Weathervane Playhouse

June 7 - 16, 2018

Directed by:  Kevin Connell

Scenic Designer:  Matthew Hamel

Costume Designer:  Madison Booth

Lighting Designer:  Dylan Bollinger

 

 

A Chorus Line is the show that most anyone who has done professional theatre can relate to.  Several hopefuls for a chorus are auditioning right at the top, and each step is a process to finding out who will ultimately be chosen.  The director of the show takes a unique approach, asking each performer what motivates them to be here.  The songs tell stories of ambition, of pain, of overcoming challenges.  Each performer has their story to tell before the final selections are made.

 

This was the first show I had ever seen on Broadway, and it continues to have an effect on me.  There is a powerful realism attached to this show that some audience members may never really appreciate if they haven’t been through an audition process.  The way these performers push themselves and live their lives for that one moment that they may be chosen to be on stage is very real, and it comes from a very familiar place.

 

This performance was done with just a piano on stage.  All of the songs save two were performed in this fashion.  I felt that this connected the piece to the audition stage in a really lovely way.  Since the piano was on stage in full view, I had to use more subtle means of adding microphones to the piano so they wouldn’t detract from the scenic world.  It needed to look and feel like a proper rehearsal piano, and so my methods for getting sound out of it had to be more sneaky in nature.

 

For two of the songs, we used prerecorded tracks from the production company.  These had to be integrated into the sound system through an application used on a mobile tablet.  The license control of these tracks was very particular, and we had to go through extra steps to make sure that the music worked the way we needed it to while still following the guidelines of the licensing.  This became challenging with the final number of the show, as the entire cast was entering and bowing one at a time while also singing the final number.

 

We used very little sound effects for this particular production, save for the sounds of light systems turning on and off in layers, as they would in an older theatre where this audition might take place.  I also worked out some ways of altering the director’s microphone when he was out in the audience to give him that ‘booming sound from nowhere’ perspective that the cast might have.  They needed to localize him, but he needed to communicate as if he was holding a mic in his hand and talking to them through the speakers.  That took some time and adjustment, but I was very happy with the finished result.