Theater Duisburg (D) visit 11 March 2015

We were the guest of the DTHG day "regionalgruppe west".
Theater Duisburg is merged together with the Oper Düsseldorf  as Deutsche Oper am Rhein (DOR).

Photos by Ivo Kersmaekers

The building was erected in 1912, but had of course several renovations.
For instance, the foyer is now in the typical 1950s style:

The stage machinery is all from recent date (around the turn of the century)

In the building is still a DC-converter from the 1920s that was used to make DC current for arc lamps, but is still in use to drive precise machines like turntables.

Discussing on operating an arc lamp, the LD of Düsseldorf told us this story:

At the time each lamp had their own technician as the distance between the carbon rods had to be adjusted constantly, as they would be consumed and get shorter by the flame.

According to the older technicians that worked with it, it was not necessary to sit at the spotlight the whole time, but adjust it from time to time.

Asked how much time there was between adjustments, he answered: "about one beer"