How to Costume a Play on a Small Budget

I've worked in the theatre for a while now. I started out as a singer/actress in the musical Godspell, but my issues with being around too many people, mixed with my love for the stage and theatre, brought me to work on the costumes, and I quickly became many directors favorite costume coordinator because I could costume a large cast, with very little money, usually less than $100.00 for a cast of 15+. I have worked on a number of plays, and to give you a few examples, I will go over a few of the plays I have done, and what I did to costume the cast, where I bought what I used, how much I paid, etc. So let's get busy, and look at how to costume a play on a small budget. The theatre I worked in, (most theatres are the same), had a huge selection of clothing that was for use on any, and all plays. Before doing anything else, we were to go through what was available in the "costume room", and see if it could be used for the play we were working on. Many items had been added to, taken from, and added to again. You would be amazed at how many times a garment of clothing can be redesigned to achieve the costume you need.

One thing to learn when working in the theatre with costumes, is use the same costume for as much as you can! I don't mean only by using the same costume in different plays, I also mean by using the same costume, and adding to it during one play, to make it appear you have changed into a whole new costume! I have done this many times, in a number of plays, and not only does it save on cost, it also saves on costume change time, and embarrassment. When changing a costume entirely, you are going down to your bare essentials, which can be very embarrassing. Many times your only option in theatre, is to change behind stage, if you embarrass easily, you want to be able to change by taking off as little as possible. Creating costumes that can be easily added to, or taken from, makes it not only cost effective, but also fast, easy, and saves the actor or actress the embarrassment of stripping in front of everyone back stage in order to be on stage for the next scene.

In Godspell, all us actors got to go through the costume room, and pick whatever we wanted to wear, the wilder and more colorful, the better. Having a costume room full of all sorts of clothes from the late 1800's to present made it very easy to costume all the cast for Godspell, and the only money spent was for props. Nothing was spent for costumes for Godspell, except $3.00 for a feather bola for one of the girls!

After Godspell I did the costumes for "Wait Until Dark". Wait until Dark was an old film from the early 70's about a young blind girl and a couple of sinister creeps, looking for a doll with hidden diamonds. This was a fairly easily play to costume from the "costume room". I found clothes that was from the right time that the director wanted the play set in, and gathered up various sizes of pants, shirts, etc, and went to work having the cast try on what I picked for each of them, until we found items that fit, matched, and fit the time period. The only cost to the production for costumes, was for shoes, (I bought these at $1.00 per pair from Hospice thrift shop), and two baby toys that had squeaky things in them. I needed the squeaky things for the villain's shoe that was to squeak as he walked across the stage. Total cost for this play for costumes, under $20.00! I used the trick of adding to, and taking away from the costumes in order to use the same costumes for two different days in the play!

My next play was "A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum". This one is not one to use as a "money saver", because the director had her own ideas, and wanted everything created new, from scratch, and all hand made! It was a costly play for costumes, over $500.00! I could have done this for a fraction, had the director allowed me to work my "penny pinching magic", but that was not an option for this director. Myself and another lady made all the costumes from scratch, by hand on our sewing machines. I spent hours and hours every day, cutting and sewing costumes! I did do what I could to save though, by using my "add to take away from" costume technique. That did help save a little.

My next play was a real fun one, even though it was a very sad play. "The Crucible" is a play about the Salem witch trials, and was my biggest play, with a cast of over 20, and a number of costume changes, this was my most challenging play, and I feel my biggest accomplishment as far as teaching how to costume on a small budget. I really used my "add to take away from" costume technique on this play, and it saved TONS of money!

The Crucible had a cast of more than 20 men, women, and children. Each of the cast had at least two costume changes, some had three! Since there were so many cast members I will just go over the costume I did for Mrs. Proctor. Mrs. Proctor was the wife of the man who had the affair of the young lady, who was responsible for what we now know as, "The Salem Which Trials, and Hangings". Yes, it was all about a young lady who wanted a married man, and when she could not have him, she made trouble to the point that she made the whole town believe that many of it's Christian citizens were witches and devil worshippers! We all know the end result, many innocent people were hanged because they refused to denounce their Christianity. One of these was Mr. Proctor, the only reason his wife was spared, was because she was pregnant, and the judges deemed her unborn child innocent, so her life was spared.

Mrs. Proctors costume consisted of a dress that looked like it was from the late 1600's, (all costumes were from this era), an apron, bonnet, and shoes. The shoes were the same throughout the play. Her dress remained the same until the end, at which time she changed into a tattered and torn skirt and shirt, with a shawl that was tattered and torn. Her apron was changed out with one that we smeared make up all over, along with her bonnet. The only cost to the production for Mrs. Proctors costume from start to finish, was about $0.25! All aspects of her costume came from our costume room, accept for her two bonnets! I made her bonnets myself, with about $0.25 worth of fabric.

The full cost to costume all the cast, with all costumes needed, was less than $50.00 total! I made all the bonnets, and aprons, (we only had three aprons available in the costume room), with about $20.00 worth of fabric. I had to buy a few pairs of shoes, and clothing items from a thrift store, other than that, I found everything I needed in the costume room, or had the actors bring in clothes they had at home that worked for our production.

That is another way to costume a play on a small budget, have the cast bring in their own clothes that may work, so the costume coordinator can look them over, because many times, a good costume coordinator can work some great magic by using the, "add to, take away from" technique, and make the actors own clothes work perfectly as their costume for the play in question.

Remember, if you are working with a small budget, always use what is available in your theatres costume room. Always ask the actor, or actress if they may have the items you are needing for their costume at home. You'll be amazed at how much of a costume you can get from the cast members own clothes closet! If you know even a little about sewing, you can sew a lot of things onto clothes in the costume room, or even make some of the items you need yourself, like I did with the bonnets, and aprons. I also did this to create a sash for a young lady in the play "Harvey". The script described a pink sash with green and magenta flowers. To find one, we would have had to have one special made, boo-koo bucks. I went to the fabric department of Wal-Mart, bought a pink satin fabric, (1/4 yard for $2.00,), and some trim that they happened to have on sale for a couple bucks, that happened to be green and magenta flowers! I made a sash with the pink fabric, then sewed the trim around the entire sash, and with some left over pink fabric, I made a simple fabric rose. When done, I had a really cool stylish sash that looked like it came from the 40's, and it cost less than $5.00 and took about an hour to make!

The most important thing to remember when doing costumes for plays, is to have fun! Working in the theatre should be a joy for all those who do this type of work. It is hard work, and can be very trying on the nerves and patients, but if you love the theatre as much as I do, then you understand what I mean when I say, have fun, because it is a wonderful experience, and such great fun!

Follow these simple ideas, and you too will hear your director say, "YOU ROCK"! I did, more than once!