Props 24/7

Jeff Alves has spent the last 15
years building a career as a successful
PA and production coordinator,
writing the well-received
Production Assistant Handbook to
help others learn the field. Vivian
Luther started her career performing
duties from prop design
to directing in Cleveland’s theater
scene before moving to Hollywood
and switching to prop design in
the television and film industry.
Now each has opened their
own open-all-hours rental house,
with Alves’s 24/7 Production
Communication Rentals specializing
in walkie-talkies and
cell phones to coolers, chairs and
wardrobe racks, while Luther’s
Tag and Drag offers an eclectic
assortment of unusual props ranging
from antique nautical gear to
Japanese wedding beds. The result
is more choices for productions
looking to build effective communications
into creative settings.
“Our approach is very customer-
oriented, and we’ll work
with people’s budgets, even with
student films,”
said Alves.
“We also have
a full expendables
store and
offer two production
offices
for rent.”
Meanwhile,
Luther “offers
a little bit of
ever y thing”
in a 6,000 square-foot warehouse
that she spent six months filling
with everything from signage to
fire safety gear after building her
collection for 15 years.
“We offer great prices including
‘all you can eat’ deals, in which a
production company can work a
one-price deal with us and keep
their props for the duration of their
shoot,” explained Luther. “We’re
hoping our foot in the door will be
our 24/7 availability by appointment,
when most prop houses
aren’t open on the weekend.”
While Alves is focusing on his
rentals for now, he is launching a
24/7 Grip Department and 24/7
Big Tents, “so companies approach
me and ask to incorporate the
name so we’re always expanding.”
His entrepreneurial ambitions have
already proven themselves through
his invention of Gear Labels, which
replaced the traditional, messy
tearing of tape for equipment identification
with paper-strip labels
that peel easily off a roll.
He’s even adapted the Gear
Labels to become Baby Gear Labels,
designed to provide parents with
an easy way of labeling their kids’
sippy cups and other possessions
with colorful strips. And coming
next is his most ambitious project:
designing “sports daddy diaper
bags,” which he hopes will make
dads proud to carry diaper bags
once he finishes his prototypes,
which will employ NBA basketball
team logos and colors.
Luther terms Tag and Drag “a
great place to stop if you need a
little bit of everything,” and offers
multiples, chairs, lighting fixtures
and “a good deal of lead man materials
such as piping, construction
and electrical goods.”
“We cover the bases, and if we
don’t have it we can get it,” said
Luther. “If someone has something
propwise we want, we go
and get it. We just want to make
a convenient place to shop, and
by being open on the weekends
we’re ahead of the prop houses
that mostly aren’t.”