Shelby Parker

LukE Hadsall
Stagecraft Section 01
December 11, 2019

Arcadia Critique

Arcadia by Tom Stoppard is a play that takes place in two separate time periods,
switching back and forth and occasionally overlapping the two. As such, it requires a set
that can function as both present day and 1809 to 1812, without ever actually leaving
Sidley Park, the country house in which the events ensue. Oklahoma City University’s
production of Arcadia was largely successful in conveying this difficult story through
props and costumes that were definitive of each time period, alongside a strong main set
that kept us grounded in the house.

The set design was functionally simple, with flair that made it more interesting to
look at. It consisted of one wall of the house, with two doorways and a window looking
towards the front yard. The sides of the wall appeared to be crumbling away, achieved by
painting jagged pieces of wood the same color as the walls and hanging them from clear
wire. The floor, too, appeared to fade away, as the paint tapered off around two feet from
the edge. Because of these two additions, there was a kind of black border that
surrounded the set, implying that the events being seen were a memory rather than
occurring there before us.

The large table in the middle of the stage was the most crucial part of establishing
theme in the play. As characters move from place to place in their own time periods, they
leave behind remnants of their work or activities, ie. a laptop or a notebook. These items
actually never leave the stage, even as we move to the next scene in which we enter a
different time period. This decision was brilliant, as it keeps the audience engaged in
comparing the lives and values of the two groups we follow throughout the show, and is
especially useful in helping to draw parallels between characters from both periods. By
the end of the show, the table is cluttered with remnants of both periods, and while it may
look haphazard, the audience is able to understand the significance of each and every one
of those items. This ties in neatly with one of the show’s core themes: chaos vs. order,
which is embodied in the scientific concept of entropy.
 The window in the center of the stage is another successful symbol in the show.
The lights coming through the window are never quite realistic, always bleeding into
greens or purples even in the middle of the day. This helps to further the idea of both past
and present versions of Sidley Park being stuck in time: the past period being irreversible
and simply a forgotten memory, and the present period being full of people that spend
their lives agonizing over those very irreversible events. At the end of the play, when
both periods overlap on stage at the same time, the window lights are constantly shifting
from pink to purple to green to orange and bleeding into each other as before. This is to
symbolize the disregard for time here in favor of emotion and love.