"This old venue, which was called Cabaret Old Town, was a fixture among theatre lovers," said Sean Roberson, who remembers sneaking away as a high school student to see shows at the building. "We missed it when it closed, so when John Hammer reopened the building as Roxy's Downtown, all of us who grew up with theatre were pulling for him to succeed."
Roberson did much more than wish the new venture well; he was able to contribute to its success, when, as project manager of Theatrical Services, Inc., he helped convince Hammer to go with the Chauvet LED stage lighting rig.
"The old lighting system was a hodgepodge of all different things, none of which were very functional," said Roberson. "We demoed the Chauvet gear to John and explained the advantages it offered. He agree to rent the rig for the first production at Roxy's Downtown, Plaid Tidings, the holiday version of Forever Plaid."
Apparently the Chauvet LED rig made a powerful impression on the Roxy's Downtown audience and owner. "The crowd loved the lighting and commented on it," said Roberson. "At that point John was committed to having us install the rig permanently."
The rig that Theatrical Services installed at Roxy's Downtown includes four COLORado 1-Quad Zoom Tour RGBW par style fixtures with a wide zoom range of 16-48 degrees, six COLORdash Batten-Quad 12 RGBA linear fixtures, six COLORdash Par-Hex 12 120-watt hex-colored RGBAW+UV par style fixtures and one Followspot 75ST from Chauvet DJ.
"There's an excellent fit between this rig and the needs of Roxy's Downtown," said Roberson. "Being that it's all LED, it's great in terms of power draw. We didn't need to have an electrician. Everything was plug and play."
(Jim Evans)
