Monday, July 27, 2009

Crawling to the finish line

My Sunday deadline has come and gone. And yes, I am almost finished making costumes! They had to try them on and in 1 hour do a run of the show with costumes for a photo session. Some hems were crooked, some belts did not make it around the waists, but for the most part, THEY LOOKED GOOD!

Loin cloths and vests fit very well. Our star must be nervous because his loincloth was falling off this week, where it was a little tight 3 weeks ago. So a shortening of elastic in the waist will fix that.

Men's shirts and pants looked so good on stage. Our tie dye job was great for looks, but the shirts are bleeding dye on the actor's armpits as they sweat it out on the dance floor. This is causing a problem because the colorful armpit sweat is transfering to the white Egyptian vests. Don't quite know how to solve that problem!

Women look fabulous in their tie dye skirts and blouses.

And the coats??? Despite the fact that they aren't exactly how I want them to look right now, they do look good, and may just stay as they are unless I can find time to change the one. There is mixed opinion on the finale coat, some love it and some don't. I happen to be one who is not totally pleased, but maybe it is as good as it gets for now, and I'll just have to accept this. When Joseph put the coats on last night, it brought tears to my eyes. This is why I wanted to costume this show, just to make THE COAT!

Here's the final count of what was made. Most were made by me, but my helpers, Miss Em and SS were invaluable helping me with garment construction, as well as SW, GW, RSM and MD, who did a lot of hand sewing for me. And of course, my two darling daughters, daughter in law and sister, who were very helpful also! MMHS, aka Monkeygirl, was a master of elastic after 3 nights of dealing with waistbands and pants legs threading elastic. Couldn't have done it without all of their help.

10 broomstick skirts (4 yards each, tie dyed)
10 peasant blouses
10 sashes to go with the skirts and blouses
10 Egyptian ladies dresses, with gold trim
4 long tunics for Cannaan men
4 robes to match
11 pairs of baggy pants for men
11 tunics/robes to match
1 jacket for Potiphar (gold lame trimmed with black satin)
1 sexy jumpsuit for Mrs. Potiphar (almost had a "wardrobe malfunction" last night when she was shaking that thing!
2 Egyptian tunics
12 loin cloths
10 vests to match loin cloths
6 gold lame Egyptian collars
1 pair of gold lame cuffs
4 gold lame Egyptian belts and front flaps
1 Elvis cape
5 little girls dresses
1 boy's shorts
20 tie dyed shirts
1 top for an actress who backed out as narrator
???headwraps and belts for actors

Made before by me for other plays but used for this play
4 piece belly dance costume
1 bakers coat
1 baker's hat


AND, AND, AND

2 COATS OF MANY COLORS--ONE IS TORN UP BY THE BROTHERS AND CARRIED OFF, THE OTHER IS THE FINALE COAT.

The breakaway coat required dozens of snaps and yards of velcro to put it together. And yes, it did survive its first ripping session, hope it can withstand the next 7-8 sessions and remain in one piece.

What is the grand total of pieces for this show? 143

That's the biggest job I've done so far!

And I'm almost finished!

P.S. Tonight, Joseph tells me that he sews costumes! Why didn't I know that before? I would have surely put him to work on something!

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