This post is dedicated to choices that fell by the wayside for various reasons in pre-production for Whisper House; the ideas that were cool or promising that there wasn't quite the time or budget for, or we decided would be too distracting...here's a taste of the "almosts" for the show!
The Eyeball Lighthouse- The script urges the set designer for a production of Whisper House to not attempt to literally build the lighthouse on the stage, and we follow that guidance in this production of show.Instead, our set incorporates the silhouette of the Maine coastline, with the shadow/outline of the lighthouse represented in the center, with some cleverly rigged lighting at the top that allows a few different looks (rotating brighe light, sort of a "rippling, watery glow", and a more standard light as well). The lamp at the top is the (traditional) fresnel lens, but we almost went much more expressionist with it. Perhaps you've seen our postcard image?
I feel like I’m being watched.
I asked the Eye at the top of the lighthouse to be incorporated into the graphic design for a few reasons. First, since the lighthouse is a place of secrets, it's appropriate to give the design of the structure a bit of an Illuminati vibe. I also was a bit inspired by the sun/light bulb in the Picasso painting Guernica; to me that image has always resembled a pitiless, staring eye. Thematically it resonates to me because of the role of God in the universe of Whisper House- rather than intervening to help these messed up people, the light of the lighthouse is an eye that stares impassively, but doesn't get involved.
So in initial set design discussions, I was interested in incorporating this eye imagery into the representation of the lighthouse in the set as well. Just one problem:
Oops.
It eventually became clear that in doing a kind of eyeball-tower on stage we'd be making a (potentially very confusing) cultural reference that we didn't mean to. So reluctantly the EyeballHouse was scrapped.