Creative Conners Celebrates Ten Years of Automation

From humble beginnings in a basement to nearly 1,000 Stagehand controllers moving scenery from coast to coast today, Creative Conners sees its first ten years in business as a moving accomplishment.

Although the official incorporation of Creative Conners was in June 2004, Gareth Conner reflected that it had actually been a New Year's Resolution in 2001 to develop the first control board. As he progressed toward the launch of the company, so did the vision: Provide quality scenic automation for all levels of live entertainment from academic and regional theatre to national tours.

The company says those beginnings were humble indeed. The company began with just one complete system -- a four product package; however, it quickly evolved. Creative Conners now offers over 100 products and services and in the past year had the pleasure of moving scenery on shows as small and charming as a middle school production of Suessical Jr. to the national tour of The Eagles.

Quick to thank the theatres and production shops for their loyalty and confidence over the past ten years, Conner said it's always fun to see how they are creatively integrating scenic motion into their shows. He added that Creative Conners enjoys responding to clients' needs for increasing complexity in scenic motion. On the horizon for the company are wireless control, turtle and friction drive machines, and more intricate software to further integrate with projection systems.