The first thing the writer told us was that the river had to be real. Not a blue cloth, not a projection: water, moving, that the sisters could fall into. Bassey Ita, our designer, said yes before he had any idea how.
The tank
Under the stage floor there is now a shallow steel tank, eight metres long and only twenty centimetres deep, lined with black rubber so the water looks deep under the lights. It holds about four thousand litres, filled from a borehole and warmed to body temperature so the actors do not catch cold.
Twenty centimetres of water, lit from the side, looks like the whole Cross River.
The flood
In the storm at the end of the first act, the floor tilts and the tank overflows on to a second, lower deck. It takes eleven seconds. The drummers cover the sound of the pumps and the haze covers the edges. Rows A and B are a metre and a half from the water, and on the third preview a single drop reached seat A8.
- Pumps tested every afternoon at 16:00
- Stage manager checks the water temperature before each show
- A towel crew of three in each wing
The actors
Edidiong, Uduak and Mfon rehearsed the canoe scenes on dry land for three weeks before the water went in. They now spend about twelve minutes of each show wet. Wardrobe has made three sets of every costume and a drying room behind the scene dock runs a dehumidifier all day.
The river opens on 20 November. We hope you feel the spray from the balcony, metaphorically.
