PNB’s Resident Mouse King, Erik Andor: The Nutcracker, The Sleeping Beauty, and Beyond
Erik Andor, and his eponymous Andor Studio, fabricated the mice costumes you see on stage during The Nutcracker. (And one giant, can’t-be-missed Mouse King costume.) The studio is also in the process of creating royal tiaras, mice puppets, and a large ogre body puppet (performed by two dancers) for PNB’s upcoming production of The Sleeping Beauty. Read on to learn more about building these dramatic elements.
Looking back on The Nutcracker…
In the Seattle performance space, everybody knows what The Nutcracker is, so it felt special to be part of it in 2015. I’m always proud to mention to people that my studio fabricated those mice. PNB is a legacy company in town, and The Nutcracker is a legacy show. Working with Ian Falconer was lovely. It was a lot of work to create, but exciting to have been part of it. We had off and on probably 12 different people working to build the Nutcracker mice, with five or six of us that were working on the Mouse King head alone.
Looking forward to The Sleeping Beauty…
The Sleeping Beauty puppets are designed by world-renowned MacArthur Genius Grant-awardee Basil Twist. When I was asked to fabricate those puppets, it was a dream come true. He comes from this avant-garde, underground world of performing, and over the last several years has worked on a large variety of projects: operas, ballets, and a stage adaptation of My Neighbor Totoro in London. I’ve been a fan of his work for many years.
It is a bit funny that I built the mice for The Nutcracker and now the mice for this, but this is a lot different because they are puppets. Four dancers will control these new evil mice, and each dancer will have a set of hand puppets, a wheel with three mice on it that they manipulate, and a mouse on their head. It will look like there’s a swarm of mice traveling around the Carabosse character when they’re on stage. We made prototypes out of cardboard and aluminum wire, tried them on the dancers, and now we can start fabricating them in the studio.
We’re creating 24 mice to go on stage immediately, plus a few extra in case of emergency. It’s a LOT of parts and pieces (and ears and noses and tails). It’s like a factory around here. There’s also a big ogre element that we’ll be working on in October. Because I have a background in millinery, I used to build the tiaras at the L’Opéra Garnier in Paris, the PNB costume shop asked me to build the crowns for the monarchs in The Sleeping Beauty as well. Paul Tazewell designed them, and I made those to look like glass as a nod to Preston Singletary’s glasswork.
The Sleeping Beauty is aesthetically gorgeous. Having Paul Tazewell in the mix, who is phenomenal, and Basil, who is a remarkable talent, AND Preston Singletary? The artistic elements are going to be so amazing.
Andor Studio makes custom and specialty items—costumes, accessories, puppets, props, surface treatments, and soft goods—for theatre, opera, dance, circus, film, cabaret, exhibition, collaborating with artists and performers of all disciplines. Highlights include: Alternative Miss World, BenDeLaCreme, Jinkx Monsoon, CabinFever, Pacific Northwest Ballet, zoe | juniper, Radio City Rockettes, John Galliano, Opera National de Paris, Cirque du Soleil, Bob Mackie, Siegfried & Roy, and Dina Martina.
To stay up to date on Andor Studio’s many and varied projects, follow @andorstudio on Instagram.
