Theatre Lighting Design: Conversations on the Art, Craft and Life

This book provides an insight into the life of a professional lighting designer, through interviews with lighting designers at different stages of their careers plus a group interview with the designer and lighting team of the hit musical Billy Elliot.
The designers featured are The interviewees are: Neil Austin, Natasha Chivers, Jon Clark, Paule Constable, Rick Fisher, Richard Howell, Howard Hudson, Jessica Hung Han Yun, Mark Jonathan, Amy Mae, Ben Ormerod, Bruno Poet, Jackie Shemesh and Johanna Town. Between them, they have worked all over the world on shows of every genre - collecting many awards for their work along the way.
They share inspiration and practical advice, useful to anyone embarking on a career in lighting, fascinating to anyone who enjoys going to the theatre, offering insights into:

> approaching a new design;
> dealing with the challenges each new show brings, from working with a new director to being part of a creative team in realising a piece;
> the use of light and dark, colour and texture;
> managing collaborations, with directors, designers and their own team of associate and assistant lighting designers, programmers and electricians.
> and beyond the art and craft of lighting, the practicalities of a lighting career - moving from just getting enough work to pay the bills, to lighting the world’s biggest shows.

Rob Halliday is a lighting designer for Guidizio Universale, Tree of Codes and others. He has worked as programmer/associate lighting designer for productions such as Billy Elliot, Miss Saigon and Les Misérables and technical writer for Lighting+Sound International, Lighting & Sound America, Theatre Crafts and others, with many of these articles collected together in the Entertainment In Production books. Rob Halliday also works as a columnist for The Stage and as a guest speaker at drama schools and trade shows around the world.

Emma Chapman is a lighting designer known for her work on productions including Kiss Me, Kate (Paris, Luxembourg); Ghost Quartet (Boulevard Theatre, Soho); The Importance of Being Earnest (Theatr Clwyd, Mold), Lungs (Paines Plough); and the Olivier-award-winning play The Mountaintop (Trafalgar Studios). She was Co-Designer of Roundabout, winner of The Stage Awards’ Theatre Building of the Year 2015 and was on the judging panel for the 2019 & 2020 ALD Michael Northern Awards for Lighting Designers. Emma Chapman also works as a theatre consultant and designer for Charcoalblue and now for Studio Three Sixty.