Never Yell Fire In A Crowded Insurance Agency

Posted on by Jon Sewell

Guest Blog Post by Marcos Duran

[Editor’s Note: Marcos Duran is a Seattle area artist and musician who has been gracious enough to work with us at Eleusyve Production starting in 2007 with The Rite of Venus. At our request today’s post is the story of how he developed one of our most interesting set pieces, the altar/hellbroth from The Rite of Saturn. Seeing as it features so prominently in the our first look video posted last Monday, it is fun to shed a little light on how it was done. In addition to props and set building, Marcos also appeared on stage for The Rite of Sol, and has regularly been integral to the entire production process, from attending planning meetings and adding his voice to the soundtrack, to providing playback for rehearsals, to being stage hand and musical instrument wrangler throughout the theatrical runs.]

Lighting the Hellbroth

Fire is expensive.  You wouldn’t think to look at the stuff you can make fire with, nor how easy it is to set one, but fire is terribly expensive… at least if you’re trying to put it on a stage inside a building where more than two people are going to witness it.   So.. ok.. Maybe not the fire itself. But the insurance you need for most venues to cover open flame on a stage is much more than a self-funded amateur theater company is going to have on hand. So… you have to improvise.

I’m Marcos Duran, prop-master for Eleusyve productions, and having participated in nearly all of the Eleusyve renditions of the Rites of Eleusis, I’ve come to learn a little something about fake fire.  Over the years, we’ve employed various tricks and methods to approximate fire or flame like things. Even incense, which is still open flame, cannot be used, so we’ve managed our old favorite standby: dry ice and boiling water.  We’ve used colored lights. But for our production of The Rite of Saturn, fire was going to play a center role in a lot of scenes and we needed to come up with something more interesting.

Fake fire in the theater world where there needs to be visible flame generally only takes a couple of forms.  The first is fan-blown dyed silks that are lit from below. With the proper weight of silk fabric and the right colors of dyes and lights, this effect is actually pretty decent.  The silks wave and ripple in the fans and make for a pretty good prop. The only problem is that fans make noise, and when you’re recording your audio live from the stage, any extraneous sounds, especially if they would mask dialog or singing in any way, are right out.

Digging around, I stumbled on a different technique that I also found out has commercial backing.  It turns out that when you blow a diffuse water vapor mist through a set of appropriate colored lights, the reflection of that light through the mist and as it tapers off into the air make an impressive demonstration of believable flames.  A great source for fine water vapor is an ultrasonic humidifier, and they generate the volume of mist needed without any noticeable sound. This technique is used commercially for no-fire fireplace inserts as well as large fire-like effects indoors for casinos and other large installations.

Here is an example of the effect:

I found a video of a prop guy building out a version of this kind of fake fire, and I decided to work with his techniques to build our own fire altar.

I picked up a test humidifier, and with a combination of tubing and some LED christmas lights, I was able to see the effect on a very small scale, so I knew if we could ramp it up, we might have something.

Here is what that test looked like:

The YouTube video included plumbing out two separate humidifiers to create enough mist to make a decent size faux fire, so I picked up another humidifier and some PVC piping and fittings along with a chunk of flexible marine tubing.  The builder in the video used theater lighting cans to light the mist, and I didn’t have those available to me at the time of testing, but I picked up some strip LED lighting to attempt to build a lighting rig. Once I was able to collect mist from two humidifiers set at their highest level, I was able to get enough pressure to create the flow we needed.

To diffuse the mist, I took a straight length of piping, just like in the video, and drilled holes at short intervals along one line.  This worked ok for a short time, but it was apparent that there were going to be some challenges. Water vapor would condense at the holes in the pipe, and over time due to the water surface tension, a droplet would form and completely block the hole.  I tried a few techniques to see if I could find a way to lower the surface tension so this would stop, but what ultimately happened was that I created larger openings that took the form of slots instead of holes. This allowed the vapor to escape and it allowed the condensation to collect in a way that did not impact the pressure of the vapor.  Another issue that came up was the fact that the diffuser tube was just too narrow to allow the vapor to spread well, so instead, larger diameter tubing and fittings were arranged and the slots were once again cut into the tube. This combination allowed us to get a fairly large and directed cloud of mist.

