Notes from the designers of IRT’s 2010 production of Romeo and Juliet

Gordon R. Strain  Scenic Designer
Romeo and Juliet was one of the first Shakespeare plays I read. We read it in high school English and then watched the Zeffirelli film. Several years later, I remember viewing and enjoying the Baz Luhrmann film. I have since re-read Romeo and Juliet a handful of times and have seen several stage productions of it. My history with the play, I believe, is not terribly unique; it seems many people have some experience with it in one form or another. Because of this, one of the greatest challenges was to try and block all those influences out and start anew with this production … or perhaps the challenge was to find a way to channel the influences in order to create a different production. In either case, creating a world that captured the love, the hatred, and the impulses that these characters live has been an exciting task.

Linda Pisano  Costume Designer
In approaching the design for this concept of Romeo and Juliet, the production team discussed the details of the time period, the nuances that created the milieu that we might not notice at first when studying this particular era, this location, and these characters. The focus of the costume design became the details in the clothing that impressed upon people in this society their socio-economic class, their roles in the community, and how they treated one another from all vantage points such as gender, race, age, and income level. They are two families alike in dignity but divided. My role was to discover those divisions and similarities in the physical attributes of the clothing such as cut, color, and fabric type that make this story real and meaningful in any time period and every culture.

Peter West  Lighting Designer
I think about lighting as a way to carve out and define a performance space. To define the space I make choices about where the light source in a scene comes from, what angle that source comes from, and the color or tone. Romeo and Juliet is very rich for a lighting designer as the scenes are often defined, in the text, by what time of day it is and by what the light looks like. The play is full of references to early dawn, midday heat, and late-night moonlight. I use all this information to create a dynamic space for actors to perform in and, I hope, to focus the audience’s attention and help them hear the play clearly and be swept up in the theatrical experience.

Gregg Coffin  Composer
The incidental music I’m composing for this production falls into several categories:  rhythmic cues which elevate the tension in the piece, melodic cues which support the love and the loss in the storyline, and auxiliary or highlighting cues which leave the story for a moment to illuminate the framework of the production. For the sound palette, I’m using piano, bass, guitar, and drums (a tight jazz combo reminiscent of early Nat King Cole orchestrations) and organ (for the more church-like music in the production).

IRT’s production of A.R. Gurney’s LOVE LETTERS has begun previews (get your tickets here!).  Sharing the stage with Priscilla Lindsay and Patrick Clear is a work by Pierre Auguste Renoir called Sketch after Danse à Bougival.  The work, a “sketch” by the artist from this larger work, was chosen by director Janet Allen and scenic designer Gordon Strain from the collection of the Indianapolis Museum of Art to represent the relationship of the play’s two characters.

IMA senior curator Ellen Lee and the original Renoir sketch

The original work housed at the IMA is teeny tiny – 6 1/2” by 7 1/8”.  Hannah Joy Hopkins, IRT scenic artist, scaled it up to a whopping 8’ by 10’!  She did this by making several larger copies – to refine the style – with larger and larger brushes.  Hannah Joy focused on the expression of the girl in the picture – her expression and how it communicates her relationship with the man.  Is she happy to be dancing with him?  Or sad?  Her trial copies also allowed her to establish her color palette for the finished work – no color is used twice!

Hannah Joy Hopkins' "drafts" and a facsimile of the original work.

Renoir used oils on canvas for the original and that canvas in turn was adhered to another one.  Hannah Joy, on the other hand, worked in acrylics for all the copies.  After making the smaller versions, she took the time between the closing of IRT’s first Mainstage production of the 2009-2010 season, The Heavens Are Hung in Black, and the opening of the second, A Christmas Carol, to paint the final version.  While her canvas was attached to the paint shop wall, she worked from a cherry picker to transform Renoir’s tiny “sketch” into a huge, impactful stage element.

Scenic designer Gordon Strain's model of the set shows the scale of the enlarged copy.

Hannah Joy Hopkins received her BFA in Design and Technical Theatre — with a minor in Art History – from Syracuse University.  She also completed a two-year scenic artist training program at Cobalt Studios and spent six months studying in Florence, Italy.  You can see her portfolio here.

Hannah Joy Hopkins and her first copies of the Renoir sketch.

See those tables out in the theatre in the seats?  Those are for the designers as they prepare the show during the final week of rehearsal.

