EMP Museum
Seattle, Washington
The Star Wars movies are one of our favorite things, so when we saw that an extensive Star Wars costume exhibit would be on display in Seattle we were eager to fit it into our visit.
The girls were happy to come with us, and we also met up with Meredith’s niece and former brother-in-law. The exhibit is in the EMP Museum, in the Seattle Center, near the Space Needle. The museum building is a funky and colorful asymmetrical building designed by architect Frank Gehry. The EMP (Experience Music Project) Museum was founded by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen in 2000.
We bought tickets both to the museum and separate, timed tickets to the Star Wars exhibit, for a total cost of $32 each. (Online discounts may apply.) EMP is the first stop for this Star Wars exhibit, which is part of a 12-city national tour; it runs at EMP through October 4, 2015.
The exhibit was lots of fun. There were costumes from all six movies, and extensive background information – text, video, and audio — about the design and fabrication of the costumes. There were also interesting displays grouping costumes, such as half a dozen senators’ robes. Several displays showed how costumes evolved as a character developed, for example four separate costumes worn by Senator and later emperor Palpatine, showing his evolution toward the Dark Side.
There are some great videos, with George Lucas, costume designer Trisha Biggar, and Natalie Portman, among others. Meredith particularly enjoyed an audio clip of actor Anthony Daniels who played C-3PO, describing his doubts when his agent sent him to see someone named George Lucas who was doing a “low budget science fiction movie” and was looking for someone to play a robot, because it might lead to bigger things. Daniels was captivated by a sketch of C-3PO in Lucas’ office and agreed to play the part.
The exhibit ends with – who else? – Darth Vader, and of course we all had to take our photos with him.
After we had cruised the Star Wars exhibit and related gift shop we saw several more exhibits at the EMP: Fantasy: Worlds of Myth and Magic; Can’t Look Away: the Lure of Horror Film; and Indie Game Revolution. Both the fantasy and the horror exhibits had some great artifacts on display, including some original Wizard of Oz costume pieces and weapons from the Lord of the Rings movies in the fantasy exhibit. We enjoyed the “guest curator” videos that were playing in the horror exhibit, particularly Roger Corman’s perspective on the evolution of horror pictures. We skipped the music exhibits at EMP and also the temporary Seahawks exhibit.
The museum has multiple levels and is a bit confusing to navigate. Wheelchair patrons can use elevators, but stairs (lots of them!) are a more direct way to get around the museum. It would be possible to use a wheelchair or walker in the Star Wars costume exhibit, but the crowds made it somewhat claustrophobic even for those of us on two feet. If we were going to bring a wheelchair to this museum, we would aim for a less crowded time than midafternoon on a rainy weekend.
There is a café on the lowest level of EMP, but we ate an excellent lunch at Chutneys, an Indian restaurant in the Queen Anne neighborhood nearby, before coming to the museum. We parked in a parking garage near Seattle Center. The trek to the restaurant took us through the center then back again, all in steady rain that turned out to set a record for March 15. We were pleased to have brought our ancient London Fog trench coats, both of which date from our undergraduate days at Yale.