Welcome Andrew!

We are welcoming a new Technical Director to the Hippodrome: Andrew Axtell. He comes to us from the Santa Fe Opera, and he'll have his hands full here! We've got a great season growing and we're looking forward to all the help he'll bring.

To help welcome him, I'm presenting a walk-through of the Hippodrome and its various facilities here. It should be not only helpful to him, but informative to anyone looking for information about the Waco Hippodrome.

Welcome to the Waco Hippodrome

Here's a shot of the side of our building. We own and operate a park on the South side of the theatre; shown here. It doesn't require too much upkeep, but we'll have to do more than has been done recently. It should be a pleasant place for people to relax before shows and also a nice place for people to enjoy lunch or a break from the office during the day. Who knows what else we'll be able to do with it in time.

We also own and operate a smaller park on the North side of the building, but that park mainly serves as an alleyway. I look forward to being able to do more with it in time. Right now it is seriously overgrown.



Here is the box office and then the interior lobby. There's enough room inside for quite a few people to gather, though not as much as I wish we had. To that end, we hope to make the area just outside the theatre doors more inviting. There's only so much we can do about the weather, but when it cooperates, we should have a few nice places for people to congregate during intermission and before the show.







Off of the lobby we have two closets. Right now they are dedicated to facilities supplies on one side and technical supplies on the other. It seems to be the best arrangement for now, but I'm open to organizational suggestions. Also... we've got serious work to do with organizing, cleaning, inventorying, etc., all of our supplies.


Here's the auditorium! It's a wonderful example of an early 20th Century Opera/Vaudeville house. It's one of the best preserved examples of its kind in Texas. The proscenium opening is not overly big, but we make do. Here also are some shots of the new tech booth that I've just constructed along with elements of our new sound system.





Our dressing rooms are underneath the stage. It's an old school arrangement, but it's novel and fun too. The dressing rooms need some work done - especially on the floors. I painted it recently, but the floors must be done. We can house up to about 23 people down there, I think.





We also own the two buildings next door to us on Austin Ave. We rent the front third of one of them out to Perry Office Supply. Here's their setup as well as the area in which we operate. The TD office is back here. I want to do major reorganizations over in this building. There's so much more that can be done with it that is not currently being done. This is where you'll find the slop sink, the washer and dryer, light land, instrument storage, and other things. Get that imagination to work, Andrew!







The next building over is what we call "The Bakery." It's not a cute name - it actually used to be a bakery. We're selling it very soon. Inside we use it for storage. I would estimate that 85-90% of its contents can be tossed or sold. We will do that together. That's just one picture of it on the right. Don't get too attached to the place.

Here are some of the faces you'll meet around the Hippo. This is Cristina, our Box Office Manager, and Shirley, our Office Manager. (Sorry Shirley's picture is a bit blurry. She didn't want me to take a picture in the first place - let alone take a second one! Ha!) This is also Jackie, from next door at Perry's.







That's as general an overview as I can give. We'll look forward to showing Andrew around in much more detail next week. If anyone else wants a tour of the place, I'd be happy to oblige. Below are just some more pictures of areas that I have already gone over. More to come soon! -- S