the creatives...
The creatives are in town... There are 29 designers (give or take a few) for this show and they are ALL here.
For those of you who don't know how a touring show like this works, here's a crash course. A bunch of people get together and design a show to include lights, sound, scenery, hair, costumes and props. Then they put that show together in Britain (in this case) and the show runs for 6 weeks (in this case) and then it's over and they pack it up and go on to other projects.
Many months (or years) later, our company buys the whole package and hires “designer/coordinators” of our own to stand in for the original people and make design choices that stay true to the original intent. Ordinarily, those coordinators put the show together and the show goes on the road looking much like the original production with only minor changes to accommodate not being able to exactly duplicate or replace certain things. For instance, if you have a pair of purple shoes custom made for an English actress with a size 5 foot and she gets replaced with an American actress with a size 10 foot, you now have to do hours of internet research to find an American company that might make a shoe like that in a size 10...
The local coordinators/designers are normally in charge of all these decisions. And we have all those coordinators/designers here all doing this job and then, in an unprecedented move, our company decided to bring in all of the original designers as well.
There's one advantage to this onslaught. If you have questions about a design choice, instead of trying to guess at what they wanted now you can find the person that made that design choice and ask them directly.
Other advantages... other advantages... let me think.
Oh, I know. There aren't any.
Because here's what now happens: 29 people who haven't seen this show in months are now looking at their design work with fresh eyes. And fresh eyes want a fresh show. Plus, there are always creative differences within a team and this is everyone's second chance to get what they really wanted in the first place.
Here's an example of what happens in the wardrobe room 50 times a day this week: “Those gloves were yellow? How come I don't remember that? Why did I ever approve that? I think they should be red but if we make them red, then we should change the buttons on the coat because those are also yellow...” And now a coat that fits perfectly and should just go on into the gondola and be ready to wear, needs to be put on the alteration rack and someone has to spend hours looking for just the right red gloves with buttons that match.
You can only imagine the extra work this entails... Plus now the designer/coordinator has to ask approval for all of his choices; and as nice as the British costume designer is (and he's a total sweetheart) this requires a conversation so everything takes twice as long.
That's the costume side.
From the sound side, it's much less gruesome. Sound cues deemed unsatisfactory require replacements and you can't just buy them – unlike gloves and shoes. You have to find them. Our British director and choreographer, one of the sound designers, the assistant choreographer and the drummer found themselves on a field trip to Lowe's Hardware Store to find sound cues for the Tin Man.
Lauren, our assistant choreographer, said that watching our choreographer test the sound quality of the metal trash can lids by knocking them into her head was one of the funniest things she's ever seen. Nigel, our director, and Phil, our drummer, walked up and down the aisles with his drum sticks drumming on everything and saying “for when he knocks on the door? For when his legs come unstuck from the rust? For when he gets knocked over?” while everyone else grabbed anything else metal and rapped it on the ground or shook it in the air to get a reverbe and kept coming back to the director and saying “This? How about this??”
It took a while for the Lowe's employees to hesitantly approach this madness and say “can we...help you...???”
Uh, no. There's no help for us. Really.
For those of you who don't know how a touring show like this works, here's a crash course. A bunch of people get together and design a show to include lights, sound, scenery, hair, costumes and props. Then they put that show together in Britain (in this case) and the show runs for 6 weeks (in this case) and then it's over and they pack it up and go on to other projects.
Many months (or years) later, our company buys the whole package and hires “designer/coordinators” of our own to stand in for the original people and make design choices that stay true to the original intent. Ordinarily, those coordinators put the show together and the show goes on the road looking much like the original production with only minor changes to accommodate not being able to exactly duplicate or replace certain things. For instance, if you have a pair of purple shoes custom made for an English actress with a size 5 foot and she gets replaced with an American actress with a size 10 foot, you now have to do hours of internet research to find an American company that might make a shoe like that in a size 10...
The local coordinators/designers are normally in charge of all these decisions. And we have all those coordinators/designers here all doing this job and then, in an unprecedented move, our company decided to bring in all of the original designers as well.
There's one advantage to this onslaught. If you have questions about a design choice, instead of trying to guess at what they wanted now you can find the person that made that design choice and ask them directly.
Other advantages... other advantages... let me think.
Oh, I know. There aren't any.
Because here's what now happens: 29 people who haven't seen this show in months are now looking at their design work with fresh eyes. And fresh eyes want a fresh show. Plus, there are always creative differences within a team and this is everyone's second chance to get what they really wanted in the first place.
Here's an example of what happens in the wardrobe room 50 times a day this week: “Those gloves were yellow? How come I don't remember that? Why did I ever approve that? I think they should be red but if we make them red, then we should change the buttons on the coat because those are also yellow...” And now a coat that fits perfectly and should just go on into the gondola and be ready to wear, needs to be put on the alteration rack and someone has to spend hours looking for just the right red gloves with buttons that match.
You can only imagine the extra work this entails... Plus now the designer/coordinator has to ask approval for all of his choices; and as nice as the British costume designer is (and he's a total sweetheart) this requires a conversation so everything takes twice as long.
That's the costume side.
From the sound side, it's much less gruesome. Sound cues deemed unsatisfactory require replacements and you can't just buy them – unlike gloves and shoes. You have to find them. Our British director and choreographer, one of the sound designers, the assistant choreographer and the drummer found themselves on a field trip to Lowe's Hardware Store to find sound cues for the Tin Man.
Lauren, our assistant choreographer, said that watching our choreographer test the sound quality of the metal trash can lids by knocking them into her head was one of the funniest things she's ever seen. Nigel, our director, and Phil, our drummer, walked up and down the aisles with his drum sticks drumming on everything and saying “for when he knocks on the door? For when his legs come unstuck from the rust? For when he gets knocked over?” while everyone else grabbed anything else metal and rapped it on the ground or shook it in the air to get a reverbe and kept coming back to the director and saying “This? How about this??”
It took a while for the Lowe's employees to hesitantly approach this madness and say “can we...help you...???”
Uh, no. There's no help for us. Really.
posted by KBARRETT at 8:30 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home