The crew covers the architectural elements of the theatre — which remain from its days as a movie palace – to convincingly recreate Charles Dickens’ London.

Next up: a timelapse video of the entire process.

Though it creates a magical winterscape onstage, the snow arrives unmagically in these 25-pound boxes from Consolidated Display in Oswego, Illinois.  Twenty-four boxes are used to cover the stage and surrounding architectural elements, and eight boxes are slowly emptied from rotating drums above the set throughout the run of the play.

This machine – which looks like a lottery drum – is used to sift out the snow and ready it for reuse in the overhead snow drums.  The snow is made from finely-shredded plastic bags. 

This barrier is placed in the backstage area to provide a passage for actors during performances. It also prevents snow from invading the paint shop!

Stay tuned for more Snow Forecasts, including a time-lapse video of the set construction and snow installation.  Special thanks to Technical Director Chris Fretts for providing information for this post.

This car is on its way to the IRT.  You’ll find out why very soon!

A favorite at the IRT for 33 of its 38 seasons, Priscilla most recently played Nan in Rabbit Hole. Among her more than 50 roles at the IRT are the title roles of Shirley Valentine, Driving Miss Daisy, and Molly Sweeney, as well as Sister Aloysius in Doubt, Mrs. Gibbs in Our Town, Linda Loman in Death of a Salesman, Ma Joad in The Grapes of Wrath, Mrs. Bennet in Pride and Prejudice, Mrs. Alving in Ghosts, Madame Arcati in Blithe Spirit, Amanda in The Glass Menagerie, and Maggie in Dancing at Lughnasa; this season she will be seen on stage in Love Letters. This is her tenth season as the IRT’s associate artistic director. In recent years she has directed To Kill a Mockingbird and ten editions of A Christmas Carol on the Mainstage, and Huckleberry Finn, The Color of Justice, A Woman Called Truth, Romeo and Juliet, The Red Badge of Courage, The Miracle Worker, I Am Somebody, and Ride a Blue Horse on the Upperstage, where next she will direct The Year of Magical Thinking. One of the area’s top voice talents, she can be heard in many national commercials.

Russell Metheny Scenic Designer

Russell has designed 44 IRT productions, including The Heavens Are Hung in Black, Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure, Iron Kisses, The Piano Lesson, The Unexpected Guest, The Gentleman from Indiana, Driving Miss Daisy, Old Wicked Songs, Searching for Eden, Plaza Suite, Arcadia, The Immigrant, Ah, Wilderness!, Looking Over the President’s Shoulder (2001), State of the Union, Othello, The Glass Menagerie, The Herbal Bed, Abe Lincoln in Illinois, Spunk, and You Can’t Take It with You. He has designed for the Idaho Shakespeare Festival, Great Lakes Theatre Festival, Shakespeare Santa Cruz, Dallas Theatre Center, the Old Globe, Geffen Playhouse, Missouri Rep, Actors Theatre of Kansas City, the Goodman Theatre, Syracuse Stage, Buffalo Studio Arena, Portland Stage, Weston Playhouse, Goodspeed Musicals, and the Studio Theatre.

Murell Horton Costume Designer

Murell received the 2007 Irene Sharaff Young Master Award for costume design. In New York he has designed A Tale of Two Cities for Jeffrey Finn Productions; “1001” for Page 73 productions; O Pioneers! for the Acting Company; and A Doll’s House, The Cherry Orchard, and A Question of Mercy at the Julliard School. At the Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington, D.C., he has received Helen Hayes nominations for Lorenzaccio, Hedda Gabbler, and Camino Real; other productions include Hamlet (twice), Edward II, Titus Andronicus, Richard III, and The Silent Woman. Other regional credits include Baltimore’s Center Stage, Denver Center Theatre, Cleveland Play House, Philadelphia Theatre Company, the Delaware Theatre Company, the Berkshire Theatre Festival, Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey, and Madison Repertory Theatre. He designed the world premiere of Lysistrata at Houston Grand Opera and at New York City Opera. Film work includes Donnie Brasco. Television work includes Saturday Night Live, Martha Stewart, and One Life to Live. He has designed men’s sportswear for L. L. Bean, Liz Claiborne, and Izod. Murell is represented by the Gersh Agency New York City. Online portfolio: web.mac.com/murell

