Intro to Theater Project Group #69

1. Big Love
Sharon Chi, Tammy Nguyen, Shirley Pham, Amber Tran

2. Set Design

3. Scenic Environment
Environment of the brides fleeing
● They are first outdoors when they arrive that the house and soon come inside when they are invited to have dinner
● The environment is on the west coast of Italy and has a beautiful atmosphere
● Once inside the home, the atmosphere becomes darker and smaller

4. Scenic Environment
● Scenery provides the visual world
in which the performance takes
place
● Consider how the
characters talk and
act to capture what
kind of environment
the play takes place
Environment when the brides begin yelling

5. Scenic Environment
Environment of the wedding
● The play transitions from a comedy to a tragedy when the brides begin murdering their husbands
● The environment for this scene should be eerie and horrific

6. Mood and Style
The way the
stage is set up
can determine
the mood of the
play
The mood of the play transitions as the wedding
gets closer

7. Realistic vs. Non-Realistic
● Realistic theatre has real life
components
● Nonrealistic theatre using
imagination to show the
importance in a scene
Big Love uses realistic theater because the
scenes occur in realistic environments

8. Locale and Period
● The stage design shows when and where the play takes place
● The time period and what outlay of the place the play is taking place

9. Design Concept and Central Image
● The design concept is an idea that
is shown visually
● The central image is a symbol that
develops an entire visual concept
The central image of the play is the torn up/dirty wedding dresses

10. Physical Layout
● The playing area must fit
into a certain stage space
● Any physical movement
requires a certain amount of
space and the scene
designer must allow for this
in the ground plan

11. Coordination of the Whole
● Using certain elements and a main symbol should stay
consistent with the play and the director’s perception.
● For realistic theatre, the setting shouldn’t take away
from the other elements of the production of the play
● The stage design should add to the production, but not
be the main focus

12. Costume Design

13. Objective of Costume Design
1. Help establish the style of a production.
1. Indicate the historical period of a play and the locale in which it occurs.
1. Indicate the nature of individual characters or groups in a play—their
stations in life, their occupations, their personalities.
1. Show relationships among characters—separating major characters from
minor ones, contrasting one group with another.

14. Objectives (cont.)
5. Where appropriate, symbolically convey the significance of individual
characters or the theme of the play.
5. Meet the needs of individual performers, making it possible for an actor or
actress to move freely in a costume, perhaps to dance or engage in a sword
fight, and (when required) to change quickly from one costume to another.
5. Be consistent with the production as a whole, especially other visual
elements.

15. Process of Costume Design
Indicating style:
● Costumes should inform the audience about the style of
a play.
Indicating Period and Locale:
● Costumes indicate the period and location of a play.

16. Process of Costume Design
Indicating identity and style:
● Costumes need to present the character’s personality.
Showing Relationships among Characters:
● Characters in a play can be set apart by the way they are
costumed.

17. Visual aid

19. Process of Costume Design
Meeting Performers’ Needs:
● No matter how attractive or how symbolic, stage
costumes must work for the performers.
Maintaining Consistency
● Costumes must be consistent with the entire
production—especially with the various other visual
elements.

20. Costume Designer’s Resources
(1) Line, shape, and silhouette: torn up dresses
(2) Color: white at first, add bloodstains towards the
murder.
(3) Fabric: typical wedding dress fabric
(4) Makeup: messy, dirty, indicate they’ve been busy
running away.

22. Light Design

23. Visibility
● First and foremost, the audience must be able to see the performers’ faces
and their actions on stage
● A balance that allows for visibility while meeting other design objectives
effectively must be established
Although the lighting in this scene is dim enough to set the mood, it is also still bright enough for the actors’ faces
to be visible by the audience.

24. Shape and Form
● Must enhance the visual
world of the play by
revealing the objects in
that world as interestingly
as possible
● Lighting should be directed
towards actors and objects
in different angles so it
does not visually wash out
the three-dimensional
effect of them on stage
making them appear flat
and boring
The light is angled on Lydia in the bathtub to highlight her
expression and the shape of the main object being
enhanced in this scene which is the tub.

25. Focus and Composition
● Focus in theatre refers to the fact that beams of light are
aimed at a particular area
● Creating a continually moving visual composition that
always keeps the audience focused on the central part of
the play
● Must control the spill of the light in front of and behind
the actor so that it will not distract the audience from
the action

26. Mood and Style
● Light along with other factors of a play like sound help
establish the mood of the play
The little amount of light during this scene
when the brides are killing their husbands
creates a violent, dark mood.

27. Time and Place
● By it’s color,
shade, and
intensity, lighting
can suggest the
current time and
day of the scene
in the play or
whether it’s
indoors or
outdoors
The lighting in this scene is bright because it is indoors.

28. Rhythm
● changes in light occur on a time continuum, they
establish a rhythm running through a production
● many lighting changes are coordinated with scene
changes and changes in other production elements
● the rhythm of the play affects the audience’s
understanding of it

29. Reinforcement and the Central Image
● Lighting must be consistent with the overall style and
mood of the production.
● The lighting can distort or even destroy the effect of a
play.

30. Properties of Stage Lighting
Four different properties of light can be manipulated for any visual change
onstage:
1. intensity (brightness) - can be controlled by devices called dimmers
which make the lights brighter or darker
2. color - most often selected to support choices made by the scenic and
costume designers while still including sufficient dramatic color to support
the varied action of the play
3. distribution - position and type of lighting instrument being used and
the angle at which the light strikes the performers onstage
4. movement - lighting cross-fades can shift the focus from location to
location and from color to color, but even within single scenes a good
lighting design will force the audience members to change their focus
without even realizing it

31. Types of Stage Lighting
● Most stage lights have three main elements: a lamp that
is the source of the light, a reflector, and a lens through which the beams pass.
● Two basic categories of lighting fixtures: conventional lighting instruments and automated or
moving light fix.
Ellipsoidal reflector
spotlight Soft-edged spotlight
Floodlights, border
lights, strip lights
Automated/moving
lights

32. Lighting Controls
Cues - lighting changes
- blackout: all lights shut off at once
- fade: lights dim slowly
- cross-fade: one set of lights come down while
once goes up

33. Director

34. Choosing a script
● Big Love
● Fifty brides running away
● Gender issues
● Domestic violence

35. Casting actors/actresses
Oed: Josh Hutcherson Nikos:
Liam Hemsworth
Constantine: Ian Somerholder
Olympia: Kristen Stewart
Lydia: Nina Dobrev
Thyona: Nikki Reed

36. Stage actors/actresses
● Bella/Eleanor: Marie Goodman Hunter
● Giuliano: George Gaul
● Piero/Leo: Dan Hildebrand

37. Stage setting

38. Spine/theme
● Breaking out of the norms
● Taking a stand for oneself
● Feminism
● Gender inequality
● Love

39. Style of production
● naturalism: to put onstage the exact copy of
life
● realism: characters and their actions
resemble real life

40. Directional concept
● Background image of a beautiful part of a manor
onstage
● Not a lot of props or furniture to give off a distant
feeling
● An empty space/feeling so that the audience can feel
that social struggle is common in this time period

41. Viewpoint
● Watching the play from the audience’s
perspective.

42. Timeframe
● First half will be 45 minutes
● 15 minutes intermission
● 30 minutes for the second half