"Hellish" Special Effects for **** Yankees

[jmc1371]

I'm directing a high school production of **** Yankees on a small gymatorium stage with a limited budget. The kids put a lot of hard work into these shows and I want to provide them with some awesome special effects to complement their performances, but I recognize we have limitations. One major thing to keep in mind is we cannot use pyrotechnics.

Here are a few of the things I'm looking for:

1) Some sort of visual effect when the Devil turns Old Joe into Young Joe. The parts are played by two different actors and they are off stage, so the effect can come from the wings.

2) The Devil creates fire in his hand and lights a cigarette. We can't use pyro or cigarettes. Do we have any other options?

3) When the clock strikes midnight and Joe is thrown into Limbo, I would love there to be some sort of lighting/fog effect. Lightning and thunder, perhaps? If so, I don't know what sort of machine I'm looking for and what would work best on a budget.

4) We also spend time in the Devil's bedroom in Hell. Any visual effects that could help with this?

I'm looking for suggestions that are cheap and easy. Most of the technical work is done by the students, which is a fantastic experience for them, but it also means we have to keep things simple.

Thank you in advance for any ideas you share. I really appreciate it!

[kiwitechgirl]

- The "transformation" should be not too hard - rig up some lights in the wings, whatever colours you like, and chase them (even if it's just the lighting operator hitting flash buttons). If you can use a smoke machine (check to see if it's going to set off smoke detectors!), then a puff of smoke would help the effect.
- Not sure on the "fire in his hand" effect...
- Thunder and lightning is not difficult. Even if you don't have the budget to rent a strobe, flashing white lights rapidly has a similar effect and you should be able to find a thunder sound effect without difficulty!
- The Devil's bedroom would seem to me to be asking for lots of red light...random puffs of smoke could work as well. If you have any budget, get some "disco" smoke machines, they're cheap as chips, and hide them around the set so you can get random smoke puffs from different places.

[esmphoto]

- The "transformation" should be not too hard - rig up some lights in the wings, whatever colours you like, and chase them (even if it's just the lighting operator hitting flash buttons). If you can use a smoke machine (check to see if it's going to set off smoke detectors!), then a puff of smoke would help the effect.
- Not sure on the "fire in his hand" effect...
- Thunder and lightning is not difficult. Even if you don't have the budget to rent a strobe, flashing white lights rapidly has a similar effect and you should be able to find a thunder sound effect without difficulty!
- The Devil's bedroom would seem to me to be asking for lots of red light...random puffs of smoke could work as well. If you have any budget, get some "disco" smoke machines, they're cheap as chips, and hide them around the set so you can get random smoke puffs from different places.

She hit all of my points, except that
A) rosco has some awesome lightning, clouds, and "rain" gobos that, if used properly, can be very effective
and
B) you can smoke "cigarettes" made of dried cabbage or lettuce for the same visual appearance of a real cigarette, but without handing a student tobacco to smoke in front of the whole school. (or you could find a way to cram some button cells and a red led into some rolling paper, not very convincing on the drags and puffs though)

Not sure how youd'd light it without a pyro though, perhaps a very, very well places and focused beam of red/orange light from above?
i.e., focus the tightest instrument you have on a spot on the ground, use an iris aswell if available, spike that spot on the ground and make sure something is standing in front of it so that the audience can't see the spike or the flash of orange hit the ground, have your devil hold his hand and the edge of the cig over the spike and bump the spot when he snaps his fingers? this way there would be an orange FLASH! illuminating his hand as he snapped, as if he was lighting the cigarette with a snap of his fingers.

[chausman]

i.e., focus the tightest instrument you have on a spot on the ground, use an iris aswell if available, spike that spot on the ground and make sure something is standing in front of it so that the audience can't see the spike or the flash of orange hit the ground, have your devil hold his hand and the edge of the cig over the spike and bump the spot when he snaps his fingers? this way there would be an orange FLASH! illuminating his hand as he snapped, as if he was lighting the cigarette with a snap of his fingers.

If there are robotic moving lights that can't hit the same spot twice in a row, what makes you think an actor could? My guess you be to try something similar, but use a follow spot or source four with a gloved stage hand to adjust to the actor.

[josh88]

not sure if this is how you'd like to have it "lit' but I've seen one of those tiny flicker candle lights used. you can hide it in your palm and if it's bright enough/dark enough on stage, you can cover the end of the cigarette, have the light on and you get the flicker of fire on face/hand.

[MPowers]

Just a question, in your case, does flash paper fall under the "NO PYRO" edict?

[MPowers]

I'm directing a high school production of **** Yankees ....

This brings back many fond memories. Back in 1963, when I still thought I was destined to be a performer, I did Applegate in D. Y. and Nicky in Bell, Book & Candle in the same summer stock. It was a *devilish* summer for me! It was also probably the reason I never started smoking at a time when it was almost dirigger for a theatre person. In both shows I did a number of "magic" lit cigarettes. My friends that did smoke said the pyro devices that ignited them, made them taste so bad, it was no wonder I never started smoking after that summer!

