Setting the Scene by Nick Smurthwaite

The Stage, March 15th 2007, pg 46.

A giant copy of The Strand Magazine greets members of the audience as they take their seats to see The Hound of the Baskervilles, currently touring the country. It was in the monthly journal that Arthur Conan Doyle first published his Sherlock Holmes stories.

One of the bolder conceits of Robin Herford’s visually striking production is that we first encounter the main characters emerging from the pages of the magazine, three dimensional, flesh and blood, in real time.

Such is the magic of video projection design – without question the most exciting new tool in the stage designer’s box since the Apple Mac – that stage effects are rapidly becoming as versatile as those of film or TV.

Projection has of course been used in stage design for many years, often to evoke stormy skies or to introduce newsreel footage, but the difference in shows such as The Woman in White, Sinatra at the Palladium, Sunday in the Park with George, and now The Hound of the Baskervilles, is that it has been used to form the basis of the design concept.

Timothy Bird, the Olivier award winning creator of the video projection for last year’s Sunday in the Park with George, is both excited by and wary of the acclamation of the burgeoning new graphic art form. “Handled in the right way, it is very powerful and effective,” he says, “but the projection must inform the play rather than overwhelm it.

“Yes, there is a huge danger of the technical effects eclipsing the narrative. What I am for every time I work on a show is a shared creative vision which requires a really good understanding between all the members of the production team as to what you’re doing, and what the possibilities are.

“It must always come back to why you are doing it, and what you are trying to express. For me, the excitement is about creating a beautiful piece of story telling which mitigates against getting carried away with one particular element.”

It is ten years since Bird first became involved in theatre design at the behest of his friend, the actor Clive Francis, who was struggling to create a one-man show out of A Christmas Carol. “We had no money, but lots of ideas,” recalls Francis. “Since it was a one-man show, Tim filmed me as Jacob Marley and the three spirits, and we projected them onto the stage at the appropriate moments. The result was a fantastic piece of theatre on a next to nothing budget.”

When Francis was commissioned to write, direct and appear in a stage version of The Lavender Hill Mob, he brought in Bird to design it. This time there was no projection input – he didn’t feel it was appropriate the play’s needs – and he describes his design influences as “a fifties Evening Standard poster, combined with the work of John Piper”.

The latest collaboration between Francis and Bird had its origins at Nottingham Playhouse in 2004, when the pair jointly conceived The Hound of the Baskervilles. Though popular with audiences and critics alike, it did not turn out quite as was expected. “It was a great success in Nottingham, and Tim’s projections were fantastic, but it was a little too pastiche for my liking – not scary enough,” explains Francis.

So they went back to the drawing board – Francis to do rewrites, Bird to reshoot some of the digital component. It has been a mad scramble to get it ready technically in time for the 11-week national tour. “What you have to remember about the digital approach to design is that it takes months to realise, so you need to be a lot more organised further in advance. It is also expensive, time-consuming and complex.”

How does it compare with Sunday in the Park with George, in terms of technical innovation? “There is a similar volume of projection in Hound,” says Bird, “and it certainly provided opportunities for new work. As with the Sondheim, we seem to have achieved a good fusion of all the elements.

“The danger is always that the video projection is perceived as another gimmick, another dry ice moment, but I think it will feel increasingly relevant in the digital age. Young people are bound to feel more attuned to video projection, so it has huge advantages from a marketing point of view.

“One of the reasons that I don’t work exclusively in theatre [he is a director of the Knifedge Creative Network], is that by combining diverse areas of creative expertise, I believe you create something far more interesting and unique than by specialising in one area only.”

The use of video projection can also enhance the narrative flow, being a far more fluid means of getting from one scene to another without having to physically move scenery and props around. Like it or not, digital technology seems certain to render these time-honoured conventions obsolete eventually.

Bird is keen to collaborate again with Sam Buntrock, who directed Sunday in the Park with George, and has himself worked productively in graphics and animation. Their combined flair, hand graft and expertise produced an outstanding piece of work. You feel, as they obviously do, that theirs is a creative gold mine requiring further excavation.