For most WNO audiences Cardiff Theatrical Services is a little-known part of Welsh National Opera. CTS build our sets and sets for other national and international companies. Managing Director, Darren Joyce filled us in on how life at CTS operates in these days of Covid.
‘At 7.30am the CTS construction supervisor unlocks the building, making sure that each entrance has enough copies of our Covid health surveillance form for staff and visitors to fill out before they enter, and that all hand cleaning stations are ready.
At 7.50am the first staff members arrive through their designated entrances. In making the building Covid-ready we have had to change how we enter and move around, following the new one-way routes put in place. The welding team are first in, followed by carpentry and scenic art teams. The managers and office staff arrive and talk through the order of work, making sure that everyone understands their tasks.
A morning walk around the workshop serves a dual purpose: checking that everyone is ok as well as the progress from the previous day. All projects are carefully managed in order to keep on schedule and budget. Deviations from either need to be caught early to minimise the overall impact on the business. The 30 or so staff of CTS are normally working on around 10 projects on any given day. Some are WNO projects, but the majority will be for other clients – such as Glyndebourne Festival Opera or the National Theatre.
Currently, the drawing office is working on Al Wasl for the Dubai Expo and Ivan the Terrible for Grange Park Opera. The project managers are juggling quotes for several potential projects and making sure everyone on the workshop floor has everything they need to keep making. The welders, carpenters and scenic artists are working on six different projects - including creating paint samples for Glyndebourne’s Il turco in Italia and building a new production for English National Opera. Paint samples allow the scenic art team to translate a designer’s vision from the small scale model to full size.
At 10am every Wednesday the management team review progress on quotations and discuss the future workload. Maintaining our high standards is essential to us, so we try not to take on too many projects, to avoid compromising on the quality of our output. Being a commercial operation, it is essential that projects remain on budget.
During an afternoon, discussions in the office range from buying a new washing machine (for staff overalls), to collecting quotes for a new piece of machinery to replace one no longer meeting current safety standards. Covid-19 comes up – it is never far away – it has had a such a decisive impact upon our business, and our clients.
Just after 4.20pm those who started work first are beginning to wind down – the tools and machinery need to be cleaned and sanitised at the end of each day. Overalls need to be changed and hands washed before we all head off home – leaving our cleaners to help us keep the building clean and safe, and our ever-reliable caretaker will lock up around 6pm.’
Marking the end of another day at CTS, where you can visit Italy, Russia and Dubai without leaving the building.