Lighting this cloud became a different challenge.  The LED strip lights were definitely not bright enough.  The light needed to be bright enough to reach high into the vapor cloud, so I began searching for alternatives.   I stuck with LED mostly for safety. The cooler temperatures ensured that we wouldn’t have to get creative with cooling or other heat-related considerations when deciding on how to color the lights or how to enclose this assembly.  I found two 3-light spotlight style lighting fixtures such that you would use in a living space to highlight a wall or a piece of art, and configured them with 600 lumen LED spot lights. I put one fixture on each side of the diffuser tube, inverted and angled so that the light would hit the wall of mist from underneath and at a focal point of about 2 feet above the deck.  One of the advantages of focusing the lights this way was to also provide stage lighting on actors who were performing around the fire altar. As they approached the fire altar, they would glow and light up as though from the light of a real fire. It was a neat effect!

Lighting color became an important piece.  If you use the wrong color gels, the effect does not look like natural fire.  I did experiment for the sake of “science” with some alternatives, and it is possible to do some really interesting effects that are fire-like but very definitely not natural.  


Here is what it looks like with red gels.  A nifty effect, but definitely not natural!  

The original reference YouTube video suggested that a mix of yellow and orange gels work best and that red is not advised.  In my case, I discovered that the color temperature of my LED spot lights was cold enough that the yellow gels didn’t offer much to the effect, so I went strictly with an orange colored gel that I ended up doubling to increase the color saturation.  

Rigging the gels was one of the most fiddly parts of the rig because I did not have a good pre-built solution.  I ended up building a wire framework to hold the gels over the bulbs. It is the one piece of the puzzle that I will eventually rebuild if I bring out this prop again.

We ended up housing all of the equipment inside one of the base units from our old, well-painted friends, the obelisks.  These are the sames obelisks that have enjoyed a role in nearly all of the Eleusyve Rites of Eleusis productions. The base offered plenty of room for all the equipment and gave us a structure for our fire altar.  One of the face panels of the base was removed to allow access to the equipment, and a deck was made to cover the top except for about a 4 inch wide slot that ran the length of the middle from where the mist would escape.  The mist rose and the lighting seemed to be working, but we needed a little extra force on the mist, so a small personal fan was installed beneath the diffuser tube to blow the mist up and out. This addition made the difference!  It didn’t add appreciable noise, and in testing we were able to get some impressive flame-like effects. All of this was routed into a power strip inside the obelisk, and an extension was run to our lighting relays so that the effect could be controlled from the board.

Here is the initial test of the fully assembled rig:

The one consideration in the design that did get missed was the need for supply air venting for the fan.  This problem wasn’t noticed until we were in the theater space, the unit installed, and the equipment hatch closed up.  The fan had no source to pull in air and lost pressure, and as a result, the flames were not very high. I spent most of the production run battling this issue with various solutions including cutting holes into the floor of our set in order to provide the necessary venting. Thankfully, we figured it out in the end!

All in all, the piece had the desired effect, and we had amazing fire on stage!  All this for around $100 plus the enclosure. It was relatively easy to build, and mostly easy to maintain.  Adding it to the lighting relays, we were able to turn it on and off at will, and that added to the mystery of it.  

Final look before installation in the theater:

This was a fun build, and it was extremely well received!  I would highly recommend this as a great solution to bringing a larger fire to your stage production.  It will keep your insurance agency and your pocketbooks at bay.

Special Moments in Rites of Eleusis History

Posted on by Jon Sewell

A Guest Post by Sister Lita-Luise Chappell

[This post was provided to me by Sister Lita at my request. I will be hosting guest posts here from time to time. If you would like to provide content, please reach out and let me know! -editor]

In early 2015, an email of inquiry went out to all O.T.O. Grand Masters, Frater Superior Representatives, and as many Masters and Secretaries of each local body around the world. Had they or any of their predecessors presented the Rites of Eleusis? If so, please respond. All the information about those rites would contribute to our Order’s overall knowledge of how well Crowley’s works had stimulated his inheritors. The response received was nothing short of amazing, and that information was presented at the Centennial Conference in Vancouver, Canada, in May of 2015.

As the information came flooding back, an Excel was produced, listing each country, the name of the local body, the date performed, which rite was presented, and any commentary about the event. The total number of performances came in at just over 600! A copy of the presentation can be found in the last chapter of the centennial celebration volume of Success is Your Proof.

Success is your Proof

Most Thelemites who have read about Aleister Crowley’s Rites of Eleusis, know that those first seven performances were held at Caxton Hall in London in 1910. However, the rites would not gain the attention they deserved for almost seventy years. That is, until 1979 when Agape Lodge No. 2 in Hollywood, introduced their members to Crowley’s Eleusis series, by informally doing readings of the rites. Thereafter, interest widely spread around the world.

