Illuminations

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When Joe Tawil started a theatrical lighting business out of his bedroom 30 years ago, he had little idea that he would help change the way audiences around the world see entertainment of all types.


Like with BlackWrap, a heat resistant matte black-coated aluminum foil that is now found on just about every TV and movie set in the world and which won Tawil an Emmy award last year. BlackWrap, which is flexible yet thick enough to mold to whatever it’s wrapped around, conceals light leaks and reduces glare. After its 1983 release, lighting technicians couldn’t get enough of it. Three years later other companies began copying it.


“I didn’t think to patent it because coating aluminum foil with color is not original, but I probably could have gotten a patent on it for this particular use,” Tawil said.


Tawil’s company, GAMProducts Inc., manufactures and distributes a variety of lighting products for movies, television, theater, amusement parks and other specialty applications. The lineup includes special effects projection devices with names like the Scene Machine, SX4, FilmFX and TwinSpin.


“The big thing Joe’s got going is his willingness to bring out specialty items that designers need,” said lighting designer Jim Moody, now head of the Professional Technical Theater Program at Los Angeles City College. Moody used many of Tawil’s products when he designed lighting on “Wheel of Fortune.”


“He was willing to do it if designers wanted it or needed it,” Moody said.


The company’s products help facilitate lighting techniques that would be familiar to most moviegoers, whether it’s a “loop tray” for continuous moving effects such as fire or rain, or patterns chemically milled onto thin pieces of stainless steel that are used for clouds or stars.


“Prior to GAM patterns, most designers didn’t use projections. They were really rare,” said Tawil. “Now everyone has seen them. It’s the background of every theater. It’s become an absolute standard.”


Oliver Stone came to Tawil’s office to choose psychedelic effects for his 1991 film “The Doors,” and musician Frank Zappa used to show up to make sure he nailed down the right projections for his shows.


GAM (which stands for Great American Market) has provided projections for Cat Stevens, the Rolling Stones, and Neil Diamond. The company once created an entire New York skyline for a Barry Manilow tour.



Industry leader


After graduating from Carnegie Mellon University, Tawil worked for a series of lighting companies. “It just wasn’t satisfying. I wanted to pursue things that were more interesting, more fun,” he said. “I wanted to do things that I hadn’t done before.”


In 1975, having developed relationships with lighting designers, he left to start GAM. In addition to developing dozens of products over the past three decades, he has a catalog of more than 1,000 patterns everything from ghosts to forests to King Tut.


Beyond the theatrical world, Tawil’s products can be seen lighting up museums, theme parks, hotels and casinos. Among projects the company worked on: Universal Studios added effects to its Terminator 2: 3D attraction, and the New York Fire Museum shows how a fire can double every minute through a multiplying fire projection.


When Emanuel Treeson’s lighting design firm Nyxdesign was hired to create moving ghosts for a Haunted Mansion mini-theme park outside Hollywood’s El Capitan Theatre, Tawil created custom ghost patterns based on original Disney artwork for the project.


“With Joe I always feel like I have a production partner,” said Treeson. “He’s been a leader in our industry for decades and decades and yet every time you come to him with a nutty idea you want to explore, he comes at it with such a wonderful sense of enthusiasm and great energy.”


Lighting designer Ken Billington recently used GAM’s snowflake patterns for the L.A. productions of “The Drowsy Chaperone” at the Ahmanson Theatre and “White Christmas” at the Pantages Theatre. “He started with the patterns when nobody was really doing that,” Billington said. “He has always found interesting products.”


The company, which sells its products both directly and through distributors, has been profitable since its inception, although revenues have been flat the last few years. “I’ve watched a lot of big companies obsessed with growth lose track of the essence of what the business is about,” he said. “As a sole owner, if it’s not interesting I don’t do it.”


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GAMProducts Inc.



Core business:

Theatrical lighting and related products


Year Founded:

1975


Revenues 2004:

$3.2 million


Revenues 2005:

$3.2 million (projection)


Employees 2004:

18


Employees 2005:

18


Goal:

To find the next innovative project


Driving Force:

Production needs for lighting patterns and other custom design elements

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