Georges Méliès: la magia del costume scenico

Elena Mazzoleni

In 2004, the Centre National de la Cinématographie de Paris acquires most of Georges Méliès’ stage costumes. This collection proves that the film director observes a clothing design practice, which includes his films in the late-century stage costume history, moreover shared with some popular Parisian theatres, such as the Théâtre du Châtelet, the Théâtre de la Porte Saint-Martin, the Folies-Bergère and the Théâtre Houdin. Besides illustrating the main aspects of the creation of the Star Film stage costumes (partly taken over from theater funds and partly commissioned to Parisian fashion houses such as Lepère and Pascaud), the essays intends to bring light to Méliès’ special care for the scenic potentialities of the clothes. His attention to the games of reflections, to the chromatic and textile alternations reveals, by the way, a deep awareness for the artistic effects of the movement, which is utterly in tune with the visual and theatrical imagery of the time.