Tag: Victoria Wood

Tonight is the night, and the cast went currently onstage to perform The Cagebirds by David Campton to a live audience at the LPAC Lincoln.

It was a great success resulting in laughter, fear and audience compliments left right and center.

Throughout the rehearsal today I took photographs of the actors in their costumes, makeup and on set in their personal nests. See Slideshow for the Final Images of the Cast in their full Makeup and Costumes.

For starters, to the left is an image of myself preparing The Wild One for her flight onto the stage by applying her Wild makeup.

The position of the costume designer is a challenging one and consists of many elements.”The main job of costume design in a production is to provide physical and emotional support to every actor through the clothing he or she will wear to enhance characterization. The costume must work onstage. This means it must provide comfort, flexibility and durability. At the same time the design must provide strong visual support of the story, concept and context of the play as a whole. It is my role to ensure that the costumes reflect the visual style of the production and help actors portray their characters on their journey through the play’s action.

I take my cues from the characters and their surroundings as written in the play, as well as from the stylistic choices of the production. In the same way that an actor builds upon the framework of traits and actions of his or her character in the story, I read what the character does and says for clues about what they might wear. I also need to think about how best to reflect a character’s evolution through the development of the story. Sometimes the character is best served by creating contrast between how a character behaves and what he or she looks like.” – Judith Bowden, The Costume Designer’s Role www.artsalive.ca/collections/costumes/designer_role

To be a costume designer you must be in collaboration with a number of people, but firstly, you must collaborate with  the director. To start the collaborative process you must present the director with visual sources of reference, such as  sketches, research ideas etc. So the director envisions and your ideas can be discussed and agreed upon form there.

Furthermore, a costume designer must work closely with the other designers (Lighting, set etc) and also with the actors who will be wearing the final result. For a Theatre company to work, they must collaborate and work as a team.“When each artist on the creative team team understands the production’s style and approach, everyone can work toward the same goal while maintaining enough flexibility to refine their ideas throughout the process.” – Judith Bowden, The Costume Designer’s Role www.artsalive.ca/collections/costumes/designer_role

What do your clothes say about you? How you want to be perceived? What makes your clothing different from everyone else around you? What’s your style? What makes you, you? We all make choices everyday about how we present ourselves to the world. Through our clothing we say things about who we are, and who we would like to be, a costume does the same thing, it conveys the same information about a character that your clothes convey about you. People can sometimes determine how you are feeling, or where you are going based on what you wear. Similarly, an effective costume gives the audience information even before the character has even spoken their lines. An effective costume connects the audience with characters and the story.

My position of being the Costume Designer for this production of David Campton’s The Cagebirds for Retold Theatre has been a challenging, stimulating and enjoyable experience. And this final image really shows the goodness of the fruits of my labor, in which the cast pose in full costume on set. I am proud to say that this production was a tremendous success and that I immensely enjoyed being a part of this experience.

As I briefly mentioned  in a previous post, each of the birds will be wearing a bird ring tag with a individual specific code relating to life span of their personal species of bird.

Remember, only six of the characters out of seven wear Ring Tags considering The Wild One is a new member of the actual caged birds, so six images will be displayed, with code and what around it is costume or not.

See Slideshow for Images.

Costume Items – Here the slippers, socks and pj bottoms are all part of her overall costume.

Tag Code – TM??30

Costume Items -Today, the actor is not wearing any of her costume, but in this image she is surrounded by her nest of food wrappers and rubbish.

Tag Code – TM3506

Costume Items – Likewise to The Guzzle, the actor is not wearing any of his costume today, but he is using the bird cane, to match the old man-like characteristics of The Thump.

Tag Code – TM40??

Costume Items – The Gazer is wearing her long train skirt in this image but she is wearing the incorrect shoes. These are her backup shoes for if her actual blue heels do not arrive in time.

Tag Code – TM23??

Costume Items – Apart for tights and top, the actress playing The Gossip is wearing the correct costume as she sits among her gossip and rag magazines .

Tag Code – TM30??

Costume Items – The Twitting is wearing her entire costume except the correct shoes because without socks, her actual shoes don’t seem to fit her correctly, so for Health and Safety purposes, today she’s wearing her normal shoes.

Tag Code – TM22??

The actors feel comfortable with their tags and they look great from the audience’s point of view. Perfect for the up and coming show of The Cagebirds by David Campton.

