Lighting designer Kenneth Posner has created a dynamic and dramatic atmosphere on stage. He says: "The UK audience is in for an exciting and unique visual experience when they see Wicked. The entire design team spent many hours recreating the Broadway visual elements and embellishing the overall design. The Apollo, with its dramatic height but shallower and narrower stage, made it necessary for us to re-design and re-plot many of the scenes."
PRG Europe project manager for the show, Loz Wilcox, continues: "Wicked is already a huge smash hit in America, with productions not only on Broadway but in Los Angeles, Chicago and on tour. PRG provides lighting solutions for all of these shows, so we know what is needed to make this complex production run smoothly. In fact, we were able to supply exactly what Kenneth had requested - from the esoteric hardware used for specific effects in the show right down to specially manufactured fixtures not normally used in the UK theatre market."
The lighting kit includes over 200 ETC Source Four Profiles and numerous ETC Source Four Pars, most with Wybron Coloram II Scrollers. A Vega 10K Fresnel provides a dazzling backlight silhouette and the cyc is stunningly lit using 16 ETC 12-lamp Multipar battens and six L&E 30 cell battens. A further four L&E battens are mounted in traps under the floor to avoid obstructing the complex automated scenery and tracks. Two City Theatrical Wireless Dimming Systems are used on various moving set pieces.
Associate LD and moving light programmer Warren Flynn used a full size Grand MA console to programme the moving lights, while a Grand MA Light console was used to programme the fixed luminaires. However, the show is run from one Grand MA Light with a second running as a tracking back up. The desks also control two video projectors via an ArtNet system.
Posner specified almost 90 Vari-Lites and PRG Europe also supplied a variety of MDG fog and haze machines plus seven High End AF1000 Dataflash strobes custom mounted inside Black Par 64 shells. Two City Theatrical Custom Source Four Spot Yokes were originally custom designed by City Theatrical for the Broadway production but have been modified by Alistair Grant and Howard Eaton to work for the London production.
(Jim Evans)
