Setting the stage

John Burgess, who has helped design sets for TV shows such as “Survivor,” is putting his talents to work as technical director for James Madison University’s “Sweeney Todd.” (Photo by Michael Reilly)

HARRISONBURG

John Burgess has worked on some big-time TV sets. He helped with sets for “Survivor,” and has assisted with the magic of some of the country’s top illusionists, such as David Copperfield and Siegfried and Roy.

So when he started designing the set for the Forbes Center for the Performing Arts’ production of “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street,” he had an opportunity to put to use all the skills he had gained during 15 years in the business.

The set is a massive, movable construction that is compartmentalized so that several scenes can be portrayed easily. The play tells the story of Sweeney Todd, who was exiled to Australia by a corrupt judge and comes back to exact revenge.

Throughout the course of the play, Sweeney opens a barbershop and practices his killing cuts on those who come to his shop, dropping them into the basement through a chute in the floor.

To help make Sweeney’s business come alive, Burgess, the production’s technical director, designed a barber chair that unfolds into a 45-degree incline, sending actors down the chute.

Creating a set that would allow for actors to fall through a trap door required a little magic of its own. Asked how the barber chair and chute work, Burgess replied with a smile, “It’s a secret.”

Dreaming up a design
Coming up with the production’s set took a bit of effort. Burgess started by looking at photos of Fleet Street from the mid-19th century to serve as a blueprint for his design, perhaps the most elaborate he’s created for a JMU production.

“I find these iconic views of what Fleet Street was like,” he said. “It was this bustling epicenter of commerce that [turned] into a melting pot.”

Burgess finished the design around Thanksgiving, allowing the set’s nearly 40 workers to begin construction early and giving enough time to perfect the massive piece.

As a theater minor, Kelsey Shore, a junior math major at JMU, has been able to work in the scene shop. She helped assemble the barber chair, welding together its metal frame.

“It’s been a lot of fun,” says Shore. “I have so many handy skills for life now. I’ve really enjoyed it.”

One of the more difficult parts of the set production, she said, involved painting the backdrop of London because the material had to be stapled to the ground and completely painted before workers could move on to other projects.

Working under Burgess, she says, has been a learning experience. When a problem gives her and her cohorts pause, he is often there with a trade secret up his sleeve.

“John has a lot of crazy life experience,” Shore said. “He has all of these crazy skills. Every time you look at something, you go ‘That’s so hard,’ and John has a short cut for it because he has been doing it so long.”

For Joseph Lass, a 22-year-old senior majoring in theater, working on the set of “Sweeney Todd” has been one of the biggest projects he’s been a part of.

Lass helped Shore with the barber’s chair but primarily serves as the lighting designer.

“For me, the process was a lot of [contemplating] about the feeling and the message and the mood we were trying to get across,” he said. “That’s where you start …  the message. You’re trying to tell, and from there, you go down to the basics of how you’re going to do that. That then plays into where you’re going to put all the lights and how the lights will look as well.”

But, while the backstage players set the scene, the performers bring the story to life.

“For us as designers, it looks nice but it’s not anything until the actors are there,” Lass said. “The story happens when the actors interact with the environment.”

Age: 48

Birthplace: Virginia

Favorite thing about set design? Allowing imagination to create the reality of the theatrical world.

Why did you go into set design? I enjoy the challenge of creating a theatrical world that serves the needs of a production.

Did you ever imagine you’d be working on such famous sets as Survivor’s tribal council? One can imagine a great deal. The Survivor sets were interesting challenges, but notoriety is not always the benchmark of what makes a project rewarding or memorable.

What would your dream project be? An environmental set that pushes the boundaries of the relationship between audience and performers.

If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be? In a Balinese style house on the island of Bora Bora.