The Fairies

A Midsummer Night's Dream

The fairies were a lively, colorful bunch. I opted to put them in cool colors and neutrals, to provide a unified look, but still allow for variation. With heavy emphasis on the blues, we also included greens and purples, and a bit of gray, ivory and gold.

For the queen of the fairies, Titania, we cast a curvy statuesque young lady with elocution and presence to spare. We considered her and another actress for both the role of Titania and that of Hippolyta. When the other actress requested a small role, the decision was very easy, and both delivered their roles stellarly.

We decided that rather than encumber Titania with lots of details and frills, we would embrace her near-austerity, and work with one piece of fabric and her natural assets to create a uniquely ethereal look. A piece of teal-blue crimped material with a velvety sheen cascaded from her neckline to a puddle on the floor, its color, texture, and movement giving a definite aquatic impression. It draped and moved beautifully and afforded her a sensuality and a regal presence that pleased us tremendously.

We added tulle in a variety of light colors as a train and a furry-textured striped material as a shoulder strap, incorporating all the fairies' colors in the gown of the queen. I made a tiara of blue and green beads and gold wire to add another layer to her aquatic inspired look, and a delicate choker in tiny seed beads of blues, greens, and gold to add hints of sparkle.

With the fairy chorus, we were going for a very light-hearted, childlike ensemble, and encouraged them to play simple games like hula-hoop, pat-a-cake, paper-rock-scissors, tag, monkey-in-the-middle, and jump-rope. We encouraged giggling at any moment that wasn't specifically serious, and achieved the silly fickle-whimmed affect we were after.

In the script, Titania is given four attendants: Mustardseed, Cobweb, Peaseblossom, and Moth. We didn't challenge the immediate assumptions much. Mustardseed wore gold. She played her character with an innocence and a joyfulness that reached from the top of her head to the tips of her toes. Cobweb got gray and black, with bits of lace trim trailing from her arms to her bodice. She had the most dynamic makeup, with a cobweb painted on her cheek and bold green eyeliner. She lurked in corners and hung from elevated set pieces, exactly as a Cobweb ought. For Peaseblossom, we opted to focus on the "Pea" rather than the "blossom" and put her in lime green (which worked well- it's the actress's favorite color) with some circular motifs in the bodice and the hair. She had a natural enthusiasm tempered by sarcastic wit that read at a distance, and she played so sweetly with our changeling boy. Moth wore ivory with small accents of red. Her costume was very symmetrical and included large swooping pieces of beige lace draping below her arms. She developed her character beautifully, holding poses for a period of time before quick flighty movements brought her to a new pose.

We thought it seemed unlikely that Titania would assign all of her fairies to attend on Bottom, and introduced four more female fairies, and encouraged them to come up with their own names and personalities. Jay and Skylar were our "twins." At auditions we watched for a pair of girls with similar voices and builds who could split the opening scene with Puck, with one's voice fading and the other's voice building in the midst of a line. They learned to move in ways that would mirror, compliment, or balance one another. Their robins-egg blue costumes, including feathers in their hair, cemented their twinship in case anyone had missed it. Periwinkle was played by a delightful pre-teen whose family is heavily involved in the local town theatre. I was so pleased to bring her in and see her work with the other girls as she found her character: soft and sweet, like her namesake flower. Raspberry wore a vibrant hues in the berry-into-plum range and brought an sweet-tart impish quality to the group. When we needed a fairy laugh, Raspberry delivered, providing a range anywhere between a light giggle to something nearing a cackle.

When it came time for the lullaby, we asked if any of the fairy-ladies would be comfortable with a solo, and Raspberry volunteered. We conferred with her, and she conferred with a music major friend of hers to compose a suitably haunting and lovely melody to match the rather unusual lyrics Shakespeare penned. She sang the verses as a solo, and taught the chorus to the rest of the fairies. As they finished singing each night, the final note lingered over the audience, casting a very real kind of magic that only music can.

For all the lady-fairies' costumes, we went with a very organic process. I chose almost entirely knit materials, so that we could leave all their garments unhemmed for a raw natural look without having to contend with overwhelming fraying. The knit materials also meant that the costumes didn't have to fit closely and could drape and flow and flutter as they moved. Three of the actresses wanted to make their own costumes, and I encouraged them to, as I knew it would relieve the seamstresses' work load, but even better, allow those actresses to make the character truly their own from start to finish. I discussed shapes and lines with them, and gave them some sketches and a stack of fabrics and let them play. To say I was pleased with their products would be something of an understatement. For the other five fairies and Titania, I set up one-on-one-on-one costuming sessions, where an actress and I went to a seamstress's home and discussed and draped until we found shapes we were all comfortable with. The seamstress safety-pinned things in place and took notes, and sewed them up in the day or two following the meeting, so as to have a clean workspace when the next costume consultation came along. It was an unusual but very tactile and fun process.
For the changeling boy, we needed to find a careful balance. He needed to be young enough to have an immediate "cute factor" but old enough to know what was going on and not need his hand held every second of the process. Again I brought in a contact from the town theatre, the eight-year-old brother of our Periwinkle actress. As the changeling is the son of an Indian follower of Titania's, we decided to put the changeling boy in a loosely South-Asian- inspired outfit, with a turban, blue foundation and heavy eyeliner. He definitely had the cute factor under control and delivered a charming and detailed performance.

