Theatre Design & Technology - Winter 2021 - 10

Fezziwig's holiday party from A Christmas Carol at the McCarter Theatre Center, scenic design by Ming Cho Lee. | Photo © Charles T. Erickson.

York, the sounds that filled the room
would always go silent when we heard
the words " Ming is here. " Sitting in
class feels like a lucid dream-or nightmare, depending on how you look at
it. Moments with Ming were filled with
banter, ideas, never-ending arguments
that took some time to digest and several
tissues for tears later. These experiences
are something one can honestly say are
the most valuable assets one owns. Ming
critiques were brutal, but for a good reason-for you to really look and investigate
what you are producing, and when we
overthink and over-design, all Ming had
to say was " Just do the goddamn play! "
All I can say is ขอบคุณ ๆๆ

Pamela Howard, OBE

Director and Scenographer,
International Chair in Drama, Royal Welsh
College of Music and Drama
Visiting Professor, Arts University Bournemouth
Professor Emeritus, University of the Arts
London
Honorary Fellow, Hong Kong Academy of
Performing Arts

I knew Ming from the mid '60s, initially
through OISTAT. In the mid '70s I was in
New York working in a small theatre in
Greenwich Village on behalf of the great
late Theatre Director Roger Planchon.
It was deep snowy winter. I was living
in Lyon and at the Théatre Nationale
Populaire as an " assistante à la mise-en

10 | THEATRE DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY | WINTER 2021

Asked to define
his concept of
space, Ming
wrote, " An
arena where the
great issues-
of values,
of ethics, of
courage, of
integrity, and of
humanism-are
encountered
and wrestled
with. "

scène. " This was the first and only play of
Planchon's that he has ever allowed to be
done outside France. As soon as I arrived
in New York, I saw it was potentially a disaster and absolutely nothing had been
done. Planchon was due to arrive the following week for final rehearsals and the
opening.
The only thing I could think of was
to call Ming and Betsy and ask their advice. Within 20 minutes, they arrived, assessed the situation, and took me in the
car round Central Park where we picked
up fallen tree branches, collected some
nylon wire from their apartment, went
back to the theatre, and with some minor tech help hung the branches over the
performance space to create the required
forest. Planchon never knew how this
potential disaster had been avoided. We
often laughed about it. Later, Ming invited
me several times to Yale to talk about theatre making and he related this story.
In 2002, the first edition of my book
What is Scenography? was published in
Britain and the U.S. On page 1 of Chapter
1, I asked Ming to define his concept of
space, and he wrote, " An arena where the
great issues-of values, of ethics, of courage, of integrity, and of humanism-are
encountered and wrestled with. "
Those words define the indefinable
Ming Cho Lee.

Theatre Design & Technology - Winter 2021

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