The Moving Light Company, supplier of automated lighting equipment to the British theatre industry, recently serviced productions at three of Britain's leading regional theatres: the Royal Exchange in Manchester, the Crucible in Sheffield and the Theatre Royal in Plymouth. In each case, the lighting designers were seeking to combine equipment from a variety of manufacturers--a speciality of The Moving Light Company, which has rental stock that includes products from Vari-Lite, Martin, High End, City Theatrical, DHA Lighting, Amptown and others.
For the Royal Exchange Theatre, The Moving Light Company together with White Light North supplied lighting designer Robert Bryan with four Vari-Lite VL1000s and four City Theatrical Autoyokes for a production of Othello. Both were specified for their tungsten light sources and low running noise--a particularly important consideration with the in-the-round arrangement of the Exchange. As with many other lighting designers, including Hugh Vanstone for his recent work at the RSC, on Breath Boom at the Haymarket and on Bombay Dreams at the Apollo Victoria, Bryan was also attracted by the VL1000's colour mixing, wide zoom range and framing shutters. Control in Manchester was from the theatre's in-house Strand 500-series consoles. The VL1000s proved so successful that the Exchange will continue to use them in their next main house production, Port, a new play by Simon Stephens, and for the Christmas show, Secret Heart.
At the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, Hartley TA Kemp specified an even more diverse collection of products: High End Studio Colors, Strand Pirouettes and DHA Digital Light Curtains and Digital Beamlight 2s, to light The Tempest. The Moving Light Company is the only company in the world to stock the Digital Beamlight, having used it on a wide range of productions since their its appearance on the West End musical Martin Guerre in 1996. This show was followed by Teeth 'n' Smiles, for which lighting designer Howard Harrison opted to keep the StudioColors and Pirouettes.
The Theatre Royal Plymouth's show required fewer lights but more customization by The Moving Light Company, converting Martin Robocolor PRO400s into fibre optic lightsources for the theatre's touring production of The Tempest. This show was lit by Paul Keogen, who has also lit the White Light-supplied production of Eden at the Arts Theatre in London.
As well as these shows, The Moving Light Company continues to be involved in a wide range of productions encompassing everything from one-day video shoots and firework parties to the largest-scale touring and West End productions including Miss Saigon, Romeo and Juliet: The Musical, Our House and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. More information about the company, its diverse stock and its WYSIWYG bureaux service can be found at The Moving Light Company website, www.moving-light.co.uk.