Ah- so glad to be back at the Old Globe!  And such an AMAZING play to be back with.  It’s the kind of play you long for as a sound designer- amazing story, fully developed characters, a touch of magic in the middle of a play grounded in reality. There are moments in which the characters fully enter their imagination through music and dance.  Matthew is seriously channeling Tennessee Williams with this one!

The play takes place within a Puerto Rican family in New York in 1959/ 1960 as their neighborhood is being torn down to make way for Lincoln Center.  The music for this one is gong to be fantastic- zigging from Bernstein to the zags of Tito Puente and Tito Rodríguez to bopping with Mingus and being with Spike Jones.

WORLD PREMIERE
Sheryl and Harvey White Theatre at the Old Globe, San Diego

• Written by Matthew Lopez
• Directed by Giovanna Sardelli
• Choreography by Greg Graham
• Scenic Design by Campbell Baird
• Costume Design by Charlotte Devaux
• Lighting Design by Lap Chi Chu
• Sound Design by Jeremy J. Lee
• Featuring:
  • Juan Javier Cardenas
  • Benita Robledo
  • Priscilla Lopez
  • Jon Rua
  • Leo Ash Evens

• Manipulation by Victoria E. Calderon
• Directed by Marilyn Fried
• Sets by Bill Stabile
• Costumes by Alejo Vietti
• Lights by Kirk Bookman
• Sound and Music by Jeremy J Lee

His name is Lucas, and he’s the new master around here.  He’s almost 2, coinciding with when I stopped posting here.  Wonder why that could be…

So, forgive me, and let’s try this again!

This was my second design for LAByrinth Theatre Company.  It was a wild ride indeed- but that’s what they’re known for!  It’s a story about 3 half-siblings that share a father.  He’s dying, and they have to come to terms with their relationship to him, each other, and his new girlfriend.

In true LAB style, the cast was absolutely fantastic.  They really carried the show, and our job was to get out of their way.

• Written by Melissa Ross
• Directed by Mimi O’Donnell
• Sets by Lee Savage
• Costumes by Bobby Frederick Tilley II
• Sound and Music by Jeremy J Lee

• Featuring
  • ELIZABETH CANAVAN
  • STEPHEN ELLIS
  • LISA JOYCE
  • MEGAN MOSTYN-BROWN
  • ALFREDO NARCISO
  • DEIRDRE O’CONNELL
  • AARON ROMAN WEINER
  • DAVID ZAYAS

The first half or so of the play was found music and soundscape/ FX which don’t translate terribly well outside of the theatre.  So here’s a couple of the little transition pieces that I wrote for the 2nd half.

Into the Living Room:

Into the hospital parking lot:

Into the coffee shop:

And my favorite outtake of the year so far:

The Ohmies was a major undertaking for all of us.  It’s a children’s musical unlike any other.  Part entertainment, and part getting kids to have fun moving, dancing, singing and even doing… Yoga!  We hope that this is going to turn into something really big.

The first installment of this piece was at the Daryl Roth theatre on Union Square.  We were sharing it with Fuerza Bruta- High powered rave dance party in the evening, and butterflies doing yoga in the morning.  Fantastic!

• Created by Laurie Miller and Ben Tollefson
• Produced by Seth Goldstein and Robert Gore
• Choreography by Amy E. Hall
• Production Design by Laura Brock
• Costumes by Tracy Christensen
• Sound by Jeremy J Lee
• Lights by Jonathan Spencer

The show was a blast to work on!  I had my hands full both with the design itself, and all the music playback editing and mixing as well.  It was a lot of work, but we all had a great time with it.  I hope this show has multiple lives, and we get to return to Ohmland!

January 2011 found me in San Diego at the Old Globe Theatre working on Death of a Salesman.  Really- what could be better?  That would be working on it with Pam MacKinnon, of course!  What a fantastic debut at the Globe.  Amazing cast, fantastic creative team, wonderful play, and a lovely new theatre.

We managed to create a very intimate production of this epic play, and I think it served the story well.  Many times this play can devolve into a cast of very angry people, rather than ones that are stuck in their lives and don’t know how to get unstuck. Jeffrey DeMunn as Willy and Robin Moseley as Linda were simply amazing storytellers, and they took us right into their worlds.  The rest of the cast was equally up to the task.

I hope to be back at the Globe soon- especially in January!

• Directed by Pam MacKinnon
• Scenic Design by Marion Williams
• Costume Design by Mathew J. LeFebvre
• Lighting Design by Rui Rita
• Sound Design by Jeremy J. Lee

NYMF.  The word gives people who work in the theatre hives just thinking about it. But how could I resist these 2 shows?!

MMLJWW is a great show, with a lot of potential to do something big.  I got to work with my friend Ethan Popp (Musical Director) and meet a lot of great people like Stafford Arima and Sonny Paladino on the creative team, and Liz Larsen and Ann Harada onstage.  Lovely people all, and a really good show with a lot of heart that I hope to see doing more in the future.

Above Hell’s Kitchen is a bit of a rock and roll version of Don Juan In Hell.  And, yeah, the music is awesome. Jonathan Spottiswoode wrote the piece and starred in it, with Riley McMahon leading the band.  Some fantastic actors and singers, as well as a great band doing theatre for the first time.

I had forsaken NYMF for 5 years, but these shows made the return worthwhile.  But it’s going to have to be a really great show to get me on another one next year!

Rich And Famous

by John Guare

• Directed by John Rando
• Sets by Scott Bradley
• Costumes by Gregory Gale
• Lights by Alex Nichols
• Sound by Jeremy J Lee
• Music Direction by Laura Burton
• Produced by American Conservatory Theater, San Francisco
  

Cast:

• Brooks Ashmanskas
• Mary Birdsong
• Stephen DeRosa
• Gregory Wallace

It was a wonderful production of a wonderful play with wonderful people.  What more could you ask for?  I liked the Lectrosonics wireless system so much, that they did a press release on it:

Jeremy J Lee & Lectrosonics

Then it was straight on to Iowa…

By Lanford Wilson

• Directed by Pam MacKinnon
• Sets by Marion Williams
• Costumes by Theresa Squire
• Lights by David Lander
• Sound and Music by Jeremy J Lee
• Produced at the Juilliard School
  

This was a fun show to revisit.  The first show I ever worked on in NY was Jim Houghton’s production at the Union Square Theatre in 2002.  We came to NYC that summer to visit friends, and ended up staying for a few months to see if it was a place we could be comfortable living.  We fell even more in love with the city, and moved here as soon as we could.

In 2002, I was the assistant designer to Rob Kaplowitz.  This time I wrote all of the music, which was a great time and challenge.  Pam and I decided on jazz as a medium.  The play is about friendship, grief, love, and the crazy tumble of passion.  But mostly about recovering from the loss of a friend and brother.  But we didn’t want to wallow in sentimentality.  We wanted to be interesting, but not get in the way of the story.  I think we did that.

Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner

By Luis Alfaro

• Directed by Tracy Young
• Sets by Robert Brill
• Costumes by Nephelie Andonyadis
• Lights by Russell Champa
• Sound & Music by Jeremy J Lee
• Produced at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Bill Rauch Artistic Director