A Conversation with Richard Pilbrow, Theatre Designer

Date: September 21, 2006

Author: Kauffman Center

Richard Pilbrow is a member of the Kauffman Center’s design team. A founder of Theatre Projects Consultants, he is one of the world's leading theatre design consultants, a theatre, film and television producer, and an internationally known author and stage lighting designer. We talked with him from his office in Connecticut.

The quality that Kauffman Center planners are aiming toward is sometimes compared to the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles.   How will our center compare?

The Walt Disney Concert Hall is an outstanding facility that we’re proud to have been a part of.  It was designed by Frank Gehry and with acoustics by our own Yasu Toyota.  But it was aimed at pure symphonic musical performance.  We are going a quantum leap beyond that.   Kansas City’s performing arts center will have two separate halls. One will be dedicated to music—the concert hall—and while it has fewer seats than the Disney Center it will have equally high sound quality. 

What excites me is that Kansas City will have a separate space for theatrical performances.  This means that we will be able to present a much greater range of events than the Disney can.  Not just symphony, ballet and opera, but theatre and pop culture performances, too.  Concerts, bands, shows and entertainment of all kinds imaginable, from the intimate to the full-scale spectacle.

What will the audience experience be like in the theater?

Audiences in Kansas City will have an experience that is completely unlike any other theaters in town.  It’s going to be a very striking, majestic space, yet very intimate for the audience.  The form and space is inspired by the great opera houses of Europe, yet within a very modern piece of architecture.  It’s an interesting combination--both modern, but based on the best of our very rich theater traditions.

How can a space have both lofty spaces and provide an intimate experience for the audience?

The great traditional opera houses (Paris and The Royal Opera House in London) grouped the audience around the stage almost in a semi-circle.  People were drawn around the stage by boxes placed on the sides.  That traditional clustering of an audience, putting them close to the performers, brings a room to life. People see each other experiencing the performance and it becomes a shared social event.  The audience members are aware of each other and a sense of excitement builds. 

This approach was largely lost in the 20th century. Architects began to build rectangular spaces with everyone sitting in rows facing the stage. They were greatly influenced by the introduction of movie theaters and “auditorium” style facilities.  Imagine going to a dinner party where you sat in rows facing the host.  It wouldn’t be much fun, would it?  Many recent major theaters and concert halls, including the Disney, have broken out of this box and begun to cluster the audience more around the stage again. While a theater can’t be in the round, like the concert hall, it can take certain steps to bring the audience closer to the performers—and to each other. 

Does this mean the audience seats will be closer together?

Oh, no. Our seating has great leg room and the site lines will all be wonderful. There will be no bad seats in this house.  Plus the center will have wonderful amenities like expanded bathrooms.  The audience will have a very civilized and exciting experience in within this beacon on the hill. It will be hugely attractive and garner enormous interest—way beyond Kansas City.

Richard Pilbrow will be in Kansas City for the groundbreaking activities on October 6.  He’ll join design team members Moshe Safdie and Yasu Toyota at celebration activities from 4 – 9 p.m. that evening in the Crossroads District.