| An interview with the assistant
lighting designer
A general introduction to the role of the lighting
designer
Ray Fearon as Oberon in A Midsummer Night's
Dream, photograph by Ivan Kyncl
Interview with James Whiteside,
assistant to Hartley T A Kemp, Lighting Designer on A Midsummer
Night's Dream.
On a flat open thrust stage like the Crucible stage, where scenery
is kept to a minimum, lighting is incredibly important as it helps
the audience to understand where each scene is being performed.
Tell us about the role of an assistant lighting designer:
'I am here on this show to work with Hartley because he's not available
to be here every single day and is off doing another show now, the
day before the press night. So if Michael Grandage wants any lighting
changes made now, I will make them, big or small. The role can vary,
and when I assist other people I do more preparation work, drawing
a lighting plan for example, but I didn't on this show.
'I don't have any input into what the initial concept is, but I've
got a reasonable idea why we've made the decisions that we have
made. For example, in the world of the forest the lighting is very
colourful, using blues and greens as a colour palette. Titania often
has a pinkish light following her, and her bower is pink. The world
of the mechanicals is whiter. You can see where those influences
come from in this show - they're influenced by the set and the costumes.
The world of the court is inside rather than outside, and has 3
windows coming down onto the stage and is also quite a white look,
and doesn't have the 'magic' feel to it that the forest does. There
are lots of gobos used in the forest scenes that provide a dappled
effect. They're layered in different colours and so they look very
subtle.
'There are about 300 lighting cues in this show. A lot of them
will make changes that aren't immediately obvious, that very gradually
build on top of one another. The moon is created with a painted
back projection screen with a lot of light and some gobo effects
coming from behind.
'There are a number of places in the story where two worlds clash
- for example, when Puck places the asses head on Bottom, and the
worlds of the mechanicals and fairies come together. In situations
like this, the lighting simply fades from one world to the other
and the time of the fade is absolutely motivated by either action
or sound - every lighting change has to have a motivation so you're
always looking for something that will actually tell you how long
the change is between one state and other state. In this example,
the change comes from us actually hearing Bottom coming up the vom.
When the mechanicals come back into this world, Bottom is isolated
in some blue light (as part of the fairy world) but the mechanicals
are placed in a slightly whiter light.
'I'm most pleased with the entrance of Puck - his descent in a
shaft of light coming down - it's just one light and it's very simple,
but that's often the case with the most effective lighting states.
That whole scene came in technical rehearsal because Michael saw
the light and re-blocked the scene having seen it. He's very good
at seeing that sort of opportunity. You can't have a model of lighting
design, or know what it's going to look at before the technical
rehearsal, so it’s very much about grabbing that sort of opportunity.
In order to create all these effects we use 8 intelligent lights
and 10 scrollers.
We use haze (a light smoke) all the way through the show; it gives
dimension to the stage and means we as the audience can see the
beams of light rather than just the effect on the stage or the actor.
It's particularly useful for the window in the court and to lift
the gobos in the forest. Smoke is also used at a number of points
in the show and is linked to the fairy world - for example, it comes
out of Titania's bower and out of the steps in the last act prior
to the dance of reconciliation.'
Lee Boardman as Bottom in A Midsummer Night's
Dream,
photograph by Ivan Kyncl
A general introduction
to the role of the lighting designer
The Lighting Designer for A Midsummer Night's Dream is Hartley
T A Kemp. His job is to design the lighting for the production,
decide on the types of lanterns he will use, provide a full lighting
plan for the technicians to rig before the technical rehearsal and
choose the colours for each lantern. He will work very closely with
the director to decide on the effects and placing of scenes on the
set. He will also plot all the lighting states with the director
before the technical rehearsal starts. During the technical rehearsal
Hartley will also work closely with his assistant, James Whiteside
and Gary Longfield, the Crucible Chief Electrician, to further modify
and adapt the design as required.
Most of the work of lighting the production happens in the lighting
session and the technical rehearsal, when the lighting cues are
programmed into the lighting console, a specialised computer. The
basic ‘looks’ for each scene are created between the
director and the lighting designer at the lighting session, and
then all of the cues in the play are made at the technical rehearsal,
as the actors work through the play onstage. But prior to that the
lighting plan must be decided on and drawn by the lighting designer:
what types of lantern to use, where to put them, and what colour
each one will be.
There are many different sorts of lanterns, or lighting instruments.
