Open Forum

 View Only

  • 1.  Les Miserables barricade ideas?

    Posted 05-25-2014 08:46
    Has anyone built the barricade for Les Miserables? My set construction leader is looking for ideas on how to approach this project.  If you have pictures, plans, etc. to post or any advice (i.e. "We tried this, but wish we had done this.."), we would really appreciate the help.  Thanks!

    -------------------------------------------
    Marla Blasko
    Theatre Arts Director
    Columbia MD
    -------------------------------------------


  • 2.  RE: Les Miserables barricade ideas?

    Posted 05-25-2014 11:57
    We did Les Mis this year on a small stage with a 13 foot ceiling and no possibility of a rotate etc.

    Our barricade was largely preset on an angle across SR and faced with wall sections which were removed prior to the start of Act Two.  It was built on moving platforms and hence we removed the wall fronts and slid it forward into position.  During the building of the barricade, the cast brought out ladders and barrels and boxes to add on to the existing structure.

    We built the barricade with items shown / referenced / symbolic of elsewhere in the show... tables, chairs, bookshelves, blackboards etc. as well as pillars and such.

    All gunfire (we used actual firing stage weapons) were then fired off stage right and that was where characters climbed over the barricade from.  (We built stairways into the barricade on the offstage side.)  Gavroche climbed over and out and sang from off stage during his death scene and the effect was very powerful.  (The current touring show has Gavroche killed off stage as well.)

    Cheers,


    -------------------------------------------
    William Jacobsen
    Red Deer AB
    -------------------------------------------






    Original Message


  • 3.  RE: Les Miserables barricade ideas?

    Posted 05-26-2014 10:16
    Our barricade was made of three peices that came together onstage like a puzzle so that you could see it being "built" and then locked together.  It was really wonderful and despite the fact that my set builder says he is not artistic, it was visually beautiful.  

    Basically, we used three wagons with heavy-duty casters as the base for it.  on each of the side wagons we mounted an existing escape stairs (6 feet tall) and built our barricade around this.  It was double sided so that we could rotate it to see Gavroche in the street.  There was a front peice on the third smaller wagon in the front middle that locked on to give it some more dimension and some more angles to climb.  On both sides of the stairs we mounted old furniture we'd scavenged and had donated--chairs, doors, drawers from dressers, dressers themselves, mirror frames, shutters...basically anything we could find.  There were specific reinforced points where the students and Gavroche knew it was safe to climb, and because the stairs were "hidden" in the middle of all the stuff, the actors could stand on the stairs to be on the barricade or look like they were climbing over.  I don't have any good pictures of it on this computer, but I'll try to find some and post them.  
    It was very important to me that the barricade come together onstage and that it be able to rotate.  It did both very well.  If you do something like this, just be aware of the weight you have on it and choose your casters accordingly.  The first set we used was too small for the bulk and had to be replaced.  

    -------------------------------------------
    Amy Bussey
    Stuarts Draft VA
    -------------------------------------------






    Original Message