The World Transformed book final draft for Carey

THE WORLD
TRANSFORMED

Scenic Designs by Carey Wong



THE WORLD
TRANSFORMED

Scenic Designs by Carey Wong



THE WORLD
TRANSFORMED

Scenic Designs by Carey Wong

Front and back cover: The set from the Seattle Repertory Theatre’s production of INSPECTING CAROL
designed by Carey Wong. The set was intended to show the small auditorium and stage for the Soapbox
Players’ production of “A Christmas Carol.” Photo by Chris Bennion.

This catalogue is published in conjunction with the exhibition “The World Transformed: Scenic Designs by
Carey Wong,” held at the Portland Chinatown Museum, Portland, Oregon, April 2 — September 10, 2022.

The exhibition is made possible in part due to generous support from the Naito Foundation.
The catalog is made possible in part due to generous support from the Goodman Foundation.
Designed by Bryan Potter Design, Portland, Oregon
Printed by Brown Printing, Portland, Oregon

Unless other specified, all photographs are the property of the photographers who hold the copyright
thereto.

Copyright @ 2022 by Carey Wong.

All rights are reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval
system, without permission in writing from Carey Wong and the Portland Chinatown Museum.

Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available from the Library of Congress.
ISBN 979-8-218-02033-0

Contents

A Note from the Executive Director 5

Preface 6

Introduction 8

UNCLE HO TO UNCLE SAM 10

GOING TO ST. IVES 14

THE MISER 18

DON GIOVANNI 22

MADAMA BUTTERFLY 28

THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO 32

THE MAGIC FLUTE 36

A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC 42

HOTEL ON THE CORNER OF BITTER AND SWEET 46

BOEING BOEING 50

THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST 54

THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE 58

SLEEPING BEAUTY 62

A SINGLE SHARD 66

THE JOURNAL OF BEN UCHIDA: CITIZEN 13559 70

AIDA 74

Inspiration 81

Current work 82

Biography 83

Listing of Shows Designed 90

CONTENTS 3

4 THE WORLD TRANSFORMED

Detail of Act 1 set model for the Seattle Repertory Theatre's THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST. Photo by Jeff Lee.

AExNeocutetivfreoDmirtehcetor

It is my privilege to write this message on behalf of the Portland Chinatown Museum
celebrating THE WORLD TRANSFORMED, our exhibit featuring 40 years of Carey
Wong's scenic designs.
I knew Carey's work from his installation design for BEYOND THE GATE, an
exhibition that originated at the Oregon Historical Society in 2016 and which was
augmented and re-mounted as a permanent part of the Portland Chinatown Museum in
2018. Dramatically presenting the lived history of the Portland Chinese community, it has
had a powerful and popular appeal since its unveiling. So I should have known how richly
revelatory this exhibit of his set models would be. However I wasn’t prepared for the impact
these jewel boxes would have once they were installed and lit, nor for the insight into the
creative process the accompanying text panels would deliver. It has been a magical experi-
ence to enter into his imaginative world of work, to see how initial design ideas slowly
develop — through refinement, revision, and collaboration — into finished scale models
and eventually into fully built sets. My personal sense of wonder has been mirrored by our
visitors' responses every day since the show opened. When viewers arrive from the tough
neighborhood outside, their body language instantly changes, they settle in and watch the
exhibition unfold much like a play. There's a delight that goes beyond the immediate beauty
and craft on display as they realize that his work connects with the story of the museum and
Portland’s Chinatown itself — the way Carey and so many others in the Chinese community
share a past that is captured in this place. It's something intangible but real, a cultural
heritage hinted at through these objects.
It makes me think of something Carey told The Oregonian, how he likes his sets to
reveal themselves gradually in a series of transformations that surprise, intrigue, delight
and resonate with subliminal meaning.
Carey understands how necessary this museum and this exhibition are for the future
of Chinatown. As we emerge from a pandemic and repair a neighborhood in crisis, Carey's
work has been a beacon of light for what we can envision in New Chinatown, and for the
larger world that our community can transform.

