Week 5: Boats and Shows

Wow what a week it's been. Major projects due, tech for The Last Lifeboat, and several days without sufficient sleep. Since I was here at the xMPL theatre space all week and all weekend as his assistant lighting designer, I feel like it's only fitting that I comment on some of Wesley Chew's lighting. 

I know one class mate already commented on TLL, but there's no harm in getting a second opinion. 

Since I'm actually working with Wes, I was able to hear and understand his design concept. He split it up where each act has its own big idea. 

The first act is the Pre-World of the leading up to and building of the Titanic and the choices J. Bruce Ismay had to make during that process. The main difference is the first act is warmer at least until the crash of the Titanic. There is a texture that he uses that mimics both the look of a ship and the ripping or shredding of metal. In using this texture he foreshadows the inevitable iceberg crash.

What I find interesting is he only uses the texture in the first act. I see it as both a way to differentiate the place between the many, many scenes, and it is a great conceptual choice to give a harsher feel to the play. There are so many scenes and I could write for a long time about every one. So I'm going to choose only one picture per act. 

I felt like this was an appropriate picture. I figured it has the most elements of the first act. The brighter more saturate and warmer colors on the cyc tell the time of day, and this is a more romantic point in the story so the colors could get more on the love side of sunsets. The icy cools cutting in from the high angle wash give a frigidity from the time and place. It also has sweeping warm sunset light coming from the heads stage right. 

Act 2 is the following event that unfold after Ismay's decision to jump into a lifeboat instead of going down with the ship. Wes' idea for the next act is to take out most of the warm from the world. Ismay is haunted by the memory of what he has done, Wes expresses that story with high angles and isolations. The color palette is more stark and nightmarish especially within the first couple scenes.

This is the scene to begin act 2 on the lifeboat. The contrast between the Act 1 picture and this one is very high. It has a iciness to it that really sets the play in a different direction. There is an icy greenish blue coming from the heads that gives an eerie unsettling deathly feeling. The surrounding blue sets the lifeboat into the ocean.