Live Design's fourth annual 31 Days Of Plots features one production per day during the month of December 2021, highlighting a different lighting design, from across theatre, concert tours, corporate events, live for broadcast, and more, as we wind down 2021 and head toward the new year.
Day 2 of 31 Days Of Plots 2021 focuses on The Black Pack: We Three Kings, a 2021 holiday special that aired on November 29 on the CW network.
Emmy Award-winning lighting designer Jeff Ravitz explains: "The producers chose, as the venue, the historic Cicada Restaurant in downtown Los Angeles. The room has rich architectural details harkening to the 1920s, but it is not a particularly production-friendly facility for the size and complexity of the show we were attempting. There is no lighting system apart from a handful of lights for restaurant entertainment. Therefore, we rented and brought in a full system, which had to be ground supported because there are zero overhead positions. Typical of a restaurant, the ceiling is a finished piece of plaster, and this one has additional elements that echo the era of the ‘20s. There is a balcony that surrounds the main floor on four sides, and the ceiling is about nine feet above the balcony level. The stage was to be at one end of the room on the main floor and there would be audience at dining tables in front of the stage all the way to the back of the room. During the scout trip, it immediately became obvious that I would outline the perimeter of the balcony with a pipe-and-base structure to get as many lights as possible surrounding the stage and room from the front, sides and back. Pipe-and-base was chosen instead of truss goal posts, to be able to hug the ceiling as closely as possible to get the lighting fixtures that much higher. The biggest challenge was posed by a line of very long chandeliers hanging from the ceiling to ten feet or so above the main floor right down the middle of the room. Thus, there could be no center lighting position, no center follow spot, and most of the lights on the balcony that could be considered “front of house” or side “front of house” would have to be precisely placed to carefully thread the needle through and around the chandeliers. That took a lot of time to work out, with hours spent rotating the 3D plan in one way or another to see every light’s focus path to the stage."
Ravitz's lighting design developed of mostly hard-edged moving profiles, in this case the Ayrton Diablo. "Some longer throws were handled by the more powerful Ayrton Huracán, provided by a stroke of luck and generosity by ACT Entertainment as demo units," he says. "Mac Auras and Rush PARs were added to light architectural elements like the ornate ceiling and wood-grain walls. ETC Lustr 2s were used to frame out the many columns in the room as well as the balcony façades. More profiles were used on the floor to fill in some dark holes, as were Chauvet Rogues and Astera AX3s. I added two follow spots which had to be at 45 degree angles to the stage to shoot through the perfect gap in the chandeliers. To complete the design task, we had various “cold open” scenes to light in the upstairs bar lounge of the restaurant. For this, we used ARRI SkyPanels, ETC Mini Ellipsoidsals, Astera AX3s and Titan Tubes, and Dracast Panels. To my great relief and satisfaction, the design ended up “filling the space” beautifully. The show was lit to the highest level of quality we were able to deliver, made possible thanks to a fabulous crew and system from Kinetic Lighting, a creative and nimble programmer, Zach Matusow, and lighting director Rachel Miller."
To see more 31 Days Of Plots, click here.