A.D. Drumm Images, LLC – Landscape, Portrait, and Fine Art Photography in Rochester MN Photography

April 14, 2016

Mary Poppins at RCT

Filed under: Rochester Civic Theatre,Theatre — Tony Drumm @ 10:00 am

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Mary Poppins is the spring musical this season at Rochester Civic Theatre. It opened on April 1, so the third weekend of four begins tonight. As I’ve been doing, I shot the show during the final dress rehearsal before Preview night.

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The stage musical version of Mary Poppins is similar to the movie, but there are a fair number of changes and new songs. It’s a pretty technical show to put on with lots of set pieces moving on and off and a good bit of stage magic to pull off.

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It’s a pretty long show as many musicals are, but the talent on stage is amazing, and the time just flies.

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Like many musicals, there are some great colors, both costumes and lighting, which make for some fun photos. I do like that!

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There’s also an abundance of choreography and several big numbers. Photographing those, it’s a balancing act of trying to capture the whole stage to convey a sense of the grandeur of the number and grabbing closer shots, usually of the main characters.

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Smallish web photos miss some of the impact of the wider shots, but I think they still work.

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One scene in the stage show not in the movie is the toys coming to life. The lighting through that is great, it’s visually very cool. It’s also the scary scene for some of the audience!

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Shooting this sort of show does demand a lot from your equipment and your experience – both shooting and in post. It was a real mix of fairly dark scenes and brightly lit scenes with spots thrown in for good measure.

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Sometimes, you get everything right and that’s a good feeling.

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And sometimes, especially at the end of big numbers, the director has blocked everyone into a group that creates a terrific photographic composition. So, you have to be ready for those, because you really don’t want to miss such amazing shots.

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In March, I helped backstage at Children’s Dance Theatre’s production of The Mermaid. I was one of four people working the flying wires – some of the mermaids “flew” under the sea. I hadn’t crewed a show for quite a while, and I forgot how much fun it is.

A call went out looking for help for Mary Poppins – it requires quite a number of folks helping backstage – and I decided to volunteer to crew some of the performances.

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That gave me the opportunity to take some behind-the-scenes pics.

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You have to be careful, of course. First, if you’re part of the crew, you have a job. So, you can only pull out the camera when you’re between things. For many scenes, I didn’t shoot a single frame.

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Then, you have to honor the sight-lines – the areas where you can be and not be seen by the audience. Sometimes, that means you don’t have a good shot of the on-stage happenings at all. But, there are other photos waiting for you if you look.

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These big musical productions at RCT have been earning a reputation for their quality. This combined with the popularity of certain titles have resulted in sell-outs. For this show, the entire run was sold out before opening night. A shame for many would-be attendees or folks who loved the show and want to see it again, but great for the theatre and the community for providing such support for the arts.

Two more weekends of performances – I hope you have your ticket!

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