Here is a brief post about how the costumes are doing. Today I have taken some photographs of the rehearsal were some of the costumes are in action.

Altogether, all the fascinators and ring tags are in use, the entirety of the Gloom’s, The Gossip’s and The Wild Ones costumes and accessories. all that’s missing is the majority of The Thump’s costume, the bottom half of The Twittering’s, the vest and shoes of The Guzzle’s costume and just the shoes of The Gazer’s. These are items that they are being sourced by the actors themselves and all costumes should be complete in a day or two.

Her are the 30 images taken today with brief notes about the action, and further detail of the personal costumes.

See Slideshow for Images and references to Figure Image.

Fig. 1 – The Wild One collapsing into herself in anger and disbelief.

Fig. 2 – The start of the mayhem in which the characters swap nests.

Fig. 3 – The Gazer, The Gloom, The Gossip among the mayhem stage left.

Fig. 4 – The Thump and The Guzzle in half costume.

Fig. 5 – The Gazer pampering herself and The Twitting with her braid going down the back of her head to demonstrate her tightness with herself.

Fig. 6 – The Wild One imploring to the The Gazer.

Fig. 7 – The Guzzle in The Gloom’s nest.

Fig. 8 – The Gazer sorting out her nest.

Fig. 9 – The Gazer looking among the nest of beauty products.

Fig. 10+16 – The Guzzle sitting in her nest of rubbish and food packets.

Fig. 11+12 – The Wild One yelling at her cage-companions, sorting the leather jacket, feather necklace and red streak of hair.

Fig. 13 – The Gloom blowing her nose in her sickly state.

Fig. 14+15 – Cast on stage.

Fig. 17 – The Guzzle once again her her nest.

Fig. 18 – The Gloom with her grey feathered grey side fascinator complaining about her ailments.

Fig. 19+20 – The Guzzle’s teal fascinator which for the actual performance will contain more feathers and has a small polystyrene block at the back to make the feathers rise higher.

Fig. 21 – Cast onstage.

Fig. 22 –  The Gazer in full out (bar shoes), likewise with The Guzzle a small polystyrene block at the back to make the feathers rise higher and become more flamboyant matching the characteristics of the character.

Fig. 23+24 – The Gossip in full outfit reading magazines and playing on her phone (actual character trait). The cardigan which she is wearing, may or may not be used in the actual performance.

Fig. 25 – The Gloom in front of The Gossip’s tail skirt.

Fig. 26 – The Wild One before her first entrance.

Fig. 27, 28+30 – The Twitting in her rather simple religious believer outfit (top half). Her fasciantor twitches when she does as a separate being, this adds to the nature of a canary.

Fig. 29 – The Gazer, once again gazing at herself in her compact mirror.

Overall the costumes are working well on the stage. We have some more work to do before the show begins in six days. But hopefully (fingers crossed) everything will be alright on the night.

As part of the new direction of species for The Wild One, in a previous post I redesigned the costume, for this blog I shall reveal the new makeup design which shall be seen live in a week’s time.

Wild One Makeup Designs

As you can see the original design on the left has a lot of earthy tones to reflect the character’s species of origin (Golden Eagle) and personality of the hippy-like, freedom hungry, wild child, yearning to be able to fly freely in the great outdoors. Also, the original design was designed with the character being the most human of all the charters in mind, thus having the most simplistic and natural looking makeup, unlike the explosions of colours of the other birds in the cage.

Now as you may remember, the Director wanted to change the species of bird to a Woodpecker, a British Spotted Woodpecker if you want to go into detail, a Male British Spotted Woodpecker for those who wish to be exact as seen below…

Male British Spotted Woodpecker
(Imaged sourced: http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/life/Great_Spotted_Woodpecker)

As you can see, this bird has very little markings on it’s face, so I have had to use a little bit of Artistic Licence to make the character look good on stage but also take into consideration the lighting of the stage and the Director’s requirements.

The Director wanted the makeup to blend in with the hairline, preferably red, so what I will do, is a blending technique used in the face painting  profession (usually on cat faces) where the darker shade it sponged onto the hairline, then blending it into the lighter colour (usually white) further into the face, in this case it will be bright red blending into the white, then the white blending into the natural skin tone or foundation base. An example of this technique is used quite often in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical CATS . Here is an image of Michael Gruber as the character Munkustrap, note the grey blending into the white, especially on the cheekbones.

