How Do Movable Stages Work?

[MikuHagane]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 3:25pm

So I have done technical theatre for over 8 years in High School and College, including other theatres around Indianapolis. However, none of the theatres have a feature Broadway stages have: the ability for the stages to move up and down. This has shown in The Lion King and Paramour. This also includes part of the set under the stage floor that rose.

So in these theatres, I was wondering what type of machinery raised these stage floors and normally how much space is available under the stage.

[Buscee]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 4:34pm

There are numerous ways stages move. Most shows have a deck that is built over the existing stage that contain numerous tracks and pulley systems which allows sets to track on and off the stage. If you are talking about Stages rising this is done with platforms/decks built on hydrolic lifts, much like elevators. Sometimes a stage can be built and lowered in the orchestra pit.  Someday you should take a backstage tour of Radio City Music Hall. They have a massive set up.

[Someone in a Tree2]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 6:31pm

Most broadway houses have 9' to 10' of height in the crossover space below the stage. If you look down into the orchestra pit you'll see a depth of 7' to 8' from the stage and usually there are steps from there leading down another couple of feet to the crossover space. If the show has lots of wagons winched on and off stage, often those winches are anchored below in the crossover space too.

[Mike Costa]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 6:49pm

Here is a sixty second video about the stage elevators at Radio City.  If it does not appear of you it can be found thru Google.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDhXFM_9rxI

[sabrelady]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 7:14pm

I remember in the tour they explained that they used the design for the military to raise the decks on ships to launch planes. For a while there, Radio City Musical Hall was declared a military secret to make sure the technology did not fall into the wrong hands

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 8:57pm

^^^ I'm not doubting the post above at all.

But there were a lot of rules in WWII that
had more to do with making civilians
"feel" like they were involved in the war
effort. Like the blackout drills my
parents and grandparents enjoyed in
Wichita. (No Japanese or German plane
carried enough fuel to get to Wichita
and back.)

The Japanese already had ship
elevators in their aircraft carriers. The
Battle of Midway was won by the
Americans in part because the
Japanese admiral kept changing
his mind as to whether his planes
should carry torpedoes or bombs.
Each change involved putting the
planes on elevators where they
were lowered to the deck that did
the rearming. So I don't know
what they were hiding at RCMH.

[bowtie7]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 9:17pm

I believe for Billy Elliot they had to excavate the basement of the Imperial Theatre for this stage lift.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21UqRW7NkV4

European mega musicals also love stage lifts especially for staircases:

Tanz der Vampire 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmWpRt9PrFM

Rebecca--the staircase (its big, its on fire, spinning and descending into the basement)(at 1:45)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lRlipxkZR0

 

[morosco]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 9:35pm

Here is a good video showing how the scenery moves in ALADDIN.

'Aladdin' the Musical: The magic of movement

[sabrelady]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 9:43pm

Quoting from the Time out article:

. The 80-year-old hydraulic elevators beneath the Great Stage are perfect just the way they are.
The theater has received a number of technological upgrades—3-D projection, a gigantic LCD screen and, back in 1980, a full renovation. But during that overhaul of the theater, engineers could find no reason to change the original hydraulic lifts beneath the stage, which were so advanced when they were first built that the US Navy imitated them in its aircraft carriers during World War II and had personnel guard the facilities at Radio City to prevent the enemy from learning their secrets.

Clicking on the link in the article takes u to a New York Times confirmation.

 

As you were.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 10:11pm

I said I didn't doubt the claim was
made on the tour and might even
be true in terms of the posting of
a guard. What I questioned was
the need to protect elevator tech-
nology from the Japanese, who
had their own elevators on their
own carriers. Such as the one at
at the link below, which was
converted from a battleship be-
ginning in 1942.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_Shinano

 

 

Updated On: 12/28/17 at 10:11 PM

[David10086]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 10:20pm

I remember when SUNSET BOULEVARD opened in London and in the states there was much written about their ascending /descending stages - as though it was something rather new. What was ait about SB that it got so much attention in the mid 90s? 

