By
Graig Uhlin
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Lighting designer, theater senior Amber Grunwald brings the backstage to center stage
The curtain falls, and as it does, the audience claps and cheers. The actors emerge, taking their bows. Another successful production - this is the magic of theater.
That is, unless you ask Amber Grunwald.
"I think it's a magical place - backstage - and a lot of people don't realize that. It's unfortunate," said the theater arts senior. "I would rather be behind stage than on stage. It gets overlooked a lot what the designers and technicians actually do."
Yet it is overlooked no more - Grunwald joins the ranks of five other Fine Arts seniors when she was named the theater department's Senior of the Year.
"I didn't expect it at all. I didn't even know they did it," Grunwald said.
Finally, Grunwald, who specializes in lighting design, is getting the recognition that she is often denied.
"It's sometimes kind of hard when the actors take their bow and that's who the audience is clapping and cheering for," she said. "But in the back of your mind, you always know that you were a part of the whole process, and you just know that you did make a lasting mark on the production. And you just have to keep that in perspective."
Grunwald, over her four years at the University of Arizona, has worked behind the scenes for many of the department's production. Most recently, she was the master electrician on "Angels in America" and lighting designer for "Dangerous Liaisons," as well as for two one-acts in this past weekend's festival.
Grunwald said her technical work (as electrician) was just as satisfying for her as her more creative work (as lighting designer).
"I really enjoy doing both. Because, on one hand, I really like being on the technical side, where I get to do a lot of hands-on work - touch the instrument, jerk it around, make it work. Troubleshooting - I enjoy doing stuff like that," she said. "But it's also fun and rewarding to actually design something and put your creative self into something as well, and see the fruits of your labors, if you will, on stage and have other people enjoy it."
As a lighting designer, Grunwald works closely with the director of a play in order to bring the text to life. She described the process that she goes through with each production.
"You have a concept (for a play) and you take your concept and your ideas and you translate that into light," she said. "You think about color, you think about angle. You think about mood, feeling. Is it a happy scene? Is it a sad scene? And how do I draw on that? How do I approach that to make it understandable to the audience as well?"
"You don't want a lot of bright light when they're crying," Grunwald added.
Julie Mack, a associate professor of theater who nominated Grunwald for the award, said Grunwald has the potential to become a great lighting designer.
"I think her work is very sensitive and very subtle and very much reinforces the themes of the play she does," Mack said. "She's one of the best students I've ever had."
And, like Mack, does Grunwald think she has deserved the honor?
"Yeah, I think I have. I hope I have," she said. "Because I know I have put a lot into the four years that I've been here. And I know that I've always put a 110% into everything that I do."
Grunwald, who will attend the graduate program at the University of California, Irvine this fall, once again invoked the magic of theater as she explained why she plans to pursue lighting design as a career.
"What's so great, and what is the magic, is having other people really enjoy something and being amazed by something, especially lighting. Which I why I chose that," she said. "I think it's such a great way to express so many things that a lot of people really enjoy and be moved by it."
