Arts Student of the Week: Paige Hahn

When you listen to Paige Hahn talk about her daily schedule, it is easy to get the impression that this dynamic Niwot High School junior never sleeps. Her coursework in the high school International Baccalaureate Diploma Program (IB) includes IB History of Europe, IB Math, IB English, IB Spanish and IB Biology, in addition to her contributions to technical theater.

It was Jason Watkins, technical director for theater at NHS, who nominated Hahn for Arts Student of the Week. "Paige is the current president of the Technical Theatre CTSO (Career and Technical Student Organization)," Watkins said. "It is her job to organize all the technicians' work shifts as well as maintain all contact information. Paige is very studious and detail oriented."

Hahn, who describes herself as "an artsy, literature person," developed an interest in the technical aspects of theater at an early age. As a child she acted in plays in summer camp. "But I was never very good at it," she said. "I didn't like everyone looking at me. I don't know how I first heard about technical theater, but in middle school I did it. In sixth grade I did backstage to the play 'Annie'".

It was an experience Hahn enjoyed, but she did not have a chance to work in technical theater again until high school. Watkins has had a major impact on Hahn's development. "Mr. Watkins is a great teacher," Hahn said. "And [because of him] it went from something that was kind of cool that I did at school to a real hobby. Originally, I was interested in set design, but in high school I started doing lighting ... I think it's such a cool medium to tell a story."

Lin-Manuel Miranda is one of Hahn's favorite playwrights, and "Hamilton" was the first play she remembers enjoying. "Hadestown" and the Stephen Sondheim musical "Into the Woods" are also favorites, and she admires the work of playwright Anaïs Mitchell.

Watkins has been impressed with Hahn's commitment to the theater. "She was our stage manager for last year's outstanding musical 'Mamma Mia!' and the lighting designer for last year's fall Play 'Peter and the Starcatcher.' Paige manages to be a high caliber leader in the class while at the same time maintain a full load of IB courses with a 4.37 GPA."

During Covid, Watkins found many ways to keep the students engaged. When describing some of those activities Hahn spoke with enthusiasm. "Technical theater is a hard thing to teach online," she said. "It is very physical, personal. But we did a lot of at-home assignments. Everyone made a set out of a shoebox, and things like that, that were totally improvised. We had a technical theater book and we read chapters about lighting and sound, which created a good base of knowledge. Later, when Covid was less severe, there were after-school workshops, woodworking and aspects of tech. That was very helpful--to have even just a limited time in the theater to do woodworking and learn about the construction aspect of it."

When asked to explain her craft to someone new to the concept of technical theater, Hahn provided a thoughtful response. "We're all the parts of the performance that you don't see. So, I guess, like we build the set, we design the lights, we design the sound, we're the reason you can hear the actors, we're the reason you can see the actors, and you are not sitting in the pitch black. We're the reason you can picture where the actors are, what time-period it is, what time of day it is, just, we develop the background. And we stay in the background."

As the co-president of the Career and Technical Student Organization, Hahn helps schedule choir and band concerts and academic events such as graduation. As the stage manager for "Mamma Mia!" Hahn learned a lot about managing people, but confessed, "After that experience... I like lighting more than stage management. It's a high stress environment. I learned a lot about managing people and running a show effectively and putting out fires."

During one of the rehearsals, she vividly recalled, a mouse got into one of the dressing rooms. "All the actors got very upset about that, and I had to help people get that situation taken care of. And make sure that the person who was taking care of that wasn't also needing me to treat a set, or fix props that were in the wrong place ..."

After high school, Hahn plans to go to a four-year college and she hopes to be able to continue technical theater. "Technical theater is a really cool thing to get involved in," she said. "A lot of people don't really think about it, but if you do realize that it's there, it's really lucky. It's worth it."