Anna Truxes
Portland Chinatown Museum

A NOTE FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 5

Preface

In 2018, while we were preparing for the grand opening of the Portland Chinatown
Museum and its permanent exhibit, “Beyond the Gate: A Tale of Portland’s
Historic Chinatowns,” Founding Executive Director Jackie Peterson-Loomis
and I spoke about the idea of having a retrospective of my theatre design work.
As I thought more about the idea, it became clear that trying to mount a sweeping
retrospective of my career in PCM’s compact gallery spaces was just not possible.
However, a show more narrowly focused on a small number of scenic designs would
not only be a better fit, but also could provide visitors with an understanding of the
different design challenges scripts pose and the varied scenic solutions that can be
created as a response. The pandemic gave me an opportunity to refurbish and
rebuild the 16 scale models that comprise this current exhibit. I chose these because
they are among my favorite projects during a career that has spanned nearly a half
century — favorites because of their design and technical challenges, intriguing
directorial concepts, or striking visual resolutions. Also, I felt it important and
appropriate that a number of those featured designs have Asian or Asian-American
settings because they would be displayed in a museum devoted to Asian-American
history and art.
Six of the 16 set models in the exhibit have settings that range from 12th-century
Korea, 1904 Japan, and war-torn Vietnam to Seattle’s International District, San
Francisco’s Japantown, and a world of Asian fantasy. Other designs include projects
that I created early in my career for Portland Opera and Portland Center Stage, as
well as later for Seattle companies I have repeatedly worked for — the Seattle
Repertory Theatre, ACT Theatre, the Village Theatre, and the Seattle Children’s
Theatre. There are also a few examples of work done for companies further afield
— the Opera Theatre at Wildwood, Anchorage Opera, and Orlando Opera (in
collaboration with the Macao and Beijing Music Festivals).

6 THE WORLD TRANSFORMED

The shows represented in this catalog span the years during which analog
photography gave way to digital photography. As a result, the images assembled
here vary greatly in clarity and quality. Although many of the images were captured
with better digital technology, other images began as less crisp images printed from
negatives and then scanned. I hope that the catalog text provides the reader with an
understanding of the design path that each project took even when the accompany-
ing photographs are not of the best quality.
I want to acknowledge the stage directors I’ve been fortunate to work with on
these projects. They include Malcolm Fraser, Dennis Bigelow, Albert Takazauckas,
Patrick Bakman, Linda Hartzell, Rita Giomi, Desdemona Chiang, Allison Narver,
Casey Stangl, Annie Lareau, Robert Egan, Steve Tomkins, Brian Yorkey, David
Bartholomew, and Robert Swedberg. All of them have helped me develop and grow
as a designer.
I also want to thank the Portland Chinatown Museum for presenting this
exhibition. Interim Executive Director Anna Truxes provided both her museum
expertise and personal support for this project. I’m grateful to preparators Roberta
Wong, Norm Gholston, Terry Chung, and Richard Woo for helping install this show.
And special thanks to Bryan Potter whose graphic design skills are so prominently on
view in the exhibit’s text panels and layout of this catalog.

Carey Wong
May 2022

PREFACE 7

Introduction

The 16 scale models included in this exhibit represent a sampling of the over
300 productions that I’ve designed during a nearly 50-year career. They
show the range of places and periods that a set designer is asked to create
and evoke. They also reflect my interest in historic architecture, design, and style.
It’s generally stage directors who initiate the idea of what they want the physi-
cal production — the sets, costumes, lighting and sound — to be like. But often a
director will ask me to suggest a visual direction for the set. Or it can spring organi-
cally from the entire creative team collaborating to develop ideas. Our conversations
will not only be about the physical requirements of the dramatic piece; they may
also drift into discussions of politics, aesthetics, history, psychology, and religion.
Based on these conversations, I prepare initial responses, either in the form of quick
sketches, groups of photographs, picture clippings or found objects suggesting a
mood. And after a preliminary design approach has been agreed upon, I can begin
building a scale model. The first scale model is often white cardboard, unfinished,
and used to assess the basic proportions and spatial layout. This model then can
go through a number of alterations as texture, paint and finishes are added. In
the end, the final painted model is as close an approximation as possible to what
the final design will look like onstage.
Set scale models are built to assist a production in a variety of capacities and
are an essential requirement for a design project. Though virtual three-dimensional
models are gaining traction, actual physical set models generally are the preferred
option since they provide real-space visual and tactile information that virtual mod-
els can’t. Set models are often created in 1/8” or 1/4” scale (1/8” or 1/4” equals 1’-0”)
as they are compact and easily transportable. But 1/2” scale models, like the ones in
this exhibit, are still preferred or required by most producing organizations because
at 1/2” scale, the detail of scenic elements becomes more apparent, and the creative
and technical teams gain a much better sense of how the scenery will actually relate
to the performers and the stage space. Set models allow production and technical
crews to gain an overall sense of the aesthetic and practical requirements of the set.
Stage directors use them as a tool to work out how they will block a show prior to
the beginning of rehearsals. Actors may refer to a scale model to give them a better

