Interview with Lisa Simpson, Costume Coordinator for "Beauty and the Beast"
Transcript:
DB: It’s for a project I’m doing. What’s your name?
Lisa: My name is Lisa Simpson.
DB: And what is your job?
Lisa: I’m the costume coordinator here at the Wheelock Family Theater.
Lisa: Right now I’m sewing together these wolf costumes hoping that I’ll get them together in time for the wolves to wear them for the -- I guess for the next scene.
Lisa: Tomorrow.
Lisa: Well, not always. This is a very very large show, and in the past with large shows like this we have been down to the wire the night before, still making costumes. It’s not an ideal situation -- it doesn’t happen for every show, but for this show it -- this is the way it is. We’re, you know, all working hard, and we’ll get it all done. Hopefully we’ll get it all done tonight so everyone can have everything tomorrow.
DB: Great. Thank you.
Lisa: You’re welcome!
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DB: Sure, why not?
Lisa: So, what sort of an angle are you doing on this whole anthropology thing? Cultural anthropology?
DB: Visual anthropology.
Lisa: Visual anthropology, okay. That’s new to me, so tell me about visual anthropology.
DB: Well, you know, I’m pretty new to it myself. This is my first visual anthropology -- my first anthropology class, really, of any kind, ever.
Lisa: Okay.
DB: But I’m in the production of “Beauty and the Beast” here at Wheelock Family Theater, you guys are working on it, but I’m approaching this as if I were not part of it, as if I had no idea what theater was, how it worked here in ‘the West’, in our methods of doing it, really just trying to figure it all out from the perspective of an outsider. I’m turning myself into the outsider, is what I’m doing. So I’m looking at what people do backstage, I’m looking at the bustle of activity -- the stuff that the audience doesn’t see. They see the finished product; I’m showing the stuff that goes into that. The means of production, I suppose.
Lisa: Yeah, you know, when people go see a production, I don’t think that they really even think about -- I mean, they’re just so engrossed in what’s happening on stage and involved with the story, I think oftentimes they don’t even think about all the people -- not just people like me, that do things beforehand -- props, costumes, you know, scene design, and you know, making the set, painting it even -- but even all the people that go into making the whole thing run. There’s just a tremendous amount of people involved in making something like this happen, but yet when people look at a production they think it’s the actors, and it’s oftentimes the actors that get the credit for making a show wonderful, but it’s so many many more people, and the actors are a very important part, but there’s so many many more people involved than just the actors. People that are hired by the theater -- I’m the costume coordinator here, which is only, it’s just a part-time, sporadic job. I work, I do three shows a year, as needed. I work as needed. There are a handful of people that are full-time employees here at Wheelock Family Theater, but what really makes this place run is we’ve got so many many volunteers. We’ve got, you know, there are two women that are doing sewing for me that are volunteers. We’ve got people that are volunteering building the set, and doing all aspects of production, and they’re doing it just because they love theater, for no other reason that that, which I think is really cool.