The Crucible

Miller’s work is timeless and so too was this production. Staged on a sparse wooden deck around which the entire cast sat to bear witness to the action of the play as it unfolded, the storytelling moved quickly and ferociously and modern touches in the costuming and staging allowed the relevance of the piece to today’s world to show through. The lighting was tasked with the emotional storytelling of the arc of the drama so while the base look for each act was grounded in the realities of setting and time of day, the more subtle choices that rounded out the design were about the state of the characters’ minds and consciences over the course of the evening. From the glaring bright light of the Act III courtroom which exposed the manipulations of accusers to the stark chilled diagonal backlight spilling through the cell window in Act V the choices were simple but effective.

Plus, with a clever framing structure that had the cast assembling itself out of the audience and house staff at the start of the piece and evaporating back into it just as suddenly at the end, audience members couldn’t help but be left with the feeling that they could be next.