Michael Lincoln Lighting Designer

Michael has designed more than 25 productions at the IRT, including Rabbit Hole, The Piano Lesson, Bad Dates, Old Wicked Songs, Arcadia, The Immigrant, Ah, Wilderness!, Dinner with Friends, The Glass Menagerie, Hedda Gabler, Spunk, and Benefactors, among others. Highlights of his 30-year career include the Broadway productions of Copenhagen, More to Love, and Skylight, as well as Off-Broadway designs including Mr. Goldwyn, The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin, Defying Gravity, Bunny Bunny, and Swingtime Canteen. His design of A Streetcar Named Desire at Cleveland Play House was chosen for the 2007 USITT USA Prague Quadrennial. He now heads the Production Design and Technology Program at Ohio University School of Theater.

Andrew Hopson Original Composition & Sound Design

Andrew is a sound designer and composer for stage, CD, and film, and assistant professor of sound design at Indiana University. He has designed and/or scored shows at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Utah Shakespearean Festival, Geva Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville, American Players Theater, Milwaukee Rep, Cincinnati Playhouse, Cleveland Play House, Victory Gardens, Harvard University, and the Indiana Repertory Theatre, where he was resident sound designer for five years. In 2004 his New York debut, Trying, was rated one of the best Off-Broadway shows of the year. His film work includes Utah’s Olympic Legacy, Hockey’s Greatest Era 1942-1967, and The Birth of Legends.

David Hochoy Choreographer

Artistic director of Dance Kaleidoscope since 1991, David has created choreography and/or movement for more than a dozen productions at the IRT and co-directed Ain’t Misbehavin’ and As You Like It. He has danced with numerous national companies, including the Martha Graham Dance Company, where he was a soloist and rehearsal director. He has taught dance classes and workshops around the world, and spent two years on the faculty at Texas Christian University prior to his appointment at DK. He has choreographed productions at the Indianapolis Civic Theatre, Phoenix Theatre, and Edyvean Repertory Theatre, as well as Arizona Opera and Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park. He was artistic director of the Green Shows at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, where for ten summers DK performed as resident dance company. He has received awards from the Indiana Arts Commission, the Arts Council of Indianapolis, the Center for Leadership Development, Indy Men’s Magazine, and the Choo-San Goh and Robert McGee Foundation.

Christopher Ludwa Musical Director

Chris returns for his fourth season with A Christmas Carol. He is in his ninth season as the artistic director of Encore Vocal Arts, formerly Indianapolis Arts Chorale. He has served as music director of the Bloomington Symphony Orchestra and continues in his role as conductor of the Bloomington Pops Orchestra. As a conductor, he has worked with the Columbus Indiana Philharmonic, the Philharmonic Youth Orchestra, and Meridian Street and Epworth United Methodist churches in Indianapolis. In the summer months, he serves as artistic director of Bay View Music Festival, an eight-week summer festival that produces more than 60 events each year. A passionate advocate for arts integration into daily life and learning, he has taught for the Butler University Honors Program, the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, the Leonard Bernstein Center for Learning, and the Bay View Educational Series. He commutes daily to Indiana University–Bloomington where he is pursuing a doctoral degree in conducting. Chris and his wife, Melissa, welcomed their first child last December.

Richard J Roberts Dramaturg

As dramaturg for 12 of his 20 seasons with the IRT, Richard provides research for the IRT’s productions and works with playwrights in the development of new plays. He has also been a dramaturg for the New Harmony Project and the Bonderman Symposium. He has directed The Giver, The Power of One, and Twelfth Night at the IRT; later this season he directs Pretty Fire. Other directing credits include the Phoenix Theatre, Edyvean Repertory Theatre, Indianapolis Civic Theatre, and Anderson University. He was editor-in-chief of Arts Indiana magazine and has taught theatre courses at Butler University and IUPUI. He studied music at DePauw University and theatre at Indiana University. In 2003 he received a Creative Renewal Arts Fellowship from the Arts Council of Indianapolis.

Nathan Garrison Stage Manager

This is Nathan’s 14th season at the IRT. He has also worked at Center Stage in Baltimore and at the Utah Shakespearean Festival. In 2005, he was awarded a Creative Renewal Arts Fellowship from the Arts Council of Indianapolis. This past summer, Nathan directed Much Ado about Nothing for HART in White River State Park.