Ten days ago, the Civic Theater stage looked like this...
Crews were frantically unloading trucks filled with all the elements needed to bring Robert
Brill's set design for "Moby Dick" to vivid life.
RON ALLEN: The crew behind us, there's probably about 50 guys plus the technical director
from Dallas, and a couple of other programmers for lights.
Ron Allen is director of production at the San Diego Opera.
RON ALLEN: Overall by the time we get this show up we 'll have several hundred people
working on this show.
That's far more people than it took to man an actual whaling vessel.
Allen and his crew are essentially bringing novelist Herman Melville's famous whaling
ship the Pequod into the theater so audiences can join Captain Ahab in his mad pursuit of
Mody-Dick.
CLIP "Death to Moby Dick, death, death, death!"
Brill's challenge was to bring more than just the Pequod onto stage.
ROBERT BRILL: But eventually we arrived at the idea of this floor surface that was both
floor and wall that could be traversed by the chorus and that could be many things.
It could be the deck of the ship or serve as a screen for projected images of the ocean
and of a 3D, computer-rendered image of the ship, a ship that feels like it's coming right
into your lap.
ROBERT BRILL: We did a lot of research on whale boats and how they are constructed.
The boat that you see created in 3D was modeled after a period whaling vessel.
So we thought that maybe there was a way to integrate the projected idea of a ship and
very quickly that turned into using the idea of the universe in the opening and I think
because the way we introduce it starts from the constellations and connecting those lines
and as an audience member you see the lines and you yourself see it assemble so you are
involved in that process of seeing the ship evolve and then you see the ship go on its
journey.
Brill's design strives to find a perfect balance of elements.
ROBERT BRILL: Trying to find this balance of something that could be both abstract and
at times could be very real.
And there are moments when everything comes together in a perfect harmony.
ROBERT BRILL: I think that the whale boat scene, because in many ways it is so literal,
yet on stage it's such a simple and kind of abstract idea, and it's a very beautiful moment
where I think all the departments are working together where you see both projections and
scenery and costumes and lighting and all of that comes together.
The set proves to be simple, elegant, and at times breathtaking.
It also incorporates a spider web of rigging for the chorus to climb and interact with.
It not only gives them something to do but it helps create the illusion of being on a
ship.
ROBERT BRILL: So the rigging of the ship seemed to be the thing that if we used it in the
right way could be the most beautiful to look at but it was a question of how much rigging
and what parts of the rigging to eliminate and that it was graphically interesting without
being absolutely accurate.
For instance, when we were looking at the rigging on the ship there are usually lines
vertical lines and horizontal lines, and we said when we had all the horizontal lines
in, it feels like we're doing Gilbert and Sullivan, it feels like now we want to see
the rest of the ship.
But when we used just the vertical lines it enhanced the vertical lines of the ship.
There's also a moment when the ship opens up to reveal where they render blubber into
oil.
ROBERT BRILL: The moment in the opera when they're rendering this big piece of blubber
we needed finally to see something.
Unlike a movie where CGI can create anything in vivid detail, Brill asks audiences to fill
in details with their own imaginations.
ROBERT BRILL: I think we're just giving enough to take them on that journey and they really
have to go the rest of the way with it.
Brill hopes audiences, like Ahab, will become obsessed with that elusive great white whale,
Moby-Dick.