Approach and inspiration

My approach and inspiration to the film adaptation of the comedy Twelfth Night is to show the dark and inhuman side of people. I therefore chose to focus on the character of Malvolio, a grotesque character unloved by all and tricked by some.

The ruffles were the starting point for the design after looking at the painting of The Somerset House Conference (Unknown artist 1604, above). The men looked uncomfortable and anxious with such big collars, which me think this how this ruffle can control and consume them.

The grotesque body expresses the anxieties and repressed sexual desires of a character. Those are transmitted to the audience and they then experience the same feeling of discomfort or the grotesque body serves as a parody and can be performative (Barbieri 2016, Zidiankis 2011). One example of this is the out of control phallus of Malvolio.

The German expressionist movies are a great influence of this project not only for their great visuals and the untraditional camera angles but for addressing emotions such as anxieties and disturbances like in Dr. Caligari (Darsa 2013).