Longtime Tisch Professor Allen Lee Hughes Illuminates a More Diverse “‘Our Town’ for Our Time”

Professor Allen Lee Hughes designed the lighting for the new Broadway revival of "Our Town." Photo by Jonathan King.

After a career spanning five decades and just about every major theater in the country, acclaimed lighting designer and Tisch School of the Arts Professor Allen Lee Hughes has finally put his mark on the American classic Our Town.

Working with a frequent collaborator, director Kenny Leon, Hughes is a member of the design team behind the limited-run production of Thornton Wilder's beloved play that opened on October 10 at Broadway's Barrymore Theatre. Billed as "an Our Town for our time," the production stars Jim Parsons, Richard Thomas, Katie Holmes, and Ephraim Sykes.

Leon's updated vision for the people and relationships of Grover's Corners-Our Town's fictional setting-reveals insights about truth, love, and death that resonate more than 80 years after the play was written.

"In this seemingly simple viewing of life in this town, we get insight into our own lives," Hughes says.

Hughes grew up in Washington, D.C., and after graduating from Catholic University, he began working at D.C.'s Arena Stage, a leading regional theater. In 1976, he moved to New York and enrolled in NYU's MFA program. He graduated three years later and spent the next two decades designing in theaters in New York and around the country.

He has worked on Broadway, at the Kennedy Center, the Mark Taper Forum, and the Guthrie, Long Wharf, and Goodman theaters. He has designed productions ranging from classics such Hamlet and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf to K2, Crowns, and The Tap Dance Kid.

The fifth Broadway revival of the 1938 Pulitzer Prize-winning play marks his second Broadway production this year, following the revival of Home that opened in June at the Todd Haines Theater.

Jim Parsons and the cast of 'Our Town,' at the Barrymore Theatre. Photo by Daniel Rader.

Hughes has been praised for his naturalistic designs, which the New York Times has described as "stunning," "ingenious," and "grand." Since 2001, he has been an arts professor in the Tisch School of the Arts, where he has taught and mentored a generation of theater artists.

A storyteller at heart, Hughes describes himself as a performance-based designer whose creative philosophy starts with the idea that lighting should enhance the story. The veteran designer and teacher spoke with NYU News earlier this month about his pioneering career, his decades teaching, and how lighting design has evolved since his first job running a follow spot in Washington, D.C.

How did you come to join the creative team for Our Town?

The director pretty much hires the team, and I love working with Kenny. I think the first time that I worked with Kenny Leon was when he hired me to be the resident lighting designer on August Wilson's 20^th Century Readings at the Kennedy Center in 2008. Since then, we have done a number of shows, including A Soldier's Play, Topdog/Underdog, and Home.

What sets this production apart?

In this production, we dispense with some elements that you expect when you think of the play, like ladders, church window projections, and intermissions. We also have very diverse casting.

How does your design contribute to Leon's vision?

I'm a designer who wants to see the performers. Selective visibility is the first function of lighting. That means seeing what you want the audience to see and hiding what you don't want them to see. Having a diverse cast means not everyone gets the same amount of light. Part of my job is to balance the actors. Another part involves the story: establishing what time of day it is, or where we are-a room, a street. That's another function of lighting.

me with pride. We prepare students by opening their minds to problem solving, to coming up with a point of view.

You came to New York from Washington, D.C.'s Arena Stage, a renowned theater founded by Zelda Fichandler, the former chair of NYU Graduate Acting who started a fellowship program in your name. Tell me about that.

Zelda was an example of an excellent leader both at Arena and NYU. She had this philosophy that she takes criticism and puts it on her to-do list. We're in a time when people are not so good at taking criticism, and I think hers was a great philosophy. The fellowship came out of that philosophy of being criticized and doing something about it. Zelda started the fellowship in 1990 to provide opportunities and professional training for people who were underrepresented in all aspects of theater.

What are the criteria that you consider when deciding which shows to take on?

The timing, the director, the reputation of the theater (if it is not Broadway), the play, the people working on it.

Since you started, you've witnessed dramatic changes, especially in the technology you use.

The technology of the field has definitely changed over the five decades. The first big revolution was the introduction of computer light boards. The first Broadway show that I worked on had piano boards run by two men. These were huge machines that resembled upright pianos. Tharon Musser was the first to use a computer on Broadway with A Chorus Line (in 1975). We are going through another technological revolution right now with LED technology. Our Town was the first show that I used all LED equipment on.

Have there been other significant changes?

The COVID epidemic hit theaters hard, especially regional theaters, and they have not fully recovered. They are tending to use local people as opposed to bringing in New York designers, and they look to artists to make great sacrifices. Also, the diversity of people in the field has improved, but certainly could be much better. When I started, there were not many Black designers. Shirley Prendergast was the only lighting designer I can think of. She was the first Black woman to do the lighting design on Broadway in 1973.