The Tempest images
A theme of the production is the suppression of the island's natural magic by Prospero's artificial and rather dark magic. (His most reliable spells and the ones he most often relies on are charms to give people cramps, and the local Spirits have all become his close-harmony-singing slaves.) Probably when the sorcerer arrived on the island 12 years ago, it had palm trees and such; now it has these quite sinister magical trees. Well, as you see at right, the Upstage tree has some relation to a butter churn, but it isn't dressed up yet. It'll get a disturbing bark treatment, sort of Cretaceous-looking branches and some footholds so the Spirits can use it as a way up to the ramp.
The Downstage tree is just a stump; the sorcerer's Book rests on it. Because of some congestion issues and sightline problems, designer Tom shifted it from all the way Stage Right to all the way Stage Left. Probably the tree and maybe even part of the Book will appear over the Labor Day weekend. New blocking is already in progress.
In the photo at left, Mary (almost hidden, playing a Spirit), Darla (Miranda), director Steven and Tom look over the day's work on the No. 2 tree. The next page will show more members of the cast and crew.
It isn't clear (to me) yet whether this tree will have branches strong enough that Ariel can swing from them. I bet she tries, though.
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