Mary Bennett

Mary Bennett

BA Production Arts

Mary is specialising in Theatre Lighting Design and Programming in her third year of BOVTS’ Production Arts BA. She is especially interested in accessible theatre and strives to make her work as accessible as possible. As well as designing lighting for Troilus and Cressida, Absolute Scenes and Far from the Madding Crowd at BOVTS, Mary is also the lighting designer for a tour of Walter and Dulcie around East Anglia. Mary’s ETC console programming credits include The Laramie Project and Nicholas Nickleby – both at the Bristol Old Vic.

CV

Portfolio

Absolute Scenes

Mary worked close alongside AV designer Ping to create an ‘in the round’ atmosphere for the audience, Mary not only focused lights onto the staging, but also the audience so that when the cast were dancing – the audience felt like part of the action too.

Absolute Scenes

Mary used non -conventional theatre lighting angles. To catch the entire space, lights were needed to be rigged and focus on the balcony railings, working around the action of the piece to be able to catch the faces of the actors.

Troilus and Cressida

Mary was inspired by Eliza’s designs of the football flags, recreating a blue and orange side-lighted state that acted as a recurring motif throughout the performance. Mary designed the lighting for both stage and screen and loved the challenge, making sure that whether the audience was digital or in the theatre in person, the show could been portrayed as accurately as possible to the director’s and designer’s vision.

It was always stressed that the contacts you make during your training are incredibly important, and your classmates are likely to end up being on set alongside you in the future. After working with a director of photography on one of the School’s short films, I was invited to work on a project with him outside of Bristol - proving that the professionals we meet via the School, may one day give us a call to action! Muir McFadden, Technical Graduate