Copyright/Reproducing Sets

[willmanc]

I know, I know... We should each be individuals and design our own visions of the show we are producing. Please bare with me!
1) What are the copyright laws with re-creating (stealing) a broadway set design?
2) Was anything settled with the URINETOWN/Akron-Chicago shows?
3) Is there anything to learn from recreating a broadway set on a high school budget?

[Footer]

There is a difference between steeling the set and reproducing what the script calls for. Lets take anything goes for instance... you are going to have two stair cases and a smokestack. Its going to be red, white, blue, gold. Thats what the audience expects. Same thing for chorus line. For les miz you are going to build a barricade that will in some way revolve. The old book musicals pretty much come with a set, the newer ones may or may not. Now their should be a line between ripping off the set of a broadway show and using that set to help figure out how you will do things and how that set relates to the script.

[jmabray]

I am in no way a lawyer nor do I even play one on TV. But I think there is a difference between using someone else's idea and using someone else's idea for profit. In the case of the Urinetown production, I think that was the main legal grounds. They stole their idea without any credit given and it was a for profit opportunity.

If you give them credit in the program(i.e. Design inspired by SoandSo) you should have even better legal standing, but again, I know about as much law as you do.....

[icewolf08]

There is a reason that people like Dramatists Play Services stopped printing groundplans in the back of their scripts. Technically, if you were to copy the original groundplan for a show it could be considered copyright infringement. As Footer said, if you are just using the idea, it is probably ok, but to sit with say a photograph or groundplan of a Broadway show and try to recreate the set could get you into trouble.

I am not sure there is as much to learn from copying a show as there is to coming up with your own design, except how to cut corners to fit in your budget. If you copy a show all you need to figure out is how to build it, whereas if you design it yourself you learn how to do research, come up with creative ideas, and create a design. That, I think, is a much more educational experience.

Oh, and by the way, why not stop by the new member board and tell us a little about yourself.

[derekleffew]

Originally Posted by willmanc

I know, I know... We should each be individuals and design our own visions of the show we are producing. Please bare with me!
1) What are the copyright laws with re-creating (stealing) a broadway set design?
2) Was anything settled with the URINETOWN/Akron-Chicago shows?
3) Is there anything to learn from recreating a broadway set on a high school budget?

willmanc, please start a new thread in the "New Members Area" introducing yourself. We like to know to whom we are talking. Tell us who you are, where you are, what you're doing and what you'd like to do.

To answer your questions, to which I suspect you already know the answers and are just looking for validation:

1) Whether or not the designs are copyrighted, intellectual property laws apply, and in the US at least, anything is actionable. Almost every drawing issued by professional designers includes the boilerplate <let me find one so I can quote it exactly>
All concepts, ideas, and design elements shown on this drawing and any other documentation are the exclusive intellectual property of the Designer and may only be used for this project. Any other use is prohibited, unless the Designer has granted express written permission. Review of this document implies acceptance of the above terms and conditions.

2) What the OP is alluding to: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/15/theater/15urin.html. I suspect that since both productions closed, and there is/was no money to be had, the lawyers advised their clients to drop the pending litigation.

3) While it's highly unlikely that a high school is going to fly Norma Desmond's mansion for Sunset Boulevard, I can't see doing Miss Saigon without a helicopter (or at least a rotating gobo) onstage. In high school and college, we often used the groundplans from the back of the Samuel French edition of the play when we were doing non-executed light plots for teaching purposes. One thing we were cautioned on, though, is that these plans are/were often drawn up by the original stage manager or prop person, and are generally not to any particular scale. If Neil Simon in his notes calls for a "door to the bedroom SL" and a "door to the hallway SR" and "a large picture window UC with a view of the New York skyline beyond," the scenic design is going to resemble the original Broadway production. So to answer your question, there is MUCH to learn from an original Broadway production, but often (always?) a high school is not going to have the resources to duplicate a design exactly, so that challenge and excitement comes from suggesting, or re-interpreting, an original design, i.e. the rotating gobo to suggest the helicopter, instead of the real thing onstage. While I can't imagine Cats taking place anywhere but in a junkyard, staging A Midsummer Night's Dream in a circus owes to Perter Brooks, but he does not deserve a royalty, in my opinion.

Likewise, I feel there's a difference between seeing a Broadway show and "copying" some of the ideas, and re-building the show from the original drawings. This is part of the reason the original drawings are so difficult to obtain. Just my 2¢. Hope this helps answer your question.

