Cheltenham Everyman Theatre

1

• Cheltenham Everyman Theatre
• September
• 2005

2
The set-

• A wicker basket

• Chairs

• A clothes rack

• A gauze curtain

• A gangway thrust

• Stage divided into three

3
The costumes

• Changes in
• place
• time
• character
• Changes in front of audience

4
1st third

• furniture moved to represent different places
• impression of a theatre

5
Next third

• Victorian nursery furniture
• 1st - neat and tidy, rocking chair moving

• 2nd - in disarray
• graveyard tombstones

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Last third

• at the back of the stage
• staircase

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The gauze

• Gothic mansion projected on - old and decayed
• Only visible when lit from front
• Whatever is behind gauze becomes visible when lit
  from behind
• Grey - as was most of set

8
Effect of colour?

• Cold
• drab
• damp
• mysterious
• impression of a Yorkshire moor
• just right for a ghost story!

9
Wicker basket became...

• pony and trap
• a train
• a table in solicitors office
• a bed

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Wicker basket as pony and trap

• How did
• sound
• actors movements
• Help make the effect seem real?

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Wicker basket

• How did
• costume
• furniture
• turn it into a solicitors office?

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Sowhy was it scary?
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• restricted palette
• lighting
• scene changes
• Sound
• Acting!

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• Use of the ghost
• Sharing Kipps point of view
• The play within the play

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Pre-recorded sound

• Screams!
• pony and trap
• woman and child falling

• Silence
• people chatting
• ticking clock

16
Lighting

• fx wheel - passing train
• lights full up on stage

• the candle
• the torch
• gobo

17
Scene changes

• Some controlled by the actors - not frightening
• some not controlled by actors - surprising e.g.
  Kipps revisiting nursery

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Sharing Kipps point of view

• Sound of banging
• literal
• symbolic
• Pace quickened
• Other occasions?

19
The ghost

• Unexpected
• Painted white face
• Black costume
• Created dramatic tension, waiting for her
  appearance

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2 plays

• The play we were watching
• Kipps play

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The play we were watching

• Seemed real, not scary
• How will anyone believe this?
• We have to use our imagination

22
The play within the play

• Suspension of disbelief we were ready to
  believe in a ghost
• ghost played by actor, unlike e.g. dog