Men on Boats
Written by Jaclyn Backhaus
Directed by Nic Radcliffe
Michigan Tech Theatre, Houghton, MI November 2025
All production Pictures Courtesy of Christopher Plummer
System Designer and Lead A2
Men on Boats is a satirical story based on John Wesley Powell's expedition into the North American West. Traveling along the Colorado River, he and his crew "discover" "new" lands and name iconic natural landmarks that definitely did not have a name before. This story covers themes of Racism and indigenous erasure, sexism/misogyny, and satire. It is a story that makes us question both the stories about history we have heard and those that we have not.
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As the system designer, my goal was to provide quality vocal reinforcement and a surround sound system that allowed the creative team to fulfill their design concept appropriately. The system itself would produce an SPL of 80dB with a +/-3dB difference amongst all of the audience. The system was constructed to provide sounds localized to the stage while providing a surround sound experience for the audience that transported them into the world of the play. Additional duties included routing all devices in Dante, programming the London BLU DSP, and creating sound system drafts.
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As the Lead A2, I led and trained a crew of four to set up A2 land, build ear rigs, and act as deck sound during shows. Communicating with stage management and costumes, I learned about actors with latex allergies, transmitter belt sizes, and hats the actors wore. These factors influenced how I would mount microphones.
Pre-Production
I communicated with the creative team to understand their concept and design goals. This helped me determine speaker choices and placements. When talking to the director, he expressed a desire to keep the speakers as hidden as possible to not impose visual elements from scenic, lighting, and projections.
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Utilizing Vectorworks and Microsoft Excel, I created a ground plan of the speaker plot, a section view of the speaker plot, a Signal Flow Block Diagram, a Console I/O sheet, and a Wireless Microphone info sheet. Additionally, I used Minotaur, a sound system database developed by sound designer Daniel Lundberg, to create A2 paperwork such as cast sheets, wireless info, and labels for receivers/transmitters.
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System Paperwork
A2 Paperwork
DSP Programming
Shop Build, Load-in, Tech week, and shows
I delegated tasks to my A2 crew during shop builds, while answering system questions from the load-in crew and Production Sound Engineer.
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All actors for this show wore hats, so the microphones were on the ear, sitting on the cheekbone, and pointed toward the mouth.
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There were many challenges throughout the system design process. To begin, the scenic designer and director did not want to see any speakers in front of or on the set. This restriction led to the removal of front fill speakers, as they would not provide adequate audience coverage and would be a visual impairment.
After the first load-in, the main speakers had to be adjusted because their initial configuration caused significant comb filtering; instead of a stereo pair, the mains were arranged as an LCR system, significantly reducing the amount of comb filtering in the audience area.
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Throughout technical rehearsal, I made adjustments to the delay of the vocal reinforcement speakers to create precedence with the actor's vocals, where the first sound arriving at the audience would be the actors on stage, then shortly after, the sound reinforcement from the speakers. The delay used on the vocal reinforcement was 13ms, as it provided enough delay to direct attention toward the stage, while being short enough that the brain does not differentiate the actor's voices and the sound reinforcement as separate sounds.
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​For shows, I created a sign-up list in Google Sheetes for the A2 crew so they could select the shows that fit their schedules.
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