The Circle Of Light

Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson. Photo by Joan Marcus.

Justin Townsend’s career has come full circle: He earned his strong design foundation at UMass Amherst; has worked within three disciplines of design, including lighting, scenic, and sound, during various stages in his career; lit theatrical performances, from Off-Broadway to the Great White Way itself; and has returned to the realm of collegiate education, this time, sharing his expertise and passion.

With his experience across several disciplines, Townsend uses a holistic approach as assistant professor of theatre at Brooklyn College. “I like to challenge all of our students—lighting, scenic, costume—to talk about storytelling,” he admits. “That is something that is really inherent in my thinking, and I am thrilled to share.”

Perhaps this teaching technique can be traced back to his UMASS undergraduate program that included colleagues such as Jane Cox, Ben Stanton, Matthew Richards, and David Korins, and where he met an “amazing mentor,” Penny Remsen. “Penny was really challenging us to be both craftsmen and, perhaps more importantly, to be artists, to really think about the art of light and storytelling,” Townsend reflects. “From that foundation, both the encouragement and the specificity, she really pushed me to be a fantastic thinker with the ability to do the details of the job.”

Justin Townsend.

After graduation, Townsend moved to New York, “because that is what you did at the time: move and start a career.” Fresh from college, he struggled to find work as a lighting designer. “You’re 21, and no one wants to hire you,” he chuckles. “I never knew really to assist  anybody. I never thought of myself as an assistant, so I didn’t do much of that.”

Since digital editing was emerging around the same time, Townsend found work as a sound designer. “As a lighting designer, I understood computers, and using the ideas of storytelling, I was able to keep up. I’m a terrible sound designer,” Townsend admits, “and I am certainly not a sound designer anymore, but I love working with them.”

In search of work experience, Townsend assisted set designer Doug Stein. “That was life-changing, to see both the high quality of production and thinking, as well as aid a design process from the set design perspective,” he says, adding that he continued to work for the designer until he met Christopher Akerlind. “When I met Chris, I saw someone who was using light and moving it in a way I had never seen in a performance before,” he declares. “The light was muscular and dynamic and thrilling, and a real part of the story, and I still think his work is that way.” Townsend was sold: He then went on to study with Akerlind at CalArts.

“I identify as a lighting designer, but I love set design,” Townsend confesses. “As a set designer, I’m really trying to support the story to try and find the muscle or machine of what the play is doing. One of my favorite things about being a lighting designer is being surprised by set designers’ work, engaging with it, and trying to wrestle with it,” he says. “I really love working with set designers and having another voice in the collaborative process.”

Casa Valentina. Photo by Sara Krulwich.

While Townsend does not want a title to define him, but rather his interests and ability to help his collaborators, he does admit there is just something about lighting that gives it that edge over scenic design. “What I really like about lighting design, which I think is why I am a lighting designer and not exclusively a set designer, is that it is a dynamic exploration in the moment,” Townsend explains. “I don’t just come in with an answer. With set design, you’re constructing something that has to exist. I like the idea that the set design really provides the foundation for the production, while the lighting design can sort of nimbly shift and change throughout time.”

Firmly believing that theatre is “what we can get away with on stage,” Townsend loves to challenge what he sees. “I’m constantly asking myself, ‘What’s working? What’s not working?’” he explains about his design process. “There is never a ‘hands-off, we’re done here’ moment, so much as it is a continual sluicing of what we’re making.”

Storytelling And Sharing

Here Lies Love. Photo by Joan Marcus.

The Off-Broadway production of the rock opera Here Lies Love is the perfect example of continuous adjustments. “We stand in the middle of the room, and the performance happens all around us, and then suddenly, the entire room moves,” Townsend describes. “‘Well then, where does the tech table go? Okay, well then, the tech table is going to roll around, too. Okay, is it a big, giant table that we’re used to on Broadway? No, we have a tiny little podium. How do we do headsets?’ So we had some boring stuff to figure out in order to keep up with the production.”

In the first versions of Here Lies Love, Townsend says they couldn’t have a monitor at the table, so everyone relied heavily on the programmer and thinking through the cue-stack with paperwork to keep track of all the lights. “We had to nimbly move through how to make the play,” he says. They eventually adopted a “tent,” as they called it, where they could tech the show from on the stage itself. “We were able to make a completely immersive experience, as opposed to looking down and imagining what the audience felt. I knew what they were feeling,” the designer laughs. “I was getting hit with the same lights they were.”

In his designs, Townsend constantly strives to propel the performance forward and recognize what it needs. The Broadway production of the rock musical Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, which was nominated for an Outer Critics Circle Award when it was Off-Broadway, needed clarity to see the humor. Likewise, Broadway’s Vanya And Sonia And Masha And Spike needed gentler lighting that could participate in the humor.

Vanya And Sonia And Masha And Spike. Photo by T. Charles Erickson

As Townsend designs upcoming shows, he is asking the same questions about what each production needs. For the Broadway production of Williamstown Theatre Festival’s hit Fool For Love at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, Townsend is excited to light Dane Laffrey’s “shoebox of a space” set with a large, black void surrounding it. “You can feel the tension in that tiny little space in the middle of the desert,” he says. “I’m inspired by the clear, simple performances that reflect in the bold choices of the light.” Townsend is also working on a new play at Soho Rep, 10 Out Of 12 by “one of America’s powerhouse writers,” Anne Washburn, who wrote Mr. Burns, A Post-Electric Play, for which he also did the lighting. Townsend will also add Stephen Karam’s new play The Humans, directed by Joe Mantello at the Roundabout Theatre, to his repertoire this year.

With all his experience, Townsend has much to share about storytelling while teaching at Brooklyn College, whose lighting program he hopes to expand. In his time as an assistant professor, he has noticed that, with modern technology, there are other and newer skills that his students need. “Frequently, people who come out of school have been taught to be excellent designers,” Townsend explains, “but in terms of who the rest of the industry and I need as an associate or as an assistant, no school can give them all of the details the job now requires.”

Townsend is currently implementing his solution: a non-credit certificate course, for anyone from college student to mid-career professional, taught by four top-level Broadway associates in an intensive summer session that is broken into two weeks each. “Over the summer, a student could study with these four associates and learn not just design skills but the nuts and bolts of craft issues,” he says. “I find the associates are the people who are doing it, who really know how to drive the paperwork, and they’re the ones who will be teaching. I am just thrilled about this, so excited.” 

Mr. Burns, A Post-Electric Play. Photo by Sara Krulwich.

With such a diverse and dynamic career, Townsend is determined to spread the light among the next generation of designers and beyond, stretching across the industry. A Broadway Master Classes speaker in previous years, he will also be speaking at this year’s rebranded New York Master Classes for Lighting and Projection, June 2 to 4 at NYU Tisch School of the Arts and the Gallatin School.

“Let the students stand on our shoulders to show us what we can do. What I love about our career is that we’re always shifting; the technology is improving, and the theatre-making model is getting faster and faster. Our hands are on the Ouija board, trying to figure out what good playmaking is,” Townsend says. “I love that idea that the production team doesn’t actually walk in knowing everything. We only walk in knowing that we trust each other to make something surprising and exciting.”

For more, download the March issue of Live Design for free onto your iPad or iPhone from the Apple App Store, and onto your Android smartphone and tablet from Google Play.