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Christopher Rader
Of all the Christophers in my life, and I know many, Chris Rader is my most dear because he is that rarity of rarities, a stage manager who is absolutely fantastic and a total dream to work with both as an actor and as a director. I've worked with Chris in both capacities, when he stage managed the original productions of Troijka and Love Egos Alternative Rock, and later when he stage managed a play I was in at the New College, Fourteen Times In Two Weeks. Dry, delightful and just a little bit devilish, Chris is Southern in the best sense- namely that he doesn't take shit from anybody and he has just enough of an accent to sound like he's going to kick ass even when all he's doing is saying hello. He also has a deep and hearty laugh which is just manna during those periods of rehearsal where you want to kill yourself and your actors- periods we frequently encountered while working on the No Nude Men revival of Speak To Me, which was a trial and a half to bring to stage, to say the least. Sadly, as with all hot commodities, he can be tough to secure for a show and his work around town includes productions with the Eureka Theater Company, the Magic Theater, Theater Rhinoceros, Asylum Theater, Crowded Fire and San Francisco Stage Works, for whom he designed the set of The Maiden's Prayer. He designed the lights for both Troijka and Speak To Me 2005- truly an endlessly talented guy, especially considering the tech capabilities of the spaces where these shows were staged, and the lights for Speak To Me, in particular, were lavishly and deservedly praised. He next returned to work on Phaedra in a purely stage manager and crew capacity but continued to prove that there is no one in the world I'd rather run a theater space with, or shout "House Open" to. On my gender-bending production of Hamlet he not only contributed one of his loveliest and most subtle feats of illumination (a gloomy, elegant world of silver-blue and pale, melancholy white) but saved the show on several occasions when lights were knocked out of their sockets mid-performance by passionate actors crashing into the walls of the Climate. Beyond all this, Chris Rader has also just become and excellent friend over the years, and mostly he's one of my favorite people to run into in the lobby of a show, whether it's my own or someone else's. He almost always has good things to say, and when he doesn't, it's rewarding enough just getting him to laugh, and when he smiles it's like the sun coming out to shine.
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