Jessie Reed

THTR 351 Light Design

Section 1
Chris Eicher
6/5/09

Critique of Anna in the Tropics

This is a critique of Anna in the Tropics preformed on May 21 thru 23 and May 28 thru

31 in the Dore Theater at California State University of Bakersfield. In it I will describe my

opinion on the performance of actors, the play itself, and the lighting design. I will be

concentration mostly on the lighting of the play. What I liked and disliked about the lights, the

visibility, selective focus, mood, and plasticity. With each of these I will discuss their effect on

the theme, genre, color, climax, distribution, and types of movement used to create the right

effect.

Anna in the Tropics is about a Cuban family that has moved their cigar company to a

small town in Florida. Santiago (played by Michael Mejia) runs the factory with his wife Ofelia

(Alyssa S. Wiley). They have two daughters who were raised to roll cigars by hand in the

traditional Cuban way. The youngest daughter of Santiago and Ofelia named Marela (Toni

Lynne), dreams of a more adventurous life outside of the cigar factory. Her fantasies are aided

by the influence of the Juan Julian (Tyree Boyd-Pates), the new lector, who reads the tale of

Anna Karenina of Russia to the workers while they roll cigars. Meanwhile the eldest daughter,

Conchita (Jess Boles), finds herself trapped in a loveless marriage with her husband Palomo

(Danvir Singh Grewal), a fellow cigar roller. She is also influenced by the story of Anna, and

decides to follow after her life and take on a lover, which happens to be the lector himself. In the

midst of this, Santiago’s half-brother, Cheche (Justin Thompson), is pushing for modernization

of the factory by switching to machines. Cheche is, however, haunted by his past quarrels with a
previous lector that ran away with his wife; this adds to the conflict of replacing workers and the

lector with machines. The main theme of Anna in the Tropics is violence versus reason. In other

words, it is whether the characters resolve to solve their problems using violence or reason. In

my opinion all of the actors in this play were very effective and played their parts well. I was

able to determine the theme and who was using violence or reason to do things.

The most important element of lighting the stage for the play is visibility. This was an

ever-present factor throughout Anna in the Tropics. I did not detect any scene where the main

focus was not seen. Visibility, in my opinion, is an important element in determining the theme

of the play, violence versus reason. Due to the well-lit stage and the wonderful performance of

the actors the audience was able to see and determine who was trying to resolve the many

different conflicts in the factory with either reason or violence. For example, I was able to tell

that Cheche wanted to use force to and power to get what he wanted while Santiago tried to

reason with him by getting the opinion of all the workers to back him up. The genre of the play

was a tragedy with a bit of comedy to balance it out. Due to this type of play it was necessary to

have bright lights during the comedic parts and more dim lights during the dramatic parts,

however, all of the main actors were visible in the dimmer lights. During the climax, when

Cheche shoots Juan, the actors were completely visible, I had no trouble seeing what was going

on, and because of the fact I could see the scene I was able to know the climax. The distribution

of lights made everything perceptible. The instruments were spread out well, which created an

even layer of light on the stage that made the selective focus easy for the audience to concentrate

on.

The emphasis or selective focus is where the audience is supposed to be looking during

each scene. To enhance the theme of the play the selective focus was on the two different
standpoints on how problems were to be settled. One example of this was when Cheche raped

Marela. She ignores his insinuations towards her so he forces himself upon her. In this scene

there is a definite emphasis on the two characters. During many of these scenes the lights put a

dramatic emphasis on the main characters to enhance the genre of the play. For example, when

Conchita and Juan were in the factory, after one of their “love affairs”, some of the lights appear

on Palomo at the top of the stairs. The audience sees that he is angry at the way things are

playing out and that Conchita knows that he is watching. She purposefully provokes him to

show her rebellion against their loveless marriage. At the climax the focus is on Cheche and

Juan. When Cheche walks into the room all eyes are on him, then he pulls out a gun and shoots

the lector, surprising the entire audience. Between cues the focus may move from one character

or area to another. An example of this is the very beginning scene when it shows Santiago and

his workers at the cockfight, the switches to Ofelia and her daughters waiting for the arrival of

Juan at the dock. In this scene there is also a change in color to represent where the action is

taking place. I did not quite like the choice of color for the mother and daughters at the sea. I

would have rather preferred a softer more inviting blue like a cool sea breeze instead of the

greenish peacock blue used in the scene. That color gave me a more sickening feeling instead of

the felling of waiting in anticipation. The different colors on the main characters of a scene also

give the play a sense of the mood.

The general mood of Anna in the Tropics was mostly dark and dramatic, with some

romance and humor tied into it. You cant quite synthesize literal darkness with the lights due to

the visibility factor, but the lighting itself does create a separate mood that should go along with

the mood and theme of the play, such as the feeling of intensity. The theme creates an intense

and dark mood. For example after Cheche failed to switch the factory to machines he resolved to
kill the lector, Juan, in order to claim his revenge. There was a short atmosphere of suspense

when Cheche walks into the room. The mood of Anna in the Tropics enhances the genre. They

both have a depressing feeling with some happy, comedic, and romantic ambience on the side.

The mood in many ways affect the colors used in the play. The main colors used in Anna in the

Tropics were a saturated blue and amber, there was also a cool purple used to give scenes a cold

feeling. In the beginning there was a hot and uncomfortable yellow during the cockfights while

on the other side there was a peacock blue, which I already stated that I didn’t quite like for this

scene. The mood of the play was heightened during and after the climax. During the scene there

was an eerie sort of mood when Cheche entered the room, then he shot the lector, which startled

everyone in the theater. After this incident everyone is mourning the loss of the lector, which

gives the play a depressing atmosphere. One of the things I notice that also enhanced the mood

was the movement of lights between cues. For example, when the mood was energetic the time

between the cues was faster, but when the there was low energy and sort of a sad mood, the

lights were a bit slower.

The plasticity of the play was very effective. The characters popped out and were more

animated. This was mostly due to the colors mostly used. The saturated ambers and blues

during most of the play was very pleasing to my eyes and even the yellow and purple in the room

above the factory was very effective for the warm romantic moments with Santiago and his wife.

There were some scenes that the characters looked a bit two-dimensional. One of the scenes was

at the beginning when it was the focus was switching between the men at the cockfight and the

women at the pier. The yellow at the fight and the blue at the pier overpowered any other colors

that might have been there. I’m not sure if that was the way the light designer intended it, but I

didn’t really like the flatness of the first scene. Another scene was at the very end when all the
lights fade out and only Palomo, reading the story of Anna Karenina, and Conchita are seen in

two spotlights with a pink hue to them. Although this scene was very warm and inviting I would

have liked them to pop out more.

All in all I thought the play was a success. I enjoyed it immensely. The play was visible

which was the most important element. The light designer was effective in creating a selective

focus during important scenes. The lights created a separate but cooperating feeling that went

along in with the mood and made it known to the audience. Another enjoyable element was the

plasticity of the characters, although I would have liked a bit more of it in some scenes. The

stage was evenly distributed with light and most of the colors fit into the play. I did not,

however, like some of the color choices in a few of the scenes. These elements of lighting also

portrayed the theme and genre clearly. Each of these factors heightened the climax. All of the

actors were convincing and played their characters well, which, along with the lights and sound,

made this play very enjoyable to watch.