University of Oklahoma School of Drama

Elsie C. Brackett Theatre

October 16 - 18, 2015

Directed by:  Joe Locarro

Scenic Designer:  Uldarico Sarmeinto

Costume Designer:  Lloyd Cracknell

Lighting Designer:  Alan Hiserodt

 

 

Ragtime tells the story of three different groups:  A well-to-do Caucasian family, an African-American ragtime musician and his friends, and immigrants coming to America for the first time.  All are trying to seek their fortune and find their way.  Pivotal people of the turn of the century, like Evelyn Nesbit, Henry Ford, J. P. Morgan, Emma Goldman, all appear to tell the story of a turbulent time in the history of America.

 

The music in this show is signature and timeless, and the story is extremely important to tell.  The events of the show have relevance throughout history.  It was a great pick to be the premiere performance in the newly renovated Elsie C. Brackett theatre.  The original concept for this performance would be a concert version of the show, with some modest action and projected content.  This evolved into a fully staged and choreographed production.

 

My research for the show involved looking at the locations of the time period.  The set was a very neutral environment, with pieces coming on and off to change our locations.  The director wanted something very similar to the original Broadway production, including a raised platform that spanned the stage up near the upstage cyc.  The cyc backdrop would formulate not only a color and texture background, but also would be a projection surface with animated backdrops.  The show flows quickly from one moment to the next and necessitated a very flexible lighting rig.  In addition to locational research, I also spent time researching color and texture ideas that could represent emotional moments.

 

As we got ready for this show, we were hampered by the last parts of the renovation.  We were not given permission to begin loading in the show until a week before we were scheduled to begin tech rehearsals.  The improvements to the lighting systems helped make a lot of this shortened process easier to negotiate, but it was still a push to get everything into place in time to start working on the show.  Many people worked some very long hours to get the show on its feet, and I am indebted to them.

 

Within this design, I wanted to strongly emphasize the emotional quality of each moment.  The family scenes were fairly realistic, with enough color to enhance emotional moments.  The ragtimers were lit with tones of red, heightened by dynamic texture.  The immigrants had a slight sepia tone to them, brushed with mottled textures.  Isolation and focus became very important as the different parts of the story would jump from one to the next in quick succession.  It was equally important to balance to and enhance the projected imagery in telling this story.

 

This musical is a tremendous undertaking, and the circumstances we all faced in pulling it together were very challenging.  In the end, we were able to deliver a powerful performance that had a huge emotional impact on all our audience members, and served to open our newly renovated performance hall with a bang.