@haxtheweb/video-player

WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.020 --> 00:00:04.060 You can't, like, punch things in a computer and 2 00:00:04.080 --> 00:00:08.110 have a hat pop out. 3 00:00:08.130 --> 00:00:12.160 You know, it has to be done by hand. 4 00:00:12.180 --> 00:00:16.260 And so artisans who work in the theatre, like 5 00:00:16.280 --> 00:00:20.410 we train here at Penn State, are valuable everywhere. 6 00:00:20.430 --> 00:00:24.450 Our kids go right into the industry because we're teaching them 7 00:00:24.470 --> 00:00:28.570 these skills that people need desperately, which is kind of wonderful. 8 00:00:28.590 --> 00:00:32.750 This past summer 9 00:00:32.770 --> 00:00:36.840 we didn't have a first year group of grad students and we decided 10 00:00:36.860 --> 00:00:41.010 we weren't going to London for one year, so I had like one year that I could do this. 11 00:00:41.030 --> 00:00:45.190 There was only once chance. 12 00:00:45.210 --> 00:00:49.280 And so I started in August making inquiries of the university of Bournemouth, and I said, 13 00:00:49.300 --> 00:00:53.400 "I have these skills and I've made a lot of hats, but we're doing a production of Titanic 14 00:00:53.420 --> 00:00:57.570 and I would like to learn bigger hats, and things that 15 00:00:57.590 --> 00:01:01.650 would be more of the period of 1910, which I've never done." 16 00:01:01.670 --> 00:01:05.710 I brag about it all the time here because for two weeks I got to do one thing only. 17 00:01:05.730 --> 00:01:09.780 and sit at a table for 10 hours a day making hats, and just 18 00:01:09.800 --> 00:01:13.910 really concentrate on learning a new skill, which was really fantastic. 19 00:01:13.930 --> 00:01:17.960 It's almost like they want to be born and have their own 20 00:01:17.980 --> 00:01:22.000 ideas about what they want to be. Even hats that I start, they don't necessarily end up 21 00:01:22.020 --> 00:01:26.130 being what I thought they were when I started when they finish. 22 00:01:26.150 --> 00:01:30.150 They had these purple velvet flowers which I thought were really fabulous, so I thought, "ok, 23 00:01:30.170 --> 00:01:34.250 I'm going to do something in the purple range." And then in one of the fabric stores in Shepherd's Bush I found 24 00:01:34.270 --> 00:01:38.290 this fabulous black and purple stripe that became the 25 00:01:38.310 --> 00:01:42.370 bow and the edging on this, and then we had to find another fabric and we thought this went like really 26 00:01:42.390 --> 00:01:46.560 nicely with it. 27 00:01:46.580 --> 00:01:50.610 My parents were both teachers, and so 28 00:01:50.630 --> 00:01:54.720 I was that kid that was in the library that they'd say, "why don't you go out on the playground?" 29 00:01:54.740 --> 00:01:58.730 And I was so happy in the world of books and whatever, and sometimes I'll get a job and 30 00:01:58.750 --> 00:02:02.860 I literally skip to the library, cause like, oh my god, I'm going to go today and research 31 00:02:02.880 --> 00:02:06.890 Vivien Leigh today, and I was like the happiest kid on the planet that day. 32 00:02:06.910 --> 00:02:10.990 And so history is huge. 33 00:02:11.010 --> 00:02:15.020 I have to be sort of knowledgeable about psychology, and relationships, and 34 00:02:15.040 --> 00:02:19.160 history, and art history, and world history. 35 00:02:19.180 --> 00:02:23.330 And you have to have kind of a knowledge of all of these things to understand 36 00:02:23.350 --> 00:02:27.380 the period of what we're doing. 37 00:02:27.400 --> 00:02:31.490 We have people in my department who make these beautiful silk dresses, these beautiful delicate things. 38 00:02:31.510 --> 00:02:35.670 I'm much more like I get to roll up my sleeves and muscle this stuff into place, 39 00:02:35.690 --> 00:02:39.750 fight it into place and put a wire in it, and make this really solid thing that will last through the run of a show. 40 00:02:39.770 --> 00:02:43.780 I like that better, actually. I could make a dress, it wouldn't be pretty and there would be a 41 00:02:43.800 --> 00:03:06.133 lot of cursing involved, but this I love.