Tag Archive: Theatre Lighting Hire London

1. White Light Works Its Magic on Derren Brown’s Showman

   5 October 2021 15:46 Leave a Comment

   

   Often regarded as the master of mind control and psychological illusion, Derren Brown is known across the globe for his ability to astonish and amaze audiences; whether that’s to millions through his television series or live on stage in his award-winning touring shows. He is now back touring theatres with his first new stage show in six years: Showman. Having supplied the lighting on several of Derren Brown’s previous production, White Light (WL) was called upon to do so again on this occasion. 

   As with any Derren Brown show, the contents of Showman remain a closely-guarded secret but as the mysterious man himself promises: ‘It will ultimately be about you, the audience member, because that’s what I find most interesting’. The lighting designer for the show is Charlie Morgan Jones, who has lit Derren’s previous West End and touring production, Underground. He comments: ‘Underground was essentially a ‘Best of’ Derren Brown show, so the directors Andrew O’Connor and Andy Nyman had worked most of the routines before and I was essentially just throwing new light on them. As such, Showman is the first brand-new Derren Brown show I’ve worked on and what a show it is. Like all of Derren’s work, and the reason he’s a master of his craft, the show isn’t just spectacle and ‘how did he do that’. Rather, there’s a beautiful emotional arc throughout and so there is a real pathos that comes with the humour and spectacle; resulting in a truly theatrical experience”. 

   So how does a lighting designer approach a show as unique as this? Does it differ greatly from a more traditional play/musical? According to Charlie, the answer is no: “As a designer, I always see my role as enhancing the mood and emotion that appears on stage. It’s almost like being an editor of the film where your job is to point the audience in the right direction and it’s no different for Showman”.

   

   As with any production he works on, Charlie always tries to ensure that he is in the rehearsal room as much as possible. This proved slightly tricky though with Showman: “I was double booked for this show but truly double booked in the sense that I wouldn’t even be in the same country! I had accepted a job as lighting designer on the Copenhagen Opera Festival and due to dates being moved because of certain global pandemics, both this and Showman ended up crossing at the same time. Thankfully, we were able to bring on an amazing Associate Lighting Designer in Clancy Flynn who steered the show through tech to opening night before I returned. Prior to this, we both spent two days at WL’s Visualisation Suite looking at lights and potential cues for the show. Thankfully, both Andrew and Andy are two of the most giving directors you could ask for and really allow you to experiment freely; something that is vital as any brand-new show will evolve through the rehearsal and tech process.” 

   Following this, Charlie approached WL’s Customer Service team to provide him with the fixtures he needed for his design. He explains: “My (current) favourite moving light is the VL2600.  It’s versatile, bright, fast and quiet and so was the natural choice to become the work horse of this rig, with 13 units positioned overhead and four out front.  We also use the Rush Par 2, which is beamy when it needs to be beamy, and zoomy when it needs to be zoomy (those are the accurate technical terms FYI).  The preset, where they really show off, is one of my favourite ‘looks’ of the show and we use this at least a couple of times. Topping off the rig is the ever–excellent ETC Source Four Lustr 2, which provides the depth of colour a show like this needs”. 

   The show opened just over a month at the Theatre Royal Plymouth and is now visiting over 30 venues across the UK, touring all the way through to October 2022.  

   Charlie comments: “After perhaps not the easiest year for those working in our industry, we had just the best time making this show, with one of the most generous teams out there.  My heart goes out to the brilliant lighting team, which included Clancy Flynn, our wonderful Production Electrician, Andy Murrell and Matt Shraga. the lighting programmer who’s only just graduated from Guildhall. As ever, a big thanks to everyone at WL too. The constant support I received throughout this production was so valuable and something that was massively appreciated”.  

   Photos courtesy of Charlie Morgan Jones and Greenbeanz Photography.

    

2. White Light in Good Spirits for Ghost Stories UK Tour

   10 March 2020 08:45 Leave a Comment

   

   White Light has provided the lighting equipment for the UK tour of Ghost Stories, having also supplied its recent West End run at the Ambassadors Theatre.

