59 Productions

59 Productions is an Olivier and Tony Award-winning design studio and production company with offices in London and New York.
Origins.
59 Productions was founded in Edinburgh by Leo Warner and Mark Grimmer. Early projects included the video design for Stellar Quines Theatre Company's "Sweet Fanny Adams in Eden" (2003), followed by the video design for the recently formed National Theatre of Scotland's "Roam" (2006) and "Black Watch" (2006), which featured in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Shortly after the success of the show, which won multiple awards at Edinburgh Festivals, a Critics' Circle Theatre Award, a South Bank Sky Arts Award, four Critics' Awards for Theatre in Scotland, four Laurence Olivier Awards, and a New York Drama Critics' Circle Award, 59 Productions relocated to London, where they began a series of collaborations at the Royal National Theatre, causing critics to say that the company had "created an entirely new art form."
59's Leo Warner and Mark Grimmer were part of the original creative team for "War Horse" in 2007, which went on to win six Laurence Olivier Awards in London and five Tony Awards for the subsequent production on Broadway.
59 Productions undertook its first opera in 2007 at the English National Opera, providing the projection design for Philip Glass's "Satyagraha", directed by Phelim McDermott and designed by Julian Crouch of Improbable theatre. This was the first of several collaborations with Improbable theatre, including the design for the Metropolitan Opera's 125th Anniversary Gala in 2009, which raised more than $10 million.
In 2012, Oscar-winning director Danny Boyle asked 59 Productions to provide the animation and projection design for the 2012 Summer Olympics opening ceremony, viewed by an audience of over a billion people. At around the same time, 59 was also asked to lead the design of the "David Bowie is" exhibition for the Victoria and Albert Museum, marking the company's expansion into the world of exhibition design. The exhibit was described as "brought to life by technology and united in sound and vision in a way rarely seen in a museum." The company was commissioned to "Light the Sails" at Sydney Opera House for the 2014 VIVID Live festival. In 2015 they were responsible for the projection design for the first-ever Broadway production of George Gershwin's An American in Paris (film). The production went on to win 4 Tony Awards, including Best Scenic Design of a Musical for Bob Crowley and 59 Productions.
In July 2016, 100 years to the day since William E. Boeing turned his attention to the thrilling and world-changing field of aviation, 59 Productions mounted an immersive show on a vast scale – The Boeing Centennial Projection Spectacular – a celebration of the Boeing company's centenary, for more than 80,000 spectators, across 30 performances, at Boeing Field in Seattle, Washington. The show featured an animated sequence projection-mapped onto the body of a Boeing 747, telling the history of the iconic aircraft, as well as a specially commissioned soundtrack by composer, Jeff Beale.
In 2017, the company developed and produced their first self-initiated production, an adaptation of Paul Auster's City of Glass, written by Duncan Macmillan. City of Glass was a co-production with the Lyric Hammersmith, HOME Manchester and Karl Sydow. The production was described by The Daily Telegraph as a "Neo-noir thriller that rewrites the rulebook for theatre design."
In 2018, 59 Productions provided both set and projection design for The Last Ship, the Sting musical which tells the story of the shipbuilding industry in the North East of England. The production opened at Northern Stage before embarking on a UK tour. Other recent projects include the design of Marnie, an opera by Nico Muhly which transferred to the Metropolitan Opera after an initial run at the English National Opera in London. The company also designed large scale events in 2018 for both the BBC First Night of the Proms at The Royal Albert Hall, and the Edinburgh International Festival.
Alongside their work for the stage, 59 Productions also made two award-winning VR films in 2018, Grenfell: Our Home, a collaboration with Parable and Channel 4 which won the Audience Award at Sheffield Doc Fest; and Nothing To Be Written, commissioned by the BBC, winner of Best UK Experience at Raindance. In November 2018, their film collaboration with composer Eric Whitacre and NASA, "Deep Field", premiered at Kennedy Space Center.
Now employing 35 people worldwide, with offices in London and New York, 59 Productions works in set design, video projection design, exhibition and events design, film, theatre, and interactive production. The company expanded in 2016 to include an architecture department with a particular focus on design for performance environments, and an interest in developing forms of architectural expression which are fundamentally narratively led.