Robert Cohen - Theatre, Brief Version-McGraw-Hill Education (2016)

Theatre 119
model costumes; he or she walks, sits, duels, dances,
and tumbles downstairs in them. Indeed, unless the
character is a prisoner or a pauper, we are supposed to
believe that the character actually chose the costume and
really wants to wear it! The wearability of a costume can
also have an impact on the character he or she portrays.
Oftentimes actors will rehearse with certain costume
items early in the process to see how their physicality is
affected—which can become internalized as psychological
components of their characters. Thus the costume
designer cannot be content merely to draw pictures on
paper but must also design workable, danceable, actable
clothing, for which cutting, stitching, fitting, and quick
changing are considerations as important as color coordination
and historical context. For this reason, costume
designers generally collaborate very closely with the
actors they dress.
THE COSTUME DESIGNER AT WORK
The costume designer begins, as all designers do, with
ideas about the play’s action, themes, historical setting,
theatrical style, and the impact the play might have on
the expected audience. Collaboration with the director,
who ordinarily takes a leading role from the start, and
with the other designers is important even at this early
stage, as ideas begin to be translated into decisions on
fabrics, colors, shapes, and time periods.
Fabrics exist in many textures and weaves and can be
cut, shaped, stitched, colored, and draped in innumerable
ways. But fabrics can also be augmented (or even
replaced) by leather, armor, jewelry, feathers, fur, hair
(real or simulated), metallic ornamentation—in fact, any
material known to exist. The designer selects or at least
oversees the acquisition of all materials. Often costumes
are acquired whole. For contemporary plays with modern
settings, some or all costumes may be selected from
the actors’ own wardrobes, purchased from thrift shops,
or bought at clothing stores. Costumes have even been
solicited as gifts. In a celebrated instance, Louis Jouvet
appealed to the citizens of Paris after World War II to
donate their fancy prewar clothing to provide costumes
for the premiere of Jean Giraudoux’s The Madwoman of
Chaillot. The spectacular garments that poured into the
Athénée theatre for that brilliant 1945 Parisian production
signaled to the world that France had survived the
scourge of Nazi occupation with its devotion to the theatre
intact.
It is, however, the production designed and built
entirely from scratch that fully tests the measure of the
costume designer’s imagination and ability. In such
Stagecraft
Importance of Small Details
“The task of subtly distorting uniformity, without
destroying the desired illusion, is a difficult one. Anton
Chekhov’s play The Three Sisters presents a case in
point. The characters of the male players are clearly
defined in Chekhov’s writing, but because the men
are all wearing military uniforms they are theoretically
similar in appearance. One of the few ways in which the
designer can help to differentiate between characters
is by the alteration of proportion; changes such as
these, which do not show enough from the “front” to
make the uniforms seem strange to the audience, can
be extremely effective, as well as helpful to the actor. In
a London production of The Three Sisters, Sir Michael
Redgrave [as Baron Tusenbach] wore a coat with a
collar that was too low; Sir John Gielgud [as Vershinin]
one that was too high. No one in the audience was
unaware of the characters’ individuality, the talents of
these actors being what they are, but the small details
added to the scope of their performances.”
—MOTLEY (THREE ENGLISH
DESIGNERS WORKING AS A FIRM)
productions, the designer can create a unique design,
matching his or her conception of the text with hat-toshoe
originality. The comprehensive design for such a
production moves from the conceptual period to a developmental
one. The designer usually compiles a portfolio
of images from his or her research, creates a series of
quick sketches (sometimes called roughs), and assembles
various palettes of possible color samples, all in the service
of giving the director and the entire design team a
quick idea of the design’s direction. Once this basic direction
is approved by the director, and is seen to harmonize
with the work of the entire design team (and the show’s
budget), the designer proceeds to create actual designs.
Generally they take the form of renderings (drawings,
first in black and white and then in color) supplemented
with notes about each costume’s accessories, hairstyles,
and construction details. Enlarged drawings provide
information about items too small to show in a single
head-to-toe illustration.
The acquisition of fabrics—the basic medium of
the costumer’s art—is the crucial next stage. Texture,
weight, color, suppleness, and response to draping, dyeing,
folding, crushing, twirling, and twisting are all considerations.
Velvet, silks, and woolens are the costumer’s
luxury fabrics; cottons, felt, burlap, and painted canvas