The Wild Party

The Wild Party is a musical written by Andrew Lippa and based off of a poem with the same name. Placed in late 1920’s Manhattan, a time of widespread social change in America, The Wild Party contains passion, destruction, and lots of bath tub gin. This set was designed by Chris Haig with the intention of making the set feel worn, fragmented, and in a state of deterioration. I was the scenic charge on this production and got to use various techniques to create each of the aged textures and surfaces that were incorporated into the set including brick, tile, marble, wallpaper, and wood.

Production Photos

Process Photos

The columns framing the stage were the most detailed and most rewarding part of the process for me as the scenic charge. Chris Haig was inspired by decorative columns that he had seen in Paris France, and he wanted to visually tie the musical back to the original source content through these columns. The poem that the musical is based on, also called The Wild Party by Joseph Moncure March, is book length and has been published with illustrations created by Art Spiegelman. Spiegelman is an illustrator, cartoonist, and comic artist known for his highly stylized work that pushes the meaning of form. My task for these columns was to design a collaged version of Art Speigleman’s illustrations, and then paint my sketches in a larger scale employing the same two-dimensional style that Spiegleman used.