{"id":11342,"date":"2016-02-11T12:40:56","date_gmt":"2016-02-11T17:40:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/?p=11342"},"modified":"2016-02-11T12:41:48","modified_gmt":"2016-02-11T17:41:48","slug":"grand-illusions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/grand-illusions\/","title":{"rendered":"Grand Illusions"},"content":{"rendered":"

February\/March 2016 | view this story as a .pdf<\/a><\/p>\n

As the dream weaver at Portland Stage, Anita Stewart is an ever rising star.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

By Diane Hudson<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"FM16-Anita-Stewart\"When Portland Stage Executive and Artistic Director Anita Stewart looks back on her first visits here in the 1990s, it\u2019s not about beach lounging or lobsters.<\/span><\/p>\n

Somehow she \u201calways managed\u201d to get hired to work on shows rehearsing in December, in tech in January. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSo I was here for New Year\u2019s, and I went to the fireworks right downtown\u2013massive fireworks you felt like were right over you, blasting away. I sort of got the picture of how Portland burned down a couple of times. It felt pretty extreme\u2013fabulous, so full of life and color and so cold and everybody just dealt with it.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

And she remembers going to the Porthole: \u201cIt was a place where fishermen would come off the boats wearing these giant yellow waders and they would come in to eat, sloshing water all over the floor, and smelling of fish, fresh fish. It was local color, real color.\u201d For Anita, Portland was \u201creal people living a real life.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Finding Home<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

At the time, Stewart was a free-lance theater designer, doing shows in \u201cSeattle, Dallas, Chicago, Minneapolis, Atlanta, all over,\u201d and each gig required a stay of several weeks.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou really get a sense of what it\u2019s like to live in the city where you\u2019re working.\u201d Increasingly, Portland became \u201cone of the few places that, coming out of a New York base,\u201d she could see herself moving to. \u201cIt was inspiring to my work.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

The other draw was \u201cthe theater space itself. It\u2019s just this jewel box. There\u2019s not a bad seat in the house. It\u2019s one of the best theater spaces in the country, and I\u2019ve worked at a lot of them.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

While an undergraduate at Yale, Stewart studied architecture. But the thought of building something that would be standing 50 or 100 years from now made her stomach tie up in knots, \u201ctriple and quadruple knots.\u201d When she looked at things she\u2019d done in the past, very few of those ideas seemed to her to be the best they could be. It was always, \u201cWell, if I had done it this way, it would be even better.\u201d For her, theater solves this problem. \u201cIt gives you something here, in the moment, right now.\u201d It\u2019s \u201cthe best thing ever,\u201d and then it becomes \u201ca memory.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Another problem with architecture. When doing a mock-up for a design, she\u2019d invent people who lived in it and a back story that made her design something other than just abstract space. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis was really set design, but it just took me a while to figure it out. When she did, she plunged wholeheartedly into the Yale School of Drama, where she found her mentors, master teachers Ming Cho Lee (sets) and Jennifer Tipton (lighting).<\/span><\/p>\n

Teamwork<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

It was at Yale during grueling studies, often working from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. with few breaks, putting on a different play each week, that she discovered one of the strongest attractions for her in theater work is the element of collaboration. \u201cEach production involves getting together with a group of people to solve a problem (as opposed to being a competition, where one of us succeeds and the other doesn\u2019t). It is more about us creating something really amazing together.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>At Portland Stage, there\u2019s the additional challenge of working within restrictions posed by the venue itself. When she designed at other theaters (like the Guthrie in Minneapolis) and was budgeted with as much money as she wanted, she found it far harder to figure out how to proceed. \u201cAs an artist, it\u2019s much easier when I have to push against something, as opposed to when the sky\u2019s the limit.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And push she does, with \u201can amazing staff\u201d of 24, plus 10 or 11 interns, a no-frills stage, and very limited budget. \u201cWe can do it,\u201d Stewart says, \u201cbecause people believe in the art and they want to be doing it. That\u2019s what gets the job done.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Take technical director Ted Gallant, with whom Stewart has worked for the past 20 years. Stewart drafts the set and Gallant, a carpenter and mechanical engineer aided by an intern and technical assistant, puts everything together in less than three weeks on a materials budget of about $2,700. \u201cIt\u2019s fun to see him get a project and latch onto it,\u201d says Stewart.<\/span><\/p>\n

