Fast Forward took place on March 4, 2015 and attracted a glittering guest list including: Simon Callow, Olivia Colman, Frances de la Tour, Anne-Marie Duff, Sir David Hare, Ian Hislop, Patricia Hodge, Tom Hollander, Jeremy Irons, Lesley Manville, Andrew Scott, Fiona Shaw and Anna Wintour.
Held in the Olivier Theatre, innovative event design saw the stage utilised for dinner service, keeping the vast auditorium space free for the plethora of entertainment. Performances included: Damon Albarn showcasing a song from his forthcoming musical wonder.land and pieces from James Graham and Patrick Marber, as well as Southbank Sinfonia and the London Community Gospel Choir.
White Light worked closely alongside the National Theatre's team, including head of lighting - Matt Drury; lighting director - James Farncombe; prod LX - Breandan Andsell and the in-house LX team to facilitate the installation.
Full kit provision from White Light incorporated new LED equipment which had previously never been used at the National Theatre. This included: sought-after CORE Pinpoints - used for the first time ever in the UK, Mac Auras, Pixelines, VLXs and Sharpy washes/profiles to transform the space.
The National Theatre's Lighting Resources' Huw Llewellyn designed the lighting for the underground walkthrough experience. Finally, Blueprint provided additional SGM LT-200 vertical tubes and SGM ILDs, used for a circular truss which flew in and out above the audience for a captivating circus performance.
Farncombe comments, "We have received excellent feedback about the lighting for this event. Our LX team enjoyed delivering something a bit different to their usual projects and we were really impressed with the speed and intensity of the new Sharpys. We are grateful to White Light for helping to deliver the goods."
Richard Saunders, project manager at White Light, comments, "This fundraiser was a prestigious addition to White Light's events calendar and we relished the creative challenge of transforming the Olivier Theatre for a more bespoke set-up. It was also an exciting opportunity to fully demonstrate the capabilities with some of our new LED kit, for the first time ever in the National Theatre."
(Jim Evans)
