Campus Connection

Innovative idea helps students, designers create best set up for “Big Fish”

It’s crunch time for the upcoming production of “Big Fish” at UWL. You can count on one hand how many rehearsals are left before opening night. Luckily for the production, the design team set up an innovative way to work on all aspects of the stage design much earlier. https://youtu.be/YidHwy1-C9M A model of the set design, created by Megan Morey, is in the Theatre Art Department’s Lighting Lab. “We can use the light lab to play with something real,” says Morey. “It’s a great opportunity for students to figure out what the lighting looks like while we’re still building the set and without hanging the full lights because that takes at least a week.” The large model and lighting lab are especially helpful for a show like “Big Fish,” which takes the audience on a journey through a swamp, New York City and small-town Arkansas, to name a few. “It’s not a movie, we can’t take the audience there,” says Ben Golden, Lighting and Sound Supervisor. “We use the set, lighting and sound to give them the sense of where they are and what the atmosphere is like.”