The Dolphin Show: Behind the Seams
When it comes to putting together a production like The Dolphin Show, attention to detail is essential. The Dolphin Show, the country’s biggest student-run musical, is a Northwestern staple. The way actors and actresses appear on stage impacts their ability to successfully portray their character. Costume designers help complete the vision of the show. The Dolphin Show’s production this year, “Hello Dolly,” opened the last week in January, and costume designer, Lena Dudley, worked hard to create the world of Dolly Levi.
Dudley found her knack for creating costumes during her sophomore year in a costume design class. From there, she began checking the student listserv, The Twist, for upcoming student shows looking to fill positions. She began to get involved with multiple student-run shows produced by Spectrum Theatre Company and WAVE and a Mainstage show this fall for “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown.”
The first show she costumed was Project NU. Dudley’s role was to look at the actors’ closets and decide if anything fit the role of their character. Project NU was mainly sourced from closets, while “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” was her first big show as a costume designer responsible for crafting the garments herself.
Getting Started
When Dudley is assigned to design for a show, she does not start sketching until the cast list comes out. This is a little later than other costume designers, but by doing this she can craft a more complete vision. “I want to talk to the directors and see what they want because with costumes and makeup, it requires so much of the actor,” Dudley says. “You don’t want to draw somebody, and the cast list comes out, and it’s not like what you drew.”
She gets an idea of what the costumes will look like by collecting images on Pinterest boards and looking at historical shows for reference. Often times, specific looks and color schemes remain true to certain shows. She has the liberty to decide if these precedents match the desired vision. For “Hello Dolly,” she compiled images and created mood boards to figure out how she wanted to master the romantic New York City ‘90s vibe. In November, her concrete ideas and sketches were looked over by the producers before being shown to the rest of the team.
Dudley’s first and favorite step in the manual process is sketching. For “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown,” she searched fabric stores for what she thought would work. Dudley got pictures from the scenic designer so she could match the costumes to the set’s aesthetic as well as her designs. She took actors and actresses’ measurements and then got to work on the sewing machine.
Beginning the Work
The longest phase in Dudley’s process is between final designs and tech week. During this time, the producers and directors are not actively giving her tasks. How she chooses to go about creating costumes is, mostly, up to her. Dudley updates the costumes weekly, making necessary alterations as she sees fit.
“Tech Week” is when everything comes together on the stage. Everyone gets to see the final product, including how the costumes look with the lights and set. Dudley begins working with the actors
and actresses. She adjusts their costumes on their bodies. “We have production meetings every night during tech just to see what needs to be altered and changed,” Dudley says.
Prior to this week, the actors and actresses perform in different spaces. The costume team constantly loosens and tightens pieces to make sure that everything is completed before the show. She noted that in “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” there was an actor who wanted his costume iron pressed for the show. “Little things like that you can’t really know what needs to be changed until you see it as it is intended, on stage,” said Dudley.
Dudley also works closely with the hair and makeup team to decide what styles will best fit the actors. She makes sure to takes into account the actors’ body types and the way characters carry themselves.
Often Dudley has run into last minute situations where she was forced to improvise. For instance, during “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown,” Dudley was unhappy with the character Sally’s dress alterations. She had to work with the directors and find a new dress that looked good and still fit with her vision.
For Dudley, these crunch-time situations are about thinking on her feet. “It is figuring it out on the spot, but it is definitely still possible to do and maintain the integrity of your design,” Dudley says. While she doesn’t anticipate last minute issues to arise, she still makes sure to be prepared for potentially disastrous situations. She always has extra garments such as a couple extra dresses, pants and tailcoats behind the curtain.
Looking Forward
For “Hello Dolly,” Dudley wanted to make sure she stayed true to the show while still including her own stylistic touches. “It’s very much to get the feel of historical elements that are consistently taken into productions of ‘Dolly’ and then just deciding what I want to keep and what I want to give some artistic liberty to,” Dudley says.
Most of the costume pieces for “Hello Dolly” were rented, however Dudley created the hats. She loooked for generic big hats, so she could add her own accessories like little flowers and supplies to make decorative additions.
The hats in the show are big and gaudy. Some of the hats have veils, which in some historical “Hello Dolly” shows have covered actors and actresses’ faces. This is something that the directors wanted to avoid.“ They were just really extra,” Dudley says. “We are just trying to find a way to make them so that they don’t prohibit the actors and actresses’ movements.”
But when the curtain rose on opening night, Dudley finally saw all of her hard work come to life, and to her, that is the best part of the process.