CATS Makeup – Blending
(Image Sourced: www.catsthemusical.com)

For the new Wild One makeup design, I have used this technique in my initial sketch, I have also tried to incorporate the detail of the Woodpecker’s feathers into the blending of the design. What I intend to do is blend a little bit of black with the red in between the eyes and each side of the nose, the paint faint white dots to match the wing feather of the bird and to link into the feathers used of the character’s headband and necklace. Note the bottom to center left of the right image at the top. See Slideshow for larger image.

Pallete Code – 1   2   10   48

Blending Code – 7+48   1+7

Here is the final design of The Wild One with the eye shadow pallete and blending codes for future reference.

In a previous post of Uniform: Part B I blogged about the darker element of costume of  the the character’s confinement of the Mistress’s cage. This Bird Ring Tags.

“Conventional ringing involves placing  an unobtrusive, light-weight, metal ring on a bird’s leg. A unique number is engraved on each ring, together with a return address. If a ringed bird is caught subsequently, or found dead, it can be reported and the recovery details linked with the original details, to show, for example, how far it has traveled and how long it has lived.” (p.22) -(Hardey, J (2006) Raptors: A Field Guide to Survey Adn Monitoring, Norwich: The Stationery Office.)

To recap: In captivity terms, Ring Tags are what you usually find on racing and messager pigeons to identify the owner of the bird and their home location. By using this influence I designed individual code systems for each of the six original cage birds which I would engrave on this ebay product to become ankle bracelet Ring Tags.

Ebay Base Bracelets

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/390555719352?var=660119164515&ssPageName=STRK:MESINDXX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1436.l2649

The codes I created are…

• The Gloom = TM??30
• The Thump = TM40??
• The Guzzle = TM3506
• The Gazer = TM23??
• The Twitting = TM22??
• The Gossip = TM30??

TM = “The Mistress” being the owner of the bird in which the ring is attached to.

The first two numbered digits stand for the longest recorded life span of that particular bird in captivity.

The second two numbered digits stand for the longest recorded life span of that particular bird in the wild.

The ?? means that the life span has not been able to be recorded.

(figures sourced from http://www.demogr.mpg.de).

Finally, after 48 hours of painful hand engraving using a small drill that felt like a Pneumatic drill I made all 6 ring tags. See Slideshow for more images of the engraved Ring Tags.

Ring Tag – All 6

The characters will wear these on their right ankle very much like an actual bird would. At the next rehearsal I shall take some more photographs of the human ring tags, but this time, on the actual birds in which they connect to. 

A short post about the handmade skirt that I have had to create for the character The Gazer, a peacock in Dave Campton’s The Cagebirds.

For The Gazer’s skirt I wanted to give a sense of  elegance, but still making her look sort of like a showgirl, but overall, giving the effect of an actual peacocks plumage when its draped behind them like a train on a ballroom skirt or wedding dress. Traditionally “The train was a detachable piece of fabric that tied at the waist. Although but one layer among many, it was extra long…The fabric usage for skirts was extraordinary and having a skirt with 3.5 yards around the hem was not unusual.” (Condra, Jill and Anita A. Stamper, 2011, Clothing Through American History: The Civil War Through the Gilded Age, 1861 – 1899, California: ABC-CLIO).

Here is some examples seen below…

Skirt Train

Peacock with his tail down, trailing behind him

See Slideshow for Images of  the final product of The Gazer’s skirt, standing alone without the matching fascinator, top or accessories…

As part of the overall design of the costumes a designer can not only research what he she wants to be used (as seen is previous costume design posts) he or she must actually so a physical design concept. More often than not, traditionally these design concepts take shape in the form of basic water colour drawings.

For each individual (bird) character for The Cagebirds I have created a personal design concept. See Slideshow for Images.

The Gloom – This character is a sickly little bird, so spending majority of her time in night clothes and slippers with a thick warm scarf.

Species Influence = The Great Thick Knee

Colour Scheme = Grey

The Guzzle – This character is a rather peckish bird, so most of her time is spent it elasticated comfy trackies in which to fill up with food. I’m also thicnking about giving a a little white lobster bib for this character – for slight comical yet practical affect.

