[waynehoskins]

Yep...

The first thing we learned about color in high school was how additive and subtractive color mixing worked. What we didn't learn, though, is that the additive method doesn't work as nicely in practice as it does in theory, because the color of an incandescent lamp changes as you dim it, it drifts to amber.

So yeah, ditch the RGB idea. Personally I'd go with neutral arealight (I lean to lavenders; 52's my go-to front color), and add warm and cool (amber and blue, like 16 and 64) colorwashes from each side, box-boomish.

A couple of colors of sidelight, and maybe even a couple of toplight, and probably a neutral back, and you're in business.

I'd do sides probably pipe-end, maybe tailed-down.

Three or five areas across, depending on the size of your stage and your fixtures and positions. Two or three deep, making 6, 9, 10, or 15 areas of frontlight. You might also be able to get away with twofering some areas as you go upstage, because often one won't be used without another.

Sidelight doesn't usually need to be broken up into as fine areas; full-stage-width zones are usually sufficient and can free up some circuits. Same for topwash, that usually runs in the same sorts of zones. Sometimes it's nice to isolate backs to an area.

If you have spares, you can throw some breakups in there too.

I've found it useful to have specials midstage left and right often, at least with the director I've worked with most. Allocate at least a couple of circuits per electric for specials. If you can have a GMOT circuit on each electric, that's really nice too (GMOT = Get Me Out of Trouble).

That's what I'd do; your mileage may vary.