Chris O’Brien Lifehouse @ RPA

The Brief

As a tribute to Chris O’Brien, the world renowned cancer specialist, Fourth Wall Events were retained to deliver an event that celebrated his life while at the same time raising funds for the foundation.

The brief was to produce a sophisticated sit down dinner that was highly entertaining, different from the recent memorial, and didn’t look like another fundraising event.

The Approach

Fourth Wall Events worked with the committee to produce an event that focused on the use of light, the perfect link back to the hope that Chris brought to people and the name of the foundation. Further more, the concept was designed around making the tickets exclusive with less numbers rather than an event focused on filling the venue, and to be directed towards building the fundraising brand.

Staged inside the Great Hall of Sydney University the design included nine metre high by twelve metre wide multi-layed projection surfaces. The advantage of such a design was that it allowed performers to appear within the projection and deliver the main focus, being the stage, on a mesmerizing scale.

Once guests were seated, lightning cracked and Christopher Stollery, from Bell Shakespeare, appeared amongst the tables. He performed a piece titled the ‘Saint Crispin’s Day Speech’ from Henry V with the focus being on the ‘Chris’ in the title.

For the central entertainment piece of the evening Fourth Wall Events edited the video to ‘You Raise Me Up’ and had performers play this live and completely in sync to the video. As different instruments and voices started within the music they were revealed within the multi-layed projection and seemed to be within the video. There simply wasn’t a dry eye amongst guests.

The Results

By creating a truly remarkable event that was theatrical, emotive and seamless in its delivery the donations flowed in and the target raised was well above expectations. A guest who is well known on the charity event market described it “as the best fundraising event I have ever been to”.