By Lisa Orzolek, Set Designer for THE VOYSEY INHERITANCE

Rebecca Martin as Ethel Voysey. Photo by Terry Shapiro.

In The Space Theatre, architectural sense can be challenging…who has pentagonal shaped rooms?   We closed off 3 of the 5 entry voms for seating, which allowed for places to put bigger scenery: the fireplace, window seat and the bar.  We needed the fireplace to be tall enough for a man to lean against so not putting seats directly behind the fireplace allowed this option.

One of the first questions director Bruce Sevy asked when we sat down to design the Voysey library was how far into the room we could put the doors.  Though it would impact a few seats on either side of the doorway, we put the doors 6 feet away from the main playing area, instead of the usual 12 feet.  Keeping the audience view of the stage as unobstructed as possible is one of the constant challenges of designing in the round.  Sometimes we make the furniture shorter than normal or only use a half door so that they can be “inside” the room.  We needed to keep the doors real and have them make architectural sense.

The Denver Center has an extraordinary stock of props and a particularly great selection from the Victorian era.  Nearly every item in the warehouse is catalogued, so it was with pictures in hand that Bruce and I began arranging the room.  Needs: desk, large table, bookshelves, fireplace, chandelier, rugs and plenty of “conversation areas” for the family to sit.  Stock was plentiful for the furniture.  Missing items were:  a tall fireplace, barrister bookshelves, an ottoman and a period looking desk.  We built the fireplace, purchased the bookshelves online, built the ottoman and our prop shopper found the desk at a local antique store. We added a window seat to fit in one of the odd corners.  We found a door and doorway in stock and built the double door to match.

But even with so much stock, the prop shop has been busy. Among the projects undertaken for THE VOYSEY INHERITANCE:
•    85+ legal looking period documents created and printed (some pulled from stock)
•    14 items upholstered or reupholstered
•    12 floral or fruit arrangements designed
•    6+ trips to the warehouse for room décor not including trips for rehearsal props
•    5 table runners sewn or modified
•    4 mourning decorations created
•    3 pillows remade
•    3 magazines scanned and printed
•    2 period newspapers created and printed
•    2 carpet runners with fringed ends made from “runner on a roll”
•    1 chandelier completely disassembled, rewired and new chimneys added
And in we are also creating the realistic 1950’s Chicago apartment interior for A RAISIN IN THE SUN.

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