TELEPHONE - un autre monde
Stage set & lighting design ~ tour lighting operation by Alan Wild
TELEPHONE At the end of 1983, French rock band TELEPHONE started planning what was to be their farewell tour of France. After 12 years, being the French equivalent of The Who, they were about to embark on their largest and most adventurous production. Their album Un Autre Monde was sitting on top of the charts and a 2 month tour was sold out months in advance.
TELEPHONE turned to the shores of Britian for the design,construction and co-ordination of their show. The lavish budget allowed for an extravagant production.
Airbrushed illustration of Un Autre Monde stage set using elements from the album cover.
The TELEPHONE set design included two 24ft high, 8ft square scaffold towers that supported 15 light boxes. "They were very similar to the Gary Numan lighting panels except they had album related artwork pasted onto the illuminated Perspex. With white Perspex and coloured gel the panels would stand out perfectly against the various stage washes".
A 10ft diameter fibre glass 'World', lit from inside, hung behind the drum riser accompanied by white fibre glass clouds which were also lit from inside. These set pieces hung in front of a 3 circuit starcloth.
The panels and mainframe of the set were hidden by huge painted cloths of sand dunes which dropped to the floor halfway through the show for 'Electric Citie' to reveal the chasing lighting panels.
The tour lighting, supplied by Britannia Row consisted of Par64 lanterns supported off the GKN Quickform scaffolding (Yellow Shit). A front truss of Pars to light the stage and set. Two onstage and four out front follow spots to light the band.
Around 400 MR16 low voltage lamps were used to great effect during black scenes for drum fills and chase sequences.
The stage scaffolding was supplied by Upfront Rigging from Greenwich and construction of the panels by Britannia Row. The fibre glass globe and clouds were supplied by Kimpton Walker in South London.
Cendrillon (Cinderella)
