By D’Arcy Morrell –
At Barter Theatre, each production begins with a spark of imagination, and few stories ignite the holiday spirit quite like Dr. Seuss’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical. Designing costumes that feel larger than life is no small feat, especially when every ruffle, stripe, and swirl needs to feel like it came straight out of Dr. Seuss’s imagination. For Barter Theatre’s Resident Costume Designer Lee Martin, that challenge is part of the joy.
“It is a very creative show to work on because everything has to have that Dr. Seuss feel, and that’s not something you can just pull out of stock,” Martin said. “You can take things and mush them together and turn them into something that has that feeling to it, but a lot of that has to be built [from scratch], and that’s great because I had a really clear vision.”
Martin described Dr. Seuss as a kindred spirit adding, “I feel like he’s like an eighth of my personality somewhere along the line.” That connection has made the process, in his words, “a joy to work on because it is all about creating new things and silhouettes that aren’t normal, with color palettes that are bright and whimsical with so much pattern and texture. Those are some of my favorite [design aspects] to use—to just take it over the top and run with it.”
Whoville wasn’t always on the travel itinerary this year, but when Elf was postponed, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical took its place, Martin switched gears without missing a beat. Though the world Dr Seuss imagined could never be “pulled out of stock,” the costume shop found inspired ways to transform existing pieces. “A good portion of the elves’ costumes from Elf have been transformed into Grinchy characters,” he said. “We’ve been able to make those things work in a completely different way than how they would in Elf.”
When asked how he approaches building the wardrobe for such a zany, unique place as Whoville, Martin emphasized the collaborative nature of Barter’s design process, which helps create the world we see on stage. “Sometimes Derek and I just happen to be on the same wave,” he said of Barter’s Resident Scenic Designer, Derek Smith. “We’ve worked together for 12 years, and it’s an amazing collaboration to be able to have. It feels really good to know that we know each other well enough that we are often on the same page before we even check out the other.”
He credits strong communication across departments for the harmony audiences see on stage. “A lot of that, I think, comes down to the director and how well they communicate the concept of the world, the type of story we’re telling,” he said. “We all have kind of a shared visual vocabulary that we have developed over the years.”
That shared understanding extends to the actors. Martin designs with their performances in mind, particularly when it comes to movement. “I know how Sean [Campos, who’s playing the Grinch] is in a role. I know that his performance is going to have a lot of movement; very expressive, very vocal,” he said. “So I try to keep those things in mind. Can he move in this? Can he lift his arms all the way up? Can he hang upside down in a chimney and not lose his hat?”
Designing the titular character’s costume required a balance of creativity, comfort, and practicality. “I know that the base of it needs to be washable,” Martin said. “You’re doing eight shows a week. You’re going to sweat, and that layer that’s against the body can absorb sweat really well if you think about it in that way.”
To solve that, Martin created a layered design. “He has a bodysuit underneath that’s hand-painted and hand-dyed,” he said. “It touches his body all the way throughout…it’s made to go underneath the fur pants, vest, and gloves he has,” he continued.
Beyond comfort and washing accessibility, the visual world of How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical blends fantasy with artistic influence. “One of the other elements of this design was we had to make it seem otherworldly,” Martin said. “I was able to use very Elizabethan and medieval kinds of things as part of the design.” The result, he said, “doesn’t look like any other Grinch you’ve ever seen.”
For Martin, it all circles back to Seuss himself, an artist who understood that imagination could be both silly and sincere. “He’s a visual artist and so am I,” Martin said. “So if he wrote this story, it only makes sense that I should draw from his work to create what I do.”
(Renderings by Resident Costume Designer Lee Martin)
