After a long career in local TV news, Stefani Booroojian explores the artistry of costuming for Good Company Players

TEXT AND PHOTOS BY DOUG HOAGLAND

This begins with a mother named Roxie, a daughter named Stefani and a Singer sewing machine.

Roxie Booroojian made dresses that young Stefani wore to school. Eventually, Stefani learned to sew herself, and there was satisfaction in making something from scratch, with skills that grew over the years.

Fast forward to today, and Stefani Booroojian – who spent 42 years doing television news in Fresno – tailors costumes for Fresno’s Good Company Players. She works under the direction of Ginger Kay Lewis-Reed, GCP’s longtime costume designer.

“It’s about being an artist, and you can be artistic in different ways,” Booroojian said. “I loved writing the stories I did for KSEE, and sewing is just another creative outlet.”

In GCP programs at Roger Rocka’s Music Hall and 2nd Space Theatre, Booroojian is identified as Stefani Cotta, her married name. Just like her work on television, Booroojian’s work in GCP’s costume shop is public, but with a decided difference.

Few people, for instance, know that Booroojian made the coat that Emily Pessano wore as the title character in “Mary Poppins, The Broadway Musical,” a GCP production earlier this year. The coat needed to help pinpoint the time frame of the show: the Edwardian Era of the early 20th Century. The coat’s silhouette needed to be sharp with a narrow waist and long A-line cut reaching to mid-calf.

“It was exciting to see that on stage,” Booroojian said. “I was really proud of that. I know that audiences appreciate the costumes, but they have no idea how much work goes into these shows.”

She also created from scratch the highly tailored, white tailcoat with high collar, shoulder cuffs and gold buttons and emblems worn by the evil Prince Hans in “Disney’s Frozen,” a 2025 production. “That was the first thing I made here that I was like, ‘Wow! I did that.’ ”

Pictured above: Stefani Booroojian with the “Mary Poppins” coat she made in the costume shop at Good