Set Designs

Designing scenery is not my first calling, but I've been happy to practice this skill for the last few years for the Wenatchee High School Drama Club spring productions.  Below are some notes about these productions, designs, and experiences. 

Amadeus (Show Photos) 2008 Wenatchee High School, Wenatchee, WA
For this production (Directed by Paul Atwood) we knew that because we were working on the high school stage, which was to host other concerts and events during the rehearsal and performance run, we would not be able to build a "permanent" set.  To solve this problem, I chose to design four periactoids that were four feet wide by twelve feet tall.  Each side opened to a different scenic treatment, mostly using wallpapers, to indicate the various settings for action.  At the beginning of the play, Mozart's Requiem (presented on one of the open faces of the periactoids) was visible.  Then, by closing panel after panel, the Venticelli (narrators of the story) were revealed and the set was transformed to the interior of Salieri's library.  At the end of the play, the reverse occurred, hiding each Venticelli after their closing line, leaving the audience with the Requiem onstage again as the final image.  Knowing I wanted to use the periactoids, I skipped the drawings and immediately created a scale model of each periactoid unit and covered each face (open and closed) with the wallpaper or painted treatment that I had selected for each scene.  The builders and painters worked directly from the model in constructing the set.  Later, the stage manager used the model to rehearse with the stagehands to coordinate the movement, opening, and closing of the periactoids.  Their work behind the scenes was just as important as that of the actors in creating smooth transitions.  The students did a beautiful job and the play flowed beautifully.  Sadly, the model did not survive so, other than photographs, I have little to show for this work, but this set for Amadeus was one of my favorites - the towering periactoids were like "Stonehenge" on that stage and a simple cardboard cutout silhouetted behind the cyc created the towering skyline for the "Don Giovanni" sequence.

Charley's Aunt (Overall Set Design and Notes) (Production Photo Gallery)2009 Wenatchee High School, Wenatchee, WA
This farce (directed by Paul Atwood) needed to be designed with a set that could be removed from the stage to allow other events to take place during the rehearsal and performance schedule.  I chose to make reversible wall units on castered wagons.  The wagons were arranged  and dressed differently to create the settings for an Oxford student residence, a campus garden, and wealthy home.  Blaine Visser, a student's dad, built the flats and wagons from my computer-based renderings (see link above) and did a fantastic job.

 Sing To Me Through Open Windows / Chamber Music (Photos of Set) 2010 Wenatchee High School, Wenatchee, WA
These one act plays (Directed by Paul Atwood) by Arthur Kopit both had strong references to windows, but required very different "interiors" - Chamber Music (presented first) required nothing more than tables and chairs and a Victrola.  Sing to Me Through Open Windows required a bed chamber.  Both plays were absurdist, so I felt freedom to design oddly shaped window and door units, painted glossy red with white veining that reacted beautifully in the light.  As usual, this set needed to be "portable" for the Wenatchee High School stage so that other concerts and events could take place during the rehearsal and performance schedule.  Budget was also a concern, so limiting the set to these four simple, but striking, pieces (three window units and one door unit), solved multiple problems.  I deliberately chose not to include functioning windows  to accentuate both scripts' repeated focus on whether or not the windows were open or closed - hoping the audience would spend time as I had, wondering why it was important.

The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940 (Photos of finished set) 2011 Wenatchee High School, Wenatchee, WA
This comedy required a library interior with 3 hidden passages specifically dictated as a revolving bookcase, a sliding bookcase, and a swinging door bookcase.  This was my first use of Google Sketchup as a design tool and in this application it worked extremely well.  The original concept of this design was to be even taller, with another 4 feet of bookshelves where the current paneling is, and then the paneling with "hard borders" of the same paneling.  We had to scale back the construction for budgetary reasons, but I was still very happy with the final result.  Many parents brought in books, family antiques, photos and other set dressing elements that, alongwith several practical lamps and chandeliers (made from fabric mache' and hula hoops), really made this look fantastic while giving the actors an immersive space within which to play.