Stage Makeup

Hi all! So, 2 of my kids are in the Middle school production of Alice in Wonderland to be performed in April. My daughter has been begging me to sign up to do the makeup for the play, but I told her that I didn't think they would be doing face-makeup like I do (facepainting), that it would be mostly costumes with regular stage makeup on their faces. So she asked the director and they said they could use help with the make up (there's like 80-100 kids in the play). So, I started reasearching stage makeup (which I have NO experience with) and came across some general tips and tricks and a recommendation of Ben Nye. I checked out the Ben Nye Production Kit, and am thinking of getting it, but wanted to get some opinions from some of our FPF experts. Does anyone have any suggestions for which brands you prefer/recommend? And do you prefer powders or creams? I'd really appreciate your help with this! Thanks!!

Alice can be done with face paints - at least, most of the characters!

I did the make-up for the show and have lots of photos on my site here http://www.shannonfennell.com/Theatrical3.html

80-100 kids??? wow, have fun with that... try to separate them into the different characters and have people assigned to a specific design - keeps it simpler.

If you are only thinking at this point of doing this one production stick with regular make-up. You don't need to get a theatrical kit to do kids.

For normal people type characters drug store brands of powder based foundation will work, a red blush, lipstick/liners and you can use the face paint for eyeliner.

Thanks, Shannon, for your input. I wasn't sure if face paint would work for stage work. That's good to know! Yes, they have around 10 or 11 main characters for the play, and 80+ kids in the ensemble that will be playing flowers, lobsters, guards, etc. I will find out later this week exactly what the Director has in mind for the makeup, or if they just want me to show them what I can come up with. I have Starblends in all the basic colors...do you think I could use the pink and red for blush? I'm hoping this will not be just a one shot deal as I would love to delve into this some more. But, for now, I just need to figure out the basics, and I really appreciate your suggestions and opinions! By the way, your Alice pics were great! How many shows did you do for Alice, and did you do the makeup exactly the same for all of them or were you able to switch it up?

The runs are usually a month long - so generally each production runs for 12-15 performances.

And we try to stay close to the character charts and test photos that I do for each character but with theatre there is always room to play around a bit - within reason. Some designs allow for tweaking or variations each time others need to stay the same.

That's with the "fantasy" characters. With the straight characters we generally try to keep the colours and details the same every night.

Yes, the pink and red Starblends, dry, will be perfectly good blush.

I'm going to have to look into some flesh colored powders then. We will have three performances and I'm hoping they allow me to be creative with the fantasy characters. We'll see.... thank you, again, for your input Shannon! Will post pics when its all said and done.

I'll be doing the same thing in BC

I'll be painting the main characters and then volunteers are doing makeup on the other 80 characters. Should be fun!

Magna, that's so cool! Be sure to post pics aftwards! I'm really looking forward to this...it will be my first time!