The combined creative talents of show producer, Kim Gavin and set designer, Es Devlin devised a circus-themed set for which Brilliant Stages created a total of 5 stages, in addition to several pieces of staging wizardry, for the 20 UK stadium dates.
The main Performer stage, 18m wide x 17.8m deep with tech tunnels beneath and access steps on either side, incorporated six lifts: a piano lift, two double band lifts and a puppet lift for the show finale.
Two satellite stages with weather-proof tech bunkers beneath were linked by ramps to the main stage and housed sound kit and instruments. A 6m-deep C stage, also with tech bunkers, was located at the front of the performer stage and incorporated two flights of curved steps with a central split-reveal and parking for the motorised lozenge and its extendable track.
Originally designed to be manually operated for a single use and incorporating a piano lift, the 3m x 6m lozenge became a real workhorse, adapted to be motorised so it could track under its own power to make no fewer than seven trips back and forth along the track between the main and 'B' stages. The lozenge was also required to carry props during set up and to break down into sections small enough to be lifted by lightweight forklift trucks.
The lozenge also acted as a train to pull a 1.5m high x 2.4m wide raised walkway, designed to carry 40 performers, the 38m from the 'A' to the 'B' stage. The walkway was built understage in 1m sections by a six-strong team and linked together soundlessly by means of pins and clips for rapid, silent deployment during a six-minute solo number.
Brilliant Stages also devised the 12m wide x 2m high, multi-tiered, 'B' stage complete with hydraulically operated 'petal' segments in the top which opened 260° to reveal one of the show's centrepieces, a 7.8m high mechanical elephant which was to transport the band to the main stage as part of their entrance.
Brilliant Stages built the substructure for the elephant around a purpose-built, two-level scissor-lift which was motorised to turn on a slew ring and track the length of the auditorium to the main stage, having first been released out of hinged front sections of the B stage.
The elephant's translucent skin of light-weight chain mail, constructed by Mark Mason of Asylum Models (who also made the skins for the big top and the Ringmaster puppet), was placed on top of the substructure and automated by a total of 13 puppeteers inside the skin and another four at ground level, activating the head, trunk and legs, and with rods to move the ears and a tail formed by an inverted acrobat wearing a helmet with hair extensions.
Finally the elephant crouches to allow the band dismount along a purpose built gangplank before returning to the B stage and sinking once more into the 1.8m high B stage - all in space of one song.
"The show just kept evolving as it went along!" says Brilliant Stages John Gittins, "which is what happens when you are working with fabulously creative people like Kim Gavin and Es Devlin. "We aim to deliver the 'design intent' - as close to their creative designs as the laws of physics allow."
(Jim Evans)