What the presentation and chapter on the Rites did not include, due to time and space constraints, were some of the additional comments offered when these rites were reported. Some of the comments spoke of interesting people that participated, and some of them were anecdotes of fun and scary things that happened. It is some of those comments which I found most fascinating and will herein share a few of them. For instance, Grady McMurtry served as Magister Templi for the Rite of Saturn for Thelema Lodge in October of 1982. Lola de Wolfe hosted a Rite of Saturn in June of 1983 at her home near Mt. Diablo. An original cast member from the Broadway production of Hair acted in the Rite of Saturn, sponsored by Thelema Lodge in 1985. Even Hymenaeus Beta contributed some original poetry of Harry Crosby, for a Rite of Sol.

There were mishaps, too. At a Rite of Mars presented by Camp 23 in the U.S. in 1980, they reported that they had placed a cauldron on stage for a burning fire, but during the presentation the cauldron tipped over and sent up dramatic tall flames. It wildly impressed the audience, who thought it was part of the play, but it was not. The fire did not last long, but the floor got pretty burned. Another Mars fire story happened at Apep Lodge in Australia in 2010. It was a 1970’s theme, held outdoors around a fire pit, with red velvet curtains all around, and a sexy funky soundtrack. Everyone began drinking early, and sometime shortly after the rite, someone got too drunk, too close, and caught fire. Fortunately the fire on his clothing was quickly put out and he did not get hurt. Athene Lodge of Denmark in the mid 1990s, presented a Rite of Saturn. They had rented a community building, but they had to keep their celebration secret. They had fun smuggling in the wine, which was otherwise outlawed on the premises.

Also in the early 1990s, 93 Lodge in San Clemente, California, presented the Rite of Luna in their garage with the rafters full of pine branches and cricket noise, but what really wowed the crowd was the use of a blue laser light cone that shown down upon Luna, until that veil was broken. In 1996, 93 Lodge put on the Rite of Sol. Jesus on the cross wore sunglasses, and Brother Lon Duquette led a Mexican hat dance around huge sombreros on the floor. The Lodge also offered a synchronized swimming presentation in a pool for a Rite of Venus. In Los Angeles, Blue Horizon Oasis in 2009, presented the Rite of Saturn with a Krishna motif, and that same year, LVX Oasis had a punk rock theme for the Rite of Mars, a Rite of Saturn with an Andy Warhol theme, and a Rite of Sol with a Templar setting.

Scarlet Woman Lodge in Austin, Texas, presented many rites with fun themes from 1997 through 2000. Saturn was set in an asylum with the mental illness of Saturn, one Rite of Mars had a gangster setting and another Mars had the cast dress as chimps, gorillas, and bonobos, but only one character was human. In the Rite of Mercury, that character was a carnival circus clown. A Jupiter rite had an Indian Ganesh theme, and a Venus rite had a Shakespearean Midsummer setting.

In 1990, Albion Lodge in London presented all seven rites at Conway Hall to celebrate Crowley’s works. It was only the second time the rites had been presented in their original city since 1910. They even included original musical pieces with a live violin player. As well, there is Eleusyve Productions located in Seattle, Washington, which has successfully produced all the rites in the form of rock operas, with great success.

Every one of the rites has had its character’s words remain intact, but in how the stories are presented is left wide open to its readers, and each rite will fit well in almost any historical setting or theme. Each modern presentation continues to stand as a strong testament to the power of Crowley’s writings. These iconic rites are an important part of Crowley’s legacy, and with their ongoing presentations, they will continue to inspire future generations. If your local body decides to do theatrical readings or live performances, no matter where in the world they take place, please let your Eleusis Historian know. The historian keeps track of all Crowley’s Rites of Eleusis presentations produced worldwide. This reporting is voluntary, but when done, becomes a part of our historical files. Please include the name of the local body, which rite was produced, the date and place of presentation, copies of any fliers, programs, or pictures, and any comments on a particular theme. Please email to: eleusis@oto-usa.org  Thank you for helping to keep these rites alive and inspiring.

Sister Lita-Luise Chappell has been an O.T.O. member since January of 1991, is the founding Master of Golden Lotus Lodge, a Bishop in the Order, and serves as the International Rites of Eleusis Historian. She has a Masters in Psychology and a Doctorate in Human Sexuality. Dr. Chappell is also a published author of The Thelemic Cookbook, two books of poetry, and three books of international murder mysteries; all available on Amazon.com. Her social commentary on sex in sports, Sticks & Balls, and her spy novel, Hiding in Paradise, will be out later this year.