Featured Article No3

Behind the scenes with the Master...

Bob Crowley's latest design masterpiece is Love Never Dies, Andrew Lloyd Webber's sequel of the phenomenally successful Phantom of the Opera.

Phantom has run for over 20 years in London alone, has travelled the world and been seen in 25 countries. Love Never Dies sees the return of the Phantom after a 10 year exile. Having travelled across the pond and established a home in the fairground on Coney Island, it's at the turn of the 19th century that this adventure begins. I went along to meet set and costume designer, Bob Crowley, at the Adelphi Theatre, London. Love Never Dies has just started its run in the UK and will go state side, to New York later this year. The critics haven't been kind about the Lord's latest creation, however its the paying public that concerns him most, and they are wanting to see the show in their thousands. This no doubt will evolve into millions. On a more personal note, I wanted to get into the mind of the creative master, Bob Crowley, and to understand the thought processes of this world-class costume and set designer. I wanted to find out what had inspired him while designing Love Never Dies. Son of a fireman, Bob decided at an early age he wasn't brave enough to become a fire fighter. And after seeing Sean Kenny's 1960's original production of Oliver, as a young teenager, he realised he wanted to do something in the theatre. Up until that point every production Bob had seen in the theatre, at home in Ireland, had had an Edwardian feel about it. Kenny's set design was Crowley's Damascus moment. Its modernity and the sculptural feel opened his eyes and his mind. Being able to see the lighting rig and workings of the theatre within, this attracted the young Crowley and opened the doors of theatre to him.

"Images often land in my path while walking down the street, it's weird and there's no logic to it."

Crowley studied at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, where he did costume and set design. The first set he designed was at the Bristol Old Vic, A Man's a Man by Brecht. Since then Crowley has designed many sets and costumes, from Aida to The History Boys, and has picked up a large handful of gongs along the way. For Crowley the design process for each project is very different and demands a different approach. The period, the location and the psychology behind the work all influence the eventual sets and costume designs. After reading the play, ballet or musical, he collects images like a magpie, from everywhere and anywhere. Images often land in his path while walking down the street, it's weird and there's no logic to it. His creative antenna attracts and amasses them. It's the collecting of images that help fuel the initial designs. It's like water divining, finding the images that are going to influence the final designs of the production. He most loves the creative process about any production; the sketching, making the white-card versions of the sets and experimenting with materials for the costume design. The set is always the first element of the production to emerge. He needs to know the environment, which then inspires the costumes. They then immerge from it and merge into it. They are intrinsically connected. The characters, the actors and singers also add to the design, it's an organic process.

Bob worked with Nicola Kileen, 'The Fabric Queen', to get the materials he wanted for this production. They experimented with dyes, colour graded dresses from top to toe, stripped white velvet of its pile, foiled material with gold and added beaded crystals to achieve the desired effects. Initially for Love Never Dies, Bob watched old black and white footage and studied photos of the Coney Island fairground from the turn of the 20th century, when it was first opened to the public. It was fantastical and a fanciful environment filled with exciting rides, freak shows and lots and lots of electric lights. At the end of 1900's the electric light bulb was still a new phenomena. Passenger liners filled with immigrants arriving at the gateway to America would have seen a vast stretch of glowing white light. It would have shone for miles like the new Atlantis rising out of the ocean. They would never have seen the likes of it before. Within the sets of Love Never Dies Crowley wanted to open this unexplored and magical universe and to leave behind the candle lit underworld of the Phantom. He knew the sets had to be a version of the fairground filtered through the eyes of the Phantom. He wanted to portray the dark shadows of Coney Island as well as the light and to make a new eyrie above ground for the Phantom. And to bring a touch of France, the Phantom's original home, to New York. Crowley's new creation is a fusion of Art Nouveau, the new America and Gothic. Within it are automatons built by the Phantom. The electric light bulb wasn't the only new thing in town. Cinema was also in its infancy and something Bob wanted to weave in to the production. Not only to celebrate its birth, but to help to explain the history of the Coney Island fairground, to the audience. For an American audience Coney Island is a part of popular culture, to a European this fairground is less familiar, if it registers at all. This is where projection design came into its element. Crowley joined forces with projection designer Jon Driscoll to achieve the desired effects and project history. Having previously worked with Jon during Fram at the National, Crowley knew this was going to be a good collaboration.

"Designing the sets and costumes for Love Never Dies is a beautiful thing to do". Phantom of the Opera was always going to be a difficult act to follow, however Bob is proud of this production. He set out to create a unique world and universe, and that's exactly what he's done. And the moment he is most proud of in the show is. when Christine sings her aria in act 2; there is little scenery, an opulent minimalism about a set. Everything focuses on Christine and her beautiful white velvet costume. Love Never Dies is running at the Adelphi, and opens in the States from November 2010. Thousands of people will see the work of a Lord and the Master and each night be thrilled by it. A big thank you to Bob for being so generous with his time. I look forward to seeing his next project, Alice in Wonderland at The Royal Opera House, next year. And long may he reign.