A child's imagination... gone wrong.
A living room in New Jersey. A fragmented wall that becomes the portal through which imaginary friend's come into this 4 year-old girl's small, neglected world. An old wallpaper, covered in not-so innocent drawings; reflections of a young mind exposed too early to very mature contents.
Directed by Greg Justice
Dramaturgy by Karl Precoda
Stage Management by Jamie Lindsay
Lighting design by Christian Specht
Costume design by Alison Owen
Props design by Felysia Havens-Furnary
Scenic charge by Rhi Sanders
Scenic art by Stefnie Cerny & Estefania Perez-Vera (self)
Studio Theatre at Virginia Tech, Spring 2017.
The separation between walls becomes the magical paths for Lucy's imaginary friends to appear and disappear. A stair unit, leading backstage out of sight lines, suggests the second floor in the apartment, where Lucy's mom invites her one-night stands.
All plates were drafted in Autocad.
The different heights in walls support the play's storytelling of seeing this world through the eyes of Lucy, a 4-year old girl. The only world she knows is her living room. Overly scaled, diffuse, and at times, overwhelming; she surrounds herself with her interpretation of what her mother, carelessly, has exposed her to.
Wall-sized caricatures cover the surface of a dirty, monotone, old wallpaper. The girly drawings coexist with their not-so innocent companions. A rainbow ties them up together, and what's the price at the end of it? A bottle of whisky. The grey vignetting at the top and bottom of the walls allows them to fade into the void, as a suggestions of vertical continuation.
Lucy's main imaginary friend, and crush, is a middled-aged man (and also an addict to cocaine and porn) named Mr. Marmalade.
Photo by Chris Russo.
Bradley is Lucy's second imaginary friend, and Mr. Marmalade's personal assistant.
With only 5 years old, Larry is the youngest suicide attempt in New Jersey, and Lucy's first real friend.
Larry's imaginary friends are plants (far different from Lucy's Mr. Marmalade). Their entrance? A trap door in the center of the dirty living room's rug.