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Design
The Laramie Project was designed to be an "actor-driven event." Therefore, the set design was minimal. The bare set was also inspired by the space that was such a part of life in Laramie. There are a few chairs and tables for the actors to interact around. Also there is a large screen in the background that shows visual images of Laramie. This is particularyly effective because the audience can actually see what the actors are describing: the clear blue sky, the mountains, the open space. Also, television monitors are used to show the descendence of the media into Laramie. The sound of all the televisions and the reporters makes the audience feel overwhelmed just as the residents of Laramie felt. Also, in some productions a video of a truck driving at night was used. The view is from the inside from the middle point of view. The audience can then see perhaps what Matthew Shepard was seeing in his last hours. These depictions seem to make the production more real because sometimes seeing is believing.
One of the more moving aspects of the play is during the funeral moment. Matt Galloway, the bartender at Fireside where Matthew was last seen, described how it was a snowy day and everyone had black umbrellas. The actors in the play all had opened black umbrellas during this scene and when the funeral was over, all the umbrellas were closed except for one. The umbrella was passed from person to person until the end of Aaron McKinney's trial, seemingly marking the end of the case. The umbrella would seem to signify the burden that each person in the town and even the interviewers themselves felt after Matthew died. These simple visual scenes nonetheless portray a powerful message.
Editing
The Tectonic Theatre Project made six trips to Laramie over the course of a year and a half, and accumulated hundreds of hours of tape. Therefore, not all of it could be included. Most were edited, but some were cut completely in order to get the message of the play across. Some actors who had connected with residents of Laramie saw all their work cut from the play. However, this is the difficult job a director has to do. As Anne Bogart said, "To be decisive is violent." A director must commit the acts of violence in keeping or discarding material for a play.
Although editing is necessary, especially in the Laramie Project, sometimes things are taken out of context or shaped to fit a certain persona. For example, Doc O'Connor was toned down in the production of the play. The words of the people who were interviewed are verbatim but even the narrator explains that they have been edited. Aaron Kriefels, the boy who found Matthew Shepard's body, was depicted as a kind of hero for finding Matthew and at least giving him a chance to live. The was the depiction given by the actors but some of his homophobic comments were not included. This would have given the audience a different perspective of who he was that would not have fit with the play.