Staten Island’s landmark St. George Theatre performing arts venue recently invested in 33 Ayrton Khamsin fixtures and 11 Ayrton Huracán Washes for its latest equipment upgrade.
ACT Entertainment is the exclusive distributor of Ayrton lighting fixtures in North America.
The 1,900-seat St. George Theatre opened in 1929 as a movie and vaudeville house whose interior, in a mix of Spanish and Italian Baroque styles, rivalled many Broadway theatres. It was renovated in 2004 and has been hosting educational programs, architectural tours, television and film shoots, concerts, comedy, Broadway touring companies and children’s shows and is noted for near-perfect acoustics.
The theatre’s most recent upgrade, to replace outdated lighting fixtures, saw 15 Ayrton Khamsin units mounted on the FOH truss and 16 Khamsins spread on the third and fourth electric and upstage truss; two more are on hand as spares.
11 Ayrton Huracán Wash fixtures are on the downstage truss and second electric. Barbizon Lighting – New York sold the fixtures to the theatre. David Winnick, Systems Integrator with Barbizon’s System Division, has been freelancing at the St. George for the last few years and assisted with the project.
A multi-million dollar grant from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs enabled the theatre to revamp all of its theatrical lighting. “We hear nothing but great things about Ayrton fixtures, so we frequently suggest them,” said Winnick.
“Khamsins and Huracáns are popular in the performing marketplace and on major tours and will be an asset to the theatre as the new Fall season gets underway.”
Michael Abrams, a Lighting Designer, Programmer and Master Electrician, designed the new rig and served as the theatre’s Head Electrician for the install. He considered Ayrton fixtures “a step up from other brands” when he used them on shows in the past.
“When we received the grant, I looked at [multiple] brands, but what drew me to the Khamsins was the Ayrton brand name and how I consider them a class above the others,” Abrams explained.
“For the theatre, I was looking at the weight of the fixtures as well as the light output. Before, we had PARs and other fixtures that had seen better days, and I wanted to get units that had punch to them. The main function of these units is primarily ‘flash’ or ‘specials.’ So Khamsins, with all of their built-in fun stuff like rotating gobos, animation wheel, prisms and the framing system, definitely fit the bill.”
In specifying the Huracáns, weight and light output were again factors. “But what I really liked about the Huracáns was the framing system as well as the Fresnel lens, making for a wash light output that I would get from a Fresnel plus all of the fun features. With my old system, I didn’t have any strips for our cyc or full black, so I used washes to light it, but, of course, there was still a circle beam.
“With the Huracáns, even though I also purchased strips, I have the opportunity to light them from the front and shutter perfectly without spill. We have also used them for downlight or backlight specials, while still being able to use the Khamsins for the crazy stuff. The gobos in them just make them more fun!”
Abrams pointed out that since “the St. George is mainly a concert venue, I wanted to make sure that the shows coming in, whether they had a lighting package or not, had the opportunity to do a lot in the space. I have gotten great feedback on my choice of Ayrton for the new rig from the lighting designers of incoming shows.”
He noted that the new fixtures are so bright that he typically runs the rig at 50 per cent to achieve “a tolerable level for guests and still have a bright light. So my decision on getting punch from those units definitely was right, and I am thrilled about that. I would rather have something too bright and bring it down than not have enough output. They have been amazing!”
Barbizon Lighting also replaced the theatre’s grandMA2 console with a grandMA3 full-size console with 8-port and 4-port nodes and an RPU. ACT Entertainment is the exclusive North American distributor of MA Lighting products.
“The consensus is that the grandMA3 is the latest and greatest in the market,” declared Winnick. “Incoming tours and shows are most often running on the grandMA3 platform.”
IATSE Local One stagehands performed the install, including Marvin Bernabel, Carolyn O’Brian, Sheldon Lewis, Phil Tabbitas, and Phil Tabbitas, Jr. At the St. George Theatre Pete Mastropaolo is the Operations and Production Manager.
