Dressing Up

Bill Geisslinger as Torvald and Shannon Cochran as Nora in "A Doll's House, Part 2” at South Coast Repertory

I’m not gonna lie, one of my favorite parts of being an actor is dressing up. It was my go-to game as a kid, and I was thrilled that I had an excuse to carry it into adulthood. It always amazes me how costumes add that last bit of authenticity to a character I’ve been working on in rehearsals for weeks or months. One moves differently in a corset and a full skirt compared to ripped jeans and a T-shirt. Those are two VERY different characters.

But aside from the obvious fun of dressing up, costume designers are incredible artists who use fabric and thread and makeup and wigs and accessories as their pallets. Their ability to create fabulous looks that make sense for the time and place of a story, while also coordinating thematically with other designers on a show, is astounding.

Let’s try on the shoes of a costume designer and walk through a typical day in the life.

A costume designer, just like everyone else working on a production, begins with the story. They read the play numerous times looking for clues about clothing characters might wear. A juicy clue might be found in the time of year and location. Are they in a cabin in February in Canada? Or are they in the desert in Egypt on an archeological dig? Another good clue could be the social status of a character. Are they royalty or a petty thief stealing bread for their family?

Next, the costume designer meets with the director. They learn about the overall mood and vision the director has for the show, and then they go back to work sketching out ideas that help to fulfill that vision. The costume designer will meet numerous times with the director and the rest of the production team before they even start to build their designs. This is one of the magical parts of theater—we do very little in a vacuum. Every artist’s contribution affects the other artists working on the production, so they must be in constant coordination.

The costume designer will next present their complete design sketches at a production meeting before the full team. They will incorporate ideas and requests from feedback they receive, and then they finally begin building the costumes for the show.

Actor fittings along the way help to ensure the costumes will fit well by the time they get to dress rehearsals. In dress rehearsals, a (usually very tired) costume designer takes notes for adjustments that still need to be made after seeing their designs on stage under the lights, and they also meet with the director after the rehearsals to find out if they have any additional costume notes.

Then, it’s long hours of alterations and additions right up until opening night and sometimes beyond.

Back to you in the shoes of a costume designer . . . You’ve just met with your director, and she has one very important request for one of the characters: a beautiful red dress.

“Cool! Got it,” you say. And walk away.

Noooooo. You need much more information. Why red? Is the director making a point with that color? And what else do you need to incorporate into the design? There are a million different red dresses out there, and they all give different vibes. You want to be hired by this director again, so ask some follow-up questions.

Colors mean different things in different parts of the world and time periods, too. When and where does your play take place? Has this show been produced enough that there is a certain expectation for what that red dress looks like, or do you have more artistic license in your creation? If your task is to create the iconic red dress for the title character in the musical Annie, then a lot may have already been decided. You likely will recreate what has been established in the theater canon, or hundreds of little girls (and your director) will be mad when Annie shows up in the finale wearing something that has no resemblance to the original.

Here's another take on a red dress. Read this article about the costume design decisions that went into the red dress for Nora in A Doll’s House, Part 2: The Lady in Red: Building Nora’s Dress.

At the end of Henrik Ibsen’s classic A Doll’s House, Nora shocked the audience when she (spoiler alert) left her husband. The show was hugely popular when it premiered in the late 1800s, but it also caused a lot of controversy because of its new take on gender roles. People wondered how she would possibly survive without a husband. Where would she go? What would she do?

The sequel, A Doll’s House, Part 2 premiered on Broadway in 2017 and was written by Lucas Hnath. It’s set 15 years after the end of Ibsen’s play, and Nora shows up as a bold feminist in a striking red dress. Fabulous! The play is a smart, contemporary look at motherhood and self-fulfillment from Nora’s angle and also the perspectives of her husband and children. She shamelessly shows up and knocks on the door, so she better make a stunning entrance.

“Nora’s red figure is so striking against the coolness and even bleakness of a traditional Scandinavian interior and landscape,” says Sara Ryung Clement, costume designer for the production at South Coast Repertory. “It’s a visual expression of her confidence and vitality in her chosen life—she is willing to be seen and known and has a sense of freedom.”

The period of the show is 19^th century, but the language of the play is modern. In the script, there is a notation that calls for “roughly period” costumes. That is a major opportunity for a savvy designer to sew outside of the lines.

Clement’s team decided to remove the corset to allow the actor to incorporate more modern movements with the text, and this changed the form of the dress. One very important consideration in costume design is wearability. The actors need to be able to execute their blocking as rehearsed, so the costumes must accommodate the action. Many costume designers sit in on rehearsals while they are building costumes to see how the actors move.

The shade of red for the dress, as well as the type of material, will be equally important to the lighting designer. They will want to make sure their choice of lights brings out the true color, not turning deep red to black.

Another great point the article brings to light is that it’s not just about the dress. Jewelry, petticoats, gloves, boots, hat, cape, hosiery all come together to complete the look.

So much to consider, so little time!

For another take on costume design, here is a video highlighting costume designer Emilio Sosa—Working in Theatre: Costume Designer. Emilio began his work as a “shopper” while he was still in fashion design school. He got the job through his History of Fashion professor and originally had no intention of going into costume design. The shopper goes around town and sources all the accessories, notions, and materials for the designer. It must have been a great way to dip a toe into the business of costume design. And the rest is history.

Today, Emilio is a Tony Award winning costume designer in New York City. You can follow him on Instagram @esosafashion to catch his latest work.

Emilio Sosa begins the “day in the life” video by telling us there is no typical day in the life for costume designers. It’s a giant creative, stressful, and ultimately fulfilling job. Emilio also makes a great point in this video that one of the most important skills a costume designer should cultivate is the skill of collaboration.

He follows up with a few other key skills to develop:

·        Aptitude for research

·        Knowledge of how clothing is built

·        Ability to meet deadlines (without freaking out or becoming overwhelmed)

Costume design is a combination of bringing your unique artistry to a story and working well with your colleagues. No room for being a difficult diva in this profession.

What do you find intriguing about the life of a costume designer?

Was there anything that surprised you in the two interviews linked above?