8 THE WORLD TRANSFORMED

idea of the environment they will inhabit during a performance. And marketing
departments use images of the scale model in their publicity campaigns to generate
excitement about a project and its point of view.
Stage design is a challenging profession, requiring a balance of aesthetic
concerns with the economic and spatial constraints of a project, so I often think of
myself as both a creative dreamer and technical pragmatist. The field can appeal
to a person who likes to solve problems. Scenic designers are asked to distill real or
imagined locations and transform them into a visual essence that can be depicted
on stage. In the process, further transformations occur as sets change internally,
often surprisingly — a metamorphosis that can illuminate the theme and communi-
cate the emotional core of the drama. Stages and performance spaces come in all
shapes and sizes, from intimate ones that have only a few dozen seats to large
municipal venues seating thousands of spectators. Most of the designs in this exhibit
were designed for standard proscenium theatres, but a few were designed for thrust
or arena configurations.
The scale models in this show are working scale models. They may show signs
of wear and tear from being in the thick of scene shop construction and painting or
from being manipulated by performers and personnel during rehearsals. To put it
bluntly, they are the remnants of the production that the creative team devised for a
particular theatre at a particular time and in a particular place — silent vestiges that
remain after the shows have closed.
I have been fortunate to have had many talented assistants over the years, and
they have contributed their time and talents to some of the models and artwork that
are in this show. Colleagues who have assisted in detailing and painting include
Sandra Kaufman, Judith Cullen, Curtis Coyote, and especially Charlotte Emrys, who
has brought a high level of artistry to set models and artwork during our over 20 years
of collaboration. Drafting assistants have included Burton Yuen, Nick Passafiume,
David Brack, and Kathleen Le Coze, and these people have also helped me cover
technical rehearsals when I was spread too thin. Without the help of all of these
people, this exhibit would not have been possible.

INTRODUCTION 9

UNCLE HO TO UNCLE SAM

by Trieu Tran with Robert Egan

ACT Theatre

October 2010 (World Premiere)

Robert Egan, stage director
Carey Wong, scenic designer
Rose Pederson, costume designer
Rick Paulsen, lighting designer
Lara Kaminsky, projection designer
Brendan Patrick Hogan, sound designer

ABOVE: Trieu Tran stands in front of the altar/shrine draped in a South Vietnamese flag as he recalls his family’s escape
from their home country in this photograph from the ACT Theatre production. Photo by Chris Bennion.

10 THE WORLD TR ANSFORMED

DESIGN CHALLENGE

Trieu Tran’s autobiographical play traces his family’s dramatic escape from war-torn
Saigon and the horrors of a Viet Cong re-education camp to becoming refugees
who end up in America. The play traverses a multitude of rapidly shifting locations,
situations, and emotions, with the playwright as the sole performer and guide.
Although presented in ACT’s arena theatre, the play was intended to be performed
in a thrust configuration, so my task also involved masking a portion of the existing
arena seating and turning it into part of the theatrical environment.

PRODUCTION CONCEPT

The director wanted to create an environment for recollection and reflection — a
kind of sacred space that contrasted with the many gut-wrenching, violent scenes
narrated. The space also needed to be a sanctuary where peace and resolution
could ultimately be achieved.

DESIGN SOLUTION/TRANSFORMATION

Honoring one’s ancestors is an important part of many cultures in Asia. Altars to
deceased family members or others who have passed often include photographs of
the dead as well as joss sticks, food offerings, and objects of personal value. Altars
to deities of nature are also common. For this production, I combined the idea of a
shrine to the deceased with that of an altar to the sea goddess Mazu, a guardian
for seafarers revered in China’s coastal regions and overseas Chinese communities
throughout Southeast Asia. For Trieu’s family and other refugees, a shrine to a deity
who could miraculously intercede in taking them across the water to a better life was
an apt symbol. And an altar to his violent, difficult dead father with whom Trieu had
a complicated relationship was also apt. The inscription over the altar reads “Long
live the noble spirit.”

UNCLE HO TO UNCLE SAM 11

Another production photograph from the ACT
Theatre premiere. Photo by Chris Bennion.

12 THE WORLD TR ANSFORMED

I used muslin sheets to cover the seats in the arena that became part of the stage
picture. Suspended window shutters and doors over these areas allowed for chang-
ing projected images that could transform the environment’s location and mood
instantly. Cloth hangings behind the altar showed fragments of Vietnamese business
signs that could have been in Saigon or America. A small pool of water surrounded
by a wood-planked hexagonal platform suggested contemplation and purification.
At the very back of the space, a curtain of taut vertical ropes completed the scene.
Depending on the way it was lit, the rope could suggest a jungle, a cage, or some-
thing more ethereal and dreamlike.

Model photo for ACT Theatre’s set. Photo by Carey Wong.

UNCLE HO TO UNCLE SAM 13

GOING TO ST. IVES

by Lee Blessing

ACT Theatre

July — August 1997 (World Premiere)

Leslie Swackhamer, director
Carey Wong, scenic designer
Jeanne Arnold, costume designer
Greg Sullivan, lighting designer
Steve LeGrande, sound designer

ABOVE: Dr. Gage (Mari Nelson, left) and May N’Kame (Gloria Nelson) confer in the latter’s backyard in Africa during Act 2.
Photo by Chris Bennion.

