?

Ryan Murray, the associate vice president of operations with Omaha Performing Arts, said it takes a combination of hard work and coordination starting years ahead of time.

“We'll start to review a document called a rider,” Murray said. “We'll start to review those documents one year to two years in advance, just to look over what their requirements are from a technical standpoint, and make sure that they can fit into the room, that there's any other structural changes or things that we need to be thinking about so that we're prepared for those types of things.”

Following that process, someone from the production often will make sure the space will be able to accommodate the show. This is the third time "Hamilton" has come to Omaha, making this initial process somewhat easier. Both sides generally know what to expect.

If the venue can accommodate the show, it will book it, eventually announce it, and people will begin to buy tickets.

“Usually, maybe about three months out is really when we start to make contact with those touring with the show,” Murray said. “To start to talk about what their crew needs are from a local standpoint. Talk about if there's any additional rental items that we need to provide for them, so that when they come here on day one, that they have everything that they need throughout the entire run that they're here.”

According to Murray, shows usually bring on around 80 to 100 local crew members to help out with the load-in and load-out. In “Hamilton’s” case, there are between 70 and 80.

On the day before the production arrives, the crew will do what is called a strip.

“We don't have any lighting of ours that are up,” Murray said. “We don't have any sound equipment, any curtains. We take all of that down and prepare the room in a way that it is a blank canvas for them to come in, because they travel with everything that they generally need.”

The day after the theater is entirely stripped of equipment, the touring show begins its load-in.

Eric Mayer, the production stage manager for this tour of “Hamilton,” arrived in Omaha before most of the touring crew, alongside the head carpenter, who drew up a stage plot that the crew referenced when they arrived.

“We have a total of 13 trucks, and then each city only has 10 of those trucks,” Mayer said. "So, while we were playing in Chattanooga, there were three trucks sitting outside of Omaha waiting to start what we call the advance load-in. Most of the time that advance happens while we're still doing shows in another city.”

Mayer said that flexibility is key when it comes to working at different venues.

“A lot of times you get to a venue and what's on paper doesn't necessarily match reality,” he said. “So, I'm here so that we can collectively make adjustments. One of my jobs as the production stage manager is to do what we call ‘maintain the artistic integrity’ of the show.”

One of Mayer’s goals is to make each show consistent. This includes the lights, sound and set design.

The first parts to be loaded in were some of the lighting and sound systems, as well as the black show deck where the famous turntable set is installed.

“When we come into a city, we hire 70 to 80 locals who assist our traveling road team, just for the load-in and load-out aspect, and then running the show, we keep about 25 locals to help us run the show,” Mayer said.

Following that, the set starts to get built. Mayer described the hustle and bustle occurring on stage.

“See over on stage left, there's a lady with a flashlight on her head?” Mayer asked. “She's doing paint touchups. So you know, things get messed up as we're moving around [the country], and she goes around and she touches everything up during load-in.”

He also said the on-stage lighting comes off the truck already installed on the metal beams and gets suspended in the air with the help of motors. This is also when crew members hoist the sound system up into the air and run miles of cable.

It was two days before opening night, and by the afternoon, the set walls were coming up, and the lights and sound system had been hung.

“So our load-in today can take anywhere from five to eight hours, and then tomorrow we'll do another eight hours for load-in, so total load-in time for the show is up to 24 hours,” said Mayer. “Three days at eight hours each as kind of a maximum.”

By the time all 10 of the show’s trucks are unloaded, the set is up, backstage is put together and sound and lights have installed and checked their equipment, it’s opening night.

Mayer said that for each tour stop the show hires eight local dressers to help with the costume changes for the 20 actors.

“The first time that wardrobe, the dressers are doing those costume changes with the actors is in front of a live audience, so that opening night, we haven't had a rehearsal beforehand,” Mayer said.

Another important point that Mayer emphasized was company morale.

“We’re a touring unit of about 70 people who spend all of our time together,” Mayer said. “So company morale is very important to us in terms of making sure that people want to come to work and that they have what they need so that they can provide the best show possible for the audience.”

Hamilton tours 52 weeks out of the year, and according to Mayer, full-time workers on the tour get vacation time and personal days off.

“It is truly a mobile workspace,” Mayer said. “We have to collaboratively schedule people's vacations, because [an actor’s] covers then have to be in the building, but each of those covers also cover other people, so like a Hamilton and a Burr can't both take vacation at the same time because they essentially have the same covers.”

This also applies to when an actor or actress leaves the tour. As they say, the show must go on.

“We have three new actors that are joining us in the city, so we'll start rehearsals with them on Thursday,” Mayer said. “Now, they happen to be alums. They're helping us with some coverage for the next couple months, so they'll only get about a week of rehearsal. But for a new-to-‘Hamilton’ actor, there's usually about six weeks of rehearsal involved in that.”

Mayer, who has worked with the tour on and off since 2018, is still amazed by how quickly and efficiently the crew, actors and musicians can be ready to put on a Broadway-caliber show.

“During tech, you know, there's a lot of communication, and we all figure out exactly who's in charge of what…we set up those, those lines of communication,” Mayer said. “So, a lot of things going on, and a lot of departments all working simultaneously to make to make everything happen.”

On opening night, people are in line to get food, drinks and merch before the show starts. With the ring of a bell produced from handbells the theater’s ushers are holding, everyone knows it is time to find their seat.

“Hamilton” has come to Omaha.