"Anything Goes", summer of 1987

My first three summers at working on the Sumer Arts Festival at Brockport I had designed the sets for the straight plays.

The summer of 1987 was the first time I designed the set for the musical production.

I had run the lighting board for a production of Anything Goes about 15 years before with the Sayville Musical Workshop.

A much younger me working on the 1972 production

My design was typical of many other productions with a multi-story view of the cruise ship.

Anything Goes, Scene Designer 1987

I was surprised a few months later when the set for the Broadway revival with Patti LuPone opened and it was very similar to my set.

The set for the most recent revival with Sutton Foster in 2011 the main view of the ship was from the side.

Of note here, Jessica Stone, an actress who appeared in several of our summer musicals was a featured actress in the 2011 production.

The main section had three levels but the third was only for looks.

The two large staircase units were designed to pivot out of the way for the stateroom platforms that rolled in from the side.

In keeping with its Art-Deco design, the set was just black and white with silver accents.

I remember that I wanted to use blue on a small set piece but happily I stayed with my tight palette and did not use it.

My set model

The nightclub scene was fun as I designed a number of white flats that were flown in around the staircases and in front of the main section of the boat unit.

 The flat had a simple black line design and silver panels of Rosco slit drape filled in between the flats.

Like many other set pieces, we had bits and pieces of the slit drape for years after the production was over.

I was very happy with some of the design ideas and solutions that I came up with for this show.

For the Bon Voyage number I had ramps up over the orchestra pit and onto the stage and actor would run down the house aisles and up onto the ship.

We also made Art-Deco railing piece that ran across the front of the stage and were easily removed by the dancers at the end of the number as the ship set sail.

I was sad to see the last of the railings in the dumpster during the clean-up for the renovation.



Stateroom Sets

I know that down in our basement storage we still have the two main doors that I made that have round portholes in them.

Adding some gold panels we use the draped a few years later when we did 42^nd Street.

Like many pieces from the past, the last bits if it were thrown during the recent renovation.

We now have a large “Rain” curtain, similar to the Rosco slit drape that we used in The Rocky Horror show hanging in the theatre.

The Rocky Horror Show, 2012

I wonder how many years we will have this and when it may be used again.

For the nightclub scene we wanted to use classic bentwood chairs but did not have enough.

I remember looking all over trying to find some used ones but the only ones I found were too expensive.

Today a few clicks on the internet and you can have as many as you want in a few days.

Not finding what we needed I had to find a way to fix some that we had and found that I could use pieces of garden hose to fill in the backs on some of the chairs.

It worked well for the show but over time the hose pieces have drooped and have become misshapen.

Although I did not design the poster I gave to campus artist an idea that he used and the poster came out great. 

Some years later I would do even more work on all four posters for school year season.

I had some research examples and did some rough sketches that were used to create the finished posters.

Like most of the other summer musicals at Brockport I had a good crew, we worked hard but had a good time working on the show.

***