Career and Influences
Career and Influences
For award-winning costume designer Holly Poe Durbin, the clothes reveal the inner lives of characters – the little nuances that make them human and real. In her career thus far, Durbin has designed costumes for a rich and varied array of characters and productions, from Broadway and Off-Broadway, to hundreds of U.S. cities, London’s West End, independent film, themed entertainment, and even assorted television pilots.
Her latest project was the costume design for The Shakespeare Center’s 25th Anniversary production of Much Ado About Nothing, directed by Ben Donenberg and starring Helen Hunt, Tom Irwin, Stephen Root, David Ogden Stiers, and Dakin Matthews.
Durbin finds her inspirations everywhere, from paintings and pop culture, to iconic film images, and talked to me about some of those influences for this latest staging of Much Ado, in this second of three features I’ll be posting about the creative process for this production. (For a look at my interview with set designer Douglas Rogers, click here).
Angela Mitchell: When did you first know you wanted to be a costume designer?
Holly Poe Durbin: I started out wanting to be either an attorney or a child psychologist. But in college, at Vanderbilt, I joined the Theater Club, and I've never looked back. I’ve been working professionally since I was 19 years old, when I began apprenticing at the Santa Fe Opera. I had no idea costume design was an actual profession until I started doing it.
Angela Mitchell: What was the first costume you remember designing?
Holly Poe Durbin: Oddly, I don't recall designing a first costume. One of my earliest memories though, at age 4 or 5, is of drawing. I thought my white bedsheets looked like really large pieces of drawing paper, so I proudly got out all my crayons and drew all over those sheets. My mother was less amused than I was.
The Myth of the 'Invisible' Designer
Angela Mitchell: There's often a lot of humor, playfulness and color to your work. Are these an integral part of your interpretations or approaches?
Holly Poe Durbin: I will often hear people say that if you don't notice the costumes, the designer has done a good job, but I don't believe in the "invisible" designer that so many talk about when discussing costume design.
I try to design costumes that are appropriate to the project-- and many times that means supporting or creating humor, grabbing the audience's attention, employing exaggeration or understatement, setting up the unexpected, and using artistic elements such as color, line and form to tell a visual story that reinforces or interprets the verbal story.
Angela Mitchell: Where do you get your inspirations?
Holly Poe Durbin: I work at this every single day. I keep huge idea books where I file all manner of things I encounter -- in museums, in life, in books, in nature, in trash piles. I am a magpie! I know that someday I will want to remember this certain color combination, or that specific texture detail -- an interesting fabric, some vintage garment or painting. I do a lot of research into the era and the locale of the play. When I begin a show, then, I have a huge storehouse of ideas.
Angela Mitchell: Have you been inspired by any other famous costume designers in your own career?
Holly Poe Durbin: I most admire Milena Canonero, because if you were to look at all of her films, you would never believe the same person designed them all. I admire her range and ability to adapt to each project individually.
Angela Mitchell: What was your inspiration and vision for the costumes in Much Ado About Nothing?
Holly Poe Durbin: Working with this director, Ben Donenberg, is very inspiring.
He has often said that if Shakespeare were alive today, he would live in Los Angeles. We talked quite a bit about the people in this play, their relationships and what California people and places would enhance those ideas best. Ben charged us all to consider the paradox that we do not see things as they are, but as we are.
As I thought about Shakespeare as a Californian, I stumbled across a book and photography collection entitled Shades of L.A.: Pictures from Ethnic Family Albums, by Kathy Kobayashi. I was so drawn to the photos of real people in L.A. spanning the 1930s to 1960s that it became the basis for my approach. I want to evoke a sense of the familiar, like looking through an old family album, but to create some wonder and discovery -- as we often feel when we see our relatives so much younger, or note that a long departed relation looks just like our sister or father. We see a bit of truth about ourselves in these romantic old pictures, and seeing yourself in others is an important theme for this play.
Angela Mitchell: How much does the casting of the individual actor or actress affect your vision for a character’s final costume?
Holly Poe Durbin: The casting is everything for me. I want to know why a director cast a particular actor in each role -- they will bring specific interpretations to the role through their body type, vocal rhythm and characterization. When I design a show, I post a storyboard online ahead of the rehearsal period so the actors can see the process and inspiration I'm working with.
Angela Mitchell: I know that you're a fan of digital textile creation. Are you incorporating any digitally created textiles into your designs for Much Ado?
