Urinetown

Urinetown was Lehigh’s first musical in many years, and was quite a task to present with a full live orchestra on our thrust stage. My design for the musical satire about environmental disaster, based on Russian Constructivism, was an enormous expanded steel mesh multi-level deck and spiral ramps on top of a trapped floor which held a live orchestra underneath. This ambitious design posed real challenges to our scene shop due to its sheer size and intricacy of design, and I collaborated very closely with Andrew Southard, the technical director, during the building phase to oversee its progress and execution. My design assistant, Cassandra Dutt, an IDEAS major who synthesizes civil engineering and design, was eager to combine her technical knowledge with design to help create the build plan. Although the execution of the set was difficult, it instilled a lot of pride in our students and provided a great playground of movement possibilities for our student actors.

Playwright: 
Mark Hollman and Greg Kotis
Director: 
Pam Pepper
Lighting Designer: 
Sue Ragusa
Costume Designer: 
Erica Hoelscher
Student(s): 
Cassandra Dutt '13, Assistant Scenic Designer
Venue : 
Diamond Theatre, Lehigh University
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