   Written by Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman, Ghost Stories has been terrifying theatregoers for over a decade. The show invites audience members to enter a nightmarish world, full of thrilling twists and turns, where their deepest fears and most disturbing thoughts are imagined live on stage; offering a theatrical experience like no other. The lighting designer for the show is James Farncombe, who comments: “What was clear from the outset was that the design needed to be as much about the absence of light as much as anything else. I really like this idea that it’s more of a darkness design and that, due to the nature of the staging and the various tricks therein, I had to hide as much as I revealed. Ultimately it’s all about creating that atmosphere for an audience”.

   It was this atmosphere that plays such an intrinsic role in what has given Ghost Stories its worldwide reputation of terrifying audiences. So how do you make lighting ‘scary’? James explains: “It’s a combination of things. The lighting works in tandem with Nick Manning’s extraordinary sound design. There is a slow, shadowy build-up of tension. then each jump moment is part release, part punchline, and all very much in the spirit of a B movie. To a large extent, Ghost Stories is about the anticipation of what might happen next, what might be lurking in the shadows. When the show is firing on all cylinders, it really creeps up on the audience. You could draw a parallel with Hitchcock’s idea that the suggestion of things left unseen is far more potent than anything we can reveal on stage or screen.  The scariest possible thing is always very particular to an individual so, to a large extent, we expect the audience to populate the shadows with their own fears”.

   James has worked on the show since it first started life at the Liverpool Playhouse in 2010. And whilst there have been significant advances in lighting since them, James has found himself drawing on more conventional fixtures ever since that initial run. He comments: “As the show is now a decade old, it actually predates my first encounter with LED fixtures such as Lustrs etc. Instead, the rig is actually made up on conventional units with no scrollers and no moving heads yet this is something that works to great effect. We spent a lot of time managing spill and flare, so Source Fours became essential for precise focussing, and they make up the bulk of the rig. In terms of other fixtures, there are a number of birdies hidden in the set, a series of little LED strips, a few practical lamps and three pinspots. Everything needed to be small as there is very little room in the fly plot, or in the nooks and crannies of the set pieces, so size was a big consideration”.

   

   This marks the first time that Ghost Stories has embarked on a UK Tour. As such, James had to ensure his rig was completely tourable. He comments: “With the show going up in two days in most venues, we have made a few nips and tucks here and there. That said, it’s still more or less the same lighting rig as was featured in last year’s Ambassadors run; largely thanks to Andy Taylor doing an amazing job of making the impossible possible. That said, the show has gone through almost ten years of slight development and distillation and we are now at a point where we know the most effective set-up in which to scare our audience members night after night…”.

   Ghost Stories began its tour at the Alexandra Theatre, Birmingham and is currently playing at the Grand Opera House, York. It will continue to tour across the UK before concluding at the Nuffield Theatre, Southampton in May 2020. 

   Photos courtesy of Chris Payne.

3. White Light Goes on Tour with Poet in da Corner

   26 February 2020 10:31 Leave a Comment

   

   White Light has supplied the lighting equipment for the UK tour of Poet in da Corner, following its critically-acclaimed run at the Royal Court Theatre.

   Poet in da Corner is a coming of age story inspired by Dizzee Rascal’s seminal album Boy in Da Corner. Written and performed by lyricist and poet Debris Stevenson, it originally ran at the Royal Court in 2018. This latest tour is a brand-new production, directed by Ola Ince and featuring a lighting design by Anna Watson. Anna comments: “Poet in da Corner is a really original and unique story told primarily through grime music. With this in mind, I always knew that the lighting would have to work hard in order to match the show’s epic, fast-paced soundtrack. I wanted my design to support the story and music as well as capture the grime rave aesthetic. I also had to work alongside the set design by Jacob Hughes which is a beautifully simple layout of yellow portals on truss along with a high shine floor with a revolve. As a creative team, we set ourselves one objective: to help create an unforgettable gig theatre vibe!”.

   With the creative team working so holistically, Anna ensured that she attended as many rehearsals as possible. She explains: “I always try to attend rehearsals but it was particularly important with this show as it really helped me get inside the music and be familiar with the choreography which really drives the piece. It also allows us to add extremely detailed cueing to the book whilst still in the rehearsal room, which ultimately helped ease our move into the theatre”.

