The 50 Greatest Ladies and Gentlemen

Light­ing design for Per­for­mance Thanatology’s The 50 Great­est Ladies and Gen­tle­men at the Ontological-Hysteric The­ater. Run­ning through August 1.

In this install­ment of Per­for­mance Thanatology’s ongo­ing research in death and per­for­mance, a soli­tary fig­ure per­forms all his old songs and dances despite the loss of his part­ner, the loss of his danc­ing shoes, and the loss of his teeth. Some­where between Krapp’s Last Tape and Artaud’s Spurt of Blood, this is what really became of vaudeville.

A con­cise light­ing rig allows for quick and shock­ing trans­for­ma­tions from con­fes­sional mono­logue to vaude­ville to rock’n’roll con­cert dur­ing this 35-minute show that stub­bornly stays one step ahead of the audience’s per­cep­tion. The 16 moments of the show are as rich and inter­nally com­plete as the tran­si­tions are swift and non sequitur. Though the piece as a whole resists dra­matic struc­ture, the light­ing attempts to intro­duce clear, pal­pa­ble ideas and emo­tions by cre­at­ing con­trast between moments while stick­ing to a small and spe­cific palette of col­ors, angles and timing.

It’s been a blast work­ing with every­one on this (Ric and Lucas: thanks for trust­ing me with your work). This is also my long-overdue Onto­log­i­cal debut, which caps an incred­i­ble 2 years in New York as I move to New Haven to pur­sue my MFA in light­ing design.