Edit: Sorry to duplicate some of the above answers. I must type slower than some people.

[willmanc]

I have no theatre background and was "thrown" into the situation as being the technical director and set designer for the high school I teach at. I have several students that are very interested in theatre and would like to continue their education in technical theatre.
I've taught myself a lot through reading, and going to see local performances and professional shows. I just dont feel that I can keep the level of performance where they are expected to be by designing myself... and I am not comfortable in teaching my students elements of design. I would hate to teach them the wrong thing and find out in college that I was wrong.
I would rather teach the engineering concepts used to produce the sets. Two years ago, we "reproduced" Beauty as close as we could. Students were able to work with "Flying by Foy," we researched and use pyro, made our west wing rotate (with home-made tracking), and had a great transformation scene (very similar to broadway).
This year, we are doing Les Mis and I am planning on making the turntable (32' Dia) and would like to do the Barricade broadway style, where it comes in vertically and rotates down. We have to use rudementary electronics to accomplish this, learn about gearing, motors, and simple machines.
Thanks for all of the input, and feel free to comment back.
Where is the new members section?

[icewolf08]

willmanc, fell free to PM or email me As I would be happy to talk to you about Mis. The theatre I work for closed last season with it, we were the first regional theatre in the US to produce the show. I would be happy to help you out with some ideas (to the point that I am allowed by the designers), and I (and many on these forums are happy to be sounding boards for ideas.

[gafftaper]

The new member forum is the 5th one from the top on the main list of forums.

There are a lot of people here with great ideas. However, the general consensus is that it should be YOUR design, not ours. So I suggest you start presenting some of your ideas and then we'll toss them around a little bit and see if we can help you develop them further.

Finally, if you are smart you will start a PM discussion with IceWolf immediately. Alex is a nice guy, knows his stuff, and just did the show.

[derekleffew]

Originally Posted by willmanc

I...
I've taught myself a lot through reading, and going to see local performances and professional shows. I just don't feel that I can keep the level of performance where they are expected to be by designing myself... and I am not comfortable in teaching my students elements of design. I would hate to teach them the wrong thing and find out in college that I was wrong...
Where is the new members section?

I think you're selling yourself short. You've seen lots of shows, and read much about design/production. The fact that you've never taken a "college theatre design course" should not stop you from teaching what you've read and experienced. (For a list of books to consider, go here.) The New Member Board is here. You may actually be doing your students a disservice by concentrating on the technical rather than the artistic. Young, eager minds need to be encouraged to explore both. Perhaps you can recruit your school's art teacher to discuss such design elements as line, shape, form, color and motif. You can't really "teach them the wrong thing" as there are really no "right" answers. If you haven't already, I recommend reading and suggesting to your students the book Scene Design and Stage Lighting
by W. Oren Parker, purchase here.

Feel free to use ControlBooth as a resource. As you've seen we love to offer advice, and often the "debates" turn out to be more interesting and informative than the original question. Advise your students to join also. We promise not to tell them you don't know everything! I feel as a high school teacher who cares about the quality of education of his students you are to be revered, and we will offer any and all assistance we possibly can. By the way, what is your primary subject matter? Industrial Arts? Science? English?

[Charc]

Originally Posted by willmanc

I have no theatre background and was "thrown" into the situation as being the technical director and set designer for the high school I teach at. I have several students that are very interested in theatre and would like to continue their education in technical theatre.
I've taught myself a lot through reading, and going to see local performances and professional shows. I just dont feel that I can keep the level of performance where they are expected to be by designing myself... and I am not comfortable in teaching my students elements of design. I would hate to teach them the wrong thing and find out in college that I was wrong.
I would rather teach the engineering concepts used to produce the sets. Two years ago, we "reproduced" Beauty as close as we could. Students were able to work with "Flying by Foy," we researched and use pyro, made our west wing rotate (with home-made tracking), and had a great transformation scene (very similar to broadway).
This year, we are doing Les Mis and I am planning on making the turntable (32' Dia) and would like to do the Barricade broadway style, where it comes in vertically and rotates down. We have to use rudementary electronics to accomplish this, learn about gearing, motors, and simple machines.
Thanks for all of the input, and feel free to comment back.
Where is the new members section?

How did the pyro go? What type of effects did you use? Did you have to, and was it a pain to, deactivate any necessary fire alarm systems, clear it with the fire marshall, and have a member of the FD on fire watch?