The Making of Joseph's "Chariot of Gold"
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The “pattern” –
Tutankhamen’s Chariot |
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The template, based on 2 existing cart wheels, some
cardboard held to the curve of a cardboard base shape by
chariot-maker’s apprentice Chris Hanford, and a broom |
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Bison Board attached to the
wooden base, in turn attached to the wooden
T-bar |
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The underbelly of theatre magic |
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Quote “Chariot bottom. Ooh, it’s the same size as
mine” |
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Covering the rough top edge with Dacron &
fabric, to give the rounded shape, and prevent snagging of Joseph’s coat |
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Masking tape to smooth the inner edge of the cutout |
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PVA glue and tissue paper, to give a good seal for
painting and give a textured surface to provide a better finish for the final
gold |
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Chipboard reinforcing at vulnerable corners and
edges, which also provided something to secure the Bison board to |
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Chris concentrating. Lots of tissue paper and
glue! |
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Just like wall-papering |
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Lots and lots of tissue paper |
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More tissue paper and concentration |
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This takes a lot of time |
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A curtain rod end, and nylon “stripping”
to provide the harness look when painted – again emphasizing texture
for stage use |
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The metal axle is attached under the wooden T-bar |
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Strangely, an olive green undercoat is best for gold,
not black |
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Plus felt washers |
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The first of several coats of gold spray |
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Gold paint hides a multitude of sins |
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Two cast members were to pull the chariot
onstage. Gold painted rope allowed
them to keep the base of the chariot flat when Joseph was in it |
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The original King Tut
version represented a wicker chariot. The
real chariots were made of wicker for lightness. This chair wicker was glued on, and the
edge left deliberately frayed, but it was trimmed below the edge of the hand
rail to prevent costumes catching |
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The sun gave a good idea of how it would look under
stage lighting. I covered the side
openings with the view to recycling the cane work in the future, as there was
still a visual hole |
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The original had elaborate decoration on the inside.
Although this view would probably not be seen, I added the scarab decoration
(plastic for shine, felt pen outline for definition) just in case the
director left it where the audience would see the innards. He didn’t! It was still right to decorate it |
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The original King Tut chariot
had lion heads on the back base of the floor plate. These were made from 2 tiny cheap dolls
wrapped in glue & tissue paper, with masking tape as the “Menes” head-dress.
The dolls were sucking a finger, but like this, looked as if they were
wearing ceremonial beards. Spraying
them gold transformed them. I had
difficulty attaching them to the gold painted chariot, and with the time constraints,
decided to discard them |
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Waiting in performance. Note I decided to cut the wicker and leave
the side openings as per the original pattern, which made it much
“lighter” in appearance |
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A few years later, the director of “70, Girls,
70” wanted to use the chariot for the dead leading lady to return from
death in the finale. He was happy to
use the gold version, but I convinced him the Inigo
Jones look would be more appropriate.
The cloud-like fabric on the front of the chariot was a lurex stretch fabric.
The rope pulling apparatus was changed to a more appropriate wooden
T-bar in this instance, and layers of Dacron represented clouds |
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The inner swagged fabric was dark blue sequins for
night sky overtones. Removing the
fabric and re-applying a coat of gold spray would return the whole thing to
the “Joseph” state. |
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