Species Influence = Pigeon

Colour Scheme = Teal

The Thump – He is the only real male bird in the cage and a right grumpy old man, as he can’t wear a vest top, a sweater vest is more in-keeping with his personal theme.

Species Influence = Bearded Vulture

Colour Scheme = Orange

The Gazer – She is the most glamorous of the birds, so a flamboyant show girl sort of out is perfect for this little Prima Donna.

Species Influence = (Male) Peacock

Colour Scheme = Royal Blue

The Gossip – Little Miss Chatterbox, loud colours to match her loud personality for this high school-like character.

Species Influence = Red Macaw Parrot

Colour Scheme = Red

The Twitting – This character is a timid little thing with only a little chirp now and again, simplicity is key for this character, simple trousers, simple colour, simple twitching fascinator.

Species Influence = Canary

Colour Scheme = Yellow 

As you may, or may not remember in my last post, the director decided to change the species of the main character – The Wild One, form a Golden Eagle to a (Male) Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, so I have uploaded the original costume design, and the new design. Here, if you refer to the Slideshow,  you can see that I’ve tried to keep the overall style the same with the leather jacket, bare foot and little shorts with leggings, the main difference is the colour scheme and the make-up design. I am going to try and keep the original fasciantor then maybe either add red feathers to the hair or to the actual head band. This will have to be a physical experiment for the next couple of days, there is only just over a week left after all until show day.

The following are the makeup designs for each of the characters of The Cagebirds by David Campton. Each character’s design uses a face paint base and  has a matching code which relates back to the makeup pallete of eye shadow below.

Makeup Pallete

The colors start at 1 10 from top left to right, then second row down along to the right etc. See Slideshow for Images.

The Wild One – 3   52   53   56   57   60

The Gloom – 2   5   6   7   10   54   104

The Guzzle – 2   4   5   23   70   71

The Thump – 10   114   115   116   119

The Gazer – 2   20   68   79   93   107 and off-gold face glitter.

The Gossip – 3   10   48   50   68   79   104

The Twitting – 3   51   52   53   103   104   105   111   113

And now, we will have to wait and see what they look like on the flesh when we have our tester session, when the makeup is put on the characters so they can be photographed for the publicity posters.

Finally! The last two sets of feathers arrived yesterday so I have been able to make all the fascinators at last 😀

So, in the Slideshow are the images of the final Head pieces for the characters of Cagebirds along side the bird that they are influenced by. Here is a brief overview of the influences behind the designs.

The influence for the Gloom is the Great Thick-Knee due to a line in the piece in which the character complains about her knees. The fascinator sits on the left side of the head at an angle in front of the low bun hairstyle.

The influence for the Guzzle is the Pigeon due to nature of the character and the common pigeon and their consistent eating habits. The fascinator sits on the center of the head behind the beehive fringe and in front of the pony-tail. Here, this fascianator also has a cupcake charm on the front to depict the food loving nature of this character.

The influence for the Thump is the Bearded Vulture due to both the character’s and the actual species’s temperament and violent nature. The fascinator is a traditional old man’s style flat cap which sits normally on the top of the head with the feather trailing back slightly flicked like the original bird.

The influence for the Gazer is the male Peacock through its flamboyant and show-off disposition  The fascinator sits center of the head trailing down the fore head to the bridge of the nose giving the Show-girl esc style donning real peacock feathers.

The influence for the Gossip is the Red Macaw Parrot threw its talkative nature. The fascinator is a traditional Alice band which sits normally on the top of the head with three sets of  feathers swooping down the left side of the head like the wing of  the original bird.

The influence for the Twitting is the Canary due to both the character’s and the actual species’s fragile and fearful disposition. The fascinator is a clip which attaches to the left side of the head with a large plumage of feathers, so when the character jumps or twitches in fear, the feathers twitch with her giving a further 3D element to the character.

As you may of noticed if you read previous blogs within the Costume Files, the Eagle charm on the original designs no longer seem to be on the current fascinators. This is because the Director has changed her mind about the species of the Wild One. As you may recall, in the original designs the Wild One was the Golden Eagle, an earthy coloured, free spirited, freedom loving bird and according to the RSPB website “Lives in the wild, open moorlands and mountains of Scotland, favouring islands and remote glens. Best looked for soaring high over hillsides in the Scottish Highlands” (www.rspb.org.uk) relating perfectly to the character’s yearning desire to be flying free in the wild and not strained behind the cage bars. The Director has now decided that she wants the Wild One to be… a Woodpecker.