Profile spots produce a precise beam which can be hard or soft edged,
shaped with shutters (such as a square), textured with gobos (such
as a leaf break-up to give the effect of light through trees), or
even turned into projectors with glass gobos (like slides). Fresnel
and pebble convex spots produce a soft-edged beam of light that
blends into the beams of other lanterns well, and can be varied
in size from a tight spot to a wide flood. Parcans produce a near-parallel
very bright oval beam of light, very bright in the centre and soft
around the edges, but the size of the beam cannot be changed except
by changing the lamp (bulb) type. We are using all of these types
of instrument on A Midsummer Night's Dream, as well as some ‘intelligent
lights’ – lights with motorised position, focus, bema
size and colour mixing, controlled from the lighting console.
The intelligent lights will be used to augment the standard equipment
– their great flexibility is that not only their levels (brightness)
but the position on the stage, shape and size of the beam and the
colour can be set at the lighting session and technical rehearsal.
This means that if things change from the final runs in the rehearsal
room once the show is in the theatre, the lighting can be easily
adjusted without having to refocus all the lights by hand. Also
the colour and even the beam size and position can be changed ‘live’
while the light is on and the time and manner of this change recorded
into the lighting desk. This is most used in musicals and music
shows, but can also be used subtlety to great effect in theatre.
Intelligent lights are relatively new technology for theatre, but
they are now starting to become affordable and useful for theatres
up and down the country.
Even with intelligent lights, a great number of conventional lanterns
are needed to light a large open stage of the size of the Crucible.
Because the audience are on three sides, the lighting must enable
anyone on any side of the stage to be able to see the action taking
place. This does not mean that everyone gets the same picture –
the sun comes from one direction and casts only one shadow, something
that every lighting designer has to remember. If the ‘key
light’. for example the sun in an outdoor scene, comes from
one side, then the audience on that side of the auditorium will
see a brighter, more front-lit picture then the audience on the
opposite side of the auditorium. When lighting open stages Hartley
tries to give each segment of the audience an even amount of front-lit
and side-lit scenes where possible. The same is often true with
the direction and acting on open stages, as different sides of the
audience see different pictures: some moments in the play will have
to be ‘blocked’ to be more visible to one or other sides
of the auditorium.
Creating the feeling of the outdoors, and natural daylight or sunlight
is a challenge. We will be using a haze machine which puts a fine
mist in the air which shows up the beams from the lights.
The lighting designer first talks about the project with the director
and set/costume designer months before the set is build and rehearsals
start, and in a theatre like the Crucible, the lighting plan is
finalised towards the end of the 4-week rehearsal period. This means
the lighting designer can see some of the staging in the rehearsal
room before finalising the plan. On the plan the exact position
of each lantern and type of lantern is decided on – the lighting
designer must bear in mind the list of available equipment belonging
to the theatre, and the budget for hiring any equipment that the
theatre does not have. Each lantern or group of lanterns has its
own channel number to control it, and this may be specified on the
plan.
The lighting designer also needs to choose the colour for each light.
Theatre lights are coloured using transparent medium called ‘gel.’
It used to be made from gelatine, but this would not stand the high
temperatures of modern lamps, so the material used is now usually
polycarbonate, often triple sealed so that the colour does not fade.
Despite this strong colours ‘burn out’ and will have
to be changed by the electricians throughout the run. There are
several different ranges from different manufacturers giving nearly
1,000 colours to choose from, but lighting designers will often
have a favourite palette of colours that they use regularly, the
lighting designer chooses colours that complement the set and costume,
enhance skin tone, combine well with each other and suit the mood
and atmosphere of the piece. The colour is specified on the plan.
Once the plan has been finalised by the lighting designer and given
to the theatre electricians to rig, the lighting designer continues
to see rehearsals and starts to decide where lighting cues will
go in the action (scene changes, specific lines, specific moves),
what each cue will do (moving many or just a few lights), and in
what time (anything from 0 seconds to 10 minutes). In this the lighting
designer will be working from original discussions with the director.
As the show moves from rehearsal room to theatre, the lighting designer
gives the final list of cues positions to the DSM (deputy stage
manager) who will ‘call’ the cues (tell the operators
when to do the cues) at the technical rehearsal, dress rehearsal
and performances.
After the lighting session and technical rehearsal are the dress
rehearsals, the lighting designer’s chance to look at all
the cues happening at once, in theory with no interruptions, and
adjust as necessary. The first performances are previews, during
which the lighting designer watches the piece from different angles
and makes notes of any further adjustments or finessing needed.
Many small adjustments in level and timing are made after the first
few previews and blocking and stage action may be changed during
the day between previews, or sequences re-rehearsed and perfected.
But the week after previews the production will finally be ready
for press night.
After press night the lighting design will not be changed: the lighting
designer moves on to their next show, while the DSM will call the
cues and the electricians operate the console for each performance.
The electricians will also look after the rig, check the focus,
change any blown lamps or burnt-out colour, and start talking to
the next show’s lighting designer about their needs.
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