The Stage

Women in Lighting teams up with Royal Court to offer lighting designer internship

Published Tuesday 19 January 2010 at 14:10 by Matthew Hemley

EQUAL ROLES: Leading West End lighting designer Paule Constable has teamed up with the Royal Court in London to offer an internship on the venue’s forthcoming production of Laura Wade’s Posh, as part of an initiative aimed at creating more opportunities for women in technical theatre roles.

The placement is being offered through Women in Lighting, the organisation launched by Constable and Sarah Rushton-Read at the end of last year, which aims to provide female theatre technicians with a forum to network and share experiences.

Constable’s placement is the first of several training and mentoring programmes Women in Lighting plan to run over the year, and will allow one young practitioner to see how a production is lit from start to finish.

Starting in April, Constable, who is currently working on Love Never Dies, the sequel to The Phantom of the Opera, said the placement was open to a student or graduate looking to learn how to make the move from working on small fringe productions to larger shows. Both she and Rushton-Read are hoping that other members of Women in Lighting with links to the likes of the National Theatre and Sadler’s Wells will provide similar placements.

“We are going to encourage women in the group to offer to mentor young practitioners or to provide placements and so I have offered one to start the ball rolling,” Constable said.

The pair also hope to work with manufacturers and service providers to offer training using specific lighting equipment and techniques.

“There are a lot of women, who, although technically competent, are not always confident about their technical abilities, because they are working in a male-dominated environment, and that can be intimidating. These training initiatives are about empowering them and making them confident within the workplace,” said Rushton-Read.

Since launching late last year, Women in Lighting has more than 50 members, with some joining from as far away as Israel, Italy and the USA.

Posh will run at the Royal Court Downstairs from April 9 to May 22.

For more information visit www.womeninlighting.com.