Oscar Hammerstein II’s famous lyrics for the title song of “The Sound of Music” conjure the vision of a lush, idyllic Austrian countryside in the imagination of every listener: the hills that are alive, the brook that trips and falls, the wings of the birds that rise from the lake to the trees. Veteran scenic designer Doug Schmidt had the task of sufficiently realizing the landscape of our minds — and nearly a dozen more locations — for the revitalized tour of “The Sound of Music” now whisking across North America.
With a score by Hammerstein and Richard Rodgers and a book by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, “The Sound of Music” follows the Von Trapp family — the strict widower Captain Von Trapp and his seven children — as they welcome a new governess, a novice nun named Maria. Through song, Maria reawakens a love that had been lost in the Von Trapp home, just as the Nazis gain power in Europe and threaten that home.
Schmidt and director Jack O’Brien collaborated for the “Sound of Music” tour back in 2015; this tour combines that thoughtful design with new elements to make the musical dazzle. “We went back and decided to put in a couple more [back]drops to locate the scenes,” Schmidt told Broadway News. “When you’re looking through the windows in the back of the set, you now see a vista of mansions around the lake, for example. Or, if you’re outside looking in, you’ll see the interior of the room.”Four new backdrops offer a firmer grounding, making it clear the musical is set in real place. As Schmidt explained, “We felt that [‘The Sound of Music’] was telling a real story, and it was one that we wanted to have some convincing details back there and not just a cyc [a white, fabric drop] with a color light on it. So we got much more specific.”
“For example, looking out over the lake in the back of the mansion, you would get more of a sense of what they were giving up and what was at stake in terms of the Nazi takeover,” Schmidt continued. These new drops present a photorealistic aesthetic. “We wanted to really make it quite beautiful back there. So we went to the more illustrative look.”
Elevation courtesy of Doug Schmidt; Kevin Earley as Captain Georg von Trapp, Cayleigh Capaldi as Maria Rainer with Ariana Ferch as Liesl, Eli Vander Griend as Friedrich, Ava Davis as Louisa, Benjamin Stasiek as Kurt, Haddie Mac as Brigitta, Ruby Caramore as Marta and Luciana VanDette as Gretl in “The Sound of Music” on tour, 2025 (Credit: Jeremy Daniel)
The photorealism is also a result of the technique used to make these drops. That view over the lake, as well as the drop during the title song, have been digitally printed. Still, one of the other new drops — what Schmidt referred to as the “show scrim with trees and dapply light in the background” — was hand-painted.
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