While actors are busy memorizing lines and learning choreography, set designer and builder, Ron Horoshko, is performing his most important role. The creative talent behind recent Hawai‘i Children’s Theater productions of “Annie,” “Honk,” “Beauty and the Beast” and the up-coming
While actors are busy memorizing lines and learning choreography, set designer and builder, Ron Horoshko, is performing his most important role. The creative talent behind recent Hawai‘i Children’s Theater productions of “Annie,” “Honk,” “Beauty and the Beast” and the up-coming “Big River” can be spread among many passionate players in the company, yet they don’t truly come together until Horoshko has designed and built the visual world that supports the songs, steps and stories. With the help of several other dedicated volunteers, Horoshko transforms the page to the stage with innovative sets and props, built entirely on-island, by hand and worthy of any repertory theater in the country.
When Horoshko moved to Kaua‘i in 2001 with his wife Mona Clark from Denver, Colo., he had never built a stage set, let alone designed one. Horoshko’s eye for detail and creative inclination comes from his life-long work in painting Ukrainian Easter eggs — the intricately decorated eggs that hold cultural and artistic significance for Orthodox Christians from Eastern and Northern Europe. Wanting to get involved with the community and children of Kaua‘i, Horoshko was encouraged by mentor Arnold Meister, of Hawai‘i Children’s Theater who invited him to contribute both on and off stage.
“I really am so grateful to Arnold,” said Horoshko, “he believed I could do it and trusted me. He is a real visionary and with his leadership, Hawai‘i Children’s Theater has grown immensely in the past five years.” Taking each project step-by-step, Horoshko has since built some of HCT’s most memorable sets. “With ‘Annie’ people started to realize what was possible. I had designed a wall that completely flipped over, so that the inside of the orphanage became the outside just by turning the whole thing on it’s axis — you could hear the audience gasp when they saw that,” Horoshko said smiling.
“You could throw something together in two weeks, but it would show. We’re not doing high school level shows — these sets have taken me from seven months to a year each, and you can see it in the final product.” Horoshko explained the intricate process of planning, designing, and then building the physical structures that often include engineering and kinetic elements. For the upcoming production of “Big River,” based on Mark Twain’s “Huckleberry Finn,” directed by Ed Eaton, Horoshko will be bringing two extraordinary elements to the HCT stage for the first time.
“The most exciting thing we’re doing for this design is to incorporate real water into the set,” Horoshko showed how the front edge of the stage will be turned into an infinity edge of flowing water, falling into a recycling pool set in the orchestra pit. “We have also purchased a scrim from California … it will be the first on Kaua‘i.”
The scrim will be used to add depth and drama to the upstage forest. It will also be used to silhouette the gospel chorus singing in the back.
Horoshko depends on the willing hands of several volunteers, “Obviously one person can’t do this alone, it wouldn’t get built if it wasn’t for our amazing volunteers,” including David Perugini, Martha Hodges, Teng Schorr, Steve Whitney, Ernie Black, Les Ward and Mona Clark. Recovering from a serious surgery to his knee, Horoshko will be more hands-off than ever before, “I guess I’ll be doing a lot of supervising, like on a construction site.”
Horoshko has the scaled-down model of ‘Big River’ ready to be unveiled to the production crew next week — “no one has seen it yet, but I’m really excited about this one. Ed Eaton, the director, has really given me freedom to design, along with solid direction of what he needs.” With a transformative bridge and raft, made to move and act as several essential elements of the story, Horoshko enjoys problem solving as much as designing.
“It’s really all about the kids. I’m on the board of HCT and so I do this as a volunteer. All of it. But I love it. It’s so worth it. When it’s built and the actors are using the sets, it just comes alive.” Horoshko, an actor in his own right, puts emphasis on how the actors will use and feel in the space he designs, “I understand it all from an actor’s perspective, because acting is what I actually love the most.”
“I try to build ‘live sets’ or ‘living sets’ — things that really work, or really move,” he said. “It’s a process and it doesn’t happen overnight. The bridge we are going to use for ‘Big River’ will take at least two weeks to build. And that’s just the bridge. For ‘Beauty & The Beast’ we had 39 pieces. It all has to be right, I’m a real purist.”
After introducing the joys of stage craft to fellow volunteer Teng Schorr during the building of “Honk Jr.” for Kalaheo School, Schorr became addicted to the process. “To see something come alive, from concept to being, and then how the kids have so much fun living in that world, it’s all worth it… Your ‘pay’ comes from the children’s joy, it’s a deep fulfillment,” said Schorr, who stopped by to see Horoshko’s model for “Big River.” “If it wasn’t volunteer, it would turn into ‘work’,” she said.
Horoshko expressed his gratitude to Debra Blachowiak and Arnold Meister for giving him the opportunity to get so involved with kids and the community. “I give so much of my time to this, just because I am so inspired by all these people. My wonderful wife is an amazing support, I couldn’t do it without her. I didn’t know I had this in me, but Arnold made me feel comfortable and free. And I can’t believe what we’ve been able to accomplish. I know it will keep growing.”
Horoshko added, “We live on an island. We’re not fortunate to have all the same resources that California has — instead, we have the people. Talented and generous people who work together and make amazing things come to life.”