14 THE WORLD TR ANSFORMED

DESIGN CHALLENGE

Seattle’s ACT Theatre (formerly A Contemporary Theatre) has a long history
of presenting world premieres — 46 as of February 2022. After its Seattle debut,
Lee Blessing’s widely praised play, GOING TO ST. IVES, went on to successful
runs in New York and Los Angeles, as well as becoming a popular title for many
regional theatres.
The play concerns May N’Kame, the mother of an African dictator, who travels
to England to see Dr. Cora Gage, ostensibly about medical treatment for her failing
eyesight. During this visit, Dr. Gage raises the issue about the unjust imprisonment
of some of her colleagues by May’s son. It emerges that May’s real motive is to obtain
poison with which to kill her murderous son, a monstrous act she rationalizes by think-
ing it’s ultimately for the greater good. The play becomes a meditation on the moral
and ethical dilemmas both women face as a result of their meeting.
Two locations are specified in the text — Dr. Gage’s living room in the town of
St. Ives, and May N’Kame’s backyard in Africa. Because this show was presented in
the round at ACT Theatre, the set needed to be a relatively simple one that could
easily be changed during the intermission.

Dr. Cora Gage (Mari Nelson, seated at left) meets May N’Kame (Gloria Nelson) in her morning room during Act 1 in the 15
world premiere of GOING TO ST. IVES. Photo by Chris Bennion.

GOING TO ST. IVES

Set model for the African backyard in Act 2 of GOING TO ST. IVES. The white areas indicate audience seating. Photo by Jeff Lee.

PRODUCTION CONCEPT

Director Leslie Swackhamer wanted the two environments to look as different
as possible. The English morning room was to be a haven of comfort and order,
while the African yard a more austere, elemental environment. She also hoped
the intermission scene change could be a smoothly choreographed one.

DESIGN SOLUTION/TRANSFORMATION

This show offered an opportunity to create a set that worked as a metaphor.
During the intermission scene change, the neat wooden floor and furniture of
Cora’s morning room were removed, along with fragmented cornices and a ceiling
chandelier. This revealed the dried earth of May N’Kame’s African yard which had
large gaping crevices in it, as if the earth were registering the enormity of an act
— May’s poisoning her son — that had overtones of a Greek tragedy. This seemed
a perfect transformation for the play: that under the civilizing veneer of ordinary
daily life and acts, there is always an undercurrent of moral ambiguity and complex
emotion — a chaos that threatens to undermine our sense of a stable, orderly
human existence.

16 THE WORLD TR ANSFORMED

GOING TO ST. IVES 17

THE MISER

by Moliere, translated by Sara O’Connor

Portland Center Stage (formerly, Oregon Shakespeare Festival Portland)

January 1989

Dennis Bigelow, stage director
Carey Wong, scenic designer
David Kay Mickelsen, costume designer
Rick Paulsen, lighting designer
David de Berry, sound designer

ABOVE: The miser Harpagon (Rex Rabold) occupies the sole chair in his rotunda attended to by his servant Valere (Jamie
Newcomb) as his daughter Elise (Jane Jones) looks on. Photo by Duane Morris.

18 THE WORLD TR ANSFORMED

DESIGN CHALLENGE

For its inaugural season, PCS Artistic Director Dennis Bigelow was eager to
showcase a new translation of THE MISER by Sara O’Conner in a production that
would be an exuberant exercise in style and extravagance to illustrate how the new
theatre company could put its spin on a classic play. Moliere’s plays were written so
they could be performed simply — with perhaps only a table and a few chairs.
Director Bigelow felt that there had to be a way to portray the opulent home of the
tight-fisted miser Harpagon and to have it make sense without seeming superfluous.

Scale model for THE MISER set at Portland Center Stage. Photo by Carey Wong.

PRODUCTION CONCEPT

Dennis Bigelow decided to update the play by presenting Harpagon as a parsimoni-
ous contemporary businessman with his spoiled children lounging around the house
in stylishly distressed sportswear or bikinis, completely self-absorbed with their
consumerist and romantic pursuits.

THE MISER 19

The rotunda set. Photo by Duane Morris.

DESIGN SOLUTION/TRANSFORMATION

To honor the classic nature of this play, I designed a spacious, marble-pillared
rotunda as part of Harpagon’s home — perhaps a residence he inherited or that he
just purchased outright as a bargain. It was replete with much gold-leafed bas relief
architectural detail, French doors and windows, and a large oversized crystal chandelier.
To illustrate his stingy nature, the room was only furnished with a single upholstered
Louis XV chair (slipcovered in plastic) in which the miser sat. For scenes in which other
characters needed to sit, other chairs in styles reflecting their personalities were
brought on — Memphis style chairs for the fashion-conscious children, for example,
or an elegant Empire style chair for the more enlightened, humane Anselme.
I wanted this set to be compact, yet feel spacious. By giving the rotunda a
curved dome-shaped ceiling, I was able to emphasize the verticality of the space
to create a capacious, open feeling while also keeping the footprint of the interior
small and focused.
This set is yet another example of how a single environment can frame the
action of an entire play by giving it a visual context that supports its themes and ideas.
With changes in lighting that included built-in fixtures, the set was able to transform
the mood and reflect the changing times of day.

