When I decided to do The Music Man, I knew I was in for a set design unlike any other. Most of my other shows had one set...maybe two. The Music Man had about 9.
My biggest issue with most musicals are the set transitions. If they take more than 10-20 seconds, it's painful and pulls away from the effectiveness of the show. With that in mind, I focused my set design on quick transitions. Many of the sets were mobile, or used common elements. I also built a runway pit for the orchestra. This made many transitions seamless because I could have actors out on the runway during one scene, while the set was being changed behind the curtain.
My design concept was "Bandstand." We built several platforms that were used throughout the show.
Sketches:
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| The idea here was to build two rolling "bandstands" that would double for two sets each. The first would be for stage right (Paroo house and Paroo porch) and the second would be for stage left (Shinn porch and hotel porch). It actually worked out really well. |
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| This was my favorite set. We built rotating walls to double as the Library and the Gym. We used foam to create a 3-D feeling with the books and signs. The big platform in the middle stayed there for the entire show and created some fun levels. I wanted as many levels for this scene as possible. |
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| This was the initial design for the park/footbridge scene. I wasn't able to obtain the lights for the platform, but it did work out quite nicely. |
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Here you can see my original idea for the train sequence and the design for the runway. The runway could not have happened without tremendous help from parents. The train sequence ended up just being blocks out on the runway. It was simple, but effective.
Those, unfortunately, are all the sketches I have, but now on to the real feature of this post: the pictures of the actual set!!!!
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| Here are the salesmen on Rock Island |
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The citizens of River City. The town was painted beautifully by the lovely and talented Cheyenne Uhler.
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| The school board with Prof. Hill on the River City Hotel Porch |
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| Marian and Mrs. Paroo out on their Porch. |
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Marian the Librarian. I'm so happy with how this set came out.
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76 Trombones in the Madison Gymnasium.
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Grecian Urns at the Park. This ended up being mostly trees for this set, but it was a pretty short scene, so it worked.
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| Marcellus and Harold performing "Sadder But Wiser Girl" on the runway while the set changed behind the curtain. |
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| Here are Harold and Marian on the Footbridge. The footbridge ended up being really big and steep, but it looked great! |
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| Inside the Paroo House during "Piano Lesson" This set had a lot of props! |
And there you have it! I wish I'd taken some stills of every set, sans actors, like I did with some of my other shows, but you get the idea. It was a wonderful show thanks to all the support of the performers, their parents, the Alta High faculty and administration, and the community.
**Also, our production was nominated for Best Musical, Best Tech Crew, Best Choreography, Best Cameo (Charlie Cowell), Best Ensemble, and Best Orchestra with the Utah High School Musical Theatre Awards. We got to perform "Shipoopi" at the awards ceremony at the Eccles Theatre in SLC on May 13th and we won "Best Choreography." What an honor!!!!
