300 Friends - Set and Lighting Design

An amazing debut for Jeffrey Michael Design, creating the Set and Lighting Design for 300 Friends, a play by Sarah Elaine Stewart. An up and coming director with a talent for creating moving and resenating moments, Sarah has her own theatre company which claims space at this site here : http://www.whitespacetheatre.com/ We met several months ago quite by chance through friends and began upon a journey that resulted in a very well acted and performed play. The play debuted at the Albany Theatre from the 3 - 5 of March, and was very acclaimed by audience members, some saying after that the play that it`captured a character that came from their own life`, and that `appealed to their own questions about the insanity of the day to day`.

The screens for the set design were created in a similar method to my lamp making process. They were important to the play as they embodied the idea of absent authority and static in the scene, used in a way physically that in combination with spot lighting demarked rooms on a set. At points the characters interacted in a central living room space, and at other times had conversation alone and together in their own rooms. Each space overlapped and therefore the set had to be cleverly able to adapt to each charcters feeling and mood for the lines performed. A very key set piece that I had imagined from the beginning was a moveable chandelier which is almost a main character in the play. Its main use is to motivate the plot forward and to challenge all the characters. The chandelier began in the play lowered near the ground and broken, promting the household to have to fix it. Through this broken experience it reveal`s each characters dreams, hopes, anxt, and troubles in how they do or don`t attempt to fix the lamp. At points in the play characters lift the chandelier, play with it, fight with it, and finally at a pivotol climax, raise the lamp up after fixing it, symbolizing freedom and clarity.

An amazing journey and a really beautiful venue. The play has been covered by many blogs and write ups and here are just a few of them. Thank you to all the actors, Sarah Elaine Stewart (the fab director) Lauren (amazing costumes), Tom (fab soundtrack) Susan (for keeping us organized) and to Andrew Harvey ( http://arharvey.com/ ) for amazing photos that we could only begin to dream of :) ! Thank you to Andrew who took time out of his schedule to come be on set for a day with us to capture these moments during our final rehersals.

The publicity :

http://blog.arharvey.com/2010/03/300-friends.html - andrew harvey blog (set and actor shots)

http://www.300friends.co.uk/ - 300 friends blog (photos, write ups)

http://www.whitespacetheatre.com/page6.htm - the whitespace theatre (blog and photos)

http://soundcloud.com/disapia/300-friends-music - links to the music of the play created specifically for the moments and magic of our actors and set (truly amazing)

http://annaiceland.blogspot.com/ - behind the scenes and event photos at play