On a morning in early June, the Costume Shop at Kent State鈥檚 Center for the Performing Arts was filled with sounds鈥攕ewing machines buzzing, radio blasting, women chattering and laughing.
With less than a week to go before Kent State鈥檚 Porthouse Theatre opened its 49th season with 鈥9 to 5 The Musical鈥濃攂ased on the hit 1980 movie starring Dolly Parton, Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda鈥攎embers of the costume crew were working way more hours than 9 to 5 to meet their deadline.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a lot of clothes,鈥 says Marti Coles, BA 鈥97, assistant costume shop manager. 鈥淭hink of it this way: If there is a three-week period condensed into one play, then there are three weeks of clothes per person. And everything has to be labeled with each actor鈥檚 name鈥攔ight down to the underwear.鈥
The costumes for this production鈥攚hich include a gown for Snow White in one of the fantasy sequences鈥攚ere designed by Kerry McCarthy, BA 鈥13, MFA 鈥16. Planning for a production starts six weeks out, at a minimum, and designers typically read the script many times to get a feel for the play before designing the costumes, then pulling clothes from stock, purchasing some and building others.
鈥淚 always say costume designers have split personalities because we carry all these people in our head,鈥 Coles says. 鈥淲e have to figure out how they鈥檙e going to look, how they鈥檙e going to move in each one of those outfits. And on top of that, you want the whole show to look cohesive.鈥
The show opened June 15 and runs through July 1.