Shows that require adjustments made to touring venues.

I recall that San Francisco's Orpheum underwent a major remodel in 1998 including a much-needed extension of the stage - as was commonly needed for old houses. It needed to be done, but also allowed more tours to play there. I remember it being done (supposedly) for "Miss Saigon" which reopened it, but I just checked Wikipedia and it said Show Boat (which was a notoriously large production).

When Phantom did a sit-down at the Curran here, they blasted through the concrete to the basement of the building next door to add extra space to store all the costumes needed for the production.

Updated On: 8/24/18 at 11:12 PM

SomethingPeculiar said: "BwayLB said: "I’m hoping the parasole issue in Hello Dolly is solved for Costa Mesa."

I think they mean Passerelle.(the stage extension that goes around the orchestra pit so the dancers can jump over during Waiters Gallop and the title song.)"

Thank you that is exactly what I mean. I just misspelled it

Mary Poppins actually did not require as much alteration as you would think. The rigging points in the house were based on a combination of the points for the Phantom Chandelier, and Cathy Rigby's Peter Pan audience flight.

RippedMan said: "Have any shows used trap doors on your? Did sunset still have the mansion raised for the set below? Or how’d they work that on tour?"

Most shows try to cut out trap doors as much as possible on tour.

With the original Phantom, the deck had the little candles that would pop up but the big candelabra would track on from the sides and raoul would jump onto an airbag rather than into a hole.

Lion King also had to modify also with things like that large trap downstage for the grasslands being cut.



for the original sunset tour, the mansion was loaded onto a platform that had 2 huge scissor lifts that would raise it up and down, and the platform wound also move up and downstage (think of 2 very big car jacks)

Going a bit further back, the original Starlight Express US tour built a sort of loop around ramp from the stage into the center seating area of the house in each theatre it played. That was likely a bit more complicated than building a passerelle out over the orchestra pit. The difference is that Starlight Express relied on that spectacle and Hello, Dolly! does not, but it's still a signature moment of the staging in this production and the original production. I have no doubt they will indeed install some version of a passerelle at each theatre.

I worked at a theater that had Broadway tours and we had a season that was to include Starlight Express but the tour was cancelled. We were a bit relieved that it was cancelled because, much like the rendering that another poster posted above, the racing track was to extend into the house downstage center. The huge problem with the extension was that we would have had to relocate over 100 season subscribers who normally had season tickets in those prime front and center seats that were going to be killed. Those subscribers were not happy that they would have had to give up those great seats to be relocated in less than prime locations.

We also had DOLLY with Channing in the early eighties that toured with a passerelle that was built over the orchestra pit. We only had to kill a few seats for that as I recall. Most road houses have larger orchestra pit space compared to Broadway houses.

In regard to the Orpheum Theater in San Francisco, their 1998 renovation was a massive project. In order to make it more hospitable for Broadway tours they needed to make the stage deeper, but because the theater's upstage property line came right up to the UN Plaza property line outside they were unable to "simply" move the back wall of the stage house. Instead they had to move the entire proscenium 9 feet forward into the house (eliminating a number of rows of seating). Because of new sight lines created by the stage being deeper into the house, the first couple of rows of the balcony were also eliminated.

Justin D said: "for the original sunset tour, the mansion was loaded onto a platform that had 2 huge scissor lifts that would raise it up and down, and the platform wound also move up and downstage (think of 2 very big car jacks)"

How did this work with Artie's apartment at the end of the first act? If the mansion was elevated by scissor lifts placed underneath it, how did the apartment come in when the mansion went up?

Lot666 said: "Justin D said: "for the original sunset tour, the mansion was loaded onto a platform that had 2 huge scissor lifts that would raise it up and down, and the platform wound also move up and downstage (think of 2 very big car jacks)"

How did this work with Artie's apartment at the end of the first act? If the mansion was elevated by scissor lifts placed underneath it, how did the apartment come in whenthe mansion went up?"

the lifts were in the wing space so there is free space under the mansion once it goes up for artie's apartment to slide under. They also had a bit more elaborate steps for the gun shot scene (not just the plain steps but it had a pair of ornate planters either side of the stairs