LEFT: Harpagon’s son Cleante (Louis Lotorto) leans against his new motorcycle and confers with Elise (Jane Jones)
about their father. Photo by Duane Morris.

20 THE WORLD TR ANSFORMED

THE MISER 21

DON GIOVANNI

music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, libretto by Lorenzo da Ponte

Portland Opera

September 1980

Stefan Minde, conductor
Malcolm Fraser, stage director
Carey Wong, scenic and costume designer
Eugene Dent, lighting designer

ABOVE: Giovanni (James Morris) welcomes the three masked guests — Donna Anna (Rita Shane), Don Ottavio (John Aler)
and Donna Elvira (Nancy Shade) — to the party at his palace. Photo by Edmund Keene.

22 THE WORLD TRANSFORMED

DESIGN CHALLENGE

Mozart’s opera DON GIOVANNI offers any stage director or designer an intrigu-
ing challenge — to give a plausible context to a story that uneasily mixes comic and
dramatic situations with a highly moral theme and ending. There is also the
supernatural element of the Commendatore’s stone statue in Act 2 that accepts
Giovanni’s invitation to dinner. Originally placed in 17th-century Spain, the opera is
set in motion when Giovanni kills the father (the Commendatore) of Donna Anna,
a woman he attempts to seduce. Later, the Don comes upon a statue of the dead
man in the cemetery. A voice seemingly uttered by the statue tells Giovanni that
he will receive his just desserts by the day’s end. Shaken, but needing to demonstrate
his bravado, Don Giovanni invites the statue to dine with him, and the statue
accepts with a nod of the head. At the opera’s conclusion, an unrepentant Giovanni
is dragged off to hell by the statue. The piece is divided into two acts with 5 different
scenic locations in each act.

Scale model of the Spanish colonial facade as it appeared for the cemetery/mausoleum scene. Photo by Jeff Lee.

DON GIOVANNI 23

Donna Anna (Heather Thomson) tells Don Ottavio (Richard Margison) that he must give her more time to mourn
her father before they can be wed in “Non mi dir”. Photo by Edmonton/Calgary Opera.

PRODUCTION CONCEPT

British director Malcolm Fraser chose to set the action in Latin America where
the boundary between the real and the supernatural can seem more permeable.
The scene in which the statue confronts Giovanni becomes more plausible in an
environment where the mystical and the miraculous are a rich part of the culture.
In Fraser’s production, the statue became a mummy in the family mausoleum,
inspired by the famous mummies in Guanajuato’s Museo de las Momias. The director
also wanted his production to have the ritual and pageantry of a Day of the Dead
celebration, when the story of Don Juan is traditionally enacted in puppet shows and
street theatre. Fraser’s production included a traditional festival procession during the
overture featuring banners with pictorial themes of the opera rendered in the style of
Mexican muralist paintings and introducing all of the principal players in the opera.

24 T HE WORLD T R A NSFOR MED

Scale model of false proscenium and cartouche showing Giovanni standing between the figures of the woman (love)
and the skeleton (death). Photo by Edmund Keene.

DESIGN SOLUTION/TRANSFORMATION

The set was dominated by a large neutral Spanish colonial architectural façade
that slowly transformed into the cemetery’s mausoleum with niches for mummies
and religious statuary as the opera progressed. For the Don’s dinner party, the
architectural façade as mausoleum hovered ominously in the background, and as
Giovanni was dragged to hell, the entire structure began to move toward the front
of the stage until the Don was pulled into the central opening of the structure as
smoke filled the stage and illuminated skeletons fell in slow motion out of the sky
behind the façade.

POSTSCRIPT

This production received such critical interest when it was presented by Portland
Opera, that a second production of it was built a few years later in Canada with
Fraser directing the show for Edmonton Opera and Calgary Opera. Thereafter,
it traveled to the opera companies of Winnepeg, Vancouver, and Anchorage.

DON GIOVANNI 25

The street procession during the overture featuring painted banners and signs identifying the characters
of the opera. Heather Thomson (Donna Anna), Judith Forst (Donna Elvira), and Peter Rose (Masetto)
are seen here, among others. Photo by Edmonton/Calgary Opera.

In the marketplace, Don Giovanni (James Morris) attempts to seduce Zerlina (Carol McGilvra) as Donna Elvira
(Nancy Shade) watches. The arhitectural façade has a more natural appearance in Act 1 before it begins its
transformation to the cemetery/mausoleum in Act 2. Portland Opera production photo.

Donna Elvira (Judith Forst) Photo credits: Set model and
prays to a shrine of the Virgin Portland Opera production
Mary during “Mi tradi.” photos by Edmund Keene.
Edmonton/Calgary Opera Edmonton/Calgary Opera
production photo. production photos courtesy
of those companies.
26 THE WORLD TR ANSFORMED

Giovanni (James Morris) invites the Commendatore’s mummy (Herbert Eckhoff) to dine with him. Portland Opera
production photo.

