Everybody Wants To Be Ronaldo
Lighting Designer & Programmer
TECTUM THEATRE - THE REP
Production Photography: Kris Askey [www.krisaskey.com]
Downloadables and documents are available at the bottom of the page 👇.
Production Bio
Set in the suburbs of Birmingham, footballing protégée, Curtis, has just had the call to say that he won’t be getting a professional footballing contract. When tensions come to boiling point between him and his dedicated Mom, things take a dark turn.
Bio taken from The Rep website.
The Design & The Challenges
The design and design process for this production posed many challenges. These included a tight time frame, a mainly fixed rig, more than four dedicated performance areas requiring a variety of highly specific lighting elements, and a production that needed a design which was dynamic and fulfilled a level of vivid realism.
Contrast
Contrast was a key factor in my design process, switching from a foundation of realism (not to be mistaken for being realistic) to dynamic and energetic when the world is turned upside down by the entrance of Diego Maradona. Finding the balance between realism and being realistic was essential for creating recognisable (being set in Birmingham and using things such as sodium colours of an old street light we all subcotiosly know) and relatable environments to sell the story while also allowing for more abstract elements, such as movement, dynamic performance, and singing to the audience, to take place within these spaces.
Balance
Funny, energetic, visceral, deep, relatable, heart-warming, upsetting, important and dynamic are all words that can be affiliated with the production, as such it was key that I got the balance right. Respecting these emotive aspects was highly important as in on scene we can go from elation to deep hard-hitting 'reality' within a second. Honouring these transitions within my desgn was critical, even if that often led to me constantly altering the most minute of intensity-down times. Ensuring the audience did not get distracrted by something that could in any way be misunderstood as a dynamic 'effect' (as this also happened often to support music, song and dance) was very important to me.
Ambitious Concepts
On looking back, this design was ambitious and perhaps (to my detriment) too ambitious sometimes. Saying this, the team and I did pull it off. The tight time frame, lack of rental fixtures for a very LX demanding show and studio style space with limited side light made things a challenge. It was key that I made plans for every eventuality to ensure my design fulfilled the brief while remaining as flexible as possible. Furthermore, the entire show was pre-programmed and visualised in ETC Audment3d. In addition, capture was used to experiment with initial concepts in the very early faze of the design process.
Improvments
Upon reflection, there are definitely things that need improvement and/or further attention. I am a big believer in showcasing the good, the bad and the ugly to help improve, and so, here are some less fond elements of my own design that I feel I could improve upon if I did the same show again (any improvents relating to budget or limited resources i will exclude from this list).
-
Increased backlight across the entire performance space using PAR 64s
-
Improved side light.
-
More time was required for the opening sequence of Diego, which always felt extremely off for me, and I was never happy with it. In hindsight, it needed to be less intense and needed a more multi-cue scene-based sequence, I feel this did not happen as this was a matter of constant debate, as is often the case.
-
Face light USC needed improvement.
It is always important to reflect, and yes, there are definite areas I could improve upon (something that will always be the case for any creative), not to mention creatively with a larger budget/time. But ultimately, the design fulfilled the brief, and I'm very happy with the final outcome. See below the dress run pictures, downloads and more!