   

   Knowing what equipment she needed for her design, Anna approached WL’s Hire team. In terms of her fixture choices, she explains: “Overhead, we had 9 metres of GLP Impression X4 Bar 20s and 9 x Martin MAC Aura XBs. The X4 Bars were the lighting stars of the show. This was my first opportunity to really test these units and they did not disappoint. Visible to the audience, we used them for a huge variety of effects and atmospheric lighting. With incredible programming from Stephen Settle, they filled or dissected the space with beautiful accuracy and detail. The Aura XBs also worked hard as moving beams through haze or acting as specials to light the performers. 

   She continues: “On the booms, we had ETC ColorSource PARs, ColorSource Profiles and PAR 64s, with birdies used as footlights. We used 30 x RGBW LED fluorescents upstage mainly behind a black BP screen, which gave them a slightly ghostly or projected feel as they chased along or flickered to beats of the music. These were only actually then revealed for one track which is set in a club but we ensured they were shown off in their full glory. We used old school asymmetric floods as audience blinders”.

   

   As the show was also visiting a range of venues across the UK, this is something that Anna had to factor into her design. She comments: “As the show is touring to a wide variety of venues (from medium size studios to Hackney Empire), couple with the tight turnaround time at each, we wanted to reduce the variables as much as possible, so made the decision to tour everything. Fortunately, with a great deal of support from WL and GLP, we were able to put together a rig that could feel big enough and flexible enough to support this bold, fast-paced and beautifully loud show. The overhead kit is rigged on three freestanding truss structures plus a metal frame at the front of the stage. The rig was always going to have to work hard and, with a fairly simple set, it was down to the lighting to capture the grime rave feel; something we feel we achieved”.

   Poet in da Corner opened at the Royal Court Theatre and is now embarking on its UK tour, visiting The MAC, Belfast later this week.

   Anna concludes: “As always, I was very well looked after by the Royal Court team, with huge support by Johnny Wilson and the lighting team. Also a big thanks to WL for once again supplying me with the fixtures I needed”.

   Photos courtesy of Helen Murray.

4. White Light Supplies the Lighting for Baby Reindeer

   24 October 2019 14:56 Leave a Comment

   

   White Light has supplied the lighting equipment for the critically-acclaimed Baby Reindeer, which has recently opened at The Bush Theatre following its award-winning run at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

   Written by Edinburgh Comedy Award Winner Richard Gadd, Baby Reindeer is a chilling personal narrative that looks at what happens when a kind gesture and trivial interactions results in much wider ramifications. It is directed by Oliver Award-winning Jon Brittain and features a lighting design by Peter Small, who comments: “Baby Reindeer is the true story of Richard’s experience of stalking. The thinking for the lighting design was to provide the necessary location changes and anchors that the audience can latch onto; especially as there were no scenery or props to guide them through the multiple revisited locations. Primarily though the lighting was there to follow Richard’s emotional journey down to breaking point and ultimately back up again. The lighting hopefully works in parallel with him on his frenetic journey, which results in a surprisingly dense cue structure and requires razor sharp operating as we pretty much chase his every move”.

   

   Prior to its London run, the show began life as part of the Paines Plough Roundabout at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Peter explains: “We wanted to keep some of the DNA of the visuals we had made there as well as wanting to recycle as much of the cue data we had done in Edinburgh as possible, therefore I needed a good quality colour changing LED light with a bright parallel beam that could be clustered together into a formation. The Bush had a good generic stock but I knew I needed to supplement the rig with specific LED lighting”.

   As a result, Peter contacted WL and worked closely with Account Handler Louise Houlihan to decide on the most suitable fixtures. Peter comments: “We eventually settled on the Chroma Q Color Force 12, which was an unexpectedly good fit, within budget and WL had the quantity we needed available. The decision to use these was quite out of the box but they ended up being a big highlight of the design. Also, you can run them in two cell mode which effectively gives you double the number of lights! We also hired some faithful Narrow 80v TW1s which were great for pulling focus tightly to Gadd for more concentrated moments and making the rest of the picture fall to black”.

