Jesus Christ Superstar in Johannesburg, South Africa

In this rehearsal photo of Jesus Christ Superstar (Sets by Keith Anderson, Lighting by Denis Hutchinson, Photos by Heidi Hoffer) you can see the actor on the acrylic cross in the ascension scene. The cross unit was brought up from the Artscape Theatre in Cape Town.  It was run by hydraulics and they brought in a master engineer stagehand to initiate the setup and supervise its use in the rehearsals. At one moment in the show it was a flat cross shaped platform about 2 meters up in the air on top of which Caesar sings.

Lighting Designer Denis Hutchinson, who took me on the University of Johannesburg tour with his theatre consulting group, brought me onboard for observing his work on Jesus Christ Superstar. Denis, or Hutch as he likes to be called sometimes, had seen JCS through several incarnations and an Asian tour. His Grand MA programmer is none other than Glenn Duncan, the programmer for Winnie the Opera at the State Theatre.


Jesus Christ Superstar Lighting Designer Denis Hutchinson and Grand MA Programmer Glenn Duncan are illuminated by the bright lights of the ascension scene.


Part of the alure of this design is that it is primarily a moving light rig. There are very few conventional instruments in the plan. I was curious how Denis would get the dramatic moments to be different from the rock and roll moments. His biggest challenge was to create a lighting design that the original lighting designer did not disagree with yet was on a small enough rig for touring and fitting into arenas and smaller venues. Denis' design in this Montecasino Johannesburg incarnation is largely his own, with the cues and the looks the way HE wanted them. I believe the introduction of moving lights to this vintage musical does change and make the look more fluid and crisp.

In this rehearsal photo of Jesus Christ Superstar (Sets by Keith Anderson, Lighting by Denis Hutchinson, Photos by Heidi Hoffer) you can see the highly balanced geometry of the moving lights as their beams are revealed by the haze in the air.

Glenn likes to organize a palette of movers (moving lights - in this case ALL Vari-*Lites) in such a way that he can call up a variety of groups and operate them in absolutely any manner a designer could wish for. Glenn stated that he wished this palette could be arranged alphabetically after the icons are made. I believe that would make his fingers flash even faster. He and Denis managed to move the whole design off a Hog II onto the Grand MA. Denis was able to call for individual instruments or specific systems and Glenn would have them up and moving before Denis had finished his sentence. Amazing.

In this rehearsal photo of Jesus Christ Superstar (Sets by Keith Anderson, Lighting by Denis Hutchinson, Photos by Heidi Hoffer) you can see that in addition to the moving lights, specific characters were picked out of the crowd my two followspots, in this case, two human operators up from Cape Town were running the followspots: two new Juliet folowspots that were so bright and beautiful  Denis considered taking them down a peg with gel.

The set was painted completely photo grey. The set had absolutely no colour in it, and the environment's colour came only from the lighting. Quite a bold choice and very excellent decision because the cripsness and clarity of each environment was paramount.

In this rehearsal photo of Jesus Christ Superstar (Sets by Keith Anderson, Lighting by Denis Hutchinson, Photos by Heidi Hoffer) you can see the back wall of the set - the stonework - is completely grey. It's colours come from the lighting. This is the scene where Caesar is trying to talk to J.C.

In this rehearsal photo of Jesus Christ Superstar (Sets by Keith Anderson, Lighting by Denis Hutchinson, Photos by Heidi Hoffer) you can see the hazers are working well to create long beams of light over the audience's heads in this ascencion scene.

The MontecasinoTeatro is the theatre that was built specifically to house The Lion King. It has limited wing space and is very cramped backstage. A black theatre drape upstage hid the dressing rooms and also hid the Carbon Dioxide fog machine with its huge tank. The design team were especially happy with the low lying fog they could get with the machine. In addition to that, they had hazers in the air to facilitate the look of the ascension. The beams of light reached out into the audience.

Stage Lighting Instruments Used in The Wits Theatres

          Most of the theatre lighting technology at Wits is from Europe, with a small number of ETC Source Four Zooms from the United States. The lighting consoles include a Strand series 200 (manual, 24 Channel, 2-Preset) and a Strand series 300 (programmable). The software for these has been discontinued, so as they fail they must be replaced.
Julian, the head of lighting here has been trying out an ETC ION and a Grand MA. ETC unfortunately as yet does not have the support back-up necessary to really land a sale, yet, but I know the groundwork is being made with certain vendors here. The Grand MA Ultra, seems to be the current choice of replacement console for the main theatre. Most everyone here relies upon Strand equipment.

          (The theatre on the education campus has a Strand MX with 48 channels. This theatre, called the “Space Frame” is certainly an interesting reconfigurable theatre which I will address in another blogpost.)

Theatre Lighting at Wits…

To begin, while the stage pin connector is a standard 2P&G, it is rated for 16 amps at 250 volts, and looks triangular.

http://clifguy.com/2008/01/20/how-to-make-your-electrical-stuff-work-in-south-africa/

There is a great safety item in all modern household circuits here as well as on all of the circuits you’d plug stage instruments into: each circuit has its own switch!

Circuit # 102 has its own 2 pin and ground outlet, complete with rocker switch to turn the circuit on or off. It also has a masking tape label for what gets circuited when the plot is restored to the standard plot.

In the above picture you can see the end of one of the stage electrics, with its top batten, electrical raceway, and bottom hanging batten. If the instrument doesn’t work after you’ve hung and circuited it for show, part of the trouble-shooting includes seeing if the damned switch was turned on!! ALL circuits have this safety item whether they are standard wall outlets or stage circuits.

This is a Harmony Profile 22/40 Zoom 

One of the well-used instruments here is the Harmony 22/40 degree beam angle zoom and it’s narrower brother, the Harmony 15/22 degree beam angle zoom. These were manufactured by Strand in 1981, and have been  steadfast performers. They are an ellipsoidal spotlight, shutterable, accept gobos, and work very well at hard focus or soft focus. Here is a link to the historic Rank Strand instrument archive featuring these babies: http://www.strandarchive.co.uk/lanterns/documents/harmony2240data1.jpg

This is a Harmony PC instrument.

The Harmony PC is the most interesting instrument because it is not shutterable and it’s beam quality lies somewhere between that of an ellipsoidal and a Fresnel. It has a single adjustment (knob is featured in the picture below) for a diffused beam variable from a very tight spot, similar to a beamlight, to a wide angle flood. The beam edge quality, which is free from colouration, is similar to a soft-focused ellipsoidal spot, but much tighter than that of a Fresnel.

The underside of a Harmony PC.

In the above picture showing the bottom of the Harmony PC you can see the round black knob that you loosen to slide the lamp/reflector sled assembly forwards or backwards in the slot. This particular instrument has the lamp/reflector close to the lens for a wide beam. (Instrument is pointing downwards to the stage floor)  Here is the link to the historic document from the Strand Archives about the Harmony PC: http://www.strandarchive.co.uk/lanterns/documents/harmonypcdata1.jpg

Checking the circuit to a Quattro Pro.

In this photo above, the student lighting technician is turning on the circuit to a Strand Quattro PM Fixed Angle profile (650w)... and apparently held together by black gaffer tape, as identified by Julian. Behind her head is one of the Harmony Fresnels. Here's the link to the Harmony Fresnel: http://www.strandarchive.co.uk/lanterns/documents/harmonyfdata1.jpg

The beautiful tin ceiling of this theatre has been painted black, of course. This picture was taken in The Nunnery Theatre at Wits during the lighting design class final exam.

More lighting instrument stories are planned...including dimmable fluorescents and Fresnels that look like metal eggs!