It’s hard to believe that the show is over this weekend. It’s been a crazy month and a half of prop making and backstage management.
Here are some other things I created for this show:
Shoulder and arm bone: front view. Paper maché over wood and wire frames. With select ligaments.
Shoulder and arm bone: back view. Paper maché over wood and wire frames. With select ligaments.
Shoulder bone: front view detail. Paper maché over wire frames. With select ligaments.
The fake organs were pulled from a latex stomach rig to comic effect during a song and dance number. The challenge was getting the preset right so that everything came out smoothly for each performance. All of the organs are weighted so that they move realistically when handled.
Liver, Pancreas, Stomach with attached Duodenum and Small Intestine.
The original Ledger Book below (left) was made by adding perfect bound pages to an existing cover. Then later a duplicate was requested. Luckily we had bought 2 similar folders at a thrift store, but the second one needed a bit of a makeover to pass as the first.
Before: Ledger book and it’s soon to be double.
First it had to be cut down widthwise and the edges sealed.
cutting down the cover for the duplicate ledger book
Then, after a set of pages had been bound and attached, I finally came to a solution for the gold corners: painted suede leather. The suede took the paint without rubbing off, and could be easily manipulated around the corners of the book to emulate the metal versions on the original.
The duplicate ledger – faux metal corner detail.
From 10 feet away, and in the short scene onstage where both are seen, no one can tell that it’s that different. The Magic of Theatre!
Matching ledgers.
The matching interior pages of the Ledgers.
These Club Monaco culottes were a perfect and very thrifty find to use as material for a Tam o’ Shanter. We wanted something that could live in the era of the play and wasn’t loud plaid (that look didn’t really exist in the 1820s). Tams are actually quite easy to construct from fabric, and I found a couple of good free patterns online. In this case, I used a light interfacing to give the lighter wool some body, and didn’t need to line it, as it is used to dress a fake body!
Before: thrift store culottes.
The completed tam on “Donald”.
This single sleeve is used on that same body to represent another character in the play as if she haas been stuffed into a barrel. One audience member really bought it, saying out loud “Wow, she must be really flexible!”
Donald had a few different roles in the show.
This fake hacksaw (used for medical purposes) was put together but the production manager, and ‘dressed’ by me. My heavy duty pinking shears came in handy for making the blade edge.
A fake saw!
Some of my favourite things to make are themed opening night gifts for the hardworking folks that put the show together behind the scenes.
Opening Night gift for the director – miniature barrels representing our most prominent prop.
The first official Theatre Scouts Badge. Presented to my Stage Manager for her thankless task of organizing and re organizing the schedule around 15 different people’s availability.
Hope you enjoyed the peek into the world of the stage from my point of view. Up next will be a packed May of varied projects!
Love Heather
