PROFILE Copyright Lighting&Sound America September 2012 http://www.lightingandsoundamerica.com/LSA.html The Designer in Charge By: David Barbour The hectic and fruitful career of James Morgan It’s a typically busy day at The York Theatre Company. two lengthy runs. New shows, such as Yank! A WWII Love People are darting about everywhere; the noise level is Story, the uproarious spoof The Musical of Musicals (The high and getting higher. The day’s agenda includes the Musical!), and Thrill Me, about the killers Leopold and Loeb, reading of a new show, and invited audience members are have been staged around the country. Souvenir, about the assembling in the lobby. So frenetic is that action that notorious would-be diva Florence Foster Jenkins, trans- even James Morgan, who runs the place, has trouble find- ferred to Broadway, nabbing a Tony nomination for its star, ing a place to talk quietly with a visitor. Then again, a cer- Judy Kaye. Soon after Memphis took home the Tony Award tain level of madness is probably native to Morgan’s daily for Best Musical, its librettist, Joe DiPietro, was at the York, life, as he is one of the very few working designers who is presenting his new show, Falling for Eve, based on the first also artistic director of a theatre company. Most people few books of Genesis. A number of these productions bene- find one career in the theatre exhausting enough; to do fited from Morgan’s design expertise. two well is certainly remarkable. In addition, thanks to attention-getting Musicals in Mufti As we go to press, Morgan is having a summer where presentations, a number of forgotten, but historically impor- everything goes right. The York’s production of the revue tant, musicals received their first full recordings. These Closer Than Ever, by Richard Maltby, Jr. and David Shire, is include Billion Dollar Baby, an early Betty Comden and riding a wave of terrific notices; it has extended several Adolph Green effort with a distinctive score by Morton times, and is now scheduled to run at least through the end Gould; Mata Hari, originally produced by David Merrick and of September. In addition, Morgan has designed scenery for written by Edward Thomas, Martin Charnin, and Jerome the Irish Repertory Theatre’s well-received revival of New Coopersmith; and The Body Beautiful, the first collaboration Girl in Town, a rarely seen musical based on Eugene of Fiddler on the Roof’s Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick. O’Neill’s Anna Christie. He also managed to squeeze in time Among the shows that have passed through the company’s to design a new production of Douglas Carter Beane’s com- developmental reading series is a little thing called Avenue Q. edy As Bees in Honey Drown at the Cape Playhouse in Morgan’s presence is felt everywhere at York, from his Dennis, Massachusetts. graphic designs for each show’s poster, to his cheery pres- It’s all in a day’s work for a man who takes on a surpris- ence in the lobby before the show, to his distinctive pre-show ing number of design projects while also running a company speeches, which often ramble hilariously through a variety of that, by any standard, must be considered a hive of activity. seemingly unrelated topics and generally include a paean to In addition to producing several main stage shows each the company’s concession stand offerings. And, more often season, York—which is billed as “where musicals come to than not, he has designed the production’s scenery. life”—offers its wildly popular Musicals in Mufti series, “I never set out to be an artistic director,” says Morgan, staged readings of lost or forgotten musicals; it also plays and indeed his career path was an unusual one, based on host to an extensive development program of new works. the concept of learning by doing. York was founded in 1969 Indeed, you could call York the Janus Theatre Company, by Janet Hayes Walker, a working actress who had for it is a two-headed enterprise, looking forward into musi- appeared in many golden-age Broadway musicals, including cal theatre’s future while lovingly examining its extensive Damn Yankees and The Music Man (where she understudied past. Its influence cannot be underestimated. The compa- leading lady Barbara Cook). Establishing a home base at ny’s 1994 revival of Merrily We Roll Along offered a critical the Church of the Heavenly Rest, on New York’s Upper East second look at a show that, on its 1981 debut, was dis- Side, York presented such rarely revived works as Arthur missed out of hand; it has since received many major Laurents’ The Time of the Cuckoo and Joshua Logan’s The revivals. Another flop, So Long, 174th Street, was reworked Wisteria Trees. Eventually, musicals