Conceptual packing

Here is the wasteland.

The empty desert that is February and March, often January and sometimes April... no work.

Little work.

Work that trickles in as you beg friends to pay you to hem pants and repair pockets...

and sometimes you get to alter Cristo-esque blankets that cover set pieces...



This is the season when one questions the path that has led to art as a career... and pines to tell your younger self "go into biology!" "How about you try computer programming"

Soon all of the shouting about being out of work should result in a tsunami of jobs that (hopefully) will make me wonder why I was ever so despondent about this paucity of work.

(fingers crossed)

New plays are an odd beast...

I recently opened a new play called Oedipus el Rey. The story is Oedipus Rex, transposed onto California Latino gang culture. I've been living with this play for weeks. I read an early draft, thought it a rough read, and slowly as we got to opening I've seen it become a solid show worth seeing. The performers are engaging, the prose is musical and the staging is dynamic. The problem I have with it is that sometimes the transposition is too literal for the action to be fully believable in a modern context. On the one hand if you're calling your play "Oedipus" you had better have the story intact. What exactly is Oedipus king of? The ghetto? The crime business? It's not clear... and finally (spoiler here) when Oedipus puts his eyes out (I will refrain from telling you how it is accomplished in this production via blog post in case any of my five readers wants to see the show) I don't think the motivation is sufficient in the modern context. Perhaps it's a moment of weakness in the play or staging that could be fixed... but the whole end makes me think that this play would be better if we weren't so bound to the Oedipus tie-in.

There are three simple but important things you need for any play. You need a performer, content(like a story, music, action, dance...) and an audience. If you lack one of these three elements you have nothing. Usually additional elements are nice (like costumes, lights, sets, atmosphere...) but you can do a show without them.
This play retells a familiar story so that the audience knows what to expect, they come in knowing 20% of the play. The journey is in the story telling. The audience enters with a fore-knowledge of the timeless issues brought up in Sophocles' Oedipus (human kind's destiny and effort to control it, violence...) hopefully they also latch onto the modern issues it brings up as well (like California's recidivism problem or modernity versus tradition). The trouble is trying to make a modern play equally effective as a classic. Is it possible the play could be stronger without the old Oedipus infrastructure? If so, who would come to see it?
The problem may be that 'Oedipus Rex' is a play over 1500 years old and our little show is less than a few years (If we count all the time it stewed in the playwright's brain). The baby play needs some maturing, but at the same time it's important to get people to come out and interact with it for that to happen.
It is an old problem. Shakespeare and Mozart stole almost every plot they ever wrote a play/opera on top of... it is a brave old tradition to get butts in seats. There is nothing new. Not really.

Rain and Rings

Monsoon season in Northern California and I am out in the middle of it. I've got a meeting at the far end of town. First I find a parking space and trek through the rain. I wore inappropriate shoes, I don't have any other kind of shoes. I don't actually own a single pair of waterproof shoes...
Meeting.
Late.
... and we break before a run through
... back to the car with the winds blowing water into my face...

I had two shopping errands to run on the other end of the city, over the hills and through the Presidio... and driving in this downpour contributes to both a lack of visibility and the increased asshole levels of everybody driving.

My first stop was easy enough, we had ordered a wig, I picked it up... easy.

Second stop was to the more popular end of the Haight Asbury...
and I stop at the cheesy jewelry store... I am on a quest for a size 4 (TINY) ring. I have one hour to find said ring and make it back across town, through the Presidio, over the hill and across the rain swept plains (well parking lot). I must face the cranky shop keeper who doesn't understand why I would want a size 4 ring. He glares at me as though I'm about to shoplift his valuable $8.99 earrings and $9.99 rings... I tell him "I'm looking for a size 4 ring that looks like an engagement ring" he "helps" me by pulling out the tray with the giant glittery butterflies and swirly glass rings. --thanks dude-- 1/2 an hour later I've looked through half of his stock and I've found exactly two rings that look vaguely like wedding rings in a size four... this is the one I chose;



...maybe a little tacky but this character also wears a pink velour sweat suit so I figure it's ok.
I braved back across the city,
Run-through rehearsal.
Back across the bridge
... just enough time to grab a banana and set up for dress rehearsal...

It's been a long 6 hours of rehearsal and driving and I'm rather soaked from the toes to the knees.

I hand the ring to the actress...

she scrunches up her little face...
"um... I'm not gonna wear this, it's ugly"

There is a word in my head right now and it rhymes with "kitsch".

New Years Resolution

Ok... here it is... I don't make resolutions usually... My Goal this year is to make at least one post for every project/show I work on this year. I would like to promise insightful and enlightening material that will blow your mind... but lets just start with a simple goal. One post per show. It may be a good story or it may just be a snap shot... but it shall happen. I hope...

The photo here is from backstage at the Nutcracker last month... it doesn't count for 2010... but be warned; blogs to come.

Tomato!

I designed and built this tomato jacket for an educational kid's show... makes you want to eat healthy food... right?

