UK - Taking place at The Vaults beneath Waterloo Station, Rhythm and Ruse offered theatregoers an immersive night of magic, music and revelry. Harkening back to the prohibition era, the show took place in a ‘Speakeasy’ and allowed audiences to experience astounding close-up illusions from mere inches away, live music from a four-piece jazz band, a secret society of magicians devised by immersive theatre experts as well as food and drink across the evening.
The show featured a lighting design by up-and-coming designer Skylar Turnbull Hurd, with this being her first time lighting a show of this scale and with a full LX team. With its reputation for both supporting young lighting designers, as well as supplying immersive theatrical productions, White Light (WL), a d&b solutions company, was called upon to provide the show’s lighting fixtures.
Skylar comments: “I would describe this show as a single window that looks directly into a dolls house. There’s something going on everywhere in one collective swoop, but, on a miniature level, there’s so many subworlds and little hidden treasures. It was a case of audiences ‘not knowing where to look’ and they quickly made it an endeavour to try and experience them all.
“My creative lighting brief was to help create a bubble that patrons unexpectedly found themselves in, perhaps without even realising. The content had to be rich, but also timeless and not dictate the flow - we wanted a safe space that audience members could relax in and feel free to explore.”
She continues: “This is the type of show, given its nature, that truly comes alive when you have people within the space. As such, it was only during previews when we had the 16 tables of 12 people inside that I really saw how my design worked – which then gave me the opportunity to make tweaks before press night and the ‘official’ opening.”
Throughout this entire process, Skylar was working closely with the WL team who supplied her lighting rig. She explains: “In terms of the actual fixtures used, we had MAC Quantum Washes and Profiles overhead, which were distributed across the space. We also had overhead LED ColourSource Specials for each table. These three fixture types gave a lot of flexibility to the different looks of the show, especially as it was staged in thrust.
“On the stage iself, we had ColorBlaze LED Battens shining through the outstretched wings structure at the back and uplighting the beautiful velvet backdrop. Around this, we had birdies glowing the performers but also keeping the movement around the stage dynamic as the cast moved between them.
“Through the entrance to the space and front of house, we had ETC LED Source Four Minis. The main area was very glowy with tungsten, and these cooler fixtures offered a nice contrast to this; refreshing the audiences’ eyes before spending the evening inside. One of the reasons I believe we managed to accommodate all of the different styles within the show was by being consistent with what our cue structure was; managed by my sterling associate lighting designer Abigail Sage. Our cue lists were entirely operated and controlled from Qlab, and how she took time and care to ensure our show file was foolproof was absolutely brilliant.”
Skylar concludes: “This was a unique show and one which I loved working on and taught me so much as a designer. I would love to say a huge thank you to the whole team from the cast to the magicians to the performers to the whole FOH and to the crew; especially Dominic Cook, our lead production electrician, and his brilliant staff. I’d also like to say thank you again to WL for supplying my first ever large-scale production and being a huge support throughout the entire process.”
