Something Rotten!
By O'Farrell, Kirkpatrick, & Kirkpatrick
Direction: Professor Lee Blair
Scenic Design: Britton Mauk
Costume Design: Professor Mary McClung
Lighting Design: Ryanne Fury
Sound Design: Elise Lein
Technical Direction: Abby Bender
Something Rotten! was the first production I technical directed in West Virginia University's Lyell B. Clay Concert Theatre, an approximately 1,400 seat house with a 60' wide proscenium arch. Our scenic designer was a guest artist in the form of Pittsburgher Britton Mauk, with assistance from WVU graduate student Karlee Klitgaard. I was assisted by BFA student Declan Mungovan, my second partnership with an undergraduate student at WVU.
Renderings by
Britton Mauk
The scenic design inspiration held a lot of images of Tudor-era and revival half-timbered houses, as well as images of mold art (the titular something "rotten") which would influence the color palette. Our designer wanted to utilize our stock turntable in its smaller diameter (18') to serve as both the theatre in which the Bottom brothers work as well as the home of Nancy Nostradamus. The theatre half would be able to be revealed via the opening of a pair of doors with compound curves, as seen in some of his renderings above. There were also two portals and two houses that would remain onstage through the entire show, with other units either flying or rolling on and off as needed to transport the audience to various locales.
I received the budgetary limits from my advisor, faculty technical director Professor Steven Neuenschwander, those being $7,000, with 625 build hours and 250 load-in hours. This show, much like several others I undertook at WVU, required more budget passes than expected. Much of Mr. Mauk's half-timbering was eliminated and became painted elements, while the two custom-built portals became one fabric portal that WVU has in stock. At the end of the budgeting process, every unit save one had escaped the axe, albeit with significant alterations.
With my undergraduate assistants, I keep them on the same units from budgeting through install, usually several smaller projects while I take on whatever the largest/most complex unit(s) are. In this case, my responsibilities included the turntable and everything that went on it, that being "Side A & B- Theatre & Nostradamus" and the "Theatre Doors" as listed in the budget. I also took the fort flat, which was a simple flown Broadway flat, while my assistant was in charge of all other major units (Nick & Bea's House, Park Stage, Tent, Bridge, and Signs). Professor Neuenschwander kindly took Walls 1 & 2, while the lanterns were primarily lighting elements that we had to keep in mind for rigging purposes.
Build and mockup for the turntable with all of its elements went relatively smoothly. The doors were a combination of steel and wood- a small portion close to the main structure would be made of wood and welded to 1/4" thick flat bar that I bolted to the wooden main structure, as pictured below.
The catch came when the doors had to open. There was no platform surround for the turntable, so while I hoped that the doors would be able to support their own weight when open and hovering 6 1/2" off the ground, that dream turned out to be a futile one.
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In the above right photo, a dummy caster can be seen holding up the door in its open position. We knew that something had to be done to allow that caster to be present when the door was opened, but tucked up inside the door when it needed to be closed. Professor Neuenschwander spearheaded the development of the solution: the caster would be mounted to a sliding piece of box tube that would be held in place with a simple block of wood when extended, and slid up into the door when it needed to sit on the turntable.
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With that problem solved for the smaller door, we could go ahead and construct and mock up the large one. In my drafting, I left the tops of the doors long so that we could cut that compound curve into them in situ; I did try to draft them but Professor Neuenschwander advised me to save my time and brainspace, it would be easier to cut with a few measurements and a jigsaw.
Fitting the doors out of the scene shop and across the hallway into the theatre took some careful planning and transportation: due to door size limitations, I had to break the doors at the connection point between the steel and wood, leaving the amazing paints team with a lot of touchup work once it was whole again.
During the tech process, the director initially had wanted actors to move the doors, but due to a variety of factors, crew ended up being necessary. Two crew members spent the entire first act of the show sitting on the turntable so that they could assist in the opening from the inside but not be seen crossing the stage to get onto the turntable. Two more crew would come onstage for the moves, to take the door from their colleagues, place the block-brake, and move the doors to their spike mark.
All photos on this page were taken by me