Ballet is a type of play that uses music and dance to tell the story. A costume designer would have to pay particular attention to the dance in order to create the costumes that will help the dancers tell the story but the costume also has to allow the dancer to dance properly in the costume as well as have enough room to breath. Ballet focuses on expressionism in order to tell the story of the particular play, such as Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The costume designer must work closely with the director so that the expressions in the play can be portrayed.
Ballet began in “1581 at the French court”, and has slowly made its way around the world. Ballet has gone through five stages of progression. From the early ballets which were “five hours long, from 10 p.m. to 3 a.m., and was watched by ten thousand guests”. To the romantic movement where the music and ballet became more expressive, the classical movement where there were three to four acts including solo performances, and modern ballet where some do not tell stories but others are interpretations of well-known stories such as Alice in Wonderland.
The Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland ballet came from “Lewis Carroll’s original story [that] is a wonderfully unusual and creative tale”. The ballet is just as creative and unusual as the story. The dramatic ballet was created by Macmillan in 1866. The music and dance coincide so that the story is easily told and is given in a magical light. The costumes of the Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland ballet are a challenge for any company that puts it on. The costume designers have to worry about the costumes allowing the dancer to be able to move freely in it as well as look the part of their character. And this for the goes shoes as well. There are many styles of dance in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, so all of the shoes have to be taken into great consideration when being chosen for the ballet.
As with any costume for any production, a lot of work is put into the task. The costuming process for ballets take months before the show. The dancers are measured constantly throughout the process for precautions if the custom becomes too small or too big. The biggest task when creating costumes for Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland it to successfully capture his detail of each character as well as making the costume “danceable and to allow the dancers as much freedom as possible”. For a costume to be danceable, the dancers should be able to dance in every way possible and to move their body into any position that would be necessary for the part.
The costumes for Alice in the ballet, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland are fairly simple to create. With the sketches from the book by Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, the costume designer has the basic idea for the nineteenth century costumes to the modern age costumes in wonderland give the designer plenty of opportunities to be creative. The only obstacle the costume designer really faces is having Alice change costumes on stage because she virtually never leaves the stage. The costume designer would then just simply have Alice’s wonderland costume be a thin, light dress that can easily fit under her ninetieth century dress at the beginning of the ballet.
There are two ways for a costume designer to put the white rabbit together. The costume designer can either put the rabbit in a full on rabbit mask or the costume designer can make ears and have the make up artist put on facial prosthesis to look like a rabbit. For the actual body costume of the rabbit, he is in a coat and vest with a flow like white undershirt. The colors of the coat vest and under shirt are typically a navy blue, golden yellow and white. The rabbit then wears white and grey stripped tights and knee length shorts that are fitted to the dancer. The rabbit has to wear black ballet shoes or black Pointe shoes for this role depending on the choreograph. As with all ballet costumes the main goal is to allow the “audience [to see the dancer’s] feet and legs clearly”.
The next costume for the costume designer would be the pack of cards. The tutu of a ballerina is made in such a way to help her stay balanced with many of her moves and dances. So in making a square tutu, there would be a lot of difficulties. “To make a square tutu work in the same way as a conventional one [would be] quite the challenge”. For this tutu there would have to be many prototypes for the ballerinas to try out in order for the proper fitting and balance to be figured out. This is where the costume designer would have to work extra hard with the ballerina and know how she danced in order to make the proper tutu for her. So the work put in for the pack of cards would take a lot of time.
The Queen of hearts has the most elaborate costume to make and would take the longest for the costume designer to make. The actual tutu is the easiest part. For a designer, the tutu is a typical one with a flexible plastic heart on the front of it with a matching heart clip to go in the Queen of Heat’s hair. The Queen’s Pointe shoes would be red and depending on the company, would have hearts going up the ribbons. The biggest challenge on the other hand is the huge skirt that the Queen of Hearts first appears in. The skirt has to be made out of plastic and have wheels on the bottom of it along with steps on the inside so the dancer can get out of it on stage. The costume designers part in all of this is to have the right torso measurements for the skirt and know how wide the tutu is going to be for the dancer. The costume designer also has to come up with the head piece to go along with this huge skirt. So the costume designer works with the set people to make sure that the head piece will be held up from suspenders so the huge head piece does not injure the dance in any way during the performance or rehearsal.
