Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 2013 - 32

based on the planned finish. Technical directors understand the
structural capacities of these materials and can build with them
effectively. These aesthetic and structural determinations come
from years of working with the materials. To shift to new materials, such as Kirei's sorghum plywood, Smith & Fong's Plyboo,
or Suberra's dense cork block, designers, technical directors,
and scenic artists need time to figure out how each of these
surfaces can best serve the needs of the production. Inevitably
there are going to be errors with any new material. Remember when Masonite was a new flooring option and we didn't
know about leaving gaps between the sheets? Given that these
materials can cost three to four times as much as the established ones, it is unwise to spend precious budget money on
these experiments during production. Further, new materials
do not permeate the residential construction supply chain until they receive widespread acceptance. Once they are tried
and trusted by homebuilders, the products are more widely
distributed and available at local and regional lumber yards.
But this circumstance delays the use of new environmentally
responsible materials for stage scenery, making it all the more
challenging to stay current with product development.
For sustainable lighting, the emergence of LEDs is both
exciting and frustrating. At the Royal Central School of Speech
and Drama (CSSD) Nick Moran likened working with new
LED fixtures in show settings to asking a fine artist to create a painting with different brushes and paints on a different surface in front of colleagues and on a tight schedule.
This difficulty is exacerbated by the fact that often lighting
designers are asked to work with mixed media, some LED
and some incandescent, meaning that light quality and dimming curves are inconsistent within the plot. To help figure
out new technologies, Moran rented an LED lighting rig for
experimentation at CSSD. His example demonstrates one of
the best ways in which academic design and technology programs can serve the industry. With their different objectives,
colleges and universities can be sites for experimentation that
ease the burden on design and production for commercial
and nonprofit theatres.
In England, Julie's Bicycle provides resources for artists
and companies trying to embody sustainable ideals. Its staff
includes administrators, activists, and scientists who work
with performing arts organizations to devise and implement
sustainable strategies through workshops, consultations, and
training. Julie's Bicycle began in Europe's music industry
through a focused effort to promote greener touring, merchandising, and packaging, and it extended to studio and
festival operations. Information for the theatre industry soon
followed. In the United States, there is no similar national organization, but there are many peer-to-peer and information
resources, such as the Broadway Green Alliance and the Center for Sustainable Practice in the Arts.
Carving out the time for artists and artisans to become
familiar with emerging materials and techniques is one problem; deciding when to insert sustainability into the creative

theatre design

& technology

s u m m e r 2013

process and who is involved at what stages is another. Based
on a sustainability summit experiment in Phoenix, Anthony
Runfola of Childsplay noted that making sustainability choices
early in the design process was essential. (Runfola 2010)
This means that someone well versed in sustainable materials and techniques needs to be involved in design/production
discussions from the beginning. Adding sustainability to these
discussion does require stretching out the standard timeline
of devising a set of drawings, but as Allison Whitlaw, a board
vice president for Mo`olelo observed, once a company has
made the shift to incorporating sustainability, it becomes the
new normal.
But there are numerous hurdles to overcome. Design
and production timelines at most theatres are fairly well established. Construction must begin so many weeks before
load-in, drawings must be completed so many weeks before that, and the director and designer must agree upon an
approach and preliminary sketches so many weeks earlier.
While these deadlines will vary from company to company,
each operates the way it does for very good reasons. It is
a balancing act between paying designers (who by standard union contract are paid two-thirds of their salary by
the time drawings are submitted) and generating income.
Likewise, designers must also protect their own interests.
Donyale Werle openly admits that she takes on fewer design
projects per year because she spends so much more time
creating greener designs compared to other designers who
operate in the standard model. The Old Globe's Ben Thoron
reinforced Werle's extraordinary time commitment, saying
the she spent about a week more on site than other designers. Theatre company business models do not easily enable
extension of the creative process.
Especially at the most ecologically minded companies,
the low hanging fruit has already been picked and most technologically possible efficiencies have been achieved. What
remains are ongoing expenses that do not help the economic
bottom line, when sustainability becomes an organizational
value considered during the budgeting process. At that point,
designers and technical directors are not in direct control of
the numbers, but artistic directors, managing directors, and
board members are. Leslie Tamaribuchi, who has served as
managing director and a board member for Cornerstone Theatre Company in Los Angeles, notes that such a systemic shift
can occur during a leadership change. A facilities change can
spark a similar reprioritization. In London, the Arcola Theatre
moved to a new space in 2010 after being forced out of their
original home and achieved a 34 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. Seizing the opportunity to reinvent their
theatre operations in a new facility, Arcola received a £1 million Arts Council grant to facilitate sustainable operations and
the renovations necessary to transform an old building into a
working theatre. One of their investments, a biomass boiler,
can burn a variety of materials to provide power for a radiant
floor heating system.

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