MYSTERIES OF MARIA; Inside Artes de la Rosa's Maria De Buenos Aires - BLOG 5 - Well Prepared Means 120 Pages!

Today we blog with Costume Designer Justin Kailer who's designs have captivated and captured the imagination in beautiful Artes de la Rosa stage productions including Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Kiss of the Spiderwoman. With a long history of collaboration between Director Adam Adolfo and himself, Justin's designs for Adam Adolfo shows are always crisp, surprising, innovative, with a distinctive eye for detail.

I first met with Adam, regarding this production of Maria de Buenos Aires, in November of last year. We met for coffee at Café Brazil and he hands me packet of information no less than 120 pages long. It was a lot to sift through; a complete synopsis including the libretto, an entire production history with reviews as well as about 100 photos. In no time at all we were discussing his vision for Astor Piazzolla’s “tango operita”.

I took my newly acquired “show bible” home with me that evening and began pouring over it. I firmly believe that a Designer’s work must always start with the script, before any drawings are made. After that comes research. And so, I read the synopsis twice and I must have read the script alone at least 5 times over the next two or three weeks before sketching out preliminary renderings for the principle characters. About the third time through, I began jotting down words that popped out (repeated words), words that I thought of or a certain feeling that the libretto invoked in me. Together with my list and a pencil I started sketching. After another two or three days, I finally had my rough drawings in hand and went back to Adam in late December, early January.

I love working with Director Adam Adolfo simply because he is always well prepared. He is never “not prepared”. He knows exactly what story he wants to tell and how he wants to tell that story. He will often times assemble his production staff to meet this very specific goals. Typically, he tells you that, “this is the way it’s been done, but we will not be doing that—instead we will be doing it this [other] way.” More often than not, the [other] way is drastically different. Adam often challenges me. By encouraging me to try out a new idea, he nurtures my creativity and ingenuity, testing new construction methods or perhaps a delicate fabric. He is always eager and willing to think outside the box, in ways that are not conventional or sometimes even comfortable, often testing limits for actors, production staff and eventual audience members alike.

In my research I was very surprised to learn that awfully little had been done with this particular operita since it was conceived by Piazzola and Librettist Horacio Ferrer almost fifty years ago in the 1960s. Because of this, I basically had free reign and could design the show any way I saw fit, within the constraints of the music and of dance.

The top of the show is extremely colorful and bright, this is when she is first discovering the city. The second Act however will be much darker in terms of costuming and also overall atmosphere. I will often take inspiration from multiple sources for a single production—movies, a piece of art, a shopping trip or even clothes I see a random person wearing on the street. Somehow, in some way, all of these things work together and manage to complement each other every single time. Each costume choice, from beginning to end, is dictated by the progression of the show or what’s happening in a particular scene.