THE WIZARD OF OZONE

By David Francis, Archtics Ticketing Manager

In the world of theatre, those magical “front of house” feelings some of my colleagues speak fondly of which

carry our patrons down the yellow brick road not only of their own imaginations, but of the imaginations of the
actors, writers, musicians, designers and all the creative people responsible for some illusive
night of reprieve are not the whole story of the whole world of theatre. For that one
night of extraterrestrial wonder which can change moods, change
outlooks, shape and sometimes even save lives,
there must be someone behind the curtain. Behind even the curtain’s curtain. Pulling the levers. Someone

who pulls together the gases from the atmosphere, molds those gases into individual cells
and glues those cells together creating structural membranes with
an enlarging vision on a diminishing scale of how those complex membranes translate
into a little piece of paper
that has the power to transfer a living, breathing person from his own space and time, from his own

unrelenting daily life and through a
not completely understood myriad of mazes and wormholes, take him
to a specific time and place and set him down into a specific receptacle no bigger than a chair. But a chair in an
illusion of emotions ranging from
laughter to tears and back again all within the timeframe of a few hours.

It is what I do. As the ticketing manager of our ticketing system that Tickemaster calls Archtics, I give

relationships to that data, drawn from the
ether, and using an ever-changing recipe, and from scratch, I create
the digital events, the digital times and prices, put together the pre-arranged digital pieces and
in the virtual blink of an eye and from the pseudo-sweat of my brow, I deliver to you a
reality-based three dimensional object you can hold in your hand and, without which, you cannot
enter that wonder filled world of theatre: your ticket.