Roundabout Theatre Company's Broadway production of The Mystery of Edwin Drood began previews on October 19th. The show opens tonight, November 13th, 2012 at Studio 54 on Broadway. In this show-within-a-show, audiences take a trip back in time to a Victorian music hall where a rowdy ensemble of actors mounts a staging of Charles Dickens's unfinished novel. Studio 54 has been decked out with large images of the Music Hall Royale actors in some of their most famous roles, and BroadwayWorld is excited to debut them below!

Set designer Anna Louizos chatted with us about the inspiration for the decor. She shared: "The idea came from Scott Ellis. One of the things he wanted to do from the very beginning was to make the audience's experience, from the minute they walked through the door at Studio 54, like they were walking into an English musical. It's not only the signage that we created when you walk in, but there's a sense that this is an established institution, and that the troupe of actors that you're about to see are known for their numerous roles from previous productions."

"Then it snowballed, because at first we were going to put people's faces on previous images of old actors from the turn of the century, but that just didn't work. So we set up a photo session. William [Ivey Long] got involved with the costumes, and there was also makeup and hair. It turned into a whole production. We couldn't go half-way. Then we selected the images and Rupert [Holmes] got involved. He got very excited because he got to create these fictitious names roles and plays. Rupert came up with all of that and we cropped and Photoshopped the images to convey the period."

On what's coming next, she added: "We have lots of ideas for what we'd like to do next. One of them is to set up a photo booth where people put their heads through an opening with a painted image. That way the audience can pose inside of the cutouts. That's next on our list of things to do!"

Photos by Kevin Thomas Garcia

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