Random Top Ten from the First Two Weeks

This Novice Costume Mistress’s Random Top Ten from the First Two Weeks...
Guest Blogger: Susanna Klumpenhouwer
(Key Costume Supervisor -- Under Jakob's Ladder)

1. In my role as "Costume Mistress", I have had the challenge of finding costumes for background actors when you have a couple dozen people show up in outfits that don’t quite fit the era we are working in. Thank goodness I have "Lifesaver Lee", a local woman with a lot of theatre and costuming experience -– she has been an amazing asset to the costuming area!

2. Sharing one bathroom/shower with 15 other crew/cast in close-living quarters, sleeping on mattresses on the floor/squeaky cots. Enough said.

3. We had to rake up and level our outside prison yard area. I’m pretty sure that at one point and time, this used to be someone’s garbage dump as we came across many interesting "treasures" and lots of broken glass, garbage and everything else you could imagine. The one worry we had was possibly coming across a dead body and how we were going to be able to cover it up, so the film schedule wouldn’t be interrupted... Fortunately, this wasn’t an issue we had to worry about!

4. I’ve had some fun repairing costumes on actors as they are still wearing them. So far I haven’t "safety"-pin pricked anyone -– but there are still two weeks to go!

5. I got to release some of my pyro tendencies one day. I had to burn paper to make ash for the prisoners to wipe on their face and hands for their makeup. At one point the flames in my bucket got a little high and I almost sacrificed my hair as well...

6. Working 13-15 hours days with a 15-minute supper break –- definitely a hard working, grueling schedule. But we have an amazing crew who give 157%. We have also had to work on some unseasonal hot days!

7. See #2.

8. To get the prisoner costumes ready for their roles, we had to do lots of distressing of the fabrics. This included rolling around the dirt in the backyard, while wearing the costumes, and playing in the mud for hours with the prisoner boots. I’m sure there were moments that, if I had somehow started foaming at the mouth and someone saw me, they would have summoned the CDC.

9. The second day of shooting we were outside in the freezing rain/snow and our poor prisoner actors had to stand for hours in a line. At this point I put on my "blanket girl" hat and every time "CUT" was yelled, a couple of us ran around putting blankets around almost all the guys trying to keep them semi-warm.

10. Working with the actors –- they have been an amazing group to work with, lots of laughs, great acting, and they always bring their costumes back to me on the hangers.

A happy Costume Mistress is a happy film set.

Fine… Not really. There are many more aspects to it, but in my world it works!