Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhauer are spending a good part of December and the first of the New Year in California to handle the lighting for the film version of Dreamgirls, to be directed by Bill Condon…LDs Steve Cohen and Joel Young have designed Ricky Martin's world tour, currently on the road in Latin America after opening in Mexico City last month. The tour will continue in the US and Europe in 2006…Jeremy Railton of Entertainment Design (we've always liked that name!) has been busy in China working on a massive Fremont Street-like architectural installation in Beijing, slated for a September 2006 opening. Railton will be writing about his adventures in the Far East in an upcoming issue of Live Design…Willie Williams, fresh off the hugely successful U2 tour, designed both the lighting and the video scenery for the stage version of a UK comedy sketch show called Little Britain, (above, and yes, that's what you think it is) which is currently touring around the country…Santo Loquasto is designing sets and costumes for the Twyla Tharp/Bob Dylan piece, The Times They are a Changing. The show premieres in February at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego…LD Jeff Ravitz recently flew to Utah to light a special five-day Christmas concert for Kurt Bestor at Salt Lake City's Abravanel Hall…Set designer Beowulf Borritt recently finished work on The Other Side, opening at Manhattan Theatre Club this month. He also has both The Two And Only, reportedly heading for Broadway in the spring, and LoveMusik, a tuner about Kurt Weill for Hal Prince, in the offing…When Frodo and his gang of hobbits make their musical theatre debut in Lord of the Rings in Toronto this March, audiences will see the residents of Middle Earth draped in costumes by Rob Howell, who also designed the sets. Paul Pyant, fresh off the Broadway bow of The Woman in White, is handling the lighting, and The Gray Circle is charged with “moving image direction”…The indefatigable Sonny Sonnenfeld, who's busier than Paris Hilton these days despite being well into his 80s, is producing something called Stage Lighting Super Saturday on January 7 in Manhattan. He says it's aimed at people who don't know much about lighting but want to learn. You can find out more about the event at www.stagelightingseminars.com.
Designers, programmers, technicians: let us know what you're doing! Email David Johnson at [email protected].