Well Gang, WE DID IT!

The most watched Halftime Show production in the history of the world! Couldn't have done it without you...here's a note from Staging Supervisor Cap Spence:

Dear NY/NJ Super Bowl XLVIII Field Team Members,

We know how you feel.

Now that the sparkle of sequins, flash of the lighting, ringing in your ears has faded away, you begin to wonder if it really happened, yet you know it did. So much time, drama and feelings invested and it is over in less than 13 minutes.

You are happy and you are sad. So are we. Just another part of show business. It happens to us as well. On every gig. This part is always shot through with joy and sadness. It is also, in show business as in life, inevitable.

We have returned to our homes or to another project. Your beloved staging and lighting carts have been stripped of their state-of-the-art electronics. The wheels and some re-usable parts of the stage are in the back of two semi’s somewhere between the MetLife Stadium and Torrance, California. The video tiles headed home to their warehouses. The rest of it has been dismantled, cut to pieces and fills a few construction dumpsters somewhere in or near E Rutherford.

You did an incredible job from the very first night in the tent. Everyone was very pleased and for that, the credit goes to many, but it could not have happened without you. Of that, one can be certain. We hope you made new friendships or renewed old ones. Many Halftime cart crews still get together on a regular basis, especially around Super Bowl time.Check the ratings and reviews. It was out of the park. ..and you were not only there, you did it.

As we all go forward, try to remember a few things we shared.

• In life, as well as when plowing with a mule or setting a Super Bowl Stage, pick out your destination, keep your eyes on it and go there. Otherwise, you are just....well, you know.

• The value of stories. The human mind is not made for emails and instant messages which say C U soon or #realfeelingnot. It is hard-wired for stories and what they teach us. We are hopeful you have a few Super Bowl stories of your own.

• How to stand around and wait and wait and wait. (We call this standing still at breakneck speed.)

• Drink water. It is good for you.

• When presented with unexpected circumstances, use your thumb.

• What it feels like to unplug from the internet, cell phone, iPod, Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter, TV and video games for a while. Look into the eyes of another human being. See them. Feel their presence and count on them to do their part. To mutually strive for and accomplish a very complex and difficult task, under the most rigid of timelines, at absolute Ground Zero of the hottest, most intensely focused media spotlight in the television world. Bruno Mars and the RHCP’s were there with us. That place where magic is.

Thanks, again NY/NJ Field Team Members. We are crazy about you!

-Cap Spence-

Your XLVIII NY/NJ Staging Team:

Staging Supervisors:
Cap Spence & Tony Hauser,

Staging Coordinators:
Graeme Lagden, Doug Cook, George McPherson, Aaron Chawla, Hans Wert, Kristy Haupt,
Bill Potopowitz, Tony Menditto, Shayla Cave, Rob Cray, Tom Banks, Mike Mutti, & Dan Carlton

Field Team Managers:
Bryan Ransom, Holly Silber & Kelly Coffey