Much Ado about Costumes WebQuest
(Source: Adapted from WebArchive - was at: WebQuest)

Secondary



Australian Curriculum General Capability: Critical and creative thinking

Australian Curriculum General Capability: ICT Capability

Australian Curriculum General Capability: Personal and social capability

Australian Curriculum General Capability: Literacy

Introduction

Congratulations! You and your team have been hired as costume designers for a production of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing. But there is a twist! The Director would like to do the play in the Cavalier Period but the Producer is very conscious of the amount of money this would entail and wants a simpler approach to the play. S/he  is unsure which era would be better:

• Edwardian Time
• Downton Abbey Time Period
• The 1940's Time Period

Task

As part of the class design team, you are to divide up each era in groups of 4 students. One team of four for the Cavalier period; one team of four for the Edwardian period; one team of four for the Downton Abbey Time Period; and, one team of four for the 1940s Time Period.

Each team is to work together to design the costumes for Benedick, Claudio, Don Pedro, Beatrice, Hero, and Ursala.

You have a budget! But you are to decide what you think would be appropriate for your play and era. 

You have to advocate your particular era to both the Director and Producer on the basis of cost and how your era would enhance Shakespeare's play to modern audiences.

Process

It will be easier to skim over all of the steps before beginning.

Step 1:

Each member of your team of four is to design two of the costumes or design the hats, shoes and accessories.

Three team members are to design one male and one female character from the following list: Benedick, Claudio, or Don Pedro, and Beatrice, Hero, or Ursala. The fourth team member is to keep track of the budget and to design the hats, shoes and accessories for the other team members.

Read the play looking for overall themes and information about your two characters, such as physical appearance, clothing, what the character thinks of himself, what other characters say about your character, etc. The fourth team member is to work with the other three team members closely to see how to enhance their characters.

Make sure to take notes on this for later use. . Make sure to record where you took the note from, for instance Act 1, scene 1.

You can read the play online at: MIT - Shakespeare - Much Ado

Step 2:

Now that you have gathered information about the play and your characters, it's time to write your design approach.

Your design approach should be one page, double spaced, and include what you think some of the overall themes of the play are, and how these themes will be represented in the costumes.

This is basically to develop an overall idea of how the play will look. It is important to identify themes of the play so that you can bring those out to the audiance through costume styles, colors, and other artistic choices.

Costume Designers share their design approach with the director and other designers to make sure that everyone has the same basic idea of how the play should look.

Devon Painter - Costume Designer -
Much Ado About Nothing

Step 3:

Using your character notes, write a character analysis for each of your two characters. Your character analysis should be in outline form. Here is the information you should include:

I. External Information
A. Environment

1. Geography/local (country, state, city where play takes place)
2. Date/year/season/time of day
3. Economic (deals with money/include where it comes from)
4. Social (deals with status in society, i.e. middle class in our society)
5. Religion (do they attend church?)

B. Personal
1. Age
2. Decorum (conformity to social conventions of society)
3. Personal taste (relate this to clothing, hair, etc. Describe their wardrobe. Make decisions if script doesn't provide.)
4. Activity (what they are dressed for on stage)
5. Physical description
6. Adjectives (words that describe external character)

II. Internal Information
A. Desires
B. Will (Strong/week)
C. Moral Stance (attitude to social conventions- external vs. internal)
D. Nervosity (deals with beat-fast/slow, loud/soft, regular/irregular)
E. Attitude toward the externals around them
F. Adjectives (summarize internal character)


Step 4:

Now it is time to do some costume research. The director has decided to do the play in the Cavalier Period but the Producer (with the money, has thought that other eras might be considered including

• Edwardian Time
• Downton Abbey Time Period
• The 1940's Time Period)

You want to make a collage of paintings and engravings for each of the two characters you choose.

You should have at least 5 pictures for each. Once you have completed your collages, print them off. You can find paintings and engravings at the following links:

Resources

Cavalier Resources

You need to research what people wore between the years of 1620 and 1655. Your best sources will be paintings and engravings done during those years:

Nicole Kipar	Dressing for Shakespeare
Baroque Art Resources (check out Frans Hals paintings between 1620 and 1658, and Rembrandt group portraits, and the 17th century artists section from Olga's gallery)	National Gallery of Art: Dutch and Flemish Paintings
Cavalier/Puritan	Reconstructing History: Patterns: Cavalier Look at the patterns and see how much material is required.

Edwardian Time Period

Reconstructing History: Edwardian Patterns Look at the patterns and see how much material is required.	Edwardian Clothing
Costuming on a Budget: Edwardian Edition

Downton Abbey - time period

Women's 1920's Downton Abbey Inspired Clothing	Fashionista
Downton Abbey Clothing

The 1940s

The Costume Box - 1940s	1940s
1940s

Step 5:

The next part of your process is to sketch out your ideas for costumes. Use your collages to make sure your costumes are true to the period. Sketch one costume for each of your characters.

Step 6:

In order to make your final costume renderings, you need to have bodies to draw them on. Your next step is to draw one male and one female figure, each on a separate piece of blank paper. You should use 8.5 x 11 size paper. Check out the following website for directions on how to draw the human figure and measurments so that your figures look true to life:

Step 7:

The final costume renderings- draw the final copy of the costumes you designed on to the human figures you drew. Next color them in. You can use color pencil, paint, marker, or any medium that you have available. Make sure to think about what colors your characters would wear and how they fit with the rest of the play.

Your last step is to neatly write the name of the character, the name of the play, and your name in one of the corners of your rendering.

Step 8:

Presentation of your team's designs.

You are to convince both the Director and the Producer (teachers) that your era is the best one based on the following criteria:

1. Cost

2.  Enhancement of Shakespeare's play

3. Revelence to the modern audience

Evaluation

You have had experience in Theatrical Costume Designing and Making from this WebQuest. You are now to consider offering your services to the school for their concert, end of the year play or musical.

Write up your reflections on this WebQuest:

How did you work with the other team members?

Were your ideas considered useful? Were they adopted by the team?

How did you feel this project went?