GORGEOUS COSTUMES & CONFECTIONS
Restoration, Cherry Orchard, Freedom House
At NYU Grad Acting, I had the privilege of collaborating with incredibly talented NYU Grad Designers Claire Aquila, Mark Koss and Glenna Ryer. Their design presentations blew me away and were a true inspiration to my work as an actor on their productions.
It was a privilege to collaborate with them, to watch them work, and to work with their creations. I thought I would take the opportunity to give them some of the artistic credit they deserve. Thank you!
For Mark Wing-Davey's 'Restoration' by Edward Bond, Claire Aquila created this dress festooned with oversized tulle roses and a rose hat bigger than my head.
Ann's frippery is stripped from her as husband Lord Are's taste in fashion eats into her fortune, revealing what Aquila called the "plain Jane" she truly always was.
Ann impersonates a ghost in order to make demands of Lord Are, dressing herself in washed-out translucent rags and cheesecloth, the skeleton of a dress.
Photo 2:
At the point in the show where Ann was sliced open, I would explode a packet of glistening glycerin onto a wet sprawl of concealed bloody intestines, so that with a single whisk of a rapier, Ann's guts would burst out of her pallid rags with a disgusting, gooey thuck.
I also played another money-grubbing lady from the other end of the class spectrum, Mrs. Wilson, the gaoler's wife. Click here to view more photos of Restoration.
Throughout Victor Pappas' production of The Cherry Orchard, Mark Koss dressed Anya in pastels. Just as her costumes lit up the room, Anya's youth and practical optimism buoyed up the tragedy of the family.
Photo: Just when Lyubov Andreevna (Crystal Lucas-Perry, right) needs the strength to go on at the end of Act Three, Anya (Emily Gardner Hall, left) comes to save her, dressed in the same colors that Lyuba had recalled of the old nursery in Act One.
Click here to view more photos of Cherry Orchard.
Freedom House is a new play written by Anna Moench, with characters written specifically for our cast.
Photo: After an apocalyptic event in which birds fall from the sky, Lisa (Tiffany Baker, left) and Sonia (Emily Gardner Hall, right) are stranded outside their only food source, a dumpster.
Costume designer Glenna Ryer duplicated our costumes and distressed the duplicates within an inch of their life, with rips, deodorant marks, dirt and detailed tears that looked like they were caused by use. One look at us, and you could see that we had been living in the evidence of our struggle to survive.
Click here to view more photos of Freedom House.