Company
Design Notes
For Company at UCI, directed by Eli Simon with music direction by Lex Leigh and choreography by Allison Eversol, I built a scenic world rooted in observation and theme. A solo trip to New York the spring before the production became the seed: white or cream walls, trim layered in decades of paint, rooms that felt uninhabited because life happened outside—in motion, in the city.
That sensibility shaped the architecture. Two coupled buildings frame stage right—linked structures echoing partnership—while a lone red-brick building at stage left stands apart, reflecting Bobby’s solitude. Fire escapes, stoops, and ladders climb throughout, offering both physical and metaphorical mobility. Backlit windows glow in purples, pinks, and blues, hinting at private lives just out of reach.
A color-shifting cyc forms the skyline, moving with mood and music—blue and expansive at times, then pulsing with disco energy—capturing the shifting emotional rhythm of Sondheim’s nonlinear world. The orchestra sits embedded between buildings, grounding the city in sound.
Rather than literal apartments, the design creates a landscape of longing: an exterior world where people connect, drift, and orbit love. It’s a New York built from memory and movement—what we see from the outside looking in—holding the ache and possibility of modern adulthood: imperfect, exhilarating, and always just out of reach.
