“What inspires me? People,” says costume designer Emilio Sosa, connecting via Zoom from his workspace to rehearse for an upcoming drama at Manhattan Theater Club. The Bastardsby David Lindsay Abair.
“I love people-watching, but it can be a little difficult in New York because if you don’t look at people for more than two seconds, they ask, ‘What are you looking at?!'” But people inspire me. Because, as the saying goes, life is stranger than fiction. ”
Born in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, and raised in New York’s South Bronx, Sosa has lived a life that epitomizes these words. is well known to reality show viewers for two seasons of making a huge impact as a contestant on . project runwaya former assistant wardrobe supervisor for the Alvin Ailey Dance Company, has far surpassed his relative success in the television series through his impressive work on the theater stage.
Sosa, who has amassed an impressive list of Broadway and regional credits, has been nominated for five Tony Awards. Parley Victorious: A non-Confederate soldier frolicking in a cotton field.; Ain’t No Mo; Good night, Oscar; matters of the heart;and The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess — earned many other accolades, including a Helen Hayes Award nomination for Arena Stage. Senor discretion himself.
During Sosa’s first residency at the D.C. Theater in 2004, he realized that what he was collecting was characteristic of theater in the District. “It’s the audience,” he attests. “Audiences are very sophisticated. They love theater, they know theater, and they’re very supportive of theater. And that’s what you want. You want people who love theater and appreciate it to come see your show, right?”
And it would be even better if the audience support was even a little louder. ” [D.C.] “Audiences know what they like and what works, and they like to talk back, and I love that. I’m one of those audiences that likes to talk back to characters, even though they shouldn’t,” he says. And this is the perfect show for that. ”
He’s talking about his current show at the arena. Chez Joeya wonderful jazz reworking of Rodgers & Hart. pal joeya new book by Richard LaGravenese and directed by Savion Glover and Tony Goldwyn.
According to Sosa, Glover and Goldwyn’s co-directors knew what they wanted, although their approaches were very different. “I have known Savion for quite some time,” Sosa says. “So I speak Savion. I mean, Savion is a whole language within itself, so I understand it.”
Communicating with dance and tap geniuses requires a certain kind of listening. “He may not express it in a linear way, because what’s important to him is movement and sound. So he’ll say, ‘Okay, I want this dress to move like this,’ and he’ll make a movement, or he’ll say, ‘I want them to be able to do this,’ and he’ll do something. And then he subtracts from that what he needs for the dress.”
Movement, of course, is what makes musicals, in Sosa’s words, “an entirely different kind of animal.” The Bastards. in Chez Joeyperiod costumes must move sublimely over a mass of dancers led by Tony Award winners. M.J. Starring Miles Frost plays Joey Evans, the titular lake.
Always dressed in fresh clothes, Frost’s Joey is required to do splits, jumps, and backbends in the air, making big demands every time he puts on his pants. So Sosa turned to the pioneers of dance pants.
“I like to go back in history. If you look at the old Nicholas Brothers movies and the costumes of the Hines brothers, Maurice and Gregory, none of their clothes had stretch. Think about it: There was no spandex in the ’40s. So they’re doing that kind of movement with non-stretch fabrics.”
Unable to rely on high-tech textiles, designers of the 40s had to design. “So it’s all about how you make it and how you cut it,” Sosa says.
“The crotch seam has to be cut high so that the legs can fully extend. The main trick back then was how to cut the pants to fit properly, not in today’s society where everything is at the natural waist and everything is sagging, and everything is like around the knees and ankles.”
Sosa and his team “kept to that mindset” for Frost. “We just made the clothes so he could do everything. And then there’s the fitting. In the fitting, we have him go through the motions. And we figure out, okay, he needs a little more space here, let’s make it a little tighter there, a little looser there.”
Everything is custom made to allow Frost to move in his own way. “And the reason why the costumes look so good is because there are about 100 people behind the scenes pressing and steaming them every day to make sure they look great. But the way the costumes are cut is important.”
Chez Joey runs through March 22 at Arena Stage, 1101 6th St. SW. Tickets range from $83 to $143. Call 202-488-3300 or Visit arenastage.org.
Source: Metro Weekly – www.metroweekly.com
