I've been pretty lucky in my life to know people who love theatre as much as I do and who have pursued it as a career. One of those people is Spencer Potter. I've known Spencer since high school when he was busy acting in all of the shows, painting all of the sets and props and making amazing beards and now that we're grown up - he's had some of the coolest jobs all over the country. His MFA from Utah State University is in Theatre Arts with an emphasis in scenic and costume design means he can pretty much do it all, but his most recent gig is as an Assistant Professor of Theatre at Westminster College, a liberal arts college in Salt Lake City, Utah. He was kind enough to let me be his shadow for a couple of days to learn about the process of costuming a show. I was even more excited to learn that the show he was working on was
Spring Awakening - one of my favorites.
When I first came to Spencer with this idea, he mentioned that this would be a unique situation because there would be limited resources (e.g. money) to work with in order to costume this show. Like most art programs, Westminster College Theatre is given a strict budget to adhere to for each show. Spencer was given $8,000 to costume an entire year's worth of shows (four shows total). For Spring Awakening that meant $2,000 went towards costumes for 18 actors and $300 for hair and makeup. That roughly comes to about $111 per person for clothes/shoes (keep in mind that period appropriate footwear alone can cost at least $100) and $17 per person for hair/makeup - that's not a lot! Luckily, for pieces too expensive to create brand new, Spencer was able to pull from existing stock at Westminster and borrow from Utah State University.
Spencer began his research for
Spring Awakening in October 2017. The obvious starting point was to talk to the director about his vision for the show, read the script and listen to the music, but Spencer might have had a bit of a chip on his shoulder. When Spencer first listened to
Spring Awakening in college he thought the characters were whiny and annoying and that the show was trying to be edgy just to prove that it could be different. But, picking it up again as a professor, he found that the message of this show is more powerful than he previously realized and relevant for the world we live in today.
Spring Awakening is a rock musical that follows a group of teenagers as they navigate the ins and outs of adolescence in late nineteenth century Germany. It discusses sexuality, abuse and education as it relates to freedom of thought and religion - all those difficult subjects that parents often don't want to be honest about, but kids want to know about the most. Wendla, a young, innocent girl wants to know where babies come from. Melchior questions religion and knows too much for his own good. Moritz wants to be successful in school and for all the annoyances of teenage hormones to go away.
Spencer focused some of his research on what would've been happening in Germany in the time of this show to ensure he was being historically accurate and to see if there were any clues on how the characters might have dressed based on what was happening in the world around them. In 1871 Germany became a country, but because of the country's struggles to free themselves from the Habsburg empire - it was still very militarized. The literacy rate was high because of educational laws made decades earlier so school and a student's performance while there was important. It's from this research that Spencer spent a lot of time focusing on what the boy's school uniforms would look like.
These jackets were some of my favorite costume pieces from the show. The red cuffs are made from beautiful, delicate silk and next to the structured wool body of the jacket it's a delightful juxtaposition of discipline and beauty. Overall the look of uniformity and seriousness immediately communicated the rigidity of their education and the expectations their teachers had for them. Each boy had a different way of dressing down their uniform during particular scenes that spoke to their character - Moritz usually left his jacket on, but undid his tie (he's a rule follower), whereas Melchior usually wasn't wearing his jacket at all unless he was in class (he doesn't care about rules). When Melchior was having his most rebellious moments, he donned a pair of green colored lenses. It almost felt psychadelic - like a hippie cult leader - which further emphasized how the characters look up to Melchior - not because he is obedient and quiet, but because he's brave enough to question the status quo and doesn't care.
Early in the process, when Spencer was assessing with his shop manager, Andrea, what fabric they already had in stock, Andrea remarked how all of the purple fabric they were sorting through looked like a big bruise. Which gave him a great idea for the color palette of the show - a bruise. With songs like "Blue Mirror" and "Purple Summer" mentioning bruise colors by name and some great lyrics in "Word of Your Body" that really drive home the point:
"Oh, I'm gonna bruise you. Oh, you're gonna be my bruise."
Spencer used
this site to generate a color palette based off of a picture of a bruise and you'd be surprised how many colors showed up! Once Spencer had a feel for the story and tone he was looking to set with the costumes, he began sketches to help gather his thoughts and help dictate what had to be built brand new.
The few adults in this show are all dressed in dark tones - grays, blacks and browns. Women wore long skirts and high collars and men wore suits and ties. Spencer wanted to show uniformity in color and style with the adults and dress them in truly period clothing - something that would visually separate them from their more free thinking children and create a wall of cold parents who wouldn't provide the answers their children were looking for.
It was the young girl's costumes that I loved most of all. Each girl had their own white tea dress made from various laces Spencer found in the fabric district in Los Angeles for $3/pound. Each dress was unique, but all achieved the same goal of showing youth and innocence. Fun touches were added on top of the dresses like patterned coats, dark, textured vests, fingerless fishnet gloves and fishnet stockings. Heavy eyeliner and contemporary hairstyles helped tie the modern feel of the music to the angsty attitudes of the characters wearing each piece.
Sometimes the actors' own items were worked seamlessly into their costumes. The character of Georg wears rose colored lenses that are the actors' everyday glasses and the actress that plays Ilse has bright pink hair that not only helps draw your eye, but also adds an additional edge to the character. With high collars and long sleeves, the costumes are still appropriate for the time period, but the thought put into the construction and style of the pieces communicates to the audience that the feelings that these kids are having are something from a more modern time.
During the dress rehearsal I attended, Spencer and I discussed how chilling it is that Spring Awakening, completed in 2009, was started in 1999 in response to Columbine and students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida, who lost 17 of their classmates in one of the worst school shootings in recent history in February 2018, were rehearsing this show at the time of the shooting. "I can think of five other productions of Spring Awakening opening this month," Spencer said, "because it's incredibly relevant." The show is from the perspective of the teens - so you can see how the adults in their lives, whether intentionally or not, are failing them.
- Wendla's mother fails her when she won't explain where babies really come from and as a result, Wendla gets pregnant.
- Ilse's parents fail her as her father abuses her and her mother "just smiles that smile."
- Moritz is failed by the school system and cruel administrators who want him gone because they find him strange and dull.
Spring Awakening will be relevant for as long as teenage curiosity and parents' refusal to answer exists. The music is rebellious (in that it doesn't match the time period of the show, is usually rock influenced and often has curse words), but with incredibly poignant lyrics throughout. The inner feelings of these kids are reflected in the music and that's what musicals should do - track the range of emotions we experience in life. And good costumes? Well they help tell the story.
You won't want to miss the chance to see this show or Spencer's beautiful costumes. Spring Awakening is playing March 8-10 at 7:30 in the Jay W. Lees Courage Theatre. You can get tickets here.
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