[MarshallPope]

For the cigarette effect, would a water vapor cigarette work? They are a bit on the expensive side, but they look great on stage.

[jmc1371]

Just a question, in your case, does flash paper fall under the "NO PYRO" edict?

I'm not entirely sure. My experience with flash paper is nonexistant, so I'm not aware of how you ignite it or the risk involved with using it.

[jmc1371]

- The "transformation" should be not too hard - rig up some lights in the wings, whatever colours you like, and chase them (even if it's just the lighting operator hitting flash buttons). If you can use a smoke machine (check to see if it's going to set off smoke detectors!), then a puff of smoke would help the effect.
- Not sure on the "fire in his hand" effect...
- Thunder and lightning is not difficult. Even if you don't have the budget to rent a strobe, flashing white lights rapidly has a similar effect and you should be able to find a thunder sound effect without difficulty!
- The Devil's bedroom would seem to me to be asking for lots of red light...random puffs of smoke could work as well. If you have any budget, get some "disco" smoke machines, they're cheap as chips, and hide them around the set so you can get random smoke puffs from different places.

The transformation lighting effect sounds easy enough. And I will start looking into cheap smoke machines. I really love that suggestion, and it seems like something my students would enjoy putting together.

[jmc1371]

For the cigarette effect, would a water vapor cigarette work? They are a bit on the expensive side, but they look great on stage.

I actually used those when I directed "Company" and the effect was fantastic. I ended up buying the disposable kind, so the price wasn't too bad.

[MPowers]

I'm not entirely sure. My experience with flash paper is nonexistant, so I'm not aware of how you ignite it or the risk involved with using it.

flash paper is a nitro cellulose product. It ignites at an extremely low temperature and can be ignited with hand held glo-plug devices, electric matches, squibs and a multitude of shop built devices.
Product Listing - handheld_devices

Flash paper and it's friends, flash cotton, flash string etc, burn at very low temperatures. Although not advised, you can light a piece in your hand and hold it while it burns, although it is very uncomfortable as it burns next to your skin. Although the flame temperature is low, nitro cellulose produces a far greater volume of expanding gas per volume of propellent, than black powder. In the form of Gun Cotton it was used for a brief time in fire arms but was so unstable it was discontinued. However, the chemical compound was later altered and adjusted to become the basis for today's smokeless gun powder.

Flash paper burns very rapidly and as I mentioned, at a low temperature, so it is relatively safe for many stage effects when the gag is designed, constructed and implemented by a person who qualifies as an OSHA/ANSI/NFPA defined "Competent Person". It can be safely used by a non-competent person under the supervision of a trained competent person. Flash paper effects are in fact used world wide by many untrained personnel.

The major danger involved with flash paper is that it IS a flame and it can ignite other easily ignited products. For example, I witnessed an incident in a dress rehearsal for the opera "The Magic Flute" where a particular scenic unit was covered with jute erosion cloth. One scene involves three actresses casting a "magic spell" by shooting, in unison, three hand held flash gun FX. One performer had not been available for the training session and the gag seemed so simple that she was told "just do what the other girls do". The quite predictable result of those omissions was the performer in question shot the ball of flame directly into the jute covered scenic unit which promptly caught fire. A quick thinking SM and alert stage crew quickly brought the piece in to the deck and extinguished it in short order. This was of course pre-Station fire, so No harm, No foul was the general thinking back then, things simply moved on. I won't go into a blame game, it was over 30 years in the past in "...a distant galaxy, far far away and long long ago".... But the obvious errors in thinking and omission and the glaring result of those omissions, allowed me to implement a strong safety program when I took over the TD position the next year.

Anyway, flash paper effects can be extremely safe, but the call is by your local AHJ as to whether or not it is allowed on your stage. However, even simple gags need to be planned, trained and implemented by a "Competent Person", which in today's world, usually means a licensed Pyro pro, but, ..... not always.

Hope this helps.

[gafftaper]

Is there a magic shop in your town? That's the easiest way to buy flash paper/cotton and a device to set it off as well to be trained. Call your fire Marshal and ask if a magic trick device which ignites a small amount of flash paper would be legal. Add that you would be trained to properly use it and have a stage hand standing by just off stage with an extinguisher.

As for cigarettes in schools, use puff cigarettes. They have a fine powder in them which hangs in the air when you BLOW through them and look great in the lights. They are only like two for a buck too. You can get them here: www.displaycostume.com

[pmolsonmus]

We did **** Yankees about 10 years ago.
1. Simple lighting effect w/ a fog machine on the transformation.
2. Flash paper from a magic shop - got clearance and it was no problem
3. You can rent a fog machine or find a DJ with one to borrow if fog is okay
4. This is where we had fun. We actually had the actor play the devil as if he was Frank Sinatra "Live at the Sands" and played it in front of the main curtain. There are electric cigarettes that look great and produce smoke w/ no flame.


Best of Luck on a great show.

Phil