"Almost, Maine" - Lighting & Design

Stephens College performed the play “Almost, Maine” by John Cariani last weekend. The performance took the audience to a town in northern Maine called Almost, where love is tangible, hearts can literally break and shoes fall from the sky. The audience is shown nine different but connected stories about love and relationships as told by different characters all living in the town. The lighting designers for the performance, Herbert Moore and Jennifer Kilgore, and the sound designer, Emma Delfosse, did a great job creating a very realistic atmosphere to capture the audience’s attention and bring them into the world of the play.

A recurring theme in the performance is the appearance of the Northern Lights. We are first introduced to the lights during the first scene, called “Her Heart,” when East, played by Kyle Delaney sees a stranger standing in his yard. East confronts the stranger and learns her name is Glory, played by Rebecca Munoz. Glory tells East she is there to see the Northern Lights and pay her respects to her dead husband. When the scene ended, after the two had fallen in love, the cyclorama lit up with different colors of green, pink and blue to represent the Northern Lights. Tinkering music played in the background while East and Glory look wondrously past the audience as if they were really admiring the Northern Lights in the big Maine sky. The lights occur again at the end of all eight scenes and the epilogue. Each time, the tinkering music plays to draw our attention to what’s happening in the background and the characters look into the audience as if the lights are above them, while the audience looks past the characters on stage and into the lights. The recurring lights, along with Ginette, played by Lydia Miller, walking through each scene in the play, helps the audience realize that all of these scenes are happening simultaneously.

There are also a couple of instances of cars in the play. The first time we hear a car is in “Where it Went,” with Phil and Marci, played by Ty Carter and Mycah Westhoff. The married couple had been ice-skating and was arguing while getting ready to leave. It seems like a very typical argument between a couple, as Marci claims she is definitely not mad and Phil tries to figure out where he went wrong. The couple got some “Ooohs” from the audience when we found out it was their anniversary and Phil had forgotten. The scene ends when Marci walks offstage and we hear the sounds of car driving away, indicating that she has left Phil. Poor Phil is left all alone to walk home (hopefully he didn’t live too far away) at the lake they had been skating at as his wife drives away without him. The Northern Lights cue up and Phil looks off into the audience as if he’s really looking at the sky. In this scene the lights seem to represent Phil’s acceptance that his marriage is no longer working out. The lights fade away and we move on to the next scene. Another car in the play was during the scene “Story of Hope,” staring Kyle Delaney as the man and Carolyn Williams as Hope. Hope had taken a taxi over 100 miles to get to this mans house from the airport. We hear a car drive up, a car door slam, and Hope walks on stage carrying a suitcase. The car sounds are crucial to this scene because without them it would appear Hope has just walked right over to this man’s house, which is not nearly as romantic as her traveling hundreds of miles. The Northern Lights end this scene when Hope finally gives the answer that she promised to a man many, many years ago.

Another important part of the play was the transition between scenes. The play contains eight scenes of different connected stories, plus a prologue, interlogue and epilogue, and the designers were faced with a tough job of ending one scene and smoothly bringing us over into the next. Each scene ended with the Northern Lights, which came to be a symbol of conclusion for each scene. After the Northern Lights lit up the cyclorama, all the lights would fade leaving the stage in complete darkness. Immediately after, music would begin to play for about a minute until the set crew had everything ready to go for the next scene. The music would slowly fade away and the lights would come back on. The consistent scene conclusions and smooth fades of light and music transitioned the audience easily from one scene to the next, without removing us from the world of the play.

The lighting designer, Jennifer Kilgore, did an excellent job at portraying the different between inside and outside scenes and setting the mood. Several of the scenes took place outside and, besides the fact that the characters were bundled up in winter clothing, it was easy to tell because the ‘sky’ was lit up with a nice dark blue. When the scene took place inside the lightning was a warmer glow, much like what you would get from a lamp in the living room. The scene “Getting it Back” opened with Lendall, played by Ty Carter, sleeping in a comfy armchair in his living room. His nap is rudely interrupted by his girlfriend Gayle, played by September Adamson, pounding on his door. The lights are dim when he first wakes up, giving the scene a very sleepy and comfortable mood. After quite a few more knocks and screams by a very upset and demanding Gayle, Lendall gets up from his chair and the lights get brighter, making the room seem more lively. Subtle differences like the lighting of a room really helped pull the audience into the play.