The septet in Act 2. Characters in
the opera become lost in a darkened
courtyard with multiple entrances
suggested by this arrangement of
stairs. Edmonton/Calgary Opera
production photo.

Giovanni (Richard Stilwell) is
dragged to his death amidst smoke
and flickering flames at the end
of the opera. Edmonton/Calgary
Opera production photo.

DON GIOVANNI 27

MADAMA BUTTERFLY

music by Giacomo Puccini, libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa based on the
short story by John Luther Long

Tacoma Opera

May 1999

Benton Hess, conductor
David Bartholomew, stage director
Carey Wong, scenic designer
Lynn Bowers, costume designer
William Forrester, lighting designer

ABOVE: Tacoma Opera production photo with Kaori Sato as Cio-cio-san during the Humming Chorus that closes Act 2.
Photo by Duane Morris.

28 THE WORLD TR ANSFORMED

Production photo of Eugene Opera’s MADAMA BUTTERFLY set showing the entrance of Cio-cio-san and her attendants in Act 1.
Photo by Duane Morris.

DESIGN CHALLENGE

Puccini’s popular opera MADAMA BUTTERFLY has in recent years been charged
with cultural appropriation and has raised questions about the practice of non-Asian
singers appearing in yellowface to take on the roles of Japanese characters. The
result is that opera companies wanting to present this work have been obliged to
address these issues and make adjustments to their casting or production designs.
Set in Nagasaki around 1904, the exterior and interior of Butterfly’s house are the
scenes required by the libretto.

PRODUCTION CONCEPT

Director David Bartholomew wanted a traditional production of the opera which
emphasized the beauty and exoticism of the location. He also wanted viewers to
be able to view action inside of Butterfly’s house even when the shoji screens
were closed.

M A DA M A B U T TER FLY 29

Scale model for Tacoma Opera’s MADAMA BUTTERFLY set. Photo by Carey Wong.

DESIGN SOLUTION/TRANSFORMATION

This set for Tacoma Opera was created before the issues of cultural appropriation
and greater sensitivity to casting became such flashpoint issues. At first glance, my
scenic design appears to take a traditional approach to the opera by creating a
picturesque environment for the opera’s action. However, on closer view, something
subversive is going on. A detail of a Japanese woodblock print is unsettlingly used
upside down as a backdrop to the set. A torii gate has been inappropriately built
close to a house that has been leased to an American sailor for his Japanese “wife.”
It is later used as a flagpole for an American flag. These and other details give the
impression of a lovely world, but one which is not as it should be, utilizing Japanese
motifs in an incorrect, uncharacteristic way and suggesting a Western misunder-
standing of the culture’s visual signals. Butterfly’s house has shoji screens for which
the opaque backing can be removed. When this is done, Butterfly’s house starts
to resemble a cricket cage in which she is more trapped than free.

30 THE WORLD TRANSFORMED

One final design note is that characters enter and exit the scene via a wooden
footbridge that passes through an oval opening at the rear of the stage — something
reminiscent of a bas relief scene on carved ivory cameo brooches, popular items at
that time and before.
Sometimes visual transformations can be achieved with lighting and sound
rather than with big changes of dimensional scenery. That was the case with this
production. A small stylized flowering cherry tree took the place of a fully leafed one
during the intermission, and the romantic mood of the first act wedding changed to
a more overcast, cold light of day for the second and third acts.

POSTSCRIPT

This intimate set was utilized by many American regional opera companies during
the decade after its fabrication. It had its debut at Eugene Opera before being seen
in Tacoma. Coincidentally, I designed my first MADAMA BUTTERFLY set for
Eugene Opera a decade earlier. It was a larger, more expansive production that was
utilized by many other companies in the 1980’s and 1990’s including Seattle Opera.
That production debuted at Utah Opera with Martina Arroyo as Cio-cio-san prior
to its appearance at Eugene Opera.

Sharpless shows Butterfly a letter from Lieutenant Pinkerton while she offers the American Consul a cigar from a box that the
kneeling Suzuki holds. Photo by Duane Morris.

M A DA M A B U T TER FLY 31

THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO

music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, libretto by Lorenzo da Ponte

Anchorage Opera

January 1991

Stephen Sulich, conductor
Patrick Bakman, production
Joshua Major, stage director
Carey Wong, scenic designer
Malabar Ltd., costume supplier
Lauren Miller, lighting designer

ABOVE: Production photograph of the Act 4 palace garden set at Anchorage Opera. Photo by Duane Morris.

