Pant-ception

My issues with clothing having gained me some sort of dubious notoriety, I thought I'd write about my latest wardrobe disaster.

As some people are probably aware, I am currently performing in a feminist version of Hamlet entitled Ophelia Thinks Harder.  I suppose I can say I have three roles in the play. My primary role is as Rosencrantz, a surprisingly liberal man with several fantastically awesome lines. The second role is as the Ghost of Ophelia's Mother. I wander in for just one scene, mumble a lot of ghosty nonsense, and drift off again. It's a very minor role, as evidenced by the fact that the character doesn't actually get a name other than "The Ghost of Ophelia's Mother" (hereafter abbreviated as GOOM).  My third role (can it even be called that?) is as Occasional Set Changer. No lines at all with this role - I just shift objects around the stage in what I hope is a stylishly efficient manner.

All three of my roles have their own costume requirements. My first foray onto the stage is as a set-changer. As shoving furniture and throwing pillows around is not really the domain of an incorporeal ghost, I wear my Rosencrantz costume. Immediately after that I have my scene as GOOM, after which I change back into Rosencrantz. The distressingly short amount of time between scene-changing and GOOM has resulted in a rather cunning costume cheat: I wear a ludicrous number of pants.

First off, I wear two pairs of underpants. One pair is white. The other is nude. The white underpants are worn on top of the nude underpants, for reasons too complicated and irrelevant to explain.

My GOOM costume consists of a beautiful white dress and cape worn with pale, ghostly pantihose. I put the pantihose on over my underpants at the beginning of the night in anticipation of a quick costume change later on. Over the pantihose I wear my Rosenpants and a pair of black, manly socks.

Underpants within underpants within pantihose within pants with a side-order of socks. It is practically Pantception. Pants-pants-pants-pants.

Usually, it works pretty well. Until one performance a few nights ago... when disaster occured.

I'd just finished my final set-change and I was hurriedly changing into GOOM.  One of my fingers was stinging slightly but, absorbed as I was with costume changing, I ignored it. I ripped off my shirt and tie and flung them haphazardly across a chair. Without pausing I ruthlessly tore off my Rosenpants and replaced them with my GOOM dress.

Just as I was reaching for my cape I glanced down at my dress. Horror rushed through me like a howling wind. Bright red splotches of blood were smeared all over my pristine white dress. I stared wildly at my stinging finger. Evidently, I'd cut it while set-changing. Blood was gushing out of it in torrents, despite it seeming to be only a small cut.

And I had approximately four minutes before I had to go onstage.

I began to panic. I admit it... some expletive may have escaped my tongue. My fellow castmates, alerted to my dilemma, swung into action. One person seized a cloth and desperately tried sponging out the blood on my dress. Another person seized my hand, raised it skywards, and hissed at me to keep it elevated to slow the bleeding. And someone else daringly made a forbidden raid past the audience into the theatre kitchen to grab the first aid kit.

Meanwhile, I'd spotted that my white Rosencrantz shirt, my blue-and-white tie, and my cream-coloured trousers were also speckled with blood. It was a costume disaster of unimaginable proportions.

But it seems that miracles can happen. The blood was able to be sponged off. My finger was liberally smothered in bandaids. I put on my cape. And I made it onstage in time. I still had to keep my finger elevated to stop the bleeding, but hey - I was playing a ghost, and freaky, abnormal hand gestures could definitely be worked into my performance. I wafted onstage, cape billowing, a vision in white, hands raised in holy benediction.

And I looked down and realised I'd forgotten to take off my thick, black, manly socks.