Doors and Their Purpose

Doors have reasons for existing. A door leads somewhere. It opens from somewhere. Doors onstage typically frame entrance and exit lines and action. Doors invite. You wonder, don’t you, what’s beyond that door? If you walked through that door, would your life change?


It is in their use where you feel a door’s purpose.

The wonderful entrance by the spirit in Blithe Spirit is a good example of a magnificent framing designed to totally take over the scene. In the first place, the onstage scene is warm and what you see through the doors is cool. Secondly, the door is centrally located, and thirdly, it opens twice as wide as a human body. The act of the door opening and the cool silhouetted and back-lit figure is like the pupil of your eye narrowing down to the focus point.

Blithe Spirit, Designed by Frank Ludwig.

The cool colored foggy entrance of these characters behind an outdoor gate in Romeo and Juliet lets you immediately know they probably shouldn’t be there. It is night, and the place they want to go has warm colored lighting, indicating that is it probably indoors and offers some comfort.

Romeo and Juliet. Designed my Michael Riha.

In this photo, the human sized door, color, painting and surrounding say a lot about who goes into the room onstage through it. The door is of the institutional variety, belonging to a building which houses, among things, a radio station. The green of the door is much brighter green than a real institutional door, enhancing the comedic probabilities in the show. The sound effects door, seen in the lower left of the photo is a very fun true-to-life sound effects props many theatres keep on hand. It is used often but rarely seen. It is comic to see a teeny tiny door but hear its “slam” which invariably sounds bigger than the door looks.

Chaps. Designed by Chris Sousa-Wynn.

In Largo Desoloto the whole room is leaning inwards, and the door seem like to spill its framed entrant inward. Curiously, there is a barrier of a chair between the brightly lit outside and the brightly white island of a sofa with its darkly clad occupant. It is almost as if the chair makes another entranceway.

Largo Desoloto. Designed by David M. Barber.

In Lady Windemere’s Fan, the very tall walls have ornate door frame shapes on top of ornate door frame shapes. Each framed entry is completely separate from the next one creating little proscenium framed stages within each one. This suggests that the arguments before and after entrances and exits are extremely important and benefit from being so famously framed. For a farce, this is a useful and proactive design choice.

Lady Windermere’s Fan. Designed by Chris Sousa-Wynn.

In the green-lit picture of Dracula, we see a very unique do-it-yourself kind of entrance. Just rip you way right through the wall to get at what you want! Very powerful moment of theatre!

Dracula. Designed by Chris Sousa-Wynn.

In summary, it is the door or doorway’s shape and surroundings that promise what is to come. Then, when the doors are used as suggested or even contrary to the normal to slam home a reason, then you’ve done a good job figuring out the purpose of a door.

Doors: The Shutter Part

Doors for the positive-minded open into other places, some of which are desirable and some of which are not. For the negative-minded, however, they are closures, barriers - preventative structures imposed on the freedom of the individual. Designers are very careful about their doors. Doorways will be in another post!

Door Inventory Photo by Andrew Fox

AutoCAD Door By Heidi Hoffer

A collection of doors by themselves, all lined up like books on a shelf as part of a theatre’s inventory seems lifeless and undemanding. Most doors are even missing knobs because those are another design choice to be made. When drafted in AutoCAD or Vectorworks, doors look very clinical and have no personality. (Plates of hand drafting have the draftsperson’s personality but the door still has no personality.)

A designer has an image in his/her head, usually in 3 dimensions, about the door. You consider how tall, how wide, how many hinges, whether or not it is wood or metal and so on. You take in to consideration whether or not both sides of the doors are seen. You consider the swing arc of the door and whether or not the door is slammed once or repeatedly. You consider the door in relation to the actual materials of the walls (which can be cloth covered or hard covered) to decide if the door needs to be a dependent or independent unit, or if it is painted or glued onto the walls.

Pencil Sketch of Door for "Moon Over Buffalo" by Heidi Hoffer

Painter's Elevation of Door for "Moliere" by Heidi Hoffer

A pencil sketch of a door starts to have some personality. The door is sketched with a purpose in mind for a particular play for a particular manner of use. The styles of the sketch and the things on or surrounding the door start to tell us more about the door by context.

When painter’s elevations are made of the door, color is dictated along with shadows, decay, age, dirt, and texture. This is different than a portion of a set sketch involving the door because surrounding props and furniture are removed so you look at just the door and its wall.

Throughout all of this, we keep in mind the reason the door is there. It leads somewhere. It opens from somewhere. Doors onstage typically frame entrance and exit lines and action. Doors invite. You wonder, don’t you, what’s beyond that door?

It is in their use where you learn a door’s purpose.