32 THE WORLD TRANSFORMED

DESIGN CHALLENGE

Mozart’s THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO has often been called the perfect opera.
Figaro, the Count’s valet, and Susanna, the Countess’ maid, are about to be married.
The Count, however, has amorous intentions towards Susanna and wants to exercise
his droit de seigneur. The Countess, hurt by her husband’s attempted infidelity with
Susanna and others, teams up with Susanna and Figaro to teach the Count a lesson,
while Figaro evades having to marry the aging Marcellina (a stipulation of a promis-
sory note for a loan) when it is revealed that she is his mother.
Four settings are specified in the libretto — Figaro and Susanna’s partially
furnished room in the Count’s palace, the Countess’s apartment, a hall in the palace
decorated for Figaro and Susanna’s wedding, and the garden of the palace with
arbors right and left. The stage director requested that the scene change from
Act 3 to Act 4 be a vista — one that is done in full view of the audience.

Act 1 scale model — Figaro and Susanna’s basement bedroom. Photo by Jeff Lee.

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Act 3 scale model — the outdoor terrace. Photo by Duane Morris.

PRODUCTION CONCEPT

Director Patrick Bakman had staged this opera many times before and had strong
ideas about this new production. He wanted the sets to have an informal country
feeling. He also wanted an overarching visual movement to be from indoors to out,
from the cramped basement interior room of Figaro and Susanna with small win-
dows admitting little natural light to the liberating palace garden at night. This
gradual opening up of spaces was meant to mirror the characters as they are forced
to view their relationships more clearly and realize what is important to them. It is no
small point that it is the women who have agency in this opera and who concoct a
plan to make the Count recognize his transgression yet ultimately forgive him.

DESIGN SOLUTION/TRANSFORMATION

The director and I were inspired by a photograph of a curved French staircase that
visually suggested the musical elegance and line of the opera. Director Bakman
suggested a raked (sloped) stage surrounded by elevated platforms with gently
curved steps leading from one to the other.

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I played with the idea of two curved arched colonnades that intersected each
other at upstage center. For the first two scenes — the basement bedroom and
Countess’s apartment — the arches were filled by wall plugs or other architectural
details that enclosed the space and made the arches look like interior architectural
details. The third scene where Figaro and Susanna’s wedding celebration took place
was changed to an outdoor space — a plant-filled terrace of the palace with the
elevated platform outlined by a stone balustrade — with soft curtains filling all of
the arches rather than hard architectural surfaces. In the last scene, the two arched
colonnades were at last fully seen without obstruction, an array of plants and trees
visible through the architecture.

POSTSCRIPT

I ultimately designed three versions of this set for three different companies.
The first was done in 1986 for the Opera Theatre at Wildwood (formerly, Arkansas
Opera Theatre). The second was done for Seattle Opera in 1989, and the third
was done for Anchorage Opera. Seattle Opera decided not to build the second
version for budgetary reasons.

Act 2 scale model — the Countess’s apartment. Photo by Duane Morris.

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THE MAGIC FLUTE

music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder

Orlando Opera

November 2002

Hal France, conductor
Robert Swedberg, stage director
Carey Wong, scenic designer
Charles R. Caine, costume designer
Gary Rankin, lighting designer

ABOVE: Tamino and Pamina stand in triumph with Sarastro in the Temple of the Sun.
INSET: Pamina (Ying Huang) and Tamino (Warren Mok) navigate thier way through the labyrinth during the trials of fire and water.
Photos courtesy of the Macao International Music Festival.

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DESIGN CHALLENGE

Sometimes the “givens” for a show determine the design direction of a project.
When general Director Robert Swedberg approached me to design THE MAGIC
FLUTE for Orlando Opera, he said that he hoped the design would utilize two
imposing stair units that were in his company’s stock. He also said that he didn’t
have a huge budget for this new production. This is a Mozart opera that can be as
simple or elaborate as the resources a producer is willing to commit to it. Divided
into two acts, it has 3 scenes in Act 1 and 10 scenes in Act 2. Set in a fantasy land-
scape, it is a story of initiation and purification, replete with freemasonry associa-
tions, that ultimately leads to the uniting of Prince Tamino and Pamina and the
banishment of the forces of night.

Scale model of Act 1 opening — “a rocky landscape”. Photo by Carey Wong.

THE MAGIC FLUTE 37

Pamina (Ying Huang) asleep in
Monostatos’s garden surrounded by
his minions. Photo courtesy of the
Macao International Music Festival.

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PRODUCTION CONCEPT

Director Swedberg let me develop the concept for this production, and I have
found that it’s often the case that rather than directors giving me a specific context
for a design, they will ask me to develop some ideas to present for their response.
Such was the case for this project.

