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'Oh What a Lovely War' 

Director: Martin Berry, New Street Theatre 

Lakeside, Nottingham (July 2014)

Set and prop design

Working intensively with Martin Berry and the cast of New Street Theatre, and alongside the costume designer Valeska Hall, we managed to bring about a wholly different world through our collective vision and hard work. Taking Joan Littlewood's political satire and setting it within the dystopian adventure playgrounds found within inner cities in the 1960s, I chose to respond to the anti-war themes present in the Theatre Workshop's insightful play. This was presented in traverse, setting the audience against each other and within the set, which spilled over from the stage into the wings and auditorium. The aesthetic was concurrent with the cast 'playing' at war, and everything orginiated in this playground of rubbish - a see-saw made of a cable reel and plank, a bath on wheels as a car, a rubbish chute sending down props and a lookout tower were all key elements of the set for the cast to interact with. 

1:25 model of set

1:25 model of set

1:25 model

1:25 model

The tower in use

The tower in use

Rubbish chute and table on wheels

Rubbish chute and table on wheels

Piano amongst junk

Piano amongst junk

Moveable palette stack

Moveable palette stack

Props as if scavenged from skip

Props as if scavenged from skip

‘Rhian Morris's concept for the set design is visually impacting and adds multiple opportunities for inventive staging’

(Phil Lowe, reviewer)

 

‘Designer Rhian Morris has come up with the ideal set, a scenery-free space dressed like a children’s playground, which lends itself to lightning scene changing by the ensemble.’ (Nottingham Post)

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