The Sunday Post, Dundee
By Stevie Gallacher
FOURTEEN tonnes of ice, 2500 litres of anti-freeze, 1.2 miles of pipes and 140 man-hours.
Just some of the key ingredients it takes to bring one of the most beautiful and moving stories to the theatre stage. At least it is in the case of the Imperial Ice Stars' interpretation of one of the world's most famous ballets. That's because these highly-talented dancers need a full ice rink on stage - for Swan Lake On Ice.
Last week the Ice Stars were at Glasgow's Theatre Royal and in April they come to Edinburgh as part of the world tour of the show which has already played to more than 100,000. It features performers who have more than 200 competition medals for ice-skating between them and the stage productios are comparable to a West End show.
Watching the graceful skaters float around the stage it's hard to comprehend the effort involved in getting them there. Artistic Director Tony Mercer explained, "I was producing theatre shows in 1992 when a production company asked if I could put a version on ice." Turning a theatre stage not designed for the purpose into a temporary ice rink is no easy task.
"We're often asked if the rink is real or plastic, but rest assured it's real - there's roughly 14 tonnes of the stuff. It's a bit like a paddling pool. First we lay the wooden rink, which is adapted to fit each theatre, it has wooden sides to prevent water seeping from the sides. It looks a bit like a large baking tray!
"A heavy-duty pool-liner sheet is then laid with a layer of polystyrene on top of that, which helps stop the ice damaging the stage beneath it, and heat getting in from the bottom. Then the pipes - around 1.2 miles long for Glasgow - are laid on top. This is the hardest part. If the spacing of the pipes isn't correct, the ice won't freeze at certain points. Then we'd have some very unhappy Russian skaters!
"Once the pipes are connected we hook them up to chiller units outside the theatre. They pump water and anti-freeze into the pipes and the liquid mix is cooled to around minus 15C. We then pick up around four tonnes of ice from a local supplier to get the process started. That's left overnight and, on the day of the performance, we're left with around three inches of ice.
"The surface is then sprayed and treated throughout the day to ensure the rink is thick and smooth enough. By the evening performance the rink should be in ideal condition. It takes 34 hours from start to finish."
As well as the rink there are 110 costumes and a real working fountain on-stage to cope with! But despite all the hard work there can be mishaps along the way. Tony said, "The skaters can kick up ice and dig in. Just beneath the surface are pipes full of anti-freeze. We've had shows where some ice has been dug up and suddenly everything stops as a beautiful fountain of blue fluid erupts from the stage floor! In those situations we just have to stop the show and get the technicians to fix the leak and re-pack the ice. The audience seem to enjoy that and when it's fixed they erupt in applause!"
Tony, originally from Salford, now lives in Moscow with his partner Albina a costume designer he met white touring with the Imperial Ice Stars. He explained, "You can't have 'ballet on ice'. It'd be like football on an ice rink. It turns into something else. We want to do 'theatre on ice'.
"But I want to move away from the 'bubblegum' image of ice-skating - where ice shows are staged in large arenas with ice rinks. These are fine, but the arenas are like big barns, they can be quite cold and the seats are uncomfortable.
"Once you put it on to a theatre stage with good production values - good sets and great costumes - you can aim for excellence. I'd hope the sets and production values are what you would find in any West End show."