The influence for the Wild One is now the Woodpecker  The fascinator is, like The Gossip’s, a traditional Alice Band. I originally made this when she was still and eagle, but thankfully the feathers somewhat match the feathers of this Male Lesser Spotted Woodpecker in which the Director described. As part of the costume, the character will also have some sort of bright red crown either made out of feathers or hair die, this is something I will have to investigate further.

So these are the final headpieces ready for the performance.

As part of the rehearsal process the Director thought it best if the characters (Birds) is they started wearing the feather elements of their costumes to get used to the fact they are actually birds. So I started creating the Fascinators.

Fascinators are posh (and usually rather eccentric) headpieces usually found on women at weddings or ascot and come in a wide variety of colours, sizes and styles.

I have created an individualistic Fascinator for each bird within the cage, focusing on their human characteristics and what actual bird they are based on. As you may or may not recall each character is based on an actual bird in existence that has similarities to human personal of text they speak within the script, if not, here is a list to remind you:

• The Wild One  – Eagle (Aguila Chrysaetos)
• The Gloom – Great Thick-Knee (Esacus Recurvirostris)
• The Thump – Bearded Vulture (Gypaetus Barbatus) 
  
• The Guzzle – Pigeon (Columbia Livia)
• The Gazer – Peacock (Pavo Cristatus)
• The Twitting – Canary (Serinus Canarius Domesticus)
• The Gossip – Parrot (Psittacidae Ara Chloroptera)

Each of the Fasciantors required for the piece shows the individual colour schemes and the breed etc, but all (except The Wild One’s) has been given a small silver charm. An Eagle charm to be exact.

Eagle Charm

This charm, (even though it may not be clearly seen from the audience) has been used for two reasons. The first being the more practical option, is to hide some of the stitching work on the Fascinator base, and the second reason, The Wild One (being an eagle) has tried to leave her mark on the other caged birds, even long after she has been killed off.

So far I have made 5 of the 7 because I am still waiting on the feathers for The Guzzle and The Thump, but See Slideshow for Images of The Wild One, The Gloom, The Gazer, The Gossip and The Twitting fascianors that have been created so far.

Hopefully, the last load of feathers etc should arrive in the next couple of days, but until then, I will continues designing the costumes and sourcing the materials and costumes. 5 down, 2 to go.

In my previous post called Costumes – Human Influences, I mentioned what the uniform code of the characters in the cage could be.

Section A consisted of a dress uniform style which visibly showed the audience of the bird’s linkage in a human way but still showing individuality through colours – the Vest tops.

Section B will consist of bird’s uniform code and to give the darker element of the the character’s confinement of the Mistress’s cage.

I started thinking about how birds are kept in captivity compared to them being free in the wild. Then the thought struck me. Ring Tags.

See Slideshow for Image

“Ringing helps investigate how long birds live and when and where they move, which is vital information for bird conservation. Placing a light, uniquely numbered ring around a bird’s leg is a reliable and harmless method of identifying birds as individuals. Some projects use colour rings to allow identification without catching birds.” – www.thebritishmuseum.org

In captivity terms, Ring Tags are what you usually find on racing and messager pigeons to identify the owner of the bird and their home location.

By incorporating these two forms I have designed code systems for each of the six original cage birds which I will engrave on this product to become ankle bracelet Ring Tags.

Human Ring Tags

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/390555719352?var=660119164515&ssPageName=STRK:MESINDXX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1436.l2649

• The Gloom = TM??30
• The Thump = TM40??
• The Guzzle = TM3506
• The Gazer = TM23??
• The Twitting = TM22??
• The Gossip = TM30??

TM stands for “The Mistress” being the owner of the bid in which the ring is attached to. The first two numbered digits stand for the longest recorded life span of that particular bird in captivity, and the second two numbered digits stand for the longest recorded life span of that particular bird in the wild.  The ?? means that the life span has not been able to be recorded. (figures sourced from http://www.demogr.mpg.de).

The next steps to the costume design process is to;

1) Research what the uniform code can be. a & b (Section B will be explained in a later post).

2)  Decide of a singular bird (or style of woman in the case of the Mistress) for each character to be.