No, I didn't print "Tomato" backwards... that's just how my computer's photo booth works.

Macy's Passport 2009

This Year's Macy's Passport fashion show was severely cut down from last year's extravaganza. My part in it was altering these 18th Century costumes for 21st Century dancing... The men did need to have stretch pants made so that they could do the splits, and all of the hems were taken up to extreme amounts, but I think that between the movement and the lighting most people couldn't see how ugly the hems were.

"Art" Opening Tonight

My latest show is opening tonight in Lafayette... The show is called "Art" It was basic men's wear... on my part a fairly straight forward piece. The script however is fantastic and thought provoking... if you get the chance , go see it, or if you're nowhere near Lafayette, look for a local production, it's a great show.

Professional Shopping

I shop all day... I'm the one with the tape measure and the clip board, "I don't work here, but I can tell you where men's sports wear is, oh and they're out of this in blue..." I'm the one sifting through the racks mumbling "too old, too young, too gay, too American, too Euro-trash, too ugly, too small, uh maybe, maybe, no..." I'm the one with the three receipts and a bag of returns. I'm the shabbily dressed one who doesn't balk when the cashier says "$503.98" because I'm not spending my own money. I've got a wallet full of receipts and I hold onto the pen to scrawl cryptic notes about who gets which one... I am the professional shopper. It's bizarre, even to me.

Lettuce Head

Just a quickie today... covered a top hat for a lettuce.
I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

Comedy Promo (SF Shakes)

Here's the fantastic promo video SF Shakes made for Comedy of Errors... I love it because it's practically a video portfolio for me!

Plaid

For my latest show I needed a suit that was made in the largest plaid possible... for about $30.
I found a suit at Thrift Town for about $20 and decided to paint the plaid!
Here's the prep... There is a procedure to it all involving placement and replacement of tape...

I did need a hat to match...

Ta Da! Plaid!


Check it out if you're in the bay area; San Francisco Shakespeare Festival!

Candy Apple Green

It started with the hat.

I fell in love with this hat... I have to get it on stage... I want to put it on the mother character in the prologue...

It's a 50's hat, so I want a 50's garden party dress to go with it... and I want the dress to be plaid so that she matches her husband (trust me it's that kind of a show)... I searched and searched and no candy apple green dresses, no plaid dresses, and certainly no 50's dresses in a size 12... for one thing this is a color that isn't manufactured anymore. I mean sure you can find things "close" but if you see this fabric up close it is luminous. It's the same green they used in Austrian Tyrolean coats as well. It's green but it glows with a golden secondary tone that you only notice when you hold it next to modern greens. The modern version always looks like a sad and flat rip off next to these old textiles. Anyway Plaid; the most difficult thing you can cut a pattern out with...

...and of corse I think that cutting it "on grain" (meaning the lines would go straight up and down) doesn't look good or period enough... so my designer side has a little fit and makes my stitcher self cut the whole thing on the bias (diagonal is a really tricky way to cut things, and extra tricky with plaid)...

... and as if that weren't enough my designer self insisted that I add green ribbon to the plaid so that it would match the accessories and that glorious hat!

I hate sewing for myself. I'm also making a crinoline...

Anyways... updates to come, wish me sanity.

Look like a Pro

I have now worked for the San Francisco 49'ers. It's a company I never expected to need me. It seems that the sports uniform industry is one that would have a full set-up that wouldn't need to call independent costume designers.
This odd job was to dress their "Look like a Pro" fiberglass figurine. The old uniform was torn from the awkward way you needed to get into it, and anyway he was wearing the old uniform.

It was interesting looking at the differences between the old uniform and the new one. Subtle things that really only a football player is ever going to notice were in my hands, as I cut it up and glued it together. The new jerseys have shorter arms, giving a better ability to reach and move arms around. The new pants were cut without a crotch seam (less binding). The new socks however are much cheaper than the old ones. Hopefully the players just toss their socks every game because the new socks are mostly disposable...

Here is the guy I worked on. We added handles to the inside,and pillows for the knees. The uniform needed to be glued and bolted onto the figure. Apparently drunk fans often will try to steal parts of it in plain sight. The guys who work at the stadium seemed to like their jobs but all found a way to mention with a groan the drunk frat boys who make their lives difficult.

After a couple afternoons in a Candlestick Park storage closet we managed to get their guy all new and shiny so that fans can get goofy photos taken.

I love that my work has so much variety to it.

Jack behind the scenes

Everyone in this photo went to school and got a degree to do this.

The fellow in the swim cap can recite Shakespeare on command. The Man holding the mirror underwater for the light effect can make a palace out of plywood and foam, and the woman in the foreground has all of the major papers in the SF Bay area on speed dial... and yet here we are doing a publicity photo shoot. The Shakespearean actor must act goofy, hold his head up and "make bug eyes" under goggles for a camera 6 inches from his face, while the scenic artisan splashes water to make ripples in the water that the journalist will assess for its artistic merit.

Jack Goes Boating; Opening at The Aurora Theatre soon...