Category: Uncategorized

Written by Rebecca Rosen

Victorian Ball is my favorite event on the HRG&SP social calendar. It combines the glamour of a white-tie event with the nostalgia and fun of a reunion; that one night constitutes perhaps the largest gathering of current HRG&SP members, alumni, and patrons all year, and it all happens in the Horner Room behind the stage. This semester we held our 10th annual Victorian Ball, and everyone had a blast!

The first Victorian Ball was held in the fall of 2006 as part of our 50th anniversary celebration. Since then, we’ve had lots of fun every year with a grand ball full of delicious food and stellar decorations courtesy of our wonderful caterer, Cindy. This year, she transformed the Horner Room into a magical forest, covering every surface with fabric, flowers, statues, and greenery. It was so wonderful to see the room that for as long as our organization has been in the Agassiz has spent much of our residency covered either in dropcloths and half-finished set pieces or cast members napping or doing homework during the show now transformed into a beautiful ballroom. It’s easy to forget the beauty of the space our organization has the privilege to occupy for several weeks every semester, and Victorian Ball always seems to renew both love for HRG&SP and for the Agassiz itself.

This year, we had a huge group of alumni come to the ball, and it was wonderful getting to know them! Most of the alumni who came this year were HRG&SP company members from the last 15 years, but we had a few alumni come back who had been a part of our organization even earlier (the earliest alumni I spoke with at the Ball were involved in the 1975 production of The Gondoliers; if you were involved in earlier years and came to the ball, we’d love to know!). There was plenty of dancing and lots of chocolate mousse, and it seems like everyone had a great time getting dressed up in their fanciest attire and partying with HRG&SP old and new. Thank you to everyone who came to the ball and made it a success; I know I can’t wait to come back for Victorian Ball next year!

(Photos below courtesy of Guan Chen unless otherwise noted)

This week’s blog post (on schedule!) is brought to you by costumer and sass-master Anne A. Power ’16. You may have seen her womanning the box office at shows. She writes about mayhems and mishaps encountered through the process.

Again, it has been so lovely to see all of you at the show. We hope to see you today at Victorian Ball!

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Written by Anne Power

HRG&SP’s spring production of Iolanthe has been the third HRG&SP show that Cassie Lowell and I have costumed together. One might think that at this point we might have worked a system that would make the process smoother, less stressful, and less daunting. One would be right, but also so very wrong.

From a more general aspect, the costuming process for HRG&SP always remains the same. At the beginning of the semester there is a trip to our Narnia-like storage container, where we get to muck about in hoop skirts, dress up in princess dresses, and, of course, pull useful items for the show. Then there are periodic meetings with the directors and producers, who let us know their plans and visions. To accomplish this vision, we combine the items from our storage run with those pulled from the ART’s extensive stock, supplemented by items ordered especially for the show.

While this schedule is more or less idiot-proof (believe me, we’ve tried), it is not fate-proof. Every production has its big and little (but actually big) challenges that must be addressed. For instance, one of the primary struggles in costuming Iolanthe was the size of the choruses. In addition, because of the nature of the show, each chorus had to have its own uniform, meaning that Cassie and I had to scramble to fabricate eight matching lord’s costumes and seven fairy costumes that fit and flattered. What’s more, all of these costumes had to hold up to eight shows of sweating actors with fiddly hands and propensity to eat in costume.

By spending the better part of a week in the Ag and blowing through our budget, Cassie and I managed to rig together costumes that put the fun in functional. We are especially proud of the lords’ capes, which came to us as gross Amazon purchases and left, with the help of faux fur and black sharpie, as ermine fit for a king. For the fairies, we took white leotards and skirts and paired them with bluish-grey sashes, shoulder draping, and a small bustle for a look that was ethereal but still a touch Victorian.

Now in their second weekend of use, the costumes have yet to disintegrate and we can breathe a sigh of relief. That sigh of relief can’t be too long, however, because we have to get back to the Ag so that we can help fairies tie sashes, lords find their crowns, and make sure the Lord Chancellor’s wig isn’t completely blocking his face.

Friends, we have just opened the show this past weekend. It’s been a whirlwind process, and it was so lovely to see so many of you there. We hope to see more of you this coming weekend, especially at Victorian Ball!

I’m excited to introduce this week’s blog poster, Brad A. Latilla-Campbell ’16, who has been one of my dedicated co-producers (shoutout to the other, Emma R. Adler ’16). Apologies for the late post; things were rather chaotic through opening weekend.

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Written by Brad Latilla-Campbell

There is nothing quite like Opening Night – the moment when months of hard work, hours of building, rehearsing, painting and singing are finally put on show to friends, family and the public. The nervous energy that crackles like electricity in your stomach and the slightly cold sweat that always makes you worry about your freshly applied make-up cannot be found anywhere else.

I am most used to being on the other side of the curtain, on the stage itself, as the visible face of a team effort. This time, however, I sat in anticipation with the rest of the opening night audience, wondering what spectacle would be presented to us when the curtains finally did open and the lights came up. This experience was totally different: a kind of nervousness that could not be calmed until the curtain came down at the end of the show. The idea of the experience not being in my hands at all was at once both terrifying and the week’s greatest relief.

Of course, one standard curtain speech and a rousing rendition of God Save the Queen later, we were underway – and what a show it was! The capes flashed, the wings flapped and the wands waved; the orchestra was in full force and the crowd was laughing uproariously. The lights and set transported us to a magical forest, and then into the gardens of Westminster; the songs filled the theater with the light-hearted whimsy of the Gilbert & Sullivan spirit, while the music kept us enthralled throughout the night. And as the curtain closed, and I turned my attention to the cheese awaiting me at the reception, I realized happily, as I always do, that this seemingly once in a lifetime feeling will be coming back next semester.