Having recently painted over the Matilda Letter Blocks, I felt nostalgic and wanted to share their story to ensure they are never forgotten.
In early 2023, while working on Matilda the Musical, we wanted to pay homage to the Broadway stage version by incorporating letters throughout the set, reflecting Matilda’s love for reading. Typically, productions use desks for the schoolroom scene, but with our limited stage and backstage space, we knew desks for 9 kids wouldn't fit. So, we decided to use blocks as desks, and needed letters on them. We also created tiles from pink foam insulation to frame the proscenium, the area of the stage in front of the curtain. With 9 blocks and 4 or 5 sides each, we had up to 45 letters to paint on blocks, but plus at least 50 on the tiles.
First, we had to base coat the block letters and the letter tiles. We wanted the letters to evoke the look of Scrabble tiles, with a wooden background and black letters. Our hardworking tech crew had a fun paint party, applying the primer and then the tan base coat on all the surfaces, covering our black marble paint technique from The Little Mermaid.
Collin Medley painting primer over black marble from The Little Mermaid.
Once we had the basecoat done, we had to find whimsical fonts to project and trace and then paint black on the blocks and tiles. Anna Jo and Leah came to help during a break from school to help get the letters on. It was a long process, but we had the show tunes and conversations flowing.
Leah Linnett and Anna Jo Briggs tracing and painting letters
Once all the letters were finished, we needed to install the tile letters on the proscenium. One of our favorite Sneelocks, our dad, (Sneelock Blog Post) came up with the plan to staple the letters to a black net that he installed in front of the main curtain (the net was originally intended to keep birds off plant). It was virtually unseen from the audience. We used a staple gun to fix the letters to the net. Other than the height being an issue (which was a big issue, with a 10 foot ladder placed carefully next to the edge of the stage which is between 3 & 4 feet off the ground and a 12 foot ladder on the ground to help stabilize the stage ladder for safety.), one challenge we ran into was making sure letters didn’t accidentally spell words that we didn’t want them to spell. (It doesn’t matter how good the production is if we accidentally spell a bad word that people stare at for 2 hours). Each and every letter was carefully selected to only spell words (or look like words) we chose. We did place the colored tiles spelling MATILDA first.
It was a stressful day, but we were thrilled with the results! Good job team!
Our painted block letters were put to good use again in Summer 2023 for We Are Monsters, Tall Tales, and The Addams Family. We enjoyed the creative challenge of finding words that fit each show, often forming fun combinations from the letters we already had. (We did have to tweak a few, such as turning an "I" into an "L," which was an easy fix.) For instance, we used "PULL" (for the song "Pulled") and "DOOM" in The Addams Family.
In Spring 2024, we refreshed the blocks with a new coat of paint for How to Eat Like a Child. Their final appearance was in Madagascar, where we continued to arrange the letters to spell “SHOW” for Showtime!
What adventures will they go on next?
Covering letters July 23, 2024