Beowulf Boritt: Murder For Two

 

Scenic designer Beowulf Boritt has designed a rather camp mystery, Murder For Two, featuring two actors and a piano. With a touch of Agatha Christie, this modest who-done-it is now in its second iteration. Live Design chats with the designer about the show now playing at New World Stages in New York City:

How did the set evolve from one venue to another?

Although the first theatre (Second Stage's Mc Ginn/Cazalle Theatre uptown) is quite differently shaped than the New World Stages space, we were largely able to use the same set. I changed the shape of the brick back wall to fit around some obstructions upstage, and I turned some flats on the forestage to fill the new wider space, but mostly we used the same set. We did have to add about 24" of height in the new space, but it disappears into the gloom up there.

rendering of the set



How did you design the set to allow for so much physical activity on stage, those two actors are everywhere!

The stage space is actually quite small. We had a lot of discussion about how large a piano to use, and ultimately used the smallest baby grand we could find. With a two-person play you don't want too much space or the actors begin to feel dwarfed, the stage unpopulated. And obviously with too small a space the action feels cramped. I think we found a good proportion with the false proscenium to frame a human being well, in a sense the scale of the portal helps create the frenetic atmosphere of the story. As the actors run around within it.

What is your basic scenic concept for the show?

sample of travel stickers on the set

Because the conceit of the play is that one actor is the detective, and the other actor is all the suspects in the murder mystery, the story is automatically very theatrical, and really can't have a realistic set. Similarly, it's no ta high concept metaphor that calls for an artsy abstraction. After a lot of discussion, director Scott Schwartz and I decided we ought to do a sort of bare stage show, but a bare stage that evokes the quality of a murder mystery. So the proscenium and its surround are all dark wood paneling like an old gentleman's club, and we swathed the whole theatre auditorium in deep red velour to give it a warm (and bloody?) feel. We also have a few details that reference famous mystery stories. A set of backstage shelves on the back wall has all the murder weapons from Clue on it (its a detail people seem to love, I often get comments about it). More subtly, we have travel stickers on the trunks around the stage that reference famous mysteries.


 Where were the sets constructed for this most recent version?

John LaCourse of D&D Productions built the Second Stage set which was altered and installed by Steve Rosenberg and Robert Mahon; Centerline Studios handled the retrofit for New World Stages. I also want to mention the invaluable work by my props supervisor Susan Barras, and our intern Nate Bertone who built the pile of junk that makes a shadow of the house where the murder occurs. Also, my two associate designers, Alexis Sistler at Second Stage and Jared Rutherford at New World Stages really did the heavy lifting to make the design come together. This sounds like an awards acceptance speech or something, but it takes so many people to make a show happen, I like to recognize them.


Who was the lighting designer and how did you collaborate?

Jason Lyons lit the show. We have worked together for many years on many different shows and I’m tempted to say we hardly have to talk we're so in sync. We did spend a fair amount of time on the technical details however. The shadow light to make the house shadow is actually oddly difficult. The relationship of the light to the junk pile to the back wall is pretty crucial, and it has to get set by an actor during the show, so it's tricky. If the relationship is off the shadow is too fuzzy and the effect doesn't work. We also had a series of light bulbs on the set that need to fee like they are getting shot out, and we did a bit of R&D on the best low-budget way to make that work. In the end those lamps have a small strobe hidden behind them and that flash (along with Jill Duboff's shattered glass sounds) helps sell the idea that they're breaking.