Holly Poe Durbin: Not this time!
Angela Mitchell: I was interested to read about your session on laundering stage blood with Jessica Mueller last Spring at USITT (and Out, Damn Spot is the best title ever!). What advice would you give to other costume designers facing the challenge of especially bloody shows?
Holly Poe Durbin: In the last five to seven years, live performances have started incorporating more and more grand-scale, film-style blood effects. But when you perform live, you cannot stop the camera to reset the scene. This creates extremely large challenges for the costume team. I would advise anyone to work closely with their producer to ensure they really have enough time and money to produce the desired effects.
Angela Mitchell: Some of your costumes for Clownzilla: Illegal Aliens included inspiration by the artist Joan Miro. What other artists inspire you in your work?
Holly Poe Durbin: Part of the fun of design is discovering new artists or seeing something different in artworks you thought you knew well. Different artists will appeal to me at different times. It took me quite some time to come across Miro as an inspiration for Clownzilla, and I'd like the opportunity to explore that idea even more. I don't think I'm finished with Miro yet.
Angela Mitchell: You've designed costumes for several Shakespearean productions. Do you prefer the challenges of the more modern interpretations, or period stagings -- or both?
Holly Poe Durbin: I rarely do Shakespeare set during his lifetime, that seems to have gone out of style. Now we spend a great deal of time trying to match a 19th or 20th century locale to the themes in that particular Shakespeare play. Modern audiences relate to updated versions more.
Angela Mitchell: Will your costumes for this production of Much Ado for the Shakespeare Center production retain any inspiration from your previous design for the Much Ado About Nothing at the Shakespeare L.A. Festival? Or will they be a wholly new take?
Holly Poe Durbin: This will be an entirely new production. This is the beauty of doing Shakespeare more than once - there is always something new. This will actually be the fourth production of Much Ado I have worked on in my entire career.
Angela Mitchell: You've given presentations on 'Garbing the Bard' – what are the biggest pitfalls to designing costumes for Shakespeare (what should costume designers avoid)?
Holly Poe Durbin: Designers can lose their way if they don't really understand the function of each character in Shakespeare's plays. It can be hard when you have many similar types on stage-- what sets each one apart from the other?
Sometimes we are given few clues, such as when we have characters named Gentleman #1, #2 and #3. But I've discovered if I read just the lines for each such character alone, I can discover that one character may be the voice of caution, one may be the voice of wisdom, and one may be the kind of person who asks a million questions.
Angela Mitchell: Meanwhile, what should they absolutely make sure to do, every time?
Holly Poe Durbin: Attend rehearsals to see how the directors and actors have shaped the play. No matter how much we pre-plan, the show evolves as we work on it. It is very important to be a part of the process.
Angela Mitchell: Did any specific artist or movement inspire your costumes for Much Ado?
Holly Poe Durbin: The costumes are inspired by an eclectic inspiration of California dreams and icons, such as Zorro, and daring Flying Ace pilots and musicians.
Angela Mitchell: Which costume for Much Ado was the most challenging to interpret?
Holly Poe Durbin: Beatrice and Benedick are always difficult, because they are complex, flawed characters with a lot of back story.
It is important to feature their nimble wit, so costume designers must make subtle and true choices for their costumes.
Angela Mitchell: Which costumes ended up as your favorites thus far in Much Ado?
Holly Poe Durbin: The costumes for our masked ball scene are my favorite. In our production, the ball will be a grape-stomping party in the vineyard. Lyle Lovett will sing "Peel Me a Grape" for this scene, so I designed it as if it were a number in musical theater, with movement and emotion in mind. The ladies’ costumes are based on Flamenco shawls, and the men will be dressed in Zorro-style costumes.
Angela Mitchell: What advice would you give to new or aspiring costume designers out there?
Holly Poe Durbin: Take some time to travel, so you understand a bit about the world. Costume designers must interpret so many cultures and eras, it is essential to experience as many as you can to broaden your own appreciation for other ways of living.
The Shakespeare Center's production of William Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing” takes place at the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City, through December 19, 2010. Tickets are available via 213-628-2772, or online at CenterTheatreGroup.org/MuchAdo. Tickets may also be purchased in person at the Center Theatre Group box office (at the Ahmanson Theatre at the Music Center in downtown Los Angeles) or at the Kirk Douglas Theatre box office two hours prior to performances.