A particularly dazzling production was John Cariani\u2019s Love\/Sick<\/em>, a play involving 12 different locations. \u201cI didn\u2019t want to have the audience suffer through stage hands constantly lugging things on and off the set,\u201d she says. \u201cTed figured it out, making a turntable with three rooms. If we were at a bigger theater, we\u2019d have a whole hydraulic system, but we don\u2019t. There was this huge bicycle wheel with a chain that went the circumference of a 14-foot circle, and then it went over to the side. He used gears so that a person could stand and crank the whole thing around. When the turntable reached a specific position, a light would go on so you knew you were at one of the places to stop.\u201d All of this from the hardware store. \u201cVery basic stage mechanics,\u201d Stewart says. \u201cLever and pulley, really ingenious.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

From the Stage Up<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Every set is a uniquely designed thing. It\u2019s not \u201csomething that comes out of a book,\u201d and there is no place to go and say, \u201cOK, that\u2019s the set.\u201d It involves a collaborative team that comes together to build a bespoke production exactly for Portland Stage.<\/span><\/p>\n

Before anything can be done design-wise, Stewart has to come to a meeting of minds with the director. Some are inspiring and can \u201ctake what you have and make it more.\u201d Director Paul Mullins does this for Stewart. Working together on Center of Gravity<\/em> and Red,<\/em> they were able to create \u201ca world that felt right for the plays and the action that needed to happen, with a cleanness where things were able to move seamlessly.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Much of design is in the transitions. Some favorites include Intimate Apparel<\/em>, Dinner with Friends<\/em>, Hidden Tennessee<\/em>, Arcadia<\/em>, and Rough Crossing<\/em>. Each had \u201ca different and unique solution, but the full space felt unified within the design.\u201d Most of these involved \u201cvery interactive spaces with the light\u2013things would move through a dappled light that was very compelling.\u201d Stewart looks for things that \u201ccan morph and change from one place or one thing into another and feel natural rather than like a lot of work.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She engages talented lighting designers to add visual voltage, notably Greg Carville, Bryon Winn, and, occasionally, Christopher Akerlind, who shared the directorship of Portland Stage with her when she first came in the 1996-\u201997 season.<\/span><\/p>\n

What gives Stewart nightmares is when there are multiple locations and lots of specific activities with furniture or props that actors are required to use. Some shows that demand everything to be present in a scene, but then, just as whimsically, it has to disappear. \u201cPeople in cars are really hard, too,\u201d she says. \u201cThey are stationary, sitting\u2013so, not much action, but you have to figure out how to suggest the car\u2013a steering wheel, just a box, a little flat cut-out or a full hood of a vehicle. Each comes with its own challenges.\u201d<\/p>\n

The puzzle, as Stewart sees it, is to determine how to get multiple worlds playing at once, working with projections, light, and more sculptural space\u2013and then you get those moments when you are part of something truly magical and everybody feels it. \u201cIt\u2019s like no other feeling\u2013you know you\u2019ve experienced a great event. It\u2019s why people run marathons or go to hear great music. It just touches you in a real way.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Setting Roots<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Stewart has grown from \u201cneeding and wanting that\u201d into recognizing that she is \u201cconnecting, not just to a group of artists but to a community.\u201d An audience that compels her to live here. \u201cConnectivity is what Portland gave me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Stewart and her husband, the actor and director Ron Botting, live on O\u2019Brion Street, steps from the Eastern Promenade. They have a son and a daughter. Stewart\u2019s home studio is a pleasantly chaotic space with glowing original pine floors.<\/p>\n

Being a mother inspired her to take an active role in education programs. She spearheaded the popular \u201cPlay Me A Story,\u201d Portland Stage\u2019s school outreach program now active in all Portland schools, K-12. \u201cThe impact of how we approach putting a play together can have an enormous effect on kids. Trying to collaborate and find meaning in a text\u2013that is exactly what they need.\u201d Ditto for imagery that takes you to the heart of a story. \u201cMeaning comes from how you say words, not just what words you say.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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