Datebook: When Derek McLane looks back at 2019’s Broadway premiere of “Moulin Rouge! The Musical,” he recalls that it took an arduous seven weeks to load the gargantuan set into New York’s Al Hirschfeld Theatre before the show’s first preview.
To bring the production to San Francisco, BroadwaySF got four days.
7 comments:
This was one of the first things I thought about when I heard Moulin Rouge was going on tour. This set is one of, if not the most incredible set I’ve ever seen on a Broadway stage. I saw this show in previews, and legitimately cried when I walked into the theater. Derek McLane is a huge idol of mine. I was curious to see what corners they would cut, but I… don’t think they did? At least, it doesn’t look like they did. Either way, that’s insane, and there must have been some ridiculously careful planning there. Something that I love about Moulin Rouge and I am so excited is becoming popularized is atmospheric work in set design. Beetlejuice and Spongebob are other examples of this - decking out the entire theater to set a mood. Another variation of this can arguably be themed prosceniums - it’s about bringing the show into the audience physically. I feel like the theatrical experience begins the moment you walk in the door, so for shows where the environment is applicable (admittedly, not all shows can suit this concept), bringing the world of the plot into the physical space allows the audience to be taken away and immerse themselves even more.
I like how depending on where your theater is located, you have to account for not only the stage but also the building and regional national disaster. There's no good way to ever handle tornadoes and storing things in hallways, but their cable points sound like a sick solution to their problem. They only had four days to load all of their stuff in I think is what I'm getting from the article and like all of that equipment could not have been fun to load in. These pictures in the article are really cool in that they literally look like they're taken right next to all of the crew. Like I can imagine myself working that call with all of those stage hands and that's pretty neat. Oh man and the time lapse at the end really got me. I love when it all comes together in the end.
More to Monica's point, I think it's clear that the crew of Moulin Rouge understand the value of taking pictures for the tumblr.. ;p
I'm always super interested in hearing how people deal with these tight load-in timelines when it comes to taking a show on the road. When you are building a show right there on the stage it can be easy to think about scenic fabrication as more like building a house rather than building something out of legoes so it can be modular and pop up and break down quickly. As a sidenote, I really love when articles give statistics for shows. Like, wow 5,100 lightbulbs is insane. I'd love to see the budget spreadsheets for this show because I'm sure it was a nightmare to budget the 4 day load-in. It must be nerve-wracking to go to bed knowing that your show is still loading in and that you might get a call any second that something has gone seriously wrong.
This is a fascinating article. I saw the tour when it was in Chicago, and I wondered how that set was transported/reassembled - it seemed so intricate, especially for a touring set (not that touring sets don’t tend to be intricate, but the Moulin Rouge one has a specific pizzaz). I very much appreciated that the elephant and the windmill came along even if they’re just for the aesthetic/scenic appeal. I also thought how they incorporated the community they were performing in via murals. I had never really considered the importance of disaster proofing shows, but it’s really important, especially with the environmental and catastrophic event risks. I wonder if disaster proofing is a required policy or something the tour decided to do? Regardless, the way they decided to do it is so interesting - and a very space effective solution. This article really highlighted some of the incredible work tours do (especially in a global pandemic).
When I heard that Moulin Rouge was going on tour, I was not surprised, but one question that popped into my head was, "How???" I was not fortunate enough to see the original production on Broadway, but I've seen videos and pictures, and as Jordan pointed out above, that set is massive. It also encompasses the entirety of the theatre. The set isn't just on the stage, the entire venue becomes part of the show. But I just love this quote from the article: “Their heads were spinning a little, but everybody kicked into gear and they all knew their jobs. It just happens, and it’s quite amazing to watch.” Sounds like literally every call I've been a part of! Academic and professional. It's also just a treat to see these photos from the load-in. Most people really don't ever get to see the work that goes into creating the magic, and it's nice to showcase the work that most patrons don't even think to consider!
And like Dean, I'm curious to know what the load-in/strike budget for a show like this would be. I wonder if they had multiple "'round the clock" crews to make up for the time constraint!
Having a show be able to travel is such a difficult challenge that I wish we could get more practice with here at the School of Drama. We are very luckily that our sets are built across the hall from our mainstage with giant doors, so things almost never have to be built as subunits if we don’t want them to be. That’s usually not the case in most professional theaters. I know I had to limit all my scenery construction this summer due to a small elevator because I was building in the second floor of a warehouse. I think by not having to worry about transportation of scenery here, it leaves us unprepared for what is a large chunk of the theater industry both for the designers and techs. Maybe one day, if the shop doesn’t have the resources to build every show, it would be worthwhile to have sets built remotely and then have the experience of loading in a touring set.
In this article, the process of moving the set pieces for a recreation of Moulin Rouge into the Orpheum Theater in San Francisco within the time span of seven weeks. Before reading this article, I didn’t really realize what the recreation of a broadway set would entail. Most of the shows I’ve been a part of have had one person responsible for creating the entire set, and no more than 6 people responsible for behind the scenes work for an entire show. Before I started thinking about working in the industry, it always baffled me to see the credits be pages and pages long, but after kinda realizing that it’s necessary to have specific specialists for each job, it started to all make sense for me. Specifically for this, I thought it was crazy it would take 70 people for a load in, but it seems like it would make things so much easier.
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