SET DESIGN & PRODUCTION
Themes central to Roche’s architecture — the play of light and shadow, a charged use of space and objects — animate her work in performance design.
featured work
FROM THE FIRE
TIFFANY'S
FROM THE FIRE
Set Design & Production
Winner of Best Music, Best Production, and Best New Musical at the UK Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2011. Named Cultural Highlight of 2011 by the Scotsman.
THE BUZZ
The critics agree. This show will open your eyes and touch your heart. A New York story, born in New York and meant for New York, From the Fire took the 2011 Edinburgh Festival Fringe by storm. A stunning dramatization of the infamous Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire, the production was awarded three top UK: Musical Theatre Matters Awards – Best Musical, Best Music and Best Production. Named a Edinburgh highlight of 2011, it returned home triumphant.
Today, From the Fire is poised to bring its magic and power back to the audiences of its home town. This universal story is our history, a musical of our time with a message that will ring true into the next century.
From the Fire was originally developed for the 100th anniversary of the Triangle fire. Conceived by writer and director Cecilia Rubino, with composer Elizabeth Swados, designer/architect Bonnie Roche and poet Paula Finn, it was an anniversary event that premiered in the stories Judson Memorial Church. Five performances sold out by word-of-mouth alone.
Following the incredible reaction at Judson, the creative team for From the Fire took the show to the world's largest arts festival in Edinburgh. There is competed against 2,500 shows to win packed houses and rave reviews from the world's media.
THE SHOW
Time and place: Lower manhattan, a century ago. Young immigrants, mostly teenage girls, inspired the labor movement that changed America. They worked long hours, in terrible conditions, for little pay — and then they went on strike.
Through the bitter winter of 1910 they stood in the frigid streets and bravely faced intimidation from their bosses and Tammany Hall. Risking everything, including starvation, they fought for what they believed. And the New York press and public took them to heart. Enduring and strong, vibrant and hopeful, 20,000 courageous and willful girls did the unthinkable — they stood up. They stood up for safe working conditions, they stood up for decent pay, and they stood up for justice.
In the end, they went back to work in the same factory conditions for only two dollars more a week.
A year later, on March 25, 1911, on an ordinary Saturday filled with laughter, gossip and grueling work, 146 young lives were lost in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. The terror of the conflagration shocked New York and changed history. Those familiar and brave young women has spoken the truth, but only in death were their voices finally heard.
From the Fire tells its story through song. Imagine Sadie Solomon, one of so many young women, as she placed her meagre pay in her new hat, stands a moment on the burning window ledge and grandly flings her hat into the clear blue sky. And then she jumps to her death. The public was outraged. Heeding the cry, the progressive movement and women’s suffrage swiftly followed. New York and America led the struggle for new rights and a brighter future; a class struggle that continues today in a century of greater enlightenment and continued oppression.
THE PRODUCTION
From the Fire's poetic text is set to a complex, unusual and vibrant new score by Liz Swados. Featuring an adaptable cast of 14 - 32 singers, many portraying spellbinding, individual characters, the production is a poignant ensemble work for an international audience.
The staging is evocative, with minimalist set pieces, video projections and authentic costumes. The sparse, flexible set of five narrow tables creates abstraction of the characters physical world — tenements, bathrooms, an elevator a locked fire door — and the only order in a chaotic existence: factory space and coffins.
THE CRITICS AGREE
“The music, the winning young signers, replaced by sepia-toned grief of the Triangle story with laughing teenage girls, sweating, gossiping and angry. The oratorio brings the young women and men of Triangle back, memory as an act of resurrection.”
– Jim Dwyer, The New York Times
“The production dramatizes the fire and looks at the earlier uprising, which saw 20,000 young women in New York stage a significant strike for the first time. It celebrates the part the women played in labor reform but also draws parallels with the perilous conditions in which many people still work today.”
– Pauline McLean, BBC News
“There are few pieces of theatre that I’ve seen that I would say pack such a wallop or teach such a lesson.”
– Rafael Pi Roman, PBS
“Trangle Productions ... tells this tragic tale with sensitivity and heart. Simple staging and the intelligent use of film combine to make this a musical worth getting out of bed to see.”
– Julie McNicholls, What's On Stage
“This is a great piece of musical theatre ...Mostly sung, the talented cast comes together beautifully with soaring harmonies and clever musical arrangements.”
– Kelly Apter, The Scotsman
“…wonderfully innovative, positive and inspiring … incredible score … The music was like another player, vibrant, mischievous, moving. The voices, along with the beauty and movement of the actors, the meticulousness of the staging, wistful lighting, and bold sound … help me captive to an emotionally riveting experience.”
– Stephanie Palewski, 60 minutes
“From the Fire was a stirring musical … [Other shows] could learn a thing or two from the more accurate harmonies by the From the Fire company.”
– Robert Dawson Scott, The Times (London)
“Impeccably researched and written...they were awarded four stars in the Scotsman and nominatinos in every category of the Music Theatre Awards”
– Tim Cronwell, The Scotsman Diary
“Blending modern dance choreography with a demanding score in which choral passages combine in a ringing Greek chorus to the Trangle tradegy...”
– Bob Flynn, The Times (London)
“...a production that will live long in the memory.”
– Brett Herriot, Scotsgay
TIFFANY'S
Tableau Setting
Featured in Architectural Digest. Table originally designed for Paloma Picasso.
"Bonnie Roche's sleek, streamlined approach is underscored by Tiffany's sterling and crystal ... design's success depends on its being the best abstract portait you can imagine of yourself." – Architectural Digest
