What Are Cues in Lighting

Simply put, a Cue is a single lighting look that is played out to the stage with a single trigger – usually a button press, fader raise, or an external software/device triggering it. In most modern lighting consoles or software, cues contain only the information that was first selected and modified in the “programmer”.

How do you label sound cues?

I always labeled my sound cues as odd numbers, i.e. S1, S3, S5… Lighting cues were labeled in fives, i.e. L5, L10, L15. Cues were always called with their prefix, denoting if it was a lighting cue or sound cue. I’ve started working with a new theatre company, who uses numbers for lights, and letters for sound cues.

What does a cue-to-cue look like?

All actors can assume that a cue-to-cue will mean a lot of starting their lines or a scene and stopping, starting over, jumping ahead and skipping lines, a lot of standing around, moving around and waiting until the director wants you to do something or needs you to do something else.