[If last month’s LD-at-Large column resolved anything, it’s that sushi is definitely the cuisine of choice among most lighting designers. Four of them, Nook Schoenfeld, Bob Peterson, John Featherstone and Olivier Ilisca, got together for an informal lunch discussion at Nook’s urging. On the menu? Sushi, of course. Once the sushi connection was established, the four LDs talked about how they started in the business and how they ended up where they are, all the while working on their appetizer. By the time the main course arrived, they were on to bigger and better things, like what it takes to get ahead in this business. This is the second of a three-part series. – ed.]
Olivier Ilisca: All of you guys apparently started out in rock ‘N’ roll. I was devoted to theatre.
Bob Peterson: I got into theatre afterwards. I actually became a Local 2 IATSE [International Alliance of Theatre and Stage Employees — the stage hands’ union–ed.] member and ran the stage at the Chicago Theatre by accident. I came to love the legitimate theatre gigs, and the concept of staying close to home with my daughter.
John Featherstone: I started hanging out with an English Opera company during the summers in England. These guys were doing huge light shows before there were moving lights. In one night I would watch them re-hang and focus 500 lights for a different show the next night. These were the true rock opera guys. I loved it. I watched and learned for many, many hours.
Olivier: I would watch designers come into my theatre and make up a plot on site. They’d say “Let’s hang all your Fresnels over here, place some PARs over here, and use the Lekos for key lights. Anyone got any gel?” It was so inspiring to see all of these people do things differently, and I soaked it all up.
Nook: I got into lighting by accident, while I was working at See Factor in New York City.
Bob: You were a sound guy first, weren’t you?
Nook: That’s correct. But Bob See [the owner of See Factor – ed.] had more lighting gigs than he did audio gigs. So I started pulling cable, and patching monster 800-PAR can rigs for the likes of lighting designer Howard Ungerleider and Rush. I asked questions and watched each LD do his thing. The next thing I know, they’ve invented moving lights. I went from working 20-hour days for 500 bucks per week to wiggling 20 moving lights for double the money. Eventually production managers started asking me to light their bands and I’ve never looked back.
Olivier: How did you come to Chicago?
Nook: In 2000 I was designing at a lighting company in Atlanta. There was this one loud salesman who everyone despised, especially me. John Huddleston from Upstaging called just to say hi one day. I told him I was moving on and looking for a new place to reside. He invited my wife and me to visit Chicago as his guests, so we did. He offered to build a state-of-the-art visualization suite at Upstaging if I would teach his employees how to program consoles and use the facility. We’ve maintained a great relationship since. My wife got out of the South, and I got away from the salesman.
So it sounds like we’re all self-taught at this table.
John: I think a formal education can be a huge benefit, but it can’t replace the huge hours spent on site. Every spring I get a deluge of resumes from kids in college. Just because you have a degree, it does not make you a designer. I’m self-taught like you guys, but I have one partner with a masters in lighting design from Carnegie Mellon, and another with a bachelor’s in fine arts. These guys know what they are doing, but they’ve spent years perfecting their craft.
Olivier: Likewise. I get young people calling me, just out of Northwest or DePaul University. They say, “I’m an LD; give me some work.” So I tell them, “You know what? First thing you’re going to do is wash some feeder. Then after a while I’ll let you hang some lights. And if you do that correctly I’ll let you wire some lights for a couple years. Then if you are still gung-ho about this business, we’ll talk about running a console.”
Nook: These new guys, as well as a lot of programmers, have not spent enough time watching others. You need to develop an eye for what we do.
John: You know, when I was getting into lighting I would do anything — cut gel, go get coffee, dump the truck. The fact that you even let me in the theatre was enough of a buzz to hook me. I think everyone in our demographic that’s successful feels that way.
Bob: Exactly. You cannot come into this business and expect people to hand you a job. You have to make your own breaks. See a door that’s slightly open, kick it in. But don’t stop there — look for the next door.
Check in with Nook and the guys next month when they wrap up their discussion about how to thrive in the lighting business.
