Zelig, an extremely popular primetime weekly TV comedy show that airs on Italian broadcaster Mediaset’s Canale 5, recently celebrated its 18th season with a new format: Each show is presented by a different pair of celebrity artists, introducing the 40 comedians who alternate over the series of shows and special guests, including Academy Award-winning film director Gabriele Salvatores.
The show is one of the broadcast offshoots of Milan’s famous Zelig cabaret, which, in addition to being a real hotbed for talent, was the launching pad for Bananas, the company co-producing the show with Mediaset. They found a new home for this latest season in Milan’s 2,800-seat Linear4Ciak Theatre, a huge marquee with all the facilities of a conventional theatre, and since the inauguration in January 2014, it has also hosted concerts by Ben Harper, Steve Hackett, Morrissey, and Ian Anderson.
Recorded before a live audience, Zelig is directed by Massimo Fusi and produced by Roberto Bosatra (Bananas) and Giuseppe Ioppolo (Mediaset), with scenography by Marco Calzavara and lighting design by Ivan Pierri. Calzavara designed a show with a very high visual impact, with LED screens not only forming almost the entire set, but also surrounding the audience.
The set centers around a total of 242 sq-m. of Compass8 8mm pitch LED panels, supplied by video contractor Showlive Srl for the stage and set. The 6x7.2m LED backdrop is divided into two motorized sections, with eight motorized LED “wings” and, on either side of the proscenium, a 5.4x7.2m screen. The motorized panels are mounted on Litec trussing with a Kinesys automation system. The audience is surrounded by six screens formed by Martin Professional LC20140 LED panels: two 6x8m, two 8x6m, and two 8x4m.
The Kinesys kit includes Vector software controlling ten Elevation1+ variable speed controllers. Gianluca Contaldi, who is in charge of the show’s automation, explains, “Five 18-meter tracks run across the stage, one for the backdrop and one for each pair of wings, with a total of ten motorized and ten slave trolleys. This ensures a wide variety of screen configurations.”
Led by production supervisor Jacopo Trini Castelli, the team from Milan TV-Motion graphics firm Clonwerk includes two video effects specialists, an LED graphics operator, three software development experts, and three technical staffers. Castelli explains, “Our work involved graphic creativity, which started out from the show’s logo, conceived by Mediaset’s creative department, and, with their supervision, we developed the show’s graphics setup. Then there was the concept and development of the management and control software for graphic content playout, using the Ventuz realtime graphics content creation, authoring, and playout control platform.”
Clonwerk manages the 5,760x1,080-pixel LED signals—three times full HD—with audio in sync, four levels of graphics for the various onstage LED screens. That includes animated backgrounds, video with alpha channel, possible video control of each single portion of the various LED panels, video used for artist changeovers, and static images with alpha channel. In addition, the team at Clonwerk provides control of two full HD signals from the production control room (DiBi Technology OB van) with display on the stage screens in various layouts (full-height, full-width, signal 1 left, and signal 2 right, etc.).
Since many Zelig comedians perform with the strong accents of their area of origin in Italy, in order to ensure the show’s success at the venue and with viewers at home, intelligibility is a priority. This means that audio also plays a fundamental role. The sound reinforcement system supplied by audio contractor Friendship Sound was designed by senior audio manager Beppe Andolina, and the audio team includes Paolo Baldan Bembo (FOH), Roberto Scioni (monitor engineer), and Marco Eleonori (RF).
The main L-Acoustics rig comprises a left and right hang, each with nine Kara speakers and a center cluster with two Arcs-Wide speakers. Two delay hangs, each with two Arcs-Wide speakers, are flown 35m in front of the main speakers, while front-fill enclosures are eight 8XTs, six set in the wide stairway leading down from the stagefront and two atop the four SB28 subwoofers on the floor below the main hangs. Two more Arcs-Wide speakers and two SB18s are used as side fills, with eight JBL SRX812 wedges and six 8XTs for stage monitors, the latter for speech mics.
Zelig Bumps Up Its Game
Veteran FOH engineer Bembo had his Zelig debut this season and his first outing with a DiGiCo SD10, which he used to mix 14 headsets and 12 handheld microphones, two wireless guitar systems, 16 channels of music from the stage (piano, hardwired guitars, etc.), plus eight stereo feeds from the production control room. He notes, “This is a really dynamic show, and the SD10 was a pleasure to use. As well as enabling me to keep everything perfectly under control, even during artists’ sorties into the audience, it has excellent mic preamps, as well as being very versatile, compact, and easy to cable.”
When it comes to RF management and coordination, Eleonori adds, “Although under a roof, from the RF point of view, working in a marquee is like being outdoors. The venue is in the center of Milan, with a considerable density of 4G phone links and terrestrial TV signals, which obviously doesn’t make life easy. I ran a spectrum analysis to establish the range frequency of the equipment to be used: forty channels that were a combination of wireless mics and IEM. Quality is obviously a priority.” The show uses Sennheiser EM 3732-IIs and SK 5212 bodypack systems, with Shure Axient handhelds, a Shure PSM 1000 in-ear monitoring system, and DPA 4060 capsules.
Rome-based Pierri has more than 12 years’ experience as a DP and LD in Italy and abroad, including countless high-profile shows on Italian state broadcaster Ray’s three main generalist channels, as well as Sky, La7, and Arab network MBC. His CV also includes high-profile ad spots, video clips for top Italian pop artists, and theatre productions. Other projects have included the Via Cruces with the Pope, broadcast worldwide, and end-of-year speeches by Italy’s president.
Discussing his rig for Zelig, supplied by DiBi Technology, Pierri says, “I chose the DTS Max for rear lighting, onstage effects, and dappling on the audience for their light weight and low consumption. DTS Raptor beams are essential as effects in the dance sequences. They’re fantastic as tracers, and, thanks to the optic group’s particularly small diameter, are more telegenic than other similar instruments. They also have a great variety of gobos.”
Pierri also uses Robe Robin LED Wash 1200s for audience lighting, especially for “their brightness, reliability, and low absorption,” he says, as well as Robin LEDWash 600s for onstage colored rear lighting. Martin Professional MAC 2000 Wash units are deployed for colored front-lighting on the audience, and Pierri notes they are “excellent for strobing—a weak point with LED wash lights.” Rounding out the rig are Coemar Parlite LED RGB units to light the backdrop behind the LED panels.
The rig also features ETC Source Four ellipsoidals, PAR 1kW floods, and two Robert Juliat Alex followspots. Consoles are an MA Lighting grandMA 2 for the colored lighting and a Compulite Spark4D for the white lights, operated by Andrea Mantovani and Jan Imbesi, respectively.
This edition is also the Zelig debut for The Mnai’s, the 10-strong dance crew whose members include Carlos, the winner of the 2013 Dance@Live World Cup in Singapore. Choreography is by Mirella Rosso.
Mike Clark, ex-sound engineer, road manager, radio personality, and club DJ, is a UK-born journalist residing in Italy and specializing in entertainment-related technology. He has contributed to LD under its four names for 15 years, and, as well as contributing to UK, Russian, and Italian periodicals, also works as a technical translator for audio and lighting manufacturers.
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