Patrick M. Strain - Scenic/Lighting Design

A Midsummer Night's Dream

Roadside Theatre
Heidelberg, Germany
October, 1999
Costumes Provided by Theatrix
Directed by Scott Fults

Did we know that the high school girl (third from the left), would one day be a Tony-award-winning actress?
(Nina Arianda).
We knew she had talent, that much is certain. It's made me rethink how much I encourage the young actors I work with. With all due respect to Nina, I've worked with kids in Portage who, at that age, had at least as much going on for them as Nina did. If they work as hard as Nina has, who knows how far they could go?

That's Bottom ala Shriner there, in his fancy red chapeau.

On a personal note - Hats off to the late Ron Paoletti, (aka Uncle Grumpy - in the orange.)
There was not a man in all Heidelberg who could discharge Peter Quince but he.

Production Notes:
Given the director's concept that the play take place in the Summer of Love, the challenge was on to weave Shakespeare with the Sixties, and yet, in homage to Shakespeare (and out budget), keep it simple. (As a start, the locale was moved to Athens, Georgia.) Given the abundance of moon imagery in the play, the one scenic piece that stayed throughout was a steel tube rimmed scrim moon. It is here that the show begins with Oberan being discovered behind the moon, and it is that same image that ends the show. Following the opening protest march, we moved into the Theseus' realm. That of marble and steel columns and clear white light. Kept simple for many reasons, the spare verticals reflected the relative barrenness of Theseus' world. From there, the columns spin and branches drop down to create trees and we moved into the woods. Layer upon layer of scrim slides into place (splattered ala Jackson Pollock) and the transformation is complete quickly and effectively. Here, the lighting dominates the design with deep colors in a variety of patterns shot though haze, giving us a rock and roll in the woods feel. The scrim allowed for great control of seeing who is coming through the woods or conversely, hide someone's approach. All this, in addition to the score of Sixties music, really pulled the show together and gave the audience a nice evening.