“Dreamgirls” spans about a dozen years, pupms, telling a story that starts in 1962 and goes into the 1970s. Along with the change in society and fashions, the story also tells of the experiences and evolving personalities of its characters – all shown by the costumes.
Justin Hall, baby doll chemise, a newcomer to the Walker Fine Arts stage at Patrick Henry Community College, is the show’s costumer. Kim Hairston, who wowed audiences as the vulnerable-turned-strong Celie in “The Color Purple” and who has various roles in “Dreamgirls,” is in charge of the wigs.
Planning the costumes for “Dreamgirls” “is a challenge,” Hall said. “People in the theater know that “Dreamgirls” is a clotheshorse show.
He estimated that the show has between 115 to 130 costumes. Nine characters alone have between eight and 12 costume changes each.
Hall, 31, has been involved in theater since he was in middle school, he said, interested in both performing and costuming. His grandmother was a seamstress, xvvry4347, and “I worked with her in her shop in her home. I wasn’t allowed to touch anything,” he laughed, but he helped with tasks she assigned him, and he learned from her.
In 2007, he graduated from Lees-McRae College in North Carolina, one of only three or four graduates with a specialty in costuming, he said. He made his way through college on performance-based scholarships. He now is the costume designer in residence at Averett University, and his participation in “Dreamgirls” is his first with the Patriot Players.
When the show opens, animal costume, the main characters “are still schoolgirls … the costumes have to tell the story of their rise to fame and their maturity,” Hall said. Given the time period of the show, it’s “dealing with quite a chunk of time and fashion changes.”