This month, our all staff blog post question is: What was your favorite Halloween costume? Take a look at the fun array of Halloween costumes our staff has worn throughout the years!
Debbie Ellinghaus, Managing Director
This is hilarious because just this weekend, I found this photo of me from Halloween 1980 (age 6). I'm Papa Smurf for the under 40-somethings who may not be familiar with that iconic cartoon. :)
This wasn't my favorite costume, but it's one I have a photo of! My favorite costume was the following year when I was a Rubix Cube.
Jason Dearing, Props Artisan
In 1999, when I was in kindergarten, my mom thought it would be cute if my siblings and I wore coordinating costumes. We decided on The Wizard of Oz and my mom made all of our costumes from scratch! I'm the tin man, my twin brother is the scarecrow, and my older sister is Dorothy.
Vern Reske, Production Management Apprentice
8th Grade (2011): George Weasley from Harry Potter
I'm from Wisconsin, so we always had to dress in layers (Halloween was usually anywhere from 30 - 55) (the worst years were when we had to wear snow pants to keep warm), so that year I took a sheet of computer paper, drew a G on it, and taped it to my shirt.
Josiane Jones, Director of Production
My love of Star Wars started early! This photo is from 1983.
Gabriela Schulman, Casting and Artistic Apprentice
Mine was Hermione Granger. I don’t have any photos of this, but I do have a photo of me as a bat.
Jenna Duncan, Associate Artistic Director/ Casting Director
(This precious picture needs no explanation)
Meredith Beisel, Marketing and Development Apprentice
My mom and I would always watch The Big Comfy Couch when I was little. One Halloween, possibly in 2000 or 2001, my mom decided I should be Loonette. You can see the joy in my face in the picture.
My second favorite costume was when I was both Sandy from Grease and a giraffe. I didn’t want to wear my giraffe onesie on the NYC subway, so I decided to be Sandy who then brought a onesie to my friend’s party.
Seth Gilbert, Costume Design Supervisor
My favorite Halloween costume was this Superman costume that my Grandma Dolly made for me. She always made our costumes growing up and I loved it so much I wore it even when it wasn’t Halloween (as I’m pretty sure it’s not in this picture). This had to have been 1989 or 1990.
Chelsea Dean, Props Apprentice
The year was 2000. Keeping up with my desire to be abnormal things for Halloween, twelve year-old me decided to be a Half Good Witch/Half Bad Witch. The left half of the dress was a regular witch's dress, the right half was a ridiculous prom dress that my mom and I found in the thrift store. We cut the prom dress up the middle and sprayed it with purple spray paint accents. My right shoe was purple as well as my nails on my right hand. The make-up was fabulous, of course 🤣. The best part was confusing the people who saw me trick or treating.
Samantha Williams, Company Manager
My cousin and I were a kitchen sink. It had to be when I was in middle school, which was around 2007.
Lelia Vetter, Electrics Apprentice
I was Raggedy Ann for Halloween one year, and my mom loved her so I'm pretty sure that was her idea. Another favorite costume of mine was the year I was a trick or treat box - my mom stuffed candy wrappers with styrofoam and glued them to the top of a box that I wore.
Rebecca Dzida, Community Engagement and Touring Coordinator
I was a washing machine in the 5th grade. I helped my grandparents move into a new house and was inspired by all of their big cardboard boxes. I wore the cardboard box and made sure it was a front loading washing machine, so when I opened the door, there was a bag to put all of the candy I collected. I've never been able to top that costume. (Not to do any product placement, but I do remember my grandmother adamantly pointing out it had to be the Maytag brand.)
Rebecca didn’t include a picture to show us what this glorious costume looked like.
Hannah Ensign, Education Apprentice
In the 4th grade, when I first became obsessed with Shakespeare, I dressed up as Ophelia for Halloween. I tore up an old nightgown and put leaves and flowers in my hair. Not a lot of people do that, and I did a lot of explaining when I went trick or treating but I thought it was a pretty cool costume.
Much like Rebecca, we don’t have the photographic evidence for Hannah’s costume.
