"Bluebird" by Simon Stephens

[Suzette]

Has anyone done recently a production of "Bluebird" by Simon Stephens??

 

We are doing it in early Feb next year and virtually the entire play is set inside a late 1980's (87/88 preferred!) Nissan Bluebird car. The director wants a real car but without - engine/battery, petrol tank, windscreen, rear window, most of roof, drivers door and passenger door behind driver.

 

It must have working passenger door & working door behind passenger, bonnet, boot, roof frame (but no roof - i.e. like a giant open sunroof!) dashboard, handbrake etc., steering wheel, headlights, indicators, rear lights etc., front and rear seats, 4 wheels, numberplates, bumpers, plus the front, side and rear wing panels.

 

Basically it needs to look like a car - the actors need to use both doors on the passenger side to get in and out, but on the drivers side it would be open for better audience sightlines.

The front and rear windscreens would be removed (again for sightlines and to help LX), the roof disappears to help LX.

 

The car doesn't move - it sits on stage throughout the entire show...... nothing opens or closes except the 2 doors .. so bonnet/boot etc. just need to look right with no internal parts needed whatseover

 

BUT our biggest problem is that the show is upstairs in a small fringe pub theatre - access is via a narrow, twisting staircase!!! So I need the bits of car to then weld together again inside the venue (don't even ask about welding in a small enclosed space --- I'm working on that one!! I am currently assuming that we can somehow do it!!!)

 

It needs to be strong enough that the actors can get in and out of it and open/close doors and look as real as possible -- the audience are within 4' of the car!

The budget to do all of this £450 !! Including buying the car, welding, transportation etc.

 

We are already going down the usual routes of scrap yards, autotrader, ebay etc. to find Nissan Bluebirds or parts thereof ... and we have been in touch with various people & garages about cutting it up, welding it back together, sizes, strengths, supports etc. But I was wondering if any BlueRoomers knew of a production and if they had similar difficulties and could offer any advice (or even offer a cut-up Bluebird!!!)

 

Thanks

[Ynot]

I can't help in any way (sorry) but my only comment is WHEW!! Tall order, or what...!!??

[trussmonkey]

a quick ebay search gave this listing for a 1987 bluebird.

 

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/1987-NISSAN-BLUEBIRD...=item2ea92f25ac

 

you might have to do some cosmetic work on it.

 

TM

[Ynot]

a quick ebay search gave this listing for a 1987 bluebird.

 

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/1987-NISSAN-BLUEBIRD...=item2ea92f25ac

 

you might have to do some cosmetic work on it.

 

TM

Have to chuckle at the "EXELLENT PRE ACCIDENT CONDTION "

[trussmonkey]

** laughs out loud ** I know.

 

A concurrent post has been automatically merged from this point on.

 

THE CAR STILL STARTS AND DRIVES PERFECT BUT WILL HAVE TO BE TRANSPORTED

 

 

!!!!!!

 

** laughs out loud **

[Suzette]

Hi,

Thanks for that one on ebay ... my SM had already seen that one, but we have dismissed it as

a) it's in Birmingham and we are in london and the transport costs are "quite high!!!"

b) we really need at least the front section to look OK - that one is so bashed it would take a lot of money and work to get it looking OK

 

Ynot - Phew indeed --- we are trying our best to accomodate the director --- it is becoming a very frustrating process when he won't compromise!

 

open to any other ideas!!!

[kerry davies]

Hi Suzette,

Just a guess but is this a student show? (£450 budget!)

You say that you haven't fully explored the idea of welding the pieces on site. If it is the pub venue I know near Islington then the chance of you being allowed to weld stuff in situ is about zero. Fire RA's, the planning regs and possibly the licensing parameters will stop you dead. To say nothing of welding in an unventilated, restricted space and the COSHH hazards to the actual welder. If it is that pub, the car will be in tiny pieces before you can get it up the back stairs and you will not have time to weld it together even if you could. The actors and crew could cut themselves to pieces on sharp edges, it will look awful and be competely unstable.

Please don't waste a lot of your time. If you can't do it, how to becomes irrelevant.

 

Buy or borrow for the director a copy of Peter Brooks' The Empty Space and direct his attention to the phrase "suspension of disbelief". The director may well be unable to compromise his artistic vision but in no way does that mean he can compromise anyone elses safety, and I include everyone elses stress levels in that!

Tell him you'll definitely do it for him....but in a different venue with a real-world budget. Otherwise he cuts his coat to suit his cloth.

[TomHoward]

Rather than taking the whole chassis up the stairs and stripping off what you don't need, why not go the other way and make a comprehensive list of what you do need off the car? Sounds to me like you might get away with the seats and a few other key parts of the interior, a couple of doors about most of the the body panels off one side, and a timber frame to attach it all to. What's the point of welding anything if you don't need to end up with a rolling shell?

