For this project, I started off by sketching thumbnails to try and decide how I wanted to set up the stage. For my concept, I wanted to be realistic with hints of expresionism. I played with this concept by creating different thrusts and wall constructions.

I wanted the pub to seem like a small hole in the wall, leading to the use of two wall units angled towards eachother. I wanted the edges to be curved to soften things and go more expressionistic. I wanted it to feel like there was a natural set floating in a bubble. I also played with several different ideas about the bathroom. I knew I wanted it to be seen so we can see what Gaston does when he goes in there every 5 minutes. Is he actually going to the bathroom? Just looking at himself in the mirror? Compulsivley washing his hands? I wanted those decisions to be shown. I orignally thought about showing the walls of the bathroom and having the audience see his actions through shadows, but then I decided to cut the front walls in half so the audience would see his actions from the waist up. In this sketch I played with lines and how they draw the eye to certain things. I liked the bricks on the stage right wall leading to the door where "Elvis" would enter and the bricks on the stage left wall leading to the painting. I did the same thing with the floor boards, but I did not like how the walls looked like spider webs, it gave it more of an expresionistic feel than I wanted.

In my final perspective sketch, I modified to bathroom walls for audience views and changed the bricks to a realistic brick layout. I kept the floor boards to put the expressionistic element inside the set itself. For the reveal of the painting, I made the stage left wall into two units. The first unit would be a scrim painted with the brick pattern and original painting. The second would be a regular wall unit painted with the new painting and night sky directly behind the first. "Elvis" would pull down the painted scrim and reveal the painting on the wall unit behind.

With these sketches, I was playing with different brick layouts and bar constructions.

With these last sketches, I was exploring how the bathroom would be set up.