As with his the fairy queen, we thought that Oberon would likely have more attendants than just the one (Puck) that is mentioned in the script. We added Bower (after the deep blue bower bird who collects shiny prizes to woo mates) In our show, Bower lured Mustardseed away for a romantic tryst, just moments after she promised to "stand sentinel" over Titania's sleep. Bower also helped Puck in the confusion and misdirection of the lovers as they stumble through the dark woods in the night. With Puck on one side of the stage and Bower on the other, both calling to the lovers, it is little wonder the befuddled humans gave up the chase.

The other male fairy we added was Verde, an energetic young man of small stature in vibrant tropical greens. We had fun adding moments where Puck could dump some of his less pleasant tasks on Verde. In the scene where Oberon sends Puck to fetch the magical flower, Verde is leaning against a rock munching an apple. Puck promises to "put a girdle 'round about the earth in forty minutes" and then sends Verde after the flower and promptly starts to eat Verde's apple. When Verde returns triumphant, and starts towards Oberon, Puck intercepts him, takes the flowers, returns the clean-picked apple core, and declares exultantly (around a mouthful of apple) that he has done his master's bidding. The male fairies added such a mischievous, deviant quality to the show, as they watched the lovers' quarrel, bickered amongst themselves, and taunted the female fairies.

With the male fairies, we wanted costuming that seemed a bit more human than their female counterparts so we put them in shirts and pants with a vest or jacket. Oberon, the "king of shadows," wore charcoal gray and navy in shades that shimmered and blended. A floor-length vest/cloak/thing swept behind him dramatically. I made a simple circlet in black, gray, silver, gold, and bronze beads and wires to affect a casual kingliness. The reason I opted for such a casual, simple look for Oberon is simple: his voice. Both scratchy and resonant, throaty and authoritative, his voice doesn't make sense in any sort of quantitative way. But the second we heard him speak at auditions, we knew he would rock the part. Add to that a truly unique face, a casual but confident way of moving, and good instincts for interaction, he was a perfect king of the fairies. I knew that with such a strong voice and presence, to give him an ornate or commanding costume would make him totally overwhelming.

All of the actors cast as male fairies had dark hair and tended towards shaggy hair and scruffy beards, both of which we encouraged. By encouraged, I mean that I forbade them to cut their hair or shave.

One notable exception to the scruffy beards of the male fairies was the young lady we cast to play Puck. Of the many capable audtioners, there really wasn't any question who ought to get the role. Her voice was high and clear. Her energy filled whatever room she was in. Her face was unlike any face I'd ever seen- a lovely mix of big feminine eyes and strong angular jaw. Add a willingness to play with short hair styles and extreme hair colors, and we had Puck. As we developed the look for Puck, we came to a few basic decisions. We tried her in the female fairy makeup, but didn't love it. We tried a hybrid of the female fairies' "albino" look and the male fairies' "fox" look, but that didn't work either. In the end, we did essentially the same "fox" look as we did on Oberon and his other followers. To spice it up though, the decision was made to dye her hair the color of a fluorescent tomato. We tied this in throughout by having the lights turn red, or at least pinkish, whenever Puck's magical mischief was afoot. And let me just say that bright red hair under bright red lights shines almost as brightly as the setting sun. As for Puck's actual costuming, I did up over a dozen sketches, but in the end, my co-director and I decided that we liked the idea of Puck almost blending in with the humans, or at least blending as much as a fluorescent-haired, fox faced fairy can. We put her in plaid trousers, a pinstriped shirt, a black jacket, and bare feet. The thought was that by almost blending in with the humans, she could "disappear" into a crowd without actually using magic to disappear. People see what they want to see.

Our goal with the two fairy groups was to be "equal but opposite." The females traveled in a large pack; the males as a small group of best friends. The girls retained a sense of formality in their court through more elegant clothing, social structure, and dialogue; the boys were more comfortable in the woods, very casual in garb, pose, and conversation. The ladies were light; the guys were dark. When they were in their two separate camps, there needed to be clear delineation, but when they came together at the end, they had to balance each other and fit together.

The fairies added a delightful aspect to the production. In some versions of "Midsummer," the fairies can feel weighed down or forced into some sort of ungainly characterization. By encouraging the actors to find their own characters, and to become real-life friends offstage, we achieved a carefree, exuberant, and decidedly supernatural ensemble. I knew from the start that the fairies would be the most wide-open and freeing part of the costuming. I had no idea that they would also be the most challenging aspect of the show to design and execute. In the end, I am beyond proud of how the fairies came out.



Photography in this entry by James Ratchford, Zachary Garber, and Molly Wilson