For award-winning costume designer Holly Poe Durbin, the clothes reveal the inner lives of characters – the little nuances that make them human and real. In her career thus far, Durbin has designed costumes for a rich and varied array of characters and productions, from Broadway and Off-Broadway, to hundreds of U.S. cities, London’s West End, independent film, themed entertainment, and even assorted television pilots.
Her latest project was the costume design for The Shakespeare Center’s 25th Anniversary production of Much Ado About Nothing, directed by Ben Donenberg and starring Helen Hunt, Tom Irwin, Stephen Root, David Ogden Stiers, and Dakin Matthews.
Durbin finds her inspirations everywhere, from paintings and pop culture, to iconic film images, and talked to me about some of those influences for this latest staging of Much Ado, in this second of three features I’ll be posting about the creative process for this production. (For a look at my interview with set designer Douglas Rogers, click here).
Angela Mitchell: When did you first know you wanted to be a costume designer?
Holly Poe Durbin: I started out wanting to be either an attorney or a child psychologist. But in college, at Vanderbilt, I joined the Theater Club, and I've never looked back. I’ve been working professionally since I was 19 years old, when I began apprenticing at the Santa Fe Opera. I had no idea costume design was an actual profession until I started doing it.
Angela Mitchell: What was the first costume you remember designing?
Holly Poe Durbin: Oddly, I don't recall designing a first costume. One of my earliest memories though, at age 4 or 5, is of drawing. I thought my white bedsheets looked like really large pieces of drawing paper, so I proudly got out all my crayons and drew all over those sheets. My mother was less amused than I was.
The Myth of the 'Invisible' Designer
Angela Mitchell: There's often a lot of humor, playfulness and color to your work. Are these an integral part of your interpretations or approaches?
Holly Poe Durbin: I will often hear people say that if you don't notice the costumes, the designer has done a good job, but I don't believe in the "invisible" designer that so many talk about when discussing costume design.
I try to design costumes that are appropriate to the project-- and many times that means supporting or creating humor, grabbing the audience's attention, employing exaggeration or understatement, setting up the unexpected, and using artistic elements such as color, line and form to tell a visual story that reinforces or interprets the verbal story.
Angela Mitchell: Where do you get your inspirations?
Holly Poe Durbin: I work at this every single day. I keep huge idea books where I file all manner of things I encounter -- in museums, in life, in books, in nature, in trash piles. I am a magpie! I know that someday I will want to remember this certain color combination, or that specific texture detail -- an interesting fabric, some vintage garment or painting. I do a lot of research into the era and the locale of the play. When I begin a show, then, I have a huge storehouse of ideas.
Angela Mitchell: Have you been inspired by any other famous costume designers in your own career?
Holly Poe Durbin: I most admire Milena Canonero, because if you were to look at all of her films, you would never believe the same person designed them all. I admire her range and ability to adapt to each project individually.
Angela Mitchell: What was your inspiration and vision for the costumes in Much Ado About Nothing?
Holly Poe Durbin: Working with this director, Ben Donenberg, is very inspiring.
He has often said that if Shakespeare were alive today, he would live in Los Angeles. We talked quite a bit about the people in this play, their relationships and what California people and places would enhance those ideas best. Ben charged us all to consider the paradox that we do not see things as they are, but as we are.
As I thought about Shakespeare as a Californian, I stumbled across a book and photography collection entitled Shades of L.A.: Pictures from Ethnic Family Albums, by Kathy Kobayashi. I was so drawn to the photos of real people in L.A. spanning the 1930s to 1960s that it became the basis for my approach. I want to evoke a sense of the familiar, like looking through an old family album, but to create some wonder and discovery -- as we often feel when we see our relatives so much younger, or note that a long departed relation looks just like our sister or father. We see a bit of truth about ourselves in these romantic old pictures, and seeing yourself in others is an important theme for this play.
Angela Mitchell: How much does the casting of the individual actor or actress affect your vision for a character’s final costume?
Holly Poe Durbin: The casting is everything for me. I want to know why a director cast a particular actor in each role -- they will bring specific interpretations to the role through their body type, vocal rhythm and characterization. When I design a show, I post a storyboard online ahead of the rehearsal period so the actors can see the process and inspiration I'm working with.
Angela Mitchell: I know that you're a fan of digital textile creation. Are you incorporating any digitally created textiles into your designs for Much Ado?
