The Hen Night Epiphany- design notes

The Hen Night Epiphany (Helix Stage)

The problem with recording the ups and downs of creating a set is that whilst one is in the middle  of said seesaw, you’re too busy, and once it’s all over, its all a blur.  They say childbirth is the same.

The Hen Night Epiphany is a new play by Tom Murphy, and it was being premiered by the Focus Theatre.  The Focus Theatre lost all its Arts Council funding last year, and they decided to put pretty much all they had into a showcase production, that would demonstrate that they were capable of touring a commercially successful show, and expanding the Focus Theatres audience, thereby regaining their funding.  So this show was important for them.

The production was opening in the Focus and then touring around the M50 circuit and the Mermaid, so I had to design a set that would fit onto the Focus stage (5mx4m) and also onto the Helix stage (12m x 11m).  I decided to design the set for the larger spaces and cut it down for the Focus.

The play is set outside a rundown bungalow up a remote hill, surrounded by beautiful views.  Airy distance is a difficult thing to pull off in the cramped confines of the Focus, but I used the same trick that I used for Proof, and painted the walls white, with a blue rising up from the floor.  This is like the sky inverted, and I’ve found it works well.  Moyra D’Arcy, the lighting designer, had grave misgivings because she was unable to avoid shadows, but with tweaking we got it to work.

In the play, the house is the possibility of a new beginning, but it could also be a trap.  I wanted to emphasise how much potential the house had, to underscore why it meant so much, so I put the surrounding countryside onto the walls and roof of the house.  At the same time I also brought the rotting carpet tiles and the discarded lives of the previous owners outside where it was visible, (along with a roll of barbed wire to deepen the warning).