   

   As the play began in Edinburgh and then received a transfer to London, this meant that the entire creative team had to formulate their design accordingly. He comments: “Perhaps the biggest difficulty in bringing the show to London was transcribing a design made on such a custom lighting rig to traditional lighting equipment in which the fundamental imagery and design logic are the same. The change to the design for London was the addition of the scenery which required lighting in its own right as well as some fiddly 3D drafting to ensure shots could be achieved. The other big addition was seven more projectors which meant stripping back a few looks as video would take the lead visually in those moments. Sometimes, with lighting, less is more and that was definitely the case in this situation”.

   The show has now opened to five star reviews, almost selling out across its entire run which concludes on November 9^th.

   Peter comments: “It was great to be part of the Baby Reindeer creative team and we’re all delighted by how it’s been received. I’d like to thank WL and my account handler Louise for once again being utterly brilliant and providing the superb service I’ve now come to expect from them”.

   Photos courtesy of Michael O’Rielly.

5. White Light Keeps Its HAIR on UK Tour

   4 April 2019 14:52 Leave a Comment

   

   White Light is supplying the lighting equipment for the iconic musical HAIR which is currently touring the UK.

   Having first debuted Off-Broadway in 1967, HAIR has gone on to become one of the theatre’s most iconic musicals, following a group of youngsters in New York’s East Village as they begin to question the world, authority and the American flag. Having been revived several times on both Broadway and in the West End, this is the 50^th anniversary production and has already received a WhatsOnStage Award.

   The lighting designer is Ben M Rogers, who comments: “I previously lit this production for its immersive incarnation at The Vaults, Waterloo so this is an evolution of that design into a proscenium format for a national tour. The key design choices and looks remain but are expanded to fill these larger spaces and the enhanced scenic elements”.

   

   Ben worked closely with director Jonathan O’Boyle to discuss the aesthetic he wanted to create for the show. He explains: “Jonathan first described the show as ‘a trip from start to finish’ and that has stayed with me. Although it continually breaks the fourth wall, the show mainly alternates between the more naturalistic environment that the tribe inhabit and the abstracted, often drug-infused hyper-reality moments. As such, I looked at how to layer the design to allow these dramatic shifts of tone and focus”.

   Ben approached WL to supply him with the fixtures to achieve his design. He comments: “I was very conscious of the era in which the show is set and the lighting instruments of the time. That said, I had to ensure the show remained a dynamic music and visual experience. The visible sources in the rig are generally tungsten sources with the LED sources hidden or masked. Although the majority of sources are automated fixtures, the programming and design steers away from live moves and copious colour chases or similar, more contemporary effects preferring the animation to be more period friendly dimmer chases.

   

   He continues: “Wash fixtures dominate the rig but the Martin Viper Performances are perhaps the hardest working units with four front of house providing gobo washes and tight shutter cut focuses throughout the show. The rig is a balance of LED sources including MAC Auras, Pixel Battens, Lustr 2 and the new (and awesome) ETC Coloursource Cyc units. The Martin TW1s are the key visible sources to maintain the period tungsten “par” looks with the Viper Performances reliving the highlights and gobo toning”.

   As this was a touring production of the show, Ben had to adapt his design so that it could visit venues of varying sizes up and down the country. He states: “I’m always conscious when developing a touring design of the practicalities of system design and layout. As a result, the bar weights, power allocations and fit-up practicalities were all considered; taking advice from Production Electrician Stephen Andrews to ensure the show could be delivered without compromise on the road. The prep resources and rack builds at WL also helped with this process”.

   

   HAIR has now opened and is playing at the Cheltenham Everyman Theatre this week.

   Ben concludes: “This is a big bold production with a powerful message of peace and love that still resonates today. Not only are we touring the UK but we will also be visiting Germany later this year to invite more audiences to join the tribe and let the sunshine in…”

   Photos courtesy of Johan Persson.

   Credits:

   Lighting Design: Ben M Rogers
   Set and Costume Design: Maeve Black
   Sound Design: Calum Robinson
   Director: Jonathan O’Boyle
   Choreographer: William Whelton
   Musical Director: Gareth Bretherton