Ask LaBricoleuse: Rehearsal garments

Haven't had a post of this sort in a while, but the question came up on the USITT costumer's email list about rehearsal garments. In the interest of formulating a policy guideline for her own employer, the querant wondered, what were the policies for providing rehearsal garments at various theatres and academic departments?

The chain of responses has yielded an interesting overview of different kinds of policies at different levels of theatre, so i thought i'd post my response here, as well as some further musings on the topic. I replied:

Here is a general overview of what we provide at PlayMakers Repertory, which is a LORT-D theatre in residence on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, operating with a 6-show mainstage season and a 3-show second-stage track running concurrently.

I am speaking here only as the staff craftsperson, not as the shop manager, so my list is not official and may not be complete. I do wind up dealing with many of the rehearsal items as part of my job responsibility, like rubberizing shoes ASAP so they can go in when asked for, so that's where i'm coming from in answering this query. We typically send in a combination of rehearsal pieces and the actual pieces, but when the actual pieces are desired we often build that into our calendar in the shop in terms of what gets made when. (More on that after my list.)

Rehearsal items--stand-ins for action development only, not the real things since we are often making them:

--Ladies petticoats or rehearsal skirts for period shows where the women need to get used to negotiating more volume and length than a modern skirt.
--Hats which need to be donned/doffed onstage.
--Accessories if they ask for them like gloves/scarves.
--Occasionally we will send in the muslin of a made-to-order costume if it is a special case show (such as when we recently did In the Next Room and sent in the muslins of bustled-up overskirts, as the women must learn to disrobe completely onstage and pace the dialogue with the actions).
--And, men's coats/jackets occasionally, especially full-skirted frock coats or tailcoats, since like rehearsal skirts the actors sometimes want to get used to negotiating those unfamiliar garment shapes/volumes.

Actual items--the costumes they will use in the run of the show:

--Shoes if they ask for them, though only after the soles have been rubberized if they need it.
--"Propstumes" which might involve action/business like a handbag, parasol, or fan. I am usually the one making these if they are made, and i try to get the real deal to them if possible since small hand props usually need to fit into handbags, parasols' handle shapes and dimensions affect blocking and action, and folding fans have their own quirks of opening and closing which the actress needs to feel comfortable with.

And, we will send in items requested for safe movement/choreography purposes, such as knee pads, fighting gauntlets, baldrics/swordbelts, joint braces, and restrictive undergarments like corsetry.

I can think of a couple occasions on which I had to schedule my production calendar in advance to accommodate the use of specific real costume pieces from the first day of rehearsal. We have done a couple shows involving many masked characters, in which the designers/directors settled on the mask designs far enough in advance for my team to make them and have them available from the beginning of rehearsal. And, once we had to make a body-puppet, for which we sent in a simplified rehearsal version (think cardboard and tape and wire) until the real one was ready.

For the drama department's student shows, i honestly have no idea what the policy is on rehearsal garments. Each year there are both "official"/departmentally-sponsored student shows and several student troupes producing their own work in our spaces, and i have the impression that for many of them, they don't work with rehearsal items given the quick turnaround between their costume pulls and their shows opening. Only in very rare cases, such as a recent masked show where the director pulled her complement of masks for the performers at the start of their rehearsal process, do they work with clothes.

I'm glad you asked this question, i am very interested to hear what others' policies are and what people provide as a matter of course at different theatres and institutions!

I should add that I'm working at a theatre which operates under an Equity contract, and union rules stipulate specific requirements of rehearsal items, which a theatre may choose to exceed (meaning, offer more than the minimum required by the contract) but may not choose to disregard.

The most salient of these requirements for crafts artisans is the provision of footwear. AEA's official agreement with resident theatres stipulates that costumes provide "professional dance shoes at least one week prior to rehearsal" [1]. This is topical to crafts artisans since shoe repair and alterations are crafts responsibilities.

If you are working for a production/company which involves dancers en pointe, AEA's agreement is much more broad in its stipulation: "The Theatre shall furnish pointe shoes with ribbons for all rehearsals and performances requiring pointe shoes. The Theatre shall furnish at least one pair of pointe shoes for each member of the cast called upon to dance in pointe shoes. New pointe shoes shall be provided sufficiently in advance of their use to allow the Actor adequate time to break in the shoes." [Ibid.] From a crafts perspective, you need to really be on top of this stipulation since, should the shoes need to be dyed, that can affect the fit and feel of the shoe so ideally you can troubleshoot this from the beginning with the input of the designer and the dancer both.

When shoes go into rehearsal early, they are often worn out before the show closes, and a good designer will know this stipulation and build it into her/his purchasing calendar and production budget disbursement for a certain number of shoe replacement pairs. Designers who aren't as experienced at the Equity level may not know this and a good shop manager or crafts artisan can save the shop and the show a world of hurt by knowing rules like this and bringing them up early in the process.

Another element which an Equity house is required to provide in rehearsal from the beginning is knee pads, elbow pads, and other protective clothing [Ibid, p. 14].

One area where our on-list discussion highlighted a difference between academic/non-Equity performance and Equity houses is in the use of performer's own clothes--character shoes, for example. Academic and non-Equity costumers have been chiming in about stressing to their actors the importance of owning a "kit" of basic costume items--character shoes and rehearsal skirts for women, dress shoes and rehearsal jackets for men, and so forth. And, it is true that an actor who can provide these items for him/herself in non-Equity and academic shows will cultivate a sense of professionalism and goodwill from the costumers with whom s/he works, but there's a longterm sense to it as well.

Equity contracts require the costume team to pay a rental fee to the actor for use of her/his personal property in a production. The fee is paid weekly over and above the Equity actor's contractual pay and varies based on the garment ($8/week for character shoes, $20/week for a 2- or 3-piece suit). These fees are paid at full price for the first two weeks of use, then at half-price for each subsequent week. {Ibid, p. 115]

I think it's great for academic programs to establish the habit with their acting students of owning a "kit" of standard rental items, especially for performers with specialized needs such as very wide feet. I have worked with several Equity actors with EEE feet who had several "standard" pairs of shoes/boots on which they would earn rental fees, and designers often loved having the option to just rent a pair from a performer which they knew would fit. The actors appreciated receiving the rental fees, as they could reinvest them into preferred well-fitting footwear as their shoes wore out.

For schools training actors whom they hope will succeed and become working union members at the Equity houses, a kit can be a wise initial investment which will later shift to a useful professional resource which pays for itself or even makes a bit of extra money for the actor.

What are your theatre's policies on rehearsal garments? How do you feel about actor-provided rehearsal or actual costumes?