Kate Unwin Macbeth
Designs for Lady Macbeth and the three
witches (not used)
Interview with Dan Clark for Haymarket Theatre Website:
Discussing Design
with Kate Unwin.
When you first read Macbeth what were the strongest
images that came to mind for you?
I first read Macbeth when I was
fifteen, at school. When I first
started to think about this production of Macbeth I had all the images of the
productions I had seen floating around my head. Blood, daggers and that stark landscape. I clearly remember after initially reading
it the images of the woods moving and the witches. The witches are a strong image for me, an iconic image that is
now part of our culture.
Did you have any strong feelings about
colours?
Really dark colours prevailed, dark
and gloomy. Scotland and castles,
barren moors – hardly any colour really.
How have you worked with the Director
to create the design for Macbeth?
The process started with Paul and I
having an initial discussion in which he told me if there were any specific
things, any specific directions he wanted to take the play. I then went away and looked at the
text. I spent time researching the
text, looking at themes and motifs. I
looked for strong symbols and then I started collecting many different images.
I looked at paintings, paintings of Lady Macbeth through the ages, and I also
looked at lot of pictures of other productions. One image that our design has stemmed from was from a ballet
(Helnwein) in Germany. This particular
ballet had hundreds of baths on the stage. These baths were vertical and had
bodies in them. This connected strongly to our ideas about washing the hands,
baths and washing the blood off. We
then started to think about toilets and sinks
- we wanted to have a very plain stage – all black with this striking
white porcelain. It soon became clear
that we would use only black, white and red for the whole play.
I put together many different images
and then I had another meeting with Paul. He then picked out the images that he
really liked. He told me what direction
he wanted me to focus on – which images he wanted me to develop. Once we were both coming from the same
direction in terms of images and sketches, I made a very simple model. Following further discussions a final model box
was made.
Are you given a design brief?
Paul doesn’t tend to give me a brief
as such, he will tell me if there is anything very specific needed for the
show. For this he told me that the audience were going to be on the stage – he
points out the main things that are in his head and then he lets me go away and
run with it. Directors are different –
sometimes they say very specific things like I want three doorways of this size
and sometimes they just say these are the themes, now go and be creative!
What have been some of the challenges that you have
faced doing Macbeth with a cast of seven actors?
One of the main challenges is that the
actors are doubling up. If one actor is
playing four different characters then those characters really need to appear
very different - you don’t want the
audience to be confused: ‘Why is
that person back on stage when he died in the last scene?’ Our edited version is quite a short one and
therefore you have the challenge of sometimes having an actor playing two different
characters in the same scene. The
quick changes are a challenge – you may want them to have a completely
different costume but they may just have to have something that they can pull
on or off very quickly!
What are you aiming to achieve with
your design for Macbeth?
We want it to be very dramatic, scary
and dark. We want it to be stylish -
stark images, the toilets, everything black and then you have these white set
pieces. The only colour we have used is
with Lady Macbeth’s dress. I am hoping
that it is going to look really stunning, stylized and pared down.
Where did the idea come from to have
the audience both on and off the stage?
That came from Paul – it is leading up
to the new building, (Performing Arts Centre), where we are going to be able to
have different staging – we wanted to start to experiment with different
staging ideas – watching something from two different angles. The point of view is shifted and shaped
through blacks dropping in and dropping out – disorientating, we don’t want the
audience to know where they are.
I am hoping people are really going to
go with it and I hope they are not going to be standing there worrying about
where their chair is or how long they are going to be standing for. They will
though…damn it! Hopefully when it gets
going though, they won’t be thinking that because they will be so engrossed
with what is happening on stage. I hope
it will be really unusual for them. A
lot of promenade does happen – but it doesn’t usually happen on a stage like
this. I hope they are going to be blown
away by it!
Often when working on theatre both the Director and
Designer have ideas that sometimes can’t be achieved because of budgetary
restraints. How do you negotiate and
adapt to these challenges?
Initially we say what we would ideally
want if we had the money and then between the production manager, other staff
and ourselves we look at alternatives.
We try and see if we can achieve the final outcome as close to our
original concept as possible. A lot of
people have links with other theatres so we can borrow things a lot of the
time. We also have a great store here
and lots of stock equipment so we can sometimes use what we have. Visual Scene
(the company that build our sets) is great at suggesting how to make things
cheaper.
I’ve learnt to live with letting go of
some ideas. It is sometimes hard if am
particularly attached to a design element.
I think I have learnt not to get too attached and not to be too
precious. On shows when I have made a
prop or costume that then gets cut it can be quite heart breaking. You can’t
dwell on it though. The reason that it
is being cut and changed is because it is keeping with the director’s vision of
the piece – you can’t hang on to it if it is not right for the overall show.
How much discussion do you have with
the actors in relation to design ideas?
I don’t
usually have much discussion with actors in terms of the set. They usually just accept what is going on.
If they are using something like a door, then they are involved in it to a
certain extent.
Usually they would have their own
ideas about costumes. Sometimes I may
design a set of costumes and then on first day of rehearsals they could say
that it isn’t what they want. I like them to have an input into their
costumes. They are going to be on stage
doing the job every night so they have to feel comfortable, they have to feel
happy – a lot of actors are willing to go with most things but some can be a
bit difficult.
How do you negotiate this? Two very
different ideas….
At the end of the day it comes down to
what the Director wants. If
compromising on something to make the actor happy isn’t going to compromise the
rest of the show and both Paul and myself are happy then we will go for
it. I would rather they went on stage
every night and be happy.
What advice would you give to a design student who
was starting out in the industry?
I started out by doing a lot of work
for free, for about a year. I worked in many different departments at a
theatre. I did flying, lighting sound, crewing, prop making, costume making.
All those little bits helped me become informed about how theatre works – and
then I got a job here and I was given a show here to design.
You have to really want to do it,
because it is badly paid and it is really hard work. Unfortunately a lot of it
is about knowing the right people and being in the right place. I would suggest trying to get some unpaid
work at your local theatre – getting people to know your face – if you are
willing to work for free, willing to put the effort in, then it does all come
eventually. You also need to build up a
portfolio of images. Youth theatre
shows, adult education shows – are all good ways – a lot of big theatres run
smaller projects and that is how you can dip your toe in and have a go. That’s
what I did – I did small shows and Paul liked them and offered me a main stage
show.