Delaney Nicol

The Haunted Mansion (Semester One Project)

Inspired by the iconic Disneyland attraction, The Haunted Mansion is an immersive theatre experience that is an interlinked murder mystery storyline, featuring some of the principal characters from the omnimover dark-ride. The production would ideally be set in an empty Victorian-style building, transforming each of the rooms into different sets to portray the different scenes within the mansion. If no building was available, a large warehouse would be completely disguised and transformed into a full set. The performance would last around 3 hours, complete with food and drink placed in the main central hub of the mansion, ‘the grand hall’. All the different characters will be in the rooms they are most likely to be found, wandering from room to room if their storyline allows it. Guests would be encouraged to take things at their own pace and explore the mansion, creating their own storyline

The attraction itself doesn’t necessarily follow one specific story, instead, some characters have backstories, others are simply placed there for the look. the aim was to emulate this idea, by placing the majority of the story making in the audience’s hands (or at least so they think) to create a unique experience for each individual as I feel that this is partly what has made the Haunted Mansion so popular as an attraction. There is however 3 main storylines for guests to follow, each revolving around murder and deceit and it’s the audience’s job to put the pieces together and figure out who the killers are.

For the design of the characters, inspiration was loosely taken from the attraction itself.  Due to the original concept of the ride being a “retirement home for ghosts’ this led to some difficulties in terms of a distinct period as characters cover a vast amount of time (BC to 1940s). There was however a focus on characters coming from the Victorian period, therefore this made sense to be the most dominant period. The main issue with designing this project was avoiding characters looking too “ghostlike” and instead wanted them to appear in more of a human state. This was in order to prevent the experience from becoming a haunted house and to focus the attention on the character's themselves.

The final costume make from this project is of Constance Hatchaway, the spirit of a black widow bride who murdered her way up the social ladder. The dress is a typical 1890s wedding gown that features several layers to create the Victorian silhouette. The dress is made of duchess satin and features a "blood-stained" hem of her victims' blood. 

Wicked: The Untold Story of the Witches of Oz (Semester Two Project)

Wicked is a reimagining of the classic MGM film The Wizard of Oz. Set as a prequel to when the events of the film takes place. it tells the origin story of Elphaba, the future Wicked Witch of the West and her relationship with Glinda, the Good Witch of the North.

The aim for this project was to design a contemporary stage version of Wicked. This project explores silhouette as a way of suggesting the whimsical world of Oz whilst exploring each character's individual personalities. As the land of Oz is an entirely fictional place, this allowed for the silhouette to be creative without focusing on a specific time period and instead using haute couture over the last 30 years as inspiration. The main focus for silhouette was to create structure and asymmetry, which would help to highlight the wacky world of Oz itself, as well as reflecting character's personalities. Colour was also an extremely important element of this project, each character was given their own colour (apart from those directly working in the Emerald City which were all green). This meant that the production would be vibrant, whilst also paying tribute to the original Wizard of Oz and the song 'Over the Rainbow'. Textile embellishment was also particularly important as it added a campy element to the costume as well as it being able to catch the light nicely on stage. 

The final costume make is Elphaba in the second act of the show when she is fully embracing what makes her stand out from everyone else. The costume consists of a duchess satin, embellished asymmetric skirt with an organza hem and ruffled detailing.  The top half consists of a wet-look leather structured corset with more sequinned embellishments, a chiffon cape and pointed shoulders.