The Hot Wing King
Lighting design for the 2023 production of The Hot Wing King at Alliance Theatre, directed by Katori Hall.
About the Lighting Design
Hot Wing King ran two worlds simultaneously: the inside of a house and the outside of the same house, often visible to the audience at once. Michael Carnahan’s set itself moved across the show. When it slid stage-left, the exterior footprint expanded. When it slid back, the interior reclaimed the room. Each position changed what was visible and what was lit, which meant the design had to commit to a different solution than a typical moving-light-heavy rig.
Instead of flexible movers reconfiguring on the fly, the design used discrete systems: house interior in position one, house interior in position two, exterior in position one, exterior in position two. Only a handful of moving lights served double duty across configurations. Everything else was purpose-built for a specific scenario. The naturalism of each scenario had to hold even as the set repositioned around it.
Pulitzer-winning playwright Katori Hall, who also directed, wanted the transition moments between scenes to amplify music’s emotional power rather than just bridge it. Working with sound designer Connor Wang on the vocabulary of those transitions, the lighting met the music. Practicals throughout the set, the lamps and piano lights and interior fixtures, shifted color during transitions. In naturalistic scenes the same practicals read as ordinary household sources. In a transition, they came alive, instruments responding to whatever the music was doing.
The subtler version of the same idea ran underneath the show. Practicals in morning scenes were tuned several hundred degrees cooler than the same practicals in evening scenes. The shift is imperceptible in the overall wash. The audience doesn’t read it, they feel it. The naturalism gets to be naturalistic while still carrying the psychological tone of whatever time of day the scene is supposed to inhabit.
- Playwright
- Katori Hall
- Director
- Katori Hall
- Scenic Designer
- Michael Carnahan
- Costume Designer
- Dede Ayite
- Lighting Designer
- Mike Wood
- Sound Designer
- Connor Wang
- Assistant Lighting Designer
- Toni Sterling
- Lighting Supervisor
- Rachael Blackwell
- Associate Lighting Supervisor
- Joy Diaz
- Programmer
- Ben Strickland
- Intimacy / Fight Director
- Rocio Medez
- Stage Manager
- Shaina Pierce
- Assistant Stage Manager
- Liz CampbellBarbara Gantt O’HaleyKacie Pimentel
- Stage Management Production Assistant
- Samantha Honeycutt
- Line Producer
- Tinashe Kajese-Bolden
- Assistant Line Producer
- Assata Amankeechi
About the Show
Cordell, his boyfriend, and their friends in Memphis, Tennessee prepare their culinary entry for the annual Hot Wing Festival. When Dwayne takes in his troubled nephew however, it becomes a recipe for disaster. Suddenly, a first place trophy isn't the only thing Cordell risks losing.
Source: Dramatists
Cast
Nicco Annan as Big CharlesBjorn DuPaty as CordellMyles Alexander Evans as EJArmand Fields as IsomJay Jones as TJCalvin Thompson as Dwayne
Production Photos
Press
The lighting design was stunning, truly. Extremely effective in illuminating the space to look and feel like a home.
Mike Wood's lighting design and Dede Ayite's costumes are full of welcome touches.
Cue Explorer
Drag the slider to step through every cue from the preview run. Each frame is the live capture from Vor; the data mirrors the Eos cue list.
Designer's note Production photo Script trigger
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