The stage that spins: Theatre program brings one-of-a-kind set to life

The wooden structure on the main stage of Helfaer Theatre looks like a plywood bicycle wheel. Precisely cut planks bridge the gap between the wheel's outer rim and its center cap. The revolving stage measures 24 feet across, three times as large as any structure of its kind that Professor Stephen Hudson-Mairet has built before.

"I've been thinking about this for months, planning it, trying to envision how it's going to work," Hudson-Mairet says.

It's a necessary endeavor for Marquette Theatre's upcoming production of "Noises Off," a farcical comedy written in 1982 by English playwright Michael Frayn. The show details the production process of a fictional play called "Nothing On," switching back and forth between the perspectives of actors "on stage" performing the fictional show and those "off stage." To produce "Noises Off," theatre companies must build a rotating set to showcase both settings simultaneously.

Hudson-Mairet knew the play would be a challenge the minute it was announced as the finale for the theatre company's 2025-26 season. The show's comedic style is highly physical, with pratfalls and prop mishaps that take a lot of training to pull off in a believable way. And then there's the issue of the stage, an obstacle that Hudson-Mairet calls "the biggest technical challenge we've had in many years."

"You have to solve for how you're going to do that on-stage-to-off-stage transition," Hudson-Mairet says. "Some people will build small wagons for the set pieces to wheel on. Others have a revolving stage with the set built in. We chose to construct our own revolving stage that will spin 360 degrees, then build a set on top of it. That involved heavy research and development."

It also involved quite some time in the Discovery Learning Center shop. Tom Silman, the operations engineer for the Opus College of Engineering, spends his days helping engineering students and others across campus fabricate the parts they need to complete their projects. Over his more than two decades at Marquette, the Discovery Learning Center has fabricated parts for everything from prosthetic limbs to x-ray phantoms to large structural bearings to Antarctic telescopes.

"It's one of the funniest shows I've ever seen. I'm really excited about how it will highlight the skills of our students."

He'd still never gotten a request quite like the one Hudson-Mairet brought him.

"The theatre is using plywood for this project, and that's something we don't normally use," Silman says.

Silman used a CNC router to carve sheets of plywood to the exact specifications of the mechanical drawing that Hudson-Mairet provided. Silman bolted the sheets down so it wouldn't move once on the machine: just one connecting piece being off by half of a degree would be enough to prevent the stage from rotating. It took two days to cut every component to exact specifications.

While this request may be an unusual one from the theatre department, collaboration with departments across campus is not. Earlier this spring, theatre and digital media came together to produce a TV pilot for a show called "The Interns," marking the first time Marquette Theatre has done a TV project as a formal part of its theater season. Theatre has also reached beyond its walls when actors need more context on the historical events surrounding a show, such as their collaboration with campus LGBTQ advocacy organizations during a production of "The Laramie Project."

"Each show brings a different opportunity to collaborate," Hudson-Mairet says. "We want to have faculty creating the art form alongside our students, and that's obviously going to look different for every show."

Once Hudson-Mairet received the materials, assembly proceeded quickly thanks to a small army of two dozen students, some of whom are employed in the theatre's scene shop and some of whom are enrolled in the department's stagecraft class. These students worked together to cut, drill and attach all the pieces.

At Marquette, it's a given that students will learn how to build, paint and light a set. However, that's not something that happens at every school. Many other theatre programs offer Bachelor of Fine Arts degrees, which asks students to specialize in discrete areas such as acting or tech. Marquette's Bachelor of Arts program instead requires students to engage with every aspect of putting on a theatre production.

"Everyone here takes stagecraft; everyone here takes acting; there are required courses in theatre history and costume technology," Hudson-Mairet says. "We try to create theatre artists who have a broad base. You end up understanding what the whole art form entails, and that makes you a stronger artist when you graduate."

Hudson-Mairet can't wait for audiences to see all that his students have learned when "Noises Off" takes the (revolving) stage.

"It's one of the funniest shows I've ever seen. I'm really excited about how it will highlight the skills of our students," Hudson-Mairet says.

Helfaer Theatre's production of "Noises Off" will run from April 17 to April 26. Tickets are available through the theatre website.