Historical human kinetics quite likely never enters the minds of audience members accustomed to wearing comfortable, comforting clothing.
If a period costume will include a corset, for example, she knows it will change the way an actor can move, gesture or turn. This “human movement of the era,” as she calls it, was often dictated by undergarments. The way people carried themselves or used body language during a certain time period determines how she designs a costume for the modern stage.
It’s fascinating to delve into that history.” She based the costumes for each fairy tale’s group of characters on a different historical period, after assessing which era’s clothing best fit each story.īombe also scrutinizes the posture and poses that inspirational art portrays. “Artists have always drawn the human body and the way that we adorn it.
“There’s always some kind of record of what people looked like,” reasons Bombe, whose academic specialty is the history of costume design. She does this kind of reconnaissance for every production she designs. “I love working with especially incredible playwrights like Shakespeare who have really rich descriptions of who these people are, what they think, what their bodies are like, what their characteristics are like,” she says.įor Into the Woods, she started with the original illustrations of Grimms’ fairy tales and moved to some modern artists for inspiration. Her first steps are to study the play’s text and delve into what clothing was like in the period in which the play is set. I’m very interested in looking at different body types and determining how a design can affect what the audience may think about a character.” “I’m not only concerned about what an actor wears but also how an actor wears it. “Costume design is creating moving sculpture,” says Bombe, who is the college’s resident costume designer and oversees theater productions.
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