a good way to go out

a rollicking band of pirates we,
who tired of tossing on the sea,
are trying our hand at burglary,
with weapons grim and gory.



the musical was this past weekend, and it was amazing. i loved it more and more each time i saw it. i will admit that i was not impressed with it at all when i first heard the music. but actually seeing it performed on stage made a huge difference. especially once everybody learned their lines...and cues...and notes. i loved the boys. the pirates were wonderfully adorable, and the policemen were an absolute riot. derrick was amazing, particularly because he had the coolest pirate king coat in the history of the world. and chris was great as the major general (i give credit to the hat). and robbie...oh, robbie. what a character you are.

people say it's the best musical we've done in the four years we've been here. i find it impossible to pick a favorite show. each of them has it's own things that i love and hate about it. also, i can't separate the shows themselves from the experiences i had working on them. but pirates is definitely in the top five (along with school for scandal, jane eyre, much ado, and CT '05).

the costumes looked soooo good. i think it may be the best designing job i've done, though they were all hard in their own way. this time, the trick was in the details. if i ever figure out how to post pictures, i'll put some up here. we really ran it up to the wire this time. i officially finished costume work two minutes before the show opened, when i was chasing pirates down with a flashlight on the set, to give them necklaces with spray-painted gold beads. this was the show of the metallic gold spray-paint. we went after any button we thought would look interesting gold (and many that we knew wouldn't). from a distance, they looked just like normal gold buttons. we were able to get rid of so many hideous ones. i only wish we had figured this trick out before i cannibalized all the vintage british navy peacoats for much ado.

during the run i did makeup. i love makeup, because i always end up with specific interesting jobs to do, and don't get stuck slapping pancake makeup on a million people. this time, my jobs consisted of: spending half an hour sewing beads and gold buttons into pat's hair ("i have gold encrusted hair") which we decided were buttons from all the policemen he has slain, similar to the way indians carried scalps around on their belts; coralling all of dale's hair under his hat - no small feat, it took two rubber bands, many bobby pins, and copious amounts of hair spray - the boys needs a haircut; and getting steve to sit still long enough to get eyeliner put on. i always end up the one forcing boys into eyeliner. it goes back to rusty during west side freshman year, whose eye would twitch so much i had to pin him against the mirror to get it on him. i also spent time getting sharpie marker tattoos from chris. by saturday night, i had flames, a skull'n'crossbones w/ bandanna, and two daggers dripping blood across my whole upper arm. we, as a group, decided that i can't really pull off a tattoo.

it was so weird on saturday, standing backstage and knowing that i was getting ready to close my last mainstage musical. and my last time designing costumes. i often have these huge dreams of doing costumes professionally, but deep down i know it will never happen. earlier that day, i had been looking at the pins on my keys, and thinking back on all the shows i've done, and trying to remember all the people and memories from each of them. it doesn't seem like four years. it seems like maybe one. my college career has flown by. i remember being a freshman, and working in the costume shop, and being very nervous at the tech meeting, and then i blinked, and here i am in my last semester, surrounded by almost completely different people, having become one of those people who is giving a speech. i can't imagine what it's going to be like when i actually finish up my last show.

but, all things considered, this was a good show for my final set of costumes. they were fun, they weren't ridiculously hard, and i actually got to use color. and it was a great group of people to work with. even though it was crazy, i didn't sleep, and i was way too stressed out, i don't regret doing it for one minute. now i just wish i would stop meeting all these cool people two months before graduation.