$50 The Lehman Trilogy

no sets, no lights ...

from the first page of the acting edition:

AUTHOR’S NOTE

These three characters play all other characters in the play, and this should be done as simply and economically as possible.

One interpretation of the playwright’s instructions could be - no sets, no lights… cheap?!?

This Boston production I just saw had a lot of moving pieces on the set. Human-sized boxes for the actors to pop in and out of, a fancy chair revealed half way through that folks get wheeled around in, rolling ladders and bales of cotton. The larger set pieces don’t move, but there is a constant flux of small changes and props moving in and out.

In the original the props and set pieces are many fewer - some small boxes, tables and chairs - but the set itself revolves on a turntable. Es Devlin, the set designer for the original West End and Broadway productions, explains the decision to set three generations, 150 years and 2 cities on one, single, unchanging set as follows,

When you consider three hours of an audience’s…