1978, after midnight. I was in Paris on a cold night in February, and it was past my bedtime. I was there to see Peter Brook to discuss lighting Orghast, a spectacle to be staged across Persepolis in Iran. By coincidence, a young American designer, Eugene Lee, was also paying late night homage at Peter’s studio. We were a diverse pair in the night, far from home.
Over a decade later, Hal Prince told me he was planning a new Broadway production of the epic musical Show Boat, and he wanted me to meet Eugene Lee who he planned should design settings for the show. Hal had a powerful vision to tell his amazing saga as a huge pageant featuring generations of a family living on a show boat on the Mississippi River. Hal’s vision was of the mighty river marking the inexorable march of time. (Editor’s note: both Richard Pilbrow and Eugene Lee won Drama Desk Awards for their Show Boat designs.)
Produced by Canadian entrepreneur Garth Drabinsnski, this was to be a mighty revival of an epic show. And quite a team, Eugene Lee, Florence Klotz (over 400 costumes), myself lighting, with Susan Stroman’s spectacular choreography This was a big show, Eugene’s settings were the ultimate in spectacular. Our showboat, the Cotton Blossom, was seen inside and out at almost full size. Scene one on the Mississippi wharf, saw the entire boat enter stage left under full steam.
The passing of time was pivotal to Hal, and day followed night aided by Hersey digital pitching light curtains allowing color-changing sheets of light to pivot from side to side across the stage. Water was everywhere, from multiple projections to the real wet stuff in trays beneath the stage. We joined the boat’s interior too, including the full Show Boat theatre in rehearsal and performance. Eugene’s brilliance took us all through backstage a hundred years ago, with changing oil, gas, and limelight piercing the fading twilight, giving way to the progress of electricity.
Without doubt, Eugene’s theatrical imagination was unique. The word “reality” hardly begins to describe the world he evoked, from river bank to the early 19th-century streets and nightclubs of Chicago. He created a hyper-real world that our cast in turn brought magically to life. We opened and ran a year in Toronto, before Broadway, and then later London and around the world. Show Boat is an immortal tale and told with such emotional power made it irrististable.Eugene had an entirely unique imagination with an unprecedented ability to create the epic experience that Hal dreamt of. Somewhat like the great designers that served the legendary Bertholt Brecht, his work delivered an almost hyper-realism that evoked beyond the real to the emotional essence.
Other extraordinary productions with Hal Prince during his career included a revolutionary promenade Candide, and extraordinary Sweeny Todd, both of which made landmark contributions to theatrical history. But Eugene contributed much more to our world, He spent much of his career as head of design at the distinguished Trinity Rep and elsewhere; was responsible for many successful movies and led an amazing life, since 1975, as head of design for the classic TV show, Saturday Night Live.
An astonishing artist and craftsman.