TECHNICAL REPORTS FRED_M._wo_LFF MASONITE OVER LAYERED PLYWOOD: A STAGE FLOOR THAT WORKS MARQUETTE UNIVERSITY JAY GLERUM fir floor for both the stage and rehearsal room. The cost of the labor and material ran so high that the specification had to be altered. The revision called for only the acting area of the stage to be wood, the rest to be concrete. The rehearsal room was to have a wood floor applied directly on concrete. Since the rehearsal room was also to be used for dance classes and the wing space of the stage was to be used for painting drops and- building scenery, this compromise was not acceptable! After almost a year of negotiation with the contractor, a solution was reached. The contractor would pour both concrete sub-floors; install and level 2" x 4" sleepers on sixteen inch centers; fill the spaces between the sleepers with sand to deaden sound; cover sleepers and sand with red rosin paper; and finally lay a single layer of 'U." COX fir plywood on top of the sleepers. When this was completed by the contractor, there was enough money Building a theatre is a lot like marriage! It is not at all what you imagined it to be, and it requires some compromise in order for it to work. What happened to the stage and rehearsal room floors in the Evan P. and Marion Helfaer Theatre at Marquette University is an example of a seeming compromise with a very pleasing outcome. There are two basic rules that Marquette University administrators follow when planning and building a new facility. The first is to put the people who are going to use the facility on the planning and building committee. The second is to stay within the budget. In September of 1973 plans and contracts for the Helfaer Theatre were finalized. It appeared that Marquette's theatre faculty would be able to live happily with all the revisions and deletions except one - the stage and rehearsal room floors. The original specifications called for an edge grain COHCIlETE COHCRETE WOOD WOOD COHCIETE WOOD PIT COVER REMOVABLE 'ig. 1 STAGE PLOOI PLAN IVAW P. AWD MAll OR IELPAER THEATIE I USITT I THEATRE DESIGN AND TECHNOLOGY SPRING,1977 31