La Périchole is an operetta by Jacques Offenbach, set in Lima, Peru. (It was originally written in French--Tacoma Opera performed an English translation.) It was a big painting job!
We reused some of the painted drop cloths from Fledermaus. I worked on these at the Armory for a while, and then we moved over to the Northwest Stage warehouse.
Working on my scrubbed-stucco look. We put muslin over the seams once we got it onstage, so I had to go over a lot of it again.
Gail cuts styrofoam blocks.
Stippling. I've got the technique down but it does take a while.
A new addition at the warehouse--one of the guys in the adjacent workspace got locked in recently.
On stage at the Rialto. I didn't go on Saturday, when most of the build happened, but there was a lot of finishing-up to do in the remaining week.
Drawing brick lines with a paint pen.
Royce hangs up the picado streamers.
Styrofoam blocks for the prison scene. There's an old prisoner who breaks out of his cell only to find himself in an adjoining cell.
We put the painted drops on rolls and cranked them up and down. It worked but it was really a pain to put together. We probably won't do it that way again.
(photo by Peter Serko)
I took Kate and Tavah to the Friday performance. It's a very funny show. Marcus Shelton, who performed the fabulous routine with the mop in Fledermaus, played the role of Piquillo. He's so good at the physical comedy. Christopher Nardine directed this one too. He likes to add in a lot of extra jokes in the dialog, which the reviewer from the Tribune didn't appreciate. Marcus made a reference to this in the Friday show--"This letter sucks! Even worse than the review!"--and got a good laugh. Chris has a fun directorial style and I could tell that everyone was just having a good time with the production. Kate and Tavah both enjoyed the show. Tavah says she will have to attend more operas in the future.
