[PappyCat]

I'm playing Fred in our production of OUAM and we are totally soaking me before I go onstage for shy.

I've been watching some clips from other's productions on YouTube and hardly anyone else has their Fred noticably wet!

I was wondering if you guys had her go onstage wet. If you didn't, how did you give her the appearance of being damp?

And if you did, did she get absolutely freezing?

[LaurelDP]

Our Winnifred was not wet... We pinned some swamp weeds and other... watery stuff on her dress.


Thing is, we didn't have a costume we liked to change her in to... also, we didn't want risk getting the mic wet.
Also her hair, because it wouldn't really dry by the right time in the show.

[PappyCat]

My hair is really versatile, we were practicing the finale, and I was trying to mess it up so it looked like I had been struggling with trying to sleep all night, but it kept going back to normal. I'm confident it'll dry fast, and that's what hair dryers are for! And we aren't using Mics, so we don't have to worry about that!

[star2ballie]

Our Fred had swamp weeds pinned to her and shimmery fabric that looked like it was kind of wet. She also had leaves and stuff in her hair.

Our director didn't want his stage wet

[jessiemil42]

[alexxboyle]

Our Fred had a wig just for that scene. She would soak the wig, but put her own hair up in a hairnet or something like that. For the rest of the play, she just took off the wig and her actual hair remained dry.

Also, if your dress is a darker color (like swamp green or something close to that), it might make the dress look more wet, since it's harder to tell if something's wet if it's a darker color.

I hope that helps!

[norayouadora]

I did this show quite a few years back, and I remember that our Fred had really crazy, bright red curly hair, so I think they just had to take advantage of that... Lol. Her hair was made pretty much soaking wet for that scene, then when she entered she would flip it back so drops of water flew off of it. We also had a net-type thing with various "water" animals (starfish, crabs, etc) and tons of seaweed and whatnot pinned to it and draped all over her. The effect was pretty cool, and they managed to do it without getting her costume wet or getting much water on anyone else. Then she would pin her hair up for a few scenes and I suppose it dried as she was performing. Sorry I don't remember all the details, it was like 5 years ago.

[Tenalto]

I threaded some green strips of "seaweed" through my braids and pulled a few more pieces from the top of my dress. I also stuffed my mouth full of spinach leaves before the entrance and spat them all over the stage. It gave the idea of having swam the moat without getting wet.

[LaurelDP]

I also remember that we threw a funny little bouncy fish over the wall when she came in....

Her dress was dark green, so I guess it wouldn't have mattered if it was wet.
As star2ballie mentioned, we also has shiny fabric pinned to her dress that was supposed to replicate water, or something like that...


I think the costumer would have killed us if we got the dress soaked every night.

[wicked_diva]

Our Winnifred had an outer layer of her dress for that scene that was really heavy, dark blue fabric, so it looked wet and hung as if it were wet. She also had plant life all over her dress and in her hair. She did spit out water, though.

[Beagle On Stage]

I think half the fun of that scene is Winnifred actually being wet and slopping it all over the stage. I've seen productions that try to do it without really having her be wet and while you can get away with it, it just loses that special element that makes her entrance great.

The first time I did it, Fred had a special parapet set up with a pile of mattresses behind it. She would stand under the shower in the dressing room in her costume and then walk out to where she came in pushing towels along with her feet to protect the floor at least a little bit. Then she climbed over the wall soaking wet, dripping everywhere. When she fell back in, she would swing her legs all the way up so she fell straight down upside down. Then there was a bucket of water to get her hair wet anew for her second entrance. It was hilarious.

The second time, I don't know how she did it, but Fred also came out onstage visibly wet. She just crawled up through a doorway above stage level with steps leading down, givng the impression that she had crawled in from below. The real crowning glory was her exit though. When she fell back in, she would fall through the door and to the side, being caught midair by a guy waiting for her, then I took a bucket of water to the face as though it was the water splashing up when she fell in.

I'll take a few screenshots of these so you can see. They were both very adorable. I really recommend having her really be wet. The audience will love it, and it's such a great chance for the actress to go all-out. If I were Fred, I would actually be disappointed if all I got to do was have a really dark dress with some seaweed pinned on.

[jessiemil42]

In our production, we cut the scene when she goes in again.. so when I made my first entrance as Fred, the director wanted to make it clearly obvious that I was wet. So as I was saying the line "But nevermind if I just stand right here.." I took off the swamp weeds that were in my dress so that the audience could figure I was wet...

and the shiny green and purple dress helped too!

[Francois]

[PappyCat]

well, here is what we did:

Totally unflattering picture of me, because I'm in the middle of singing shy, but anyway:

This was taken at our first dress rehearsal. We decided that I wasn't wet enough and ended up soaking me even more for the actual performances. We also added weeds and such to the costume, especially in my hair.

The costume lady didn't make my dress huckleberry, clearly, so we had to alter those lines a little bit.

[LaurelDP]

We interpreted Huckleberry as being a very ambiguous color, and assumed that was on purpose.

Because really, the audience has no idea what color Huckleberry is...

Our "Huckleberry" dress was dark green.

[PappyCat]

Google searched it and it IS rather ambiguous. This kind of berry yielded the most results:

[wicked_diva]

Our Huckleberry was a light navy blue color.

[hershey04]

Yeah, our huckleberry was purple.

Our Winnifred wasn't wet at all...I don't think that even crossed anyone's mind to actually get her wet. It sounds like the effect would've been much cooler if she had been.

[momsterv]

When my daughter played Fred a few years ago, they didn't make her wet. She did spit water at the beginning. And had seaweed all over her. It wasn't pinned on, so she could pick it off during the first few minutes.

Her dress was a dark pinkish color.