DESIGN SOLUTION/TRANSFORMATION

One of the first stage directions in the opera is that Prince Tamino enters in a
Japanese hunting costume. I have always taken this detail to mean that the world
of this opera can occur in an Asian milieu. Because of the project’s modest budget,
I felt a set that combined two-dimensional Japanese and Chinese visual elements
(brushstroke landscape painting, floral motifs, torii gates, kabuki drops, intricate
repeating geometric patterns and shapes) could suit the financial resources as well
as visually clarify the labyrinthine journey to enlightenment that Tamino and
Papageno undertake to be deemed worthy of Pamina and Papagena.
Panels of solid colored fabric represented characters — red and dark blue for
the Queen of the Night and saffron yellow for Sarastro. The two staircases that
Robert Swedberg wanted to include in the production were incorporated into the
design, being partially visible in certain scenes and fully visible in the final tableau
as they formed the pyramid for the Temple of the Sun. During the finale, in an
extended open scene change, the forces of the Queen of the Night were banished as
Sarastro assembled his priests in the temple to honor the union of the two couples.

POSTSCRIPT

This production ultimately became a co-production with the Macao and Beijing
Music Festivals, where Mr. Swedberg directed his production with the same Tamino
(Warren Mok) the year after his staging in Orlando. The Asian influences in the
design played well to those audiences.

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Scale model of Act 1 — Pamina held captive in Monostatos’s garden. Photo by Carey Wong

Scale model of Act 1 — the three gates. Photo by Carey Wong

Scale model of Act 2 — inside the pyramid. Photo by Carey Wong

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Scale model of Act 2 — the Queen of the Night visits Pamina in the garden. Photo by Carey Wong

Scale model of Act 2 — the trials of fire and water. Photo by Carey Wong

Scale model of Act 2 — the Temple of the Sun. Photo by Carey Wong

THE MAGIC FLUTE 41

A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC

music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, book by Hugh Wheeler

Opera Theatre at Wildwood

June 1996

Benton Hess, conductor
Albert Takazauckas, stage director
Carey Wong, scenic designer
Malabar Ltd., costume supplier
Michael Baumgarten, lighting designer

ABOVE: An Act 2 scene set amid birch trees from the Opera Theatre at Wildwood production. Photo by Duane Morris.

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Act 1 scale model for A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC. Photo by Duane Morris.

DESIGN CHALLENGE

Stephen Sondheim’s classic musical is set in Sweden around 1900 and is based
on the Ingmar Bergman film SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT. It is about the
romantic lives of a number of couples whose relationships are intertwined, the most
central of them being the bittersweet romance between middle-aged lawyer Fredrik
Egerman and the glamorous but aging actress Desiree Armfeldt. The show contains
7 scenes in the first act and 8 in the second. Act 1 is set in the city, while Act 2 is set at
the country estate of Mme. Armfeldt, Desiree’s mother. The challenge was to design
a set that moved seamlessly from scene to scene without impeding the forward
momentum of the musical.
The venue was a thrust stage with a shallow area upstage behind a proscenium.
The set and stage action needed to be visible to all audience members who sat on
three sides of the thrust.

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Final moment of “A Weekend in the Country” and the end of Act 1 from the Opera Theatre at Wildwood’s 1996 production.
Photo by Duane Morris.

PRODUCTION CONCEPT

Director Takazauckas wanted to place his production on a turntable so that the
rotation of the stage could reflect the movement of a show with musical numbers
all in 3/4 time, practically an endless waltz. He felt that the scenes in town could
be played against a central cluster of buildings with pieces of furniture suggesting
the show’s different locations rotating into and out of view. The second act could
be set amid a central stand of birch trees so that nature would always be present.
This seemed particularly appropriate for both the musical’s setting and because
Wildwood Park, where the theatre was located, featured over 100 acres of forested
land with natural vegetation as well as specimen gardens and a man-made lake.

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DESIGN SOLUTION/TRANSFORMATION

Buildings in Stockholm’s historic Old Town were the models for the cluster of
miniature structures surrounded by a low brick wall in Act 1. For daytime scenes,
the dimensional details of the facades were visible, while nighttime scenes featured
illuminated windows. During the intermission, the buildings were replaced by a group
of birch trees with single birches and garden benches placed around the perimeter
of the turntable. The formal dinner scene became al fresco in this staging.
This inaugural production in the Lucy Lockett Cabe Festival Theatre launched
the first Wildwood Festival season that also included a fully staged production of
THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO, other orchestral and vocal events, films, lectures,
and art exhibits. Wildwood Park served as the Opera Theatre’s venue until 2007.

Act 2 scale model of dinner al fresco. Photo by Duane Morris.

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HOTEL ON THE CORNER
OF BITTER AND SWEET

adapted by Annie Lareau from Jamie Ford’s novel

Book-It Repertory Theatre

September-October 2012 (World Premiere)

Annie Lareau, director
Carey Wong, set designer
Jocelyne Fowler, costume designer
Andrew D. Smith, lighting designer
Kevin Heard, sound designer

ABOVE: A jazz enthusiast, the young Henry Lee (Jose Abaoag, at right) chats with musician Sheldon (Marcel Davis) on a street
in Seattle’s Chinatown district in 1942. Note the wartime newspaper headlines painted on the floor. Photo by Alan Alabastro.

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