Designer Hayley Grindle is determined to make The Bard accessible

Hayley Grindle is one of our brightest and busiest designers but her two current projects couldn’t be more different.

She’s been working with tech wizards imitating the dog on their bold reimagining of the Frankenstein legend and is back at Leeds Playhouse conjuring up the madness of Macbeth directed by her long-time collaborator Amy Leach.

Hayley and Amy have already created acclaimed reworkings of Romeo & Juliet and Hamlet. This time the duo reunite for a second go at one of Shakespeare’s darkest political dramas.

Our Features Editor Paul Clarke caught up with Hayley to talk about the challenges of designing for two very different companies, and how design can draw audiences into even the densest texts.

So, what was your inspiration for Frankenstein given it’s a story that is such a central part of our cultural consciousness?

The first thing is the script they’ve written, and with imitating the dog we work alongside each other. They had the story in mind, and they really wanted there to be a contemporary reference point.

Ok, but how do you bring a story written in the nineteenth century into the modern world?

What we have is a couple, she’s got pregnant, it’s an accident and they’re trying to figure out whether they want to create life, and whether they should bring a child into this world. So, you’ve got Victor Frankenstein who created the creature, and then you’ve got the comparisons of what happened when society didn’t look after that creature. Victor didn’t love that creature, and you see all the things that happened to him, and then you’ve got this couple deciding whether they want to bring life into the world.

And where does Frankenstein’s creation he stitched together from body parts fit into all this?

There’s an additional character of a Shouty Man, which is like a modern-day version of the creature, that is essentially a homeless person who is living outside in the street, uncared for and unloved.

What were the design challenges of bringing to the stage this epic tale of what it means to be human?

In terms of designing the show we’re taking the themes of what happens to humans when we don’t look after each other. That was the route in, and in terms of design I’ve got to be able to conjure the inside of a contemporary flat, and I then have to create a world that is able to be projected on, so that has to be a certain colour. I need to make sure that within that palette we could then conjure a laboratory, and to make sure we could then believe that we’re going to the Arctic landscapes. There’s a big theme of electricity and science in Frankenstein, which I really felt needed to be present.

In contrast, you’ve back at the Playhouse doing Macbeth with Amy Leach, and they are very different productions.

Shakespeare is really hard, and we really wanted it to be as accessible as possible, and really accessible to a young audience as well.

You and Amy have a long standing artistic relationship so what is your process?

One of the things Amy and I will do is we don’t do the script first, we do a really big musical montage to set up what has just happened before we get to the first line.  In Macbeth what you don’t get to read in those first few pages is that Lady Macbeth has lost a baby, so if we understand at the beginning, we understand why she is going mad.

A lot of people would think it would be text first, so how does what is essentially a mixtape help create a visual piece?

With music, no words, we set up the world: this is Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, this is Macduff The Ghost. We introduce there’s been a war, there’s a baby that died. To make it easily accessible is absolutely at the forefront of the storytelling.

And how did the music inspire you?

I listened to this track called Prologue, and then one day I could just see this big earthy landscape and all the characters coming out of the mist and this drawbridge because essentially everyone wants the kingdom. Having this huge drawbridge in the centre of the space that could open and close, and be the mouth of the Kingdom, just felt like absolutely what we needed to place on stage.

I say your version of Macbeth on its first run, and I thought having the drawbridge as the centrepiece of quite a stark stage allowed for both mood and dynamic movement.

It also allows us in that massive Quarry space to create a small space so when the bridge is open, we will have a banquet under it, and in that big space your eye is really focused on that setting. When it’s night time and Macbeth is going to kill Duncan you have all these smaller set ups.

What do you think is your core motivation as a designer?

I think I come at it from function first, how do you tell the story, how do we help the actor, directors tell this story. I don’t put anything into the space that we don’t need, everything I put in we need. I tend to strip back each scene and think about what do I need to tell the story here. I don’t believe anything should get in the way of telling the story, I don’t think anything should be onstage that would hinder that or just look pretty. 

Macbeth is at Leeds Playhouse until Saturday 23rd March. To book 0113 1237700 or www.leedsplayhouse.org.uk

imitating the dog’s Frankenstein is touring. To find out more www.imitatingthedog.co.uk