I designed, sourced, and fabricated costumes for The Pear Theatre's 2017 production of What You Will. This "Shakespearean travesty" was written using solely language and phrases from Shakespeare's plays, reassembled to produce an entirely new story about the courtier Antonio and his misadventures after he returns from France with his new bride Katherine.
While the play has around 20 characters, the directorial concept was to use a cast of 8 "players" to put on the story, fluidly switching from character to character. Sometimes, performers had to transform from one character to the next without even time to walk offstage from one scene and back on for the next.
In order to acheive the necessary speed and fluidity, my costume design had two main components. Each actor wore a neutral-colored base costume that was evocative of characteristics of the main characters they would portray. Additionally, I created one costume piece per character, which could be rapidly taken on or off as the script required. For instance, the fancy courtier Rodrigo could take off his ruff, don a floppy cap, and be transformed into the dull Messenger.
