Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 2010 - 70

book

reviews
a huge personality. I like to describe Feder as
someone who talked long distance without a
telephone. The combination of Dali and Feder
was electric and sometimes explosive. I sometimes had to mediate.
Laura Hanson and Robert Lewis Smith
write about Oliver Smith and included a couple
of details that I found telling. I did some small
jobs for Smith as an extra hand, a sort of assistant's assistant. Hanson and Smith tell of Oliver
Smith designing the set for a new number in
Hello Dolly. Since Smith was on vacation during
the out-of-town tryouts, he designed the scene
by describing it over the phone to his assistant,
citing the research material he wanted provided
for the scene shop. A pejorative for an actor's
performance is the expression "phoning it in." If
a designer "phones it in" is it any better? None of
us would recommend this process to students.
This not to say that Smith was not a fantastic designer. But he did absent himself at times,
such as spending long periods of time incommunicado in his studio that had no phone. The
choreographer Agnes de Mille is quoted here as
saying that people put up with this sort of thing
"because he's just that good. People want him."
I don't want to harp on Smith, but one
anecdote here is at odds with my memory. According to this chapter, Smith told students at
NYU that Rex Harrison was concerned about
the width of a door in the library scene in My
Fair Lady. He said he showed Harrison that he,
Smith, could go through the door easily and this
convinced Harrison. I was a student in New Haven when the show first tried out at the Shubert
Theatre and the story then was that a door had
to be made higher so that the tall Harrison could
get through without ducking. It's possible there
were two different doors. I may be wrong, or...
no, I won't go there.
I was sorry that Whitney Blauson's profile
of Pat Zipprodt ended before what I thought
was a charming story about her later years. I
saw Pat in 1993, and she was a bit giddy and filled
with a girlish embarrassment because in her late
sixties she was finally going to get married.
Pat graduated from Wellesley in 1946 and
returned to Chicago. There she met Robert
O'Brien Jr., who proposed. She didn't accept his

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proposal because she wanted to have a career.
Then almost fifty years later, O'Brien, now a
widower, saw her name in a playbill, contacted
her, and again proposed. As I remember it, he
had a horse farm in Virginia, and she spent time
there with him until he died five years later. She
died a year after. She was a gracious lady.
I have nothing but praise for all the writers of these profiles. Some knew their subjects
personally, but I gather from the writing, many
did not. That makes the research all the more
impressive because there is a sense of both the
subject's importance to the art of theatre and, in
most, a feeling for what they were like as people. When all the shows they designed are listed,
they become, as the kids would say, awesome.
What is more, taking all the chapters together, a
history of an era in design has become available
where none existed before.
Late and Great: American Designers
1960- 2010 is a gift tied with multi-colored ribbons. Personally, since I graduated and went to
New York in 1960, the exact span of the book, it
allowed me to relive experiences and remember
people that were long forgotten. Each generation
thinks the shows done in its time are the best.
Maybe my joy in reading this book is a result of
that same phenomenon, but it was truly a golden
time. As proof, any number of shows from that
period are still being revived, while seldom is
this true of the fifty preceding years.
Finally, USITT must be thanked for a program of documenting our history. Bobbi Owen
must be thanked for what must have been huge
task of shepherding all the writers. Each of the
writers must be thanked for bringing these designers to life again. And the production team
must be thanked for the layout, the placement
of pictures and the clear captions. Those of you
who teach, assign this book.
Beeb Salzer is the author of The Skeptical
Scenographer: Essays on Theatrical Design
and Human Nature (Broadway Press, 1995).
He retired in 2008 from the School of
Television, Theatre and Film at San Diego
State University, where he taught scenic
design and aesthetics. He is currently
working on a book for children.

S U M M E R

2010

Learning to See
A Matter of Light

By Howard M. Brandston; New York,
Illuminating Engineering Society of North
America, 2008. 138 pp. Cloth, $65.00 ($50.00,
IES members, www.iesna.org.).
Reviewed by Debra Garcia Lockwood
Reading Learning to See: A Matter of Light
has been my formal introduction to Howard
Brandston. If you do not recognize his name
and are not familiar with this highly lauded and
respected lighting designer's career, prepare to
be amazed. Brandston's work in architectural
lighting is nationally and internationally known.
His firm, The Brandston Partnership, Inc., has
completed more than 3,500 commercial, institutional, residential, and governmental projects
worldwide. Google him, and you will be astounded by the depth of his experience and the
caliber of his work. In fact, you most likely have
seen evidence of or experienced at least one of
his lighting designs. Among its many high profile
architectural lighting design projects, Brandston's firm was selected to design the lighting
for the 1986 restoration of the Statue of Liberty.
He uses this project as one of the insightful case
studies featured in this book.
In Learning to See: A Matter of Light,
Brandston shares in an easy to understand manner his more than 50 years of experience. His
book is completely accessible to students and
professionals alike. He doesn't get mired down
with technical jargon. "Lighting is not about the
equipment," he writes, "it's all about the light."
He explores light in a "holistic context" and
makes the connection between light and life.
His design aesthetic and the approachable manner in which he writes is for anyone interested
in light, architecture, theatre, and perception.

Straightforward approach
I found the introductory sections, where he
provides insight into his straightforward approach, particularly engaging. He invites you to
learn from a passionate artist and teacher. He
reveals a bit of his personality and tells you that
his lighting roots are in the New York theatre

http://www.iesna.org

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 2010