were added to the mix, at York as Enter Laughing, The Musical, where it enjoyed and, thanks to Walker’s cordial relationship with Stephen Photo: Carol Rosegg 90 • September 2012• Lighting&Sound America New Girl in Town at Irish Repertory Theatre. Morgan’s design, Morgan’s design for As Bees in Honey Drown, at Cape made up of modular parts, allowed for rapid scenic transitions, a Playhouse, featured a colorful expressionist collage of New York helpful strategy for a large musical staged in a tiny space. skyscrapers. Sondheim, York began staging major revivals of Sondheim’s 1975.” He became the company’s in-house set designer hits (Company, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the and, he adds, “after a while, Janet’s right-hand person.” He Forum) and misses, including a production of Pacific learned on the job, designing show after show and observ- Overtures that some reviewers felt was more coherent and ing Walker’s artistic and management style firsthand. “My effective than the Broadway original. It transferred to a com- experiences here were my graduate school,” he says. mercial Off Broadway production. The first Broadway revival Morgan took a major forward step in 1983 when, with of Sweeney Todd, staged at Circle in the Square Theatre, several years of design experience behind him, he applied to was also a transfer from York. join United Scenic Artists. “I found out that you could get in York’s productions from this era were definitely “Off based on your body of work and the quality of your recom- Broadway” in their production values—the company per- mendations,” rather than taking the famous entrance exam. formed in a gym, and shows had to be struck each night, Thanks to his work at York, he came armed with letters from to allow classes to take place during the day at the private Sondheim, Comden and Green, Joshua Logan, and Cy school where, for many years, Morgan directed shows. But, at Coleman, among others. Unsurprisingly, he was admitted. a time when revivals of Broadway musicals were much rarer For years, York-Walker-Morgan seemed like a winning than they are now and before the Encores! At City Center combination—with Morgan taking the time to design for series, they were unmissable events for musical theatre fans. other companies and also doing summer stock—until Morgan arrived in New York City in 1974, just out of col- Walker fell ill with cancer, and he began to take on more and lege. His aunt and uncle, who attended services at the more responsibility. “I had been there 20 years, and people Church of the Heavenly Rest, set up a meeting for him with didn’t really know anyone but Janet,” he says. “I started Walker. “She asked me to design the poster for her next doing the pre-show speeches, just to put another face on play, which I did,” he recalls. “After that, I helped out on a the company.” Walker died in 1997, and the theatre’s board Top left: Carol Rosegg. Top right: Courtesy of James Morgan; Bottom: Carol Rosegg. left: Carol Rosegg. Top Top couple of shows, and then I designed Night Must Fall in of directors asked him to take over. The design of Closer Than Ever, currently running at York Theatre Ionescopade, also staged at York, featured a witty and slightly Company, combines motifs of doorways and partly cloudy skies. sinister design that employed multiple images of Eugene Ionesco. www.lightingandsoundamerica.com • September 2012 • 91 PROFILE By this point, York had evolved con- says. “I wanted us to do new shows on to Treat a Lady, featured an artfully siderably, having left the Church of the the main stage, saving revivals for the drawn New York skyline that burst the Heavenly Rest for a permanent berth in Musicals in Mufti series. That’s also boundaries of the proscenium, placing the basement of St. Peter’s, a Lutheran when we began to focus more on the audience in Central Park, sur- church in the Citicorp Building in developmental work.” rounded by 1970s Manhattan. This Manhattan’s East 50s; also, over time, Also by now, Morgan had a fully summer, his design for As Bees in the theatre began producing more formed design style, defined by a Honey Drown presented the city as a musicals. As Morgan officially took puckish wit, a strong graphic eye (he wildly tilting Expressionist collage of over, he pushed York to convert to an admits to being “fascinated by print skyscrapers; the buildings were all-musicals policy. He had a clear and type”), the ruthless elimination of defined by bright pastels, as if some- vision for the theatre’s mission. “I had unnecessary details, and the ability to one had thrown a silkscreen over most designed a lot at Goodspeed Opera work small miracles with a limited of Manhattan.