The pregnancy of Betsy and Lindsey posed an interesting challenge to me as a costume designer. The characters treat their pregnancy very differently, something I wanted to reflect in the costume, as well as remaining accurate in terms of time period. Both pregnancies are symbolic of the future generations that will be effected by the changing neighborhood. As historian Bill Savage says about the piece in a NYT article, “both acts have confrontations where people compete over the meaning, the past and the future of a building on a street,” and the building resonates even more knowing that there is a baby whose future will be different depending on what the characters decide to do. Betsy’s pregnancy is handled very different from Lindsey’s. In 1959 no one directly mentions the pregnancy, instead only alluding to it in euphemisms (expecting a stork, etc) or Jim’s miming, so I decided to hide Betsy’s baby bump as I imagined she would feel pressured to in this time period. Her clothes are loose and everyone is very worried about her state but they tiptoe around the issue. Lindsey, on the other hand, wears a tight shirt and leggings, casually unconcerned with showing off her pregnancy. She wanders around freely and no one is trying to get her to sit down or expresses worries about the baby. In the second act, the baby will benefit from the changes being purposed, whereas the characters argue that Betsy’s baby will suffer because of the change, and prefer to keep it sheltered and hidden. I hope I was able to portray the differences in addressing the baby and future through costuming, adding to the multitude of metaphors the conflicts over the house represented.
Works Cited
Piepenburg, Erik. “Integration, Gentrification, Conversation.” The New York Times. 3 Aug. 2011. Web. 20 Mar. 2016.
Clybourne Park, by Bruce Norris. Dir. Ann Marie Costa. Duke Family Performance Hall, Davidson College. 16 Mar. 2016. Performance.
