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Filmmaker
Gina Scarnati
Costume Designer
(Photograph
by Nicholas Reader)
The following article,
written by Gina Scarnati, discusses the roles that
personal history and heritage play in the paths we
choose in life. Personal and family history
has always been a significant influence in Gina's
career and her progression as a filmmaker.
This is one reason that we are so proud to consider
Gina a part of the Expressway family and to have
been such an integral part of her professional
history.
You will find a Gina Scarnati, Costume Designer
credit on everything we have produced and in turn we
are happy to have been there to support and
facilitate Gina's initial foray into filmmaking.
Since her (and our) earliest IMDB credits, like
"Gary and Gorilla" and "Melon Snatch", Gina has
excelled at making the transition from Theater to
Film and now she is working in costume departments
on both coasts. You can find Gina in the
credits of huge box office studio films like
"Cowboys and Aliens" and "The Last Airbender".
We are very proud of Gina and wish her the best of
luck, whatever coast she may be on right now.
It is much appreciated that she was able to take the
time to write this article for us. We hope you
all enjoy it.
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Filmmaker Gina Scarnati
On
Heritage and Profession
As a little kid I used to sit, cross-legged, on the
floor, beneath a quilt which hung from my parent’s
bedroom wall. I was fascinated with the pieces of
plush burgundy, black, and brown velvets, collaged
together with ornate stitches. I felt badly for the
scattered bits of silk that had faded, and begun to
separate, thread by thread, from age. I asked my
mother why some of the stitches matched, from panel
to panel, and she explained that those women were
friends, or sisters. Maybe they taught each other? I
remember asking why names matched, and she explained
how those names were related. And then, one day, I
asked, “What does 1891 mean?” That was the year my
great-grandmother and these other woman made this
quilt, with their bare hands.
Whether it was my mother turning old sheets, with a
strawberry vine pattern, into a Strawberry Shortcake
costume, or watching a pair of green velvet curtains
transform into Scarlet O’Hara’s dress, I have always
been fascinated with watching people create. Just
as the women who fashioned my family’s quilt shared
their knowledge, with scraps of fabric, and
embroidery stitches, my maternal grandmother taught
me to embroider and crochet. By Junior High I was
embroidering jeans, while I wore them, in class. My
mother showed me how to use the family’s metal
sewing machine, which had first perched atop my
grandmother’s dining table, during the 1940’s. I
made a ruffle.
By sophomore year of high school, I designed my
first production, “The Wiz”. There were 111
costumes, and I had a twenty-four-person crew. At
the same time, I was working my first job ever,
sewing rhinestones onto the tutus and bodices of the
Russian Ballet. By the age of fourteen, working on
three or more shows at a time, I knew what I wanted
to do for the rest of my life.
It wasn’t until after college that my father’s
mother shared with me that not only had her sister
worked in a shirt factory, and even made all her
husband’s clothes, but that my great-grandmother
arrived on the shores of New England, with nothing
but a loom. She worked in the textile mills before
moving to Pennsylvania. I now cherish her treadle
sewing machine (a Singer, of course), along with the
one I first learned to sew upon.
For me, there is nothing more influential than
family history. History is all about influences.
Why and How. I never met the woman, who landed on
the shores of New England, with nothing but a loom,
but I’d like to think that rather than charting my
own path, I inherited it from her. If the path of
life becomes clearer when you look back at the steps
taken, then it would seem I was always headed “here”
anyway.
For me, there is nothing more exhilarating than the
moment where what only exists in my mind comes to
life. It is a magical moment. It is when piles of
fabric, nearly finished hats, freshly sculpted
masks, or racks of costumes surround me, that I am
most who I have always been.
I do what I was always meant to do, and that is a
dream come true.
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Please
feel free to visit Gina's design websites below
www.Coroflot.com/players
Gina's
Custom Designs and Unique Gifts
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