In honor of Women’s History Month, we are spotlighting women who are working on one of the musicals opening on Broadway this spring season. Women have long been a part of the fabric of Broadway, yet the push for gender equity and parity continues. Meet the women who are adding their own threads as they keep Broadway running behind the scenes.
Sarafina Bush’s life in the theater has been ordained since birth, starting with her parents naming her after the 1988 musical Sarafina! And since her phase of listening to British rock in high school, Bush has been unknowingly preparing to design the costumes for The Who’s Tommy, a destiny she’s fulfilling this spring.
The Who is regarded as one of the most influential bands of the 1960s and 1970s, selling more than 100 million albums since the English rock band first formed. In 1969, they released Tommy, which included now-beloved songs such as “Pinball Wizard” and “I’m Free.” Conceived and primarily written by band member Peter Townshend, Tommy became the band’s breakthrough album and received dozens of accolades.
Considered the first use of the term rock opera, the album’s story follows a fictional character named Tommy Walker, who experiences several extremely traumatic events as a child, leaving him seemingly unable to speak, hear, or see. As he grows up, his virtuosic talent with a pinball machine launches him into a life as a celebrity savior.
Two decades after the original album was released, Townshend teamed up with Tony Award–winning director Des McAnuff to transform the concept album into a stage musical. The Who’s Tommy, starring Michael Cerveris in the titular role, opened at Broadway’s St. James Theatre in 1993. It would go on to earn 10 Tony Award nominations and win five, including McAnuff’s direction and Townshend’s score.
Now, a reimagined The Who’s Tommy is back on Broadway for its 30th anniversary revival, opening March 28 at the Nederlander Theatre. The rock musical is once again directed by McAnuff and stars Ali Louis Bourzgui in the title role. Bush, as the lead costume designer, takes on communicating the musical’s story and setting through fashion.
As with all of her projects, the initial step in Bush’s process for designing The Who’s Tommy was reading the script — “Text is always the first thing for me” — and then listening through The Who’s original album as well as the 1993 cast recording. Coupling her knowledge of the 1960s British rock scene with her extensive dramaturgical research helped inspire Bush’s designs from topline vision to the smaller details.
“Post–World War II youth culture was really invested in the unexpected and breaking the status quo,” says Bush. “When you’re looking at a show that’s based on an existing musician or band, the aesthetic needs to reflect the vibe of the music. London’s counterculture and rock music showed young people rebelling against conservatism.”
One moment that illustrates this notion is the adult Tommy during his pinball wizard fame. Bush saw the silhouette of a regular blazer with the lapels turned up (rather than lying flat as intended) repeatedly in her research, which inspired the bright yellow blazer that Tommy wears during Act Two.
Though the story’s timeline typically spans from World War II to the 1960s, in this production, Tommy’s time as a celebrity stretches into an unspecified future, which gave Bush lots of freedom to imagine what she wanted her version of the future to look like. During her research phase, Bush dove into the artistic movement of retrofuturism. The style centers on the past’s vision of what the future would look like, and inspired art across all disciplines — think the 1962 animated sitcom The Jetsons. For Bush, the style seamlessly tied the musical’s time periods together.
“It was very exciting and overwhelming trying to figure out just the right note, because with futurism, there are so many different flavors and interpretations,” says Bush. “Yes, it’s a period piece, but it’s also speaking to right now and to the future. The ensemble’s base costumes are based in that [retrofuturism] aesthetic with a contemporary lean, and the whole show really is through that lens.”
Bush also had another key resource in shaping her vision: McAnuff, who offered his prior experience with the show to offer clarity on some of the more abstract moments in the story. But Bush notes that McAnuff wanted to approach the revival with new, fresh ideas. During their earliest conversations, McAnuff, Bush, and her fellow designers discussed the concept of using color to symbolize certain characters and Tommy’s various traumas.
“When we were in development, we talked about how color would function in this production. For the costumes, we keep the world grayscale until Tommy’s first trauma, and that’s when we get our first burst of color. Des calls it ‘trauma yellow,’ and you start to see it in all the design disciplines—costumes, lighting, and props.”
The color theory also extended to the character Cousin Kevin, who starts off as Tommy’s bully and then becomes one of Tommy’s biggest protectors. Bush and McAnuff went back and forth between red and orange, settling on orange since it was adjacent to Tommy’s yellow, communicating the through line of Cousin Kevin’s character arc.
“The thing I love about costume design and clothing is how it intersects with and represents our identities. Identity is so important in the world and in the work that I do. For me, I am a Black woman costume designer, and that informs so much both my approach, my process, and my lens. It’s exciting to be in rooms that previously didn’t have people who looked like me in them.”
Having Bush’s perspective as a Black woman in Broadway costume design is crucial as the industry continues to expand its understanding of diversity onstage and beyond the wings. Her Tony Award nomination for the 2022 revival for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf made Bush the fourth Black woman to receive a nomination for costume design since 1947. Two of her fellow nominees, Toni-Leslie James and Dede Ayite, are Black women who inspire her, as well as for colored girls’ Tony-nominated director-choreographer Camille A. Brown, and Ruth Carter, who made history twice as the first Black person to be nominated for — and then win — an Oscar for Best Costume Design, 25 years apart.
“I feel very lucky to have worked with so many [women theatermakers],” says Bush. “Our lighting designer [for The Who’s Tommy, Amanda Zieve] is a phenomenal young woman designer. To have her on the team, and other women, other young women, other Black creatives, where we can recognize and cheer each other on is amazing.”
Bush is certainly making her own mark, as she has been lead costume designer for three musicals this season alone. In addition to The Who’s Tommy, she designed costumes for How to Dance in Ohio, which opened in the fall, and The Outsiders, which opens just two weeks after The Who’s Tommy. With a Broadway résumé that boasts 10 credits since 2018, it would seem that costume design was always Bush’s plan. However, as a student at Adelphi University, she majored in French and minored in dance.
“[Discovering my love for costume design] was an accident from enjoying the costume class I took, but now looking back, in hindsight, the foundation was already there because costume design combines a lot of the things I enjoy in the world — sociology, anthropology, psychology — all of that combined into a visual medium. I have always loved clothing and fashion.”
Designing three musicals that open within months of each other has kept Bush with a packed schedule and fueled by caffeine. Even with the busy schedule and the challenges that come along the way, Bush is in awe as she reflects on her career thus far.
“Surreal is the first word that comes to mind,” says Bush. “I’m not just a Black woman, but I’m also earlier on in my career. It’s difficult — this is not an easy job, but in those moments, I think back to Sarafina from college who had absolutely no inkling that this was a possibility. It’s exciting.”