The Mad Hatter is another simple but fun task for the costume designer. The Mad Hatter’s costume is a basic long coat, shirt and vest, and pants. But with it being the Mad Hatter, there is a twist. The color scheme that the costume designer uses is pinks, greens and some blues. The top hat of the Mad Hatter is a dark green with a playing card on it. The top hat must fit the dancer’s head because the Mad Hatter does a lot of jumping and dancing around, doing strange movements and such. The wig for the Mad Hatter is a bright pink that is the same shade as the Mad Hatter’s coat. The coat of the Mad Hatter is a bright pink with green and blue timings on it. The undershirt of the Mad Hatter’s costume must be a light blue with a light blue vest with green decorations and pink trimmings on it. The bow tie that the Mad Hatter wears is a lime green that stands out from the rest of the greens used in the outfit. And the pants of the Mad Hatter are stripped pants with different shades of blue and green on it. The pants are high torso and have to be tested out to secure that the Mad Hatter will be able to do the proper tap dances that are needed for the role.
The Cheshire cat is surprisingly left up to the costume designer. The reason this is because the shape of the body parts of the cat have to work for the puppet tears and how they have to move with the puppet on stage. The Cheshire cat is “composed of a collection of gigantic body parts, maneuvered around the stage by puppeteers dressed in black”.
The caterpillar “is a sultan whose harem lines up behind him to form a glittering
body and line of pointed legs”. The task of the caterpillar is simple, the main ballerina that has the head of the costume holds a blue Indian embellished umbrella and the rest of the body must be made out of material that is easy for the rest of the ballerinas to move around in but to also breath in. The caterpillar’s dance is on Pointe shoes so the material must be breathable and very danceable.
The Ugly Duchess is and outrageous role and a fun costume to design. The role is usually performed by a male ballet dancer so the costume its self is huge. The dress that the Ugly Duchess wears is black with a ruffled hopped skirt. The top of the dress has a white linen layer on top with a black broach. The sleeves of the dress have bows on them that are yellow, purple, and red. The dancer wears long purple gloves and a yellow and red belt around the torso. The hat the Ugly Duchess wears is over the top as well and must be designed in a way that it is not too heavy and will not fall off the head of a dancer. The hat is a sort of top hat but a girls version of it. The colors are yellow, purple, and red and has a crown at the base of the hat. The crown is what supports the hat to the dancers head. The shoes that the dancer wears are character shoes with a tall body. The shoes have to be flexible enough to do simple ballet moves in them.
The only difficulty that runs into making the March Hare and the Dormouse’s costume is the mask. The mask has to properly fit the dancers head and have breath holes in the nose, mouth, cheeks and eyes. The costumes for both of these characters are simple other wise. The March Hare is in a plaid long coat with a brown vest and white under shirt. The pant leggings are the same pattern as the long coat and the shoes match the outfit. For the Dormouse’s costume, he wears a similar pattern coat but with brighter colors and brown furry chiffon’s with reddish pink tights and brown dance shoes.
With the production of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the costume designer has a lot of work that is involved. The costume designer not only has to create the costumes that will help the dancers portray their characters but will also allow the dancers enough room to dance around in them and breath. In this particular ballet, there are a lot of masks used and costumes that use multiple dancers at the same time. So the costume designer must make sure that all of the needs of the dancers are met. Including flexibility, dance ability, and the ability to breath. In Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the costume designer works with everyone in the production. From the director, to the dancers, to the stage managers. All is necessary for the creation of such unique and creative costumes for this wonderful interpretation of Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland. Without the costume designers help in any ballet, the portray of the stories would not make as much sense or be as enjoyable. The costume designers role in the ballets are as big as the main role in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland or any other ballet.
The information that was taken to successfully put this article together came form various dance websites that hold reviews of several ballets but also gives interviews and short clips of the ballet at the top of the bill.