3) Research human influences in fashion and design for them all to have.

1) Uniform: Section A – Firstly, I thought about the structure of a uniform. In a military sense it would be a clean-cut jacket with medals and spit-polished boots, but that’s not what I’m aiming for, I’m thinking more of the birds being imprisoned behind their cage bars… like a prison cell.  So, what do they wear in prison, apart from the stereo-typical, non-slimming black and white stripes? In America, I know they sometimes wear the bright orange jumpsuits, but that’s too bold a statement for our piece, we need something that underlines the fact they are in a prison-like cell but nothing too obvious that will distract from the story of the piece. Usually prisoners wear the vest shirts under the jumpsuit, simple yet can be uniformal.  Vests it is, now to the next step.

2) talking to the director and some of the cast members then making some alterations, I came to this final decision of what breed was for each character…

• The Wild One  – Eagle (Aguila Chrysaetos) 
• The Gloom – Great Thick-Knee (Esacus Recurvirostris)
• The Thump – Bearded Vulture (Gypaetus Barbatus) 
  
• The Guzzle – Pigeon (Columbia Livia)
• The Gazer – Peacock (Pavo Cristatus) This character in particular the director wanted to be in the style of a Peacock so from henseforth shall be so.
• The Twitting – Canary (Serinus Canarius Domesticus)
• The Gossip – Parrot (Psittacidae Ara Chloroptera)
• The Mistress – An Eccentric Old Woman (Ecentricus Antiquus Fēmina)

3) Each of the birds will have and individual costume items that relate to their character’s personality etc; a colour scheme, a regulation uniform vest tip, bottom half, footwear,  headpiece/fascinator, accessory, hair style and make-up design.

See Slideshow for Images

The Wild One – Earthy colours of brown go best for this character to match her need to be free. Her bare feet and leather jacket also helps the hippy/freedom loving sense to this character with her hair freely blowing in the breeze. Wind swept and interesting.

Personal Colour:- Brown

The Gloom – Due to her sickly nature of being a hypercondriact a dull grey colour will go well for this character, and long length pajama bottoms that can be easily pulled up to show the knees will show the mentality of this gloomy, bed-ridden believing character.

Personal Colour:- Grey

The Thump – Orange and black match this bold yet dark nature of this character. He is the only male in the piece, so a grumpy old man with a duck headed cane and flat cape will go well with this Victor Meldrew-like, (see the popular television programme One Foot into the Grave) grumpy guts. Instead of the uniformal vest, to keep with his character he will wear an orange sweater vest on top of a black shirt,

Personal Colour:- Orange

The Guzzle – Comfy trousers  that stretch (Food Pants) is key for this character, the more room to fill the better, and tied back hair so it doesn’t get in the way of all the lovely food that she fantasies about. Blends of grey, teals, a hint of purple and the nature of the character will hopefully make the audience realize that shes a parallel of the type of bird that they see in everyday life.

Personal Colour: – Teal

The Gazer – Pretty as a picture and eye-catching is the main theme for this character’s costume. a long formal skirt that relates to the flamboyant male peacock unveiling his tail-feather plumage for all to see, with matching feather peacock feather accessories and fascinator will really show the self-adoring persona of the character.

Personal Colour:- Royal Blue

The Twitting – Yellow, yellow,yellow, that’s the theme for this character. Yellow vest top, yellow fasinator and even yellow shows. Her braid will show how interwoven she is with the ways of the cage that will be symbolized in a necklace that will hang round her neck. Her bonds to the life of a caged-bird.

Personal Colour:- Yellow

The Gossip – This little chatter box reminds me of a stereo-typical American high school girl you see in all the flick-chick movies, so modern fashion is a big influence in the character’s costume design. Big chunky belts and the blue skirt in the image above is very popular at the moment with young women and looks rather like a parrot’s tail in the way that it hangs gracefully from the back.

Personal Colour:- Red

The Mistress – Once again the Mistress is a tricky one, due to the fact she is not a bird herself but a rather a as a flamboyant elder lady. But style wise I am currently thinking of a blend of three different women; Lady Gaga – the popular singer, Iris Apfel – an eccentric fashion designer with a thing for overly large rimmed glasses and Norma Desmond – the ageing silent movie star in Sunset Boulevard.