[Suzette]

Thanks for replies -

 

Kerry, no it's not in Islington but it is a drama school, but obviously we are all professionals except the actors. However yes it is a small budget, as we also need money for lights, costume, props, sound etc. etc. I am aware of all the risks associated with welding & am dealing with them one at a time. As to "suspension of disbelief" - you haven't worked with this director or have any idea of his vision for the show- we have to at least try to do what he wants, and make it safe - that's our job! When it becomes impossible then I can say no, but I don't say "no" to a director at the start of a production process without having serious reasons & looking into what he wants properly. When I do say no, I then need options for him to work with. Obviously if he had said "I want to burn the theatre down every night, and I want it to be for real - you can re-build it again the next day" - then that's different... I might hesitate for a couple of seconds before an outright NO!

 

Tom - your idea is another option we are working on as well - the big problem we are actually finding at the moment is to track down a Bluebird that isn't completely bashed up and is still a reasonable price! And isn't the other side of the UK so will cost most of the budget to transport to us in London!

 

I think this job is what is called "work in progress!!!"

[WiLL]

A suggestion re: welding in the fringe venue (I think I know which one you mean ;) ) may be to drill bolt holes in your sections so that each section can be moved up the twisty, narrow staircase and then safely and quickly bolted together in situ. More initial fabrication work required pre-rig I would think but less to go wrong both in the rigging and during the run. Also it would allow other work to be going on the the limited space while the car is assembled as opposed to a lone welder trying not to set fire to the seats. A good 12mm metal bit on a mains drill should punch through most car associated metals and allow an M10 half thread bolt to pass through and bind the two pieces together.

Although have to say, I'd need a stiff drink after getting a brief like that from a director. Good thing the venue is above a pub :unsure:

Good Luck!

[kerry davies]

Hi Suzette,

Wasn't being flippant suggesting "No" as a starting point, Fiat Pandas are OK because they have flat, bolted on panels, other cars = not good. If you really do want to build the car insitu then there are a few basic things to consider.

 

How can you cut up the body so that it fits back together, assuming you want the doors to open and close? The Bluebird has a floorpan which will need to be chopped to get it in and rewelding it accurately would be a nightmare for a professional body shop with all their kit.

The door pillars are integrally welded to the floorpan, where do you cut to ensure they can be rewelded to maintain stability? If the welding is not done on a body jig it would be a miracle to get the bits to fit on reassembly, let alone have working doors.

Cutting out individual panels/pillars without reinforcing all others removes the integral stability of the pressings and alignment becomes yet another nightmare. It is a tensile structure and with bits missing the whole thing would wobble madly with actors in it.

Assuming that you can actually get it all rewelded, aligned, working and, most importantly looking OK (re-spray?), how safe will it be for actors to use it as a"normal" car? Will it actually function without falling to bits?

You could build a chassis or framework to attach the panels and doors to, though that provides difficulty in that the panels, I believe, are welded not bolted and attachments to them would need to be fabricated, again perfectly aligned for it to work.

 

I was certainly not impugning the crews status as professionals, merely trying to point out that £450 will not get you within a country mile of what your director wants. Doing it with half a dozen brand new bodyshells to play with, unlimited funds, world-class facilities and weeks in which to do it was difficult enough. Trying to do it with a rusted up 20 year old vehicle on a get-in timescale for that budget is being asked too much. A different venue with a realistic budget was my first suggestion but if he will not take a "no" then maybe a "talk to this body-shop" is the answer. They have more experience of what you are attempting than BR members and only cost about £50 an hour.

 

Personally, I would do away with the car and just use a raised framework supporting car seats, www.Find-A-Part.com , www.247Spares.co.uk or your local scrapyard, it would make LX design far simpler as well!

Best of luck with it, let us know the outcome please.

[IRT]

We did Bluebird for our AS level Theatre Studies Production, for which I was SM, LD, SD, (Not being boastful, there was 4 of us, 3 actors, and me therefore I acted as Dogsbody)

 

I got a scrap car from the local scrapyard and they chopped it for me so that all that was left was bonnet, wings, doors and the dash, I then placed two seats on a rostra behind..

 

My car wasn't a Bluebird, but it did the job,

 

So my suggestion is talk nicely to your local breakers, it took half a dozen of us to get it on the stage but once there, it was quite impressive, and no-one would believe it was a real car until they saw it :)

[osal]

and no-one would believe it was a real car until they saw it :)

 

you saying it looked unrealistic

[IRT]

and no-one would believe it was a real car until they saw it :)

 

you saying it looked unrealistic

 

No... What I was saying is that rumours went around the school, but no-one would believe that there was a real car on our stage, until they actually saw it...

 

[sorry for bad grammar and syntax in the first post]