25: 2010 - Look Behind You

Main - "Backstage" scene

Panto - "Onstage" scene 1

Panto - "Onstage" scene 2

Panto - "Onstage" scene 3

Something like buses, perhaps, in that it's quite possible to go for some time without the need for complicated stages, then several come along one after the other. Following on from the multiple-set requirements of "...Earnest" and the location-based lighting most recently used in "Run For Your Wife"...this was a production which needed both at once.

The premise of this particular show is that it is primarily backstage, during the run of a typical B-list celebrity panto, but is interspersed with on-stage scenes from the panto itself. The transitions between the two areas are frequent and often short-lived. The ideal solution would have been a rotating stage, of course, but with an 8' depth to play with that was never going to be viable. Nor was the traditional use of free-standing flats: in some cases, this would have made the scene changes longer than the scenes themselves.

Without being able to use rotation, and needing something a little more convincingly pantomime than simply drawing the half-tabs, the only realistic option was to slide scenery on and off quickly, which meant some sort of runner system. A few abortive thoughts on how to achieve that in concealed format led to the idea of dividing up the "backstage" area as though it had partition walls (theatrical license allowing those to be see-through). The partition frame could then double as the runners for scenery. That was complicated a little by the need to have removable flats somewhat longer than the space available in the wings: this was addressed by cutting them in half and hinging them.

So, the backstage area was separated into the prompt booth and a generic dressing room, plus the communal corridor leading to the "stage" and to the rest of the theatre. Two sets of scenery - a shop front and a ship - plus a set of bushes with the half-tabs and the apron in front of the main curtains gave four separate configurations for the on-stage parts. Lighting was - just about - divided up between the various areas: allowing for the need to have different coloured spots out front for the good fairy and the bad rat-queen, it was something of a problem to get the remainder to cover everything. Short of installing more lights, in fact, this pretty much reached the limit of the possible as far as the current set-up goes.

All in all, the technical side of things was rather successful. By the time it was put in front of an audience, the many people required to work it all backstage had reduced the scene changes to a slick and efficient routine, despite the cramped and crowded working conditions necessitated by it all. Challenging, without a doubt, but equally very satisfying.