From this Human Influence boards I will now draw up some designs and gather research on acquiring the materials/items for each character costume.

“Understanding the range of gestures and movements which the current fashion allowed, will enable the scholar to decipher the messages transmitted through the body language and the costumes in the motionless portraits.” (p.149) – Entwistle, Joanne and Elizabeth B. Wilson (2001) Body Dressing, London: Berg.

David Campton’s The Cagebirds is a allegorical play about six birds that live in a cage, each totally absorbed in his or her own particular characteristics and personas. But when the Wild One is introduced into their little caged society by their Mistress, she tries to persuade them to break out from their   imprisonment into the wider world outside and to venture into what would be their new found independence. Sadly, her efforts are in vain and result  in only her own destruction at their hands.

As I am in the role of creating the costumes, one of the main key features for the production is to create stylistic and innovative costumes that will relate to each individual character, but also for the majority of the birds, create an identifiable uniformity twist, but in keeping with their own individuality of character.

“The role of costumes has, therefore, been very significant  in stimulating psychological  response among the people. This may be best exemplified by the costumes worn by different actors on the stage to typify different characters. Having, therefore,  felt impressed by the inherent potentialities of different types of costumes – their texture, colour, quality of raw material and the manner in which these are used, with further  qualify their characteristics, the man has used them in innumerable ways  in the real life throughout the course of history. Besides, he has phantomatized himself by their use in magic, sorcery, witchcraft etc. to dramatize a situation or to simulate desired psychological response… The costumes have, thus, by usage become characterising symbols for different social, cultural  and occupational groups on the hand and for the individuals on the other.” (p.19) – Hāṇḍā , Omacanda (1998) Textiles, Costumes and Ornaments of the Western Himalayas, New Delhi: Indus Publishing Company.

So, who/what are the characters?

• The Wild One
• The Gloom
• The Thump
• The Guzzle
• The Gazer
• The Twitting
• The Gossip
• The Mistress

The first thing I have to consider in designing the costumes is what kind of creature these characters would be.  So to be I created individual Species Mood Boards as seen below, showing three types of birds that relate to each individual charter, and three different style of costume ideas on how the Mistress than be dressed.

SeeSlideshow for Images

The Wild One – I believe that earthy colours are essential to this character considering her desire to be free, with strength and slight hippy qualities to give the passion of anger and desire to fly free.

The Gloom – This character is seen as a sort of hypercondriact so my research at this point looked into the most fragile breeds of birds. Also at several points of the script the Gloom fusses and complains about her knees, thus the Great Thick-Knee came to mind for this character.

The Thump – This character is a rather cynical and violent (especially in the final moments of the piece) sort of creature, thus the larger breed of birds for its influence.

The Guzzle – This character does not stop talking about food! Seriously everything she says is food related, she practically talks with her stomach. So here are three most food food pinching, greedy guts, food guzzling birds in the world.

The Gazer – This character is the pretty one of the group, so naturally, you would most likely think of peacock, but, I’ve seen too many productions of The Cagebirds that have followed that angle, so I tried to think out side the box. (the cage in this instance) These three breeds I think are the most colourful/beautiful I’ve ever seen, perfect, for Little Miss Pretty Bird.

The Twitting – Here you see the most common of caged birds, also the most common that constantly twitters. This character in particular is comfy in its surroundings and fears the world beyond the bars, but also for slight moments questions itself, then quickly resumes its timid, twittering self, much like these three breeds.

The Gossip – The chatter box of the group. Here are three of the most talkative of the all the bird kingdom. These particular breeds have learnt to mimic what they hear which is perfect for the Gossip who is constantly repeating what she has heard in previous conversation.

And lastly…

The Mistress – This character is different to all the other characters of the play, for in our version especially, she is the only human being – Homo Sapien. This character is a little bit more difficult to identify costume wise than the others, so, what do I personally think about when I think of someone who keeps creatures in a cage? I think of  three things in particular;

1) Some sort of asylum doctor

2) A bird keeper at the zoo

3) A sweet (or sometimes cookie/eccentric) old lady that dolts on her “Babies”, or in this case “My Sweeties” – David Campton, The Cagebirds.

So, overall, I think the natural animal kingdom will come into great assistance in influencing my designs of the costumes and also hopefully help the actors for their portrayals in their personal characteristics of their characters.