In July, Distant Era photographed the poster images for Babes With Blades Theatre Company’s upcoming production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. For the poster, graphic designer Morgan Manasa planned to place the play’s characters around the letters and interacting with them, with an image of Puck looming in the background.
To execute the concept, we photographed the subjects against a gray background and used overlays of letters from the A Midsummer Night’s Dream typeface that Morgan had chosen so that while we were shooting, the actors could see the letters on the computer screen and choose how to interact with them. We photographed this concept over two nights, as the cast was a large one, and for scheduling and physical space we needed to divide the session.
An Unexpected Party
I hadn’t seen the cast list beforehand, so imagine my surprise when the first person to show up was Sarah Scanlon, our own Pandora from Distant Era’s current Gods and Heroes of the Aegean series, who I’d seen nearly every day on the computer for the past year while working on Pandora but hadn’t seen in real life since we photographed Gods and Heroes in June 2023.
Creative Diversions
These days, most of my work with Babes is on gray backgrounds for a graphic designer to composite. Therefore, I like to add a little creative photography to the shoot when there’s time. In this case, I photographed three characters on a bright yellow background. I’d only used this background once—way back in The People of Light and Shadow. In addition, I wanted to see how quickly I could edit a session where the parameters remained consistent.
On the second night of the session, we had the opportunity to make creative photography with Puck, using specific light. To this, we added plenty of shadow areas, a fan, and some haze. While these shots were candidates for the poster image, they also served as fun creative experiments. The same gray background remained. This time, however, we focused the light so specifically on Puck that the background fell away into darkness.
The A Midsummer Night’s Dream shoot was a joyous occasion of experimentation and play with old friends and new. I always enjoy a technical challenge, and the overlays presented just that very thing. I’m excited to see the show when it premieres in the late summer. I also look forward to seeing Morgan’s poster when it appears on the wall of the coffee shop from which I’m writing this post! In the meantime, best wishes to Babes With Blades on their production!
Cast and Production Team
A Midsummer Night’s Dream runs October 16–November 23, 2024, at the Edge Theater in Chicago. The show’s full details, as well as how to get tickets, is detailed on the company’s website, here, along with this list of the cast and the production team:
Cast
Whitney Ann Bates (they/them, Helena/Snout/Snug U/S), Christine Chang (they/she, Lysander/Flute U/S), Cat Evans (they/she/he, Hermia), Kim Fukawa* (she/her, Demetrius), Jessica Goforth (she/her, Starveling; U/S Demetrius), Jalyn Greene (they/she, Titania/Theseus), Morgan Manasa* (she/her, Quince), Jennifer Mohr* (she/her, Hermia/Quince U/S), Izis Mollinedo* (they/she, Lysander), Hazel Monson* (she/her, Puck/Egeus), Lauren Paige* (she/her, Snout; U/S Oberon), Logan UhiwaiO’Alohamailani Rasmussen (she/her, Snug; U/S Bottom), Hayley Rice* (she/her, Oberon/Hippolyta), Patty Roach (they/them, Helena), Cee Scallen (they/them, Flute; U/S Puck), Sarah Scanlon (she/her, Bottom).
Production Team
The production team includes BWBTC Ensemble Members Line Bower* (they/them, technical director), Carrie Hardin* (she/her, text coach), Madison Hill* (they/them, assistant fight choreographer), Kelsey Kovacevich* (she/her, assistant director) and Jillian Leff* (she/her, fight choreographer) as well as Esau Andaleon (he/him, stage manager), Sydney Cox (she/her, intimacy choreographer), Hannah Foerschler (she/her, sound designer), Mikayla De Guzman (she/her, assistant stage manager), Rose Hamill (she/her, production manager), Vicki Jablonski (she/her, costume designer), Marcus Klein (he/him, scenic designer), Persephone Lawrence (they/her, props designer), Jen Pan (she/they, fight workshop instructor), Payton Shearn (she/they, production assistant), and Laura J. Wiley (she/her, lighting designer).
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