Holly Poe Durbin: Not this time!
Angela Mitchell: I was interested to read about your session on laundering stage blood with Jessica Mueller last Spring at USITT (and Out, Damn Spot is the best title ever!). What advice would you give to other costume designers facing the challenge of especially bloody shows?
Holly Poe Durbin: In the last five to seven years, live performances have started incorporating more and more grand-scale, film-style blood effects. But when you perform live, you cannot stop the camera to reset the scene. This creates extremely large challenges for the costume team. I would advise anyone to work closely with their producer to ensure they really have enough time and money to produce the desired effects.
Angela Mitchell: Some of your costumes for Clownzilla: Illegal Aliens included inspiration by the artist Joan Miro. What other artists inspire you in your work?
Holly Poe Durbin: Part of the fun of design is discovering new artists or seeing something different in artworks you thought you knew well. Different artists will appeal to me at different times. It took me quite some time to come across Miro as an inspiration for Clownzilla, and I'd like the opportunity to explore that idea even more. I don't think I'm finished with Miro yet.
Angela Mitchell: You've designed costumes for several Shakespearean productions. Do you prefer the challenges of the more modern interpretations, or period stagings -- or both?
Holly Poe Durbin: I rarely do Shakespeare set during his lifetime, that seems to have gone out of style. Now we spend a great deal of time trying to match a 19th or 20th century locale to the themes in that particular Shakespeare play. Modern audiences relate to updated versions more.
Angela Mitchell: Will your costumes for this production of Much Ado for the Shakespeare Center production retain any inspiration from your previous design for the Much Ado About Nothing at the Shakespeare L.A. Festival? Or will they be a wholly new take?
Holly Poe Durbin: This will be an entirely new production. This is the beauty of doing Shakespeare more than once - there is always something new. This will actually be the fourth production of Much Ado I have worked on in my entire career.
Angela Mitchell: You've given presentations on 'Garbing the Bard' – what are the biggest pitfalls to designing costumes for Shakespeare (what should costume designers avoid)?
Holly Poe Durbin: Designers can lose their way if they don't really understand the function of each character in Shakespeare's plays. It can be hard when you have many similar types on stage-- what sets each one apart from the other?
Sometimes we are given few clues, such as when we have characters named Gentleman #1, #2 and #3. But I've discovered if I read just the lines for each such character alone, I can discover that one character may be the voice of caution, one may be the voice of wisdom, and one may be the kind of person who asks a million questions.
Angela Mitchell: Meanwhile, what should they absolutely make sure to do, every time?
Holly Poe Durbin: Attend rehearsals to see how the directors and actors have shaped the play. No matter how much we pre-plan, the show evolves as we work on it. It is very important to be a part of the process.
Angela Mitchell: Did any specific artist or movement inspire your costumes for Much Ado?
Holly Poe Durbin: The costumes are inspired by an eclectic inspiration of California dreams and icons, such as Zorro, and daring Flying Ace pilots and musicians.
Angela Mitchell: Which costume for Much Ado was the most challenging to interpret?
Holly Poe Durbin: Beatrice and Benedick are always difficult, because they are complex, flawed characters with a lot of back story.
It is important to feature their nimble wit, so costume designers must make subtle and true choices for their costumes.
Angela Mitchell: Which costumes ended up as your favorites thus far in Much Ado?
Holly Poe Durbin: The costumes for our masked ball scene are my favorite. In our production, the ball will be a grape-stomping party in the vineyard. Lyle Lovett will sing "Peel Me a Grape" for this scene, so I designed it as if it were a number in musical theater, with movement and emotion in mind. The ladies’ costumes are based on Flamenco shawls, and the men will be dressed in Zorro-style costumes.
Angela Mitchell: What advice would you give to new or aspiring costume designers out there?
Holly Poe Durbin: Take some time to travel, so you understand a bit about the world. Costume designers must interpret so many cultures and eras, it is essential to experience as many as you can to broaden your own appreciation for other ways of living.
The Shakespeare Center's production of William Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing” takes place at the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City, through December 19, 2010. Tickets are available via 213-628-2772, or online at CenterTheatreGroup.org/MuchAdo. Tickets may also be purchased in person at the Center Theatre Group box office (at the Ahmanson Theatre at the Music Center in downtown Los Angeles) or at the Kirk Douglas Theatre box office two hours prior to performances.
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