The brief was to produce a 40-minute show about Hugo, paying particular attention to his time in Guernsey. Ashton asked writer Elizabeth Fry to collaborate with scripting and storyboarding, and together they researched the project. With Hugo being such a prolific creative force, there was no shortage of archive material - on Guernsey, and in France and England. Guernsey’s Prieux Library yielded an impressive stock of pictures, as did Hauteville House, his abode on the island. Ashton and Fry’s main challenge here was containing the show to just 40 minutes with the available material!
E//T//C had the soundtrack - involving a narrator and four actors - recorded in Wales at KBMF Audio, engineered by Will Biggs. The show involves over 200 images, which were turned into scrolling artwork for the two 6kW E//T/C xenon projectors and their rotating double scrollers. All images were original material, apart from a couple (e.g. Hugo’s daughter drowning), which Ashton had to ‘invent’, and all the quotes in the script were taken from original written quotes by Hugo and those close to him.
Ashton hand tinted some of the pictures for the scrolls - in a process similar to the way they were coloured as originals - for which he rigorously followed the colour palettes of the original postcards and prints. Finding a large, pale projection surface, easily accessible to the public was a challenge! After exploring many possibilities, E//T//C and the Festival Committee came up with the Ship and Crown Pub combined with the villa next door on the Harbour Esplanade in picturesque St Peter’s Port. The pub also has a historic connection to Hugo in that his mistress Juliette Drouet stayed there.
Deputy Mike Burbridge, chair of the Victor Hugo Working Party and a member of the State of Guernsey Government comments: "We were thrilled with the projections. E//T//C did an excellent job and produced work of outstanding quality. The public response has been incredibly positive and the whole event has boosted the island’s profile enormously."
(Lee Baldock)
