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Set and Staging

In the film Reservoir Dogs, the entire movie -- barring "flashbacks" and the opening scene -- largely takes place in one location: the warehouse. I have chosen to remain faithful to that aspect in Reservoir Dogs the Musical. 

During the opening number, "Just the Tip," the entire stage is empty save for a simple diner set. There is a table, around which sit Mr. Orange, Mr. White, Mr. Blonde, Mr. Pink, Mr. Brown, Mr. Blue, Nice Guy Eddie, and Joe Cabot. They do their song and dance and then there is a full blackout. When the lights come back on, the diner set is off and replaced with the warehouse set: walls and a ramp set up at an angle to the audience. On stage right, there is the bathroom that Mr. White and Mr. Pink chat in near the beginning of the film. It is followed shortly by the ramp. On stage left there are two double doors leading offstage. Across the room are scattered various tarps and crates and other assorted set decoration to make it look like an abandoned warehouse.

This set remains onstage throughout the entirety of the rest of the show. It does not change for any "flashbacks." However, there is a sort of catwalk or raised walkway upstage (similar to the one in Hamilton). It is raised higher than the warehouse walls because what takes place there exists on a plane outside of the warehouse. This is where the "flashbacks" will be acted out by the some actors, while others talk or sing about them below.

For instance, during the song "The Commode Story," Holdaway, Joe, and Mr. White all appear. They will be playing their roles up on the walkway. Down below, Mr. Orange is singing his part in the song. But since Mr. Orange also appears in the "flashback," an auxiliary Mr. Orange played by a member of the ensemble will be going through the motions up on the walkway with the other characters. 

I use the term "flashback" loosely because Quentin Tarantino himself does not see those scenes that way. "It's not a flashback," he is quoted as saying in Jeffrey Dawson's book Quentin Tarantino: The Cinema of Cool. "Novels go back and forth all the time. […] Flashbacks, as far as I'm concerned, come from a personal perspective. These aren't, they're coming from a narrative perspective." In the film, it is not simply one character having a personal moment of remembering something. It is the entire story being physically rewound to tell a different portion. So while it is technically "flashing back," it does not reflect the literary meaning of the term "flashback," because it is not a memory. It is the actual scene happening for the first time.

This is why I chose to portray these scenes simultaneous to the main storyline. During Mr. Blonde's backstory, for instance, he is telling Mr. Pink and Mr. White what's going on. As he does so, we can see Joe, Eddie, and auxiliary Mr. Blonde up on the walkway acting it out. Joe and Eddie are speaking their lines. But auxiliary Mr. Blonde is silent. He simply acts out principal Mr. Blonde's narration. 

Similar things will happen many times throughout the show: Mr. White's backstory, for instance. Also Mr. Orange's backstory, which encompasses songs such as "The Commode Story" and "Mirror." 

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