Behind the Scenes

	Jeff Quinn

Name: Jeff Quinn

Birthplace: Pennsylvania

City of Residence: Miami

Occupation: Lighting Designer/Teacher

Credits and Awards:  Carbonell Best Lighting Design Awards for The Goat and Frozen.  Curtain Up Best Lighting Design Awards for Boy Gets Girl, The Diary of Anne Frank, and Frozen.  Exhibited at World Stage Design 2005, Toronto.  Upcoming exhibit at the Prague Quadrenniel, June 2007.  Approximately 500 scenic and lighting designs for theater, dance, opera, and special events.

How long have you been a lighting designer?
Since 1966.

What got you interested in lighting?
My sophomore year in high school, I noticed a lot of interesting people around the theatre, so I started hanging out there too, and it turned out that auditions were already over, but not all the production positions were filled.  So I did the lighting for The Importance of Being Earnest.  It went well.

What is involved in creating the lighting for a show?
Everything.  The goal is to create a unique and interesting environment for the show that fits it so well it seems necessary, and to find a pace for changing that environment that both suits and augments the work of the director, cast, other designers, and playwright.  And of course, the scenery, the costumes, and the cast have to look good.

How much of your direction for lighting is in the script and how much
is of your own design?
There’s a great deal in most scripts, and that creates a broad outline.  The scenic design, the director’s blocking and intentions, and the mood that can be felt in rehearsal add specificity.  Then I try to respond.

How has lighting a show changed over the years?
The most important change is that it is easier to handle projections now, so that texture is a quality of light most designers now play with most of the time.  When I started, it felt cutting edge to try projections at all.  Most of the other changes are simply about more:  we use more cues, more dimmers, more electricity, more and brighter lights, more color, more movement.  And there is usually not more time to work in the theater, so we are relying ever more on pre-planning by computer to stay organized enough to get the job done.

What shows present the biggest challenges?
It’s not always the ones that will obviously be challenging—musicals and multi-scene dramas that require a lot of changes.  Sometimes the biggest challenge is to make the “simple” show come alive, to be unique.

What inspires you?
I look for inspiration everywhere—in the work of other artists, in and out of the theater, in nature, in my collaborators, in my students, in daily life.

What are the hallmarks of good lighting?
It fits the play.  Usually, that means it tells a story.
 

What do you consider your proudest professional moment?
Every opening night that goes well, and most of them do.   There have been many moments that seemed, and were, uniquely important at the time, but then the next show comes along, and it’s the most important project ever.

What show or project have you most enjoyed working on and why?
I enjoy nearly all of them, but a few stick out.  Frozen at GableStage, despite a macabre subject, brought together a great team and a very pointed script, and we were able to exceed our own high expectations through hard work and luck.  Nefertiti, the Musical at the Parker Playhouse was a chance to work in a bit more detail and with a bit more equipment than usual, and I was very pleased with how that design turned out.  Angels in America at New Theatre was an exquisitely impossible task—how to create the sweep of that epic play in that tiny space with a limited budget.  It forced us all to make bolder choices than we might have in a better-equipped theater, and I thought resulted in especially fine work.  This Is How It Goes is a script that invents its own genre, and that pushed all of us at GableStage to invent a style of presentation that could be relaxed and pleasant and insidious and false.

What is the best thing about working in South Florida theatre?
It’s wonderful growth.  I came here in 1985.  The growth in both the quantity and quality of professional theater in South Florida since then is just amazing, and it has been exciting to be a part of it.

Current and upcoming projects:
Several TBA plays at GableStage this season
The grand opening of the Ziff Ballet Opera Theater at the Carnival Center
The musical Parade at New World School of the Arts
An awards show for the American-Hispanic Advertising Association