[sabrelady]

Posted: 12/28/17 at 11:01pm

Too many secret service men and they had to featherbed?

[RippedMan]

Posted: 12/29/17 at 2:41pm

In regards to Sunset, I think it’s because the mansion set - which was massive - lifted to reveal the sets underneath, which was quite impressive as it was essentially the entire stage. And to this day, I don’t think we have seen a show as massive.

[sorano916]

Posted: 12/29/17 at 6:42pm

Side discussion: how do water tanks work on stage? Such as for Tiffany's Glass Menagerie that was at the Booth? Or even Harry Potter and the Cursed Child where the actors actually are immersed in it?

[RippedMan]

Posted: 12/29/17 at 7:12pm

Tiffany’s Menagerie was actually some kind of black goop, not water. And in Harry Potter - I can’t remember - do we actually see them submerged? I think it’s just a pool of water under the stage that I’m sure is cleaned and filled everyday.

I’m more curious about Let The Right One In that had the actor submerged in a giant pool in front of us. I’m sure it’s like a pool where they put cleaners etc in it.

[Call_me_jorge]

Posted: 12/29/17 at 8:20pm

GavestonPS said: "I said I didn't doubt the claim was
made on the tour and might even
be true in terms of the posting of
a guard. What I questioned was
the need to protect elevator tech-
nology from the Japanese, who
had their own elevators on their
own carriers. Such as the one at
at the link below, which was
converted from a battleship be-
ginning in 1942.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_Shinano



"

Where in their initial post did they mention the Japanese???

[Call_me_jorge]

Posted: 12/29/17 at 8:26pm

After a show leaves a theatre and the show cut up the theatres deck for lifts, do they replace the deck?

[Tag]

Posted: 12/29/17 at 11:01pm

^Usually the theatre's actual deck is removable, and/or removable in sections.  So the trapped areas of the stage already exit.  There is a steel understructure that holds up the actual deck.  The show deck is placed on top of the actual deck and/or the actual deck is removed in sections, with the show deck replacing those sections.

[DRSisLove]

Posted: 12/29/17 at 11:38pm

Call_me_jorge said: "After a show leaves a theatre and the show cut up the theatres deck for lifts, do they replace the deck?"

I think it depends on the show. If I remember correctly, the producers of Billy Elliot put something like $1 million in a locked account for use when the show closed in order to renovate the Imperial back to how it was previously.

[Lot666]

Posted: 1/2/18 at 1:02pm

bowtie7 said: "Rebecca--the staircase (its big, its on fire, spinning and descending into the basement)(at 1:45)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lRlipxkZR0"

Aww man, now you've got me pining for this on Broadway again. 

 

[bowtie7]

Posted: 1/2/18 at 6:59pm

The troubled broadway production was never going to exactly duplicate the original production. The staircase and the fire were going to be (they are both central to the plot) but I'm pretty sure they weren't going to excavate under the Broadhurst, so no sinking into the basement. I sort of remember a proposed London production was cancelled after they started to dig down in the basement of the the theatre to accommodate the staircase and hit water. That staircase has a mind of its own and is not to be messed with

[Tag]

Posted: 1/2/18 at 7:38pm

Yes it was a 3 million dollar effect that was axed for Broadway (before the whole show was!).  You can read about it and the Shaftesbury excavation here.

Updated On: 1/2/18 at 07:38 PM

[David10086]

Posted: 1/2/18 at 7:53pm

RippedMan said: "In regards to Sunset, I think it’s because the mansion set - which was massive - lifted to reveal the sets underneath, which was quite impressive as it was essentially the entire stage. And to this day, I don’t think we have seen a show as massive."

Thank You for the response. I remember when I saw the show on B'way in 1996, and the mansion was rising everyone in the audience seemed to gasp. That really was a massive stage and in retrospect, it did take away from the musical itself. 

[denali.fire]

Posted: 1/3/18 at 11:47am

Mice on little treadmills.
For larger sets the local rats are used.