Rope

Rope is set within the warped cognition of the two murderers Brandon and Granillo. The ordinary items of their Baroque style house they recently inherited; from the paintings on the walls, to the chest, to the books on the tables have been transformed into a nightmarish wonderland esc game of information overload. As the duo grapples with both flaunting enough information to the guests at the dinner party for Brandon to take joy in the act of murder, but also struggling to keep the explosion of all the information around them contained to prevent any of the guests from catching on, and to prevent themselves from getting hanged.

This set design is specifically set within a warped cognition of the two murders because that is where the stakes of the play are the highest. Within the minds of the murders. With the murders (that now as we see repletely emphasized through Granillo’s anxiety) having to repletely grapple with all the consequences that they have committed the most heinous and insidious act a member of society can commit, which is that of murder.

The world around them and the murder they have committed has consumed them. The outside world seen through the window now flashes with paintings that once hung on the walls of their outside. With a never-moving clock serving as an additional reminder that there is truly no escape for this hellscape.

The walls are now adorned with what literature symbols of Brandon’s younger days of reading books about murder which while not driving his objective to commit murder what was what provided him with the technique he needed in the first place. With the particular writings that have been scribbled on the wall both establish a thread of connection to the aforementioned paintings and to the marital connection between Brandon and Granillo. These symbols have additional manifested in the wonderland warping of the library that duo had recently come into melting into the floor.

Outlines of dead bodies littered throughout the floor which only Brandon and Granillo are aware of serve as constant reminders of what truly lies just feet away instead of the truck. With the truck itself initially curved and warped as a beaconing to see the duo’s bloody prize that lies inside. The murder victim itself. While not rotting away at this stage in the game as the duo had only committed murder recently still serves as a grotesque image of what is really going on.

Ideally this would be countered with the casting of actors in the roles of Brandon and Granillo who bring a likeability and charm to the characters though that is more of a directorial decision than a set design one so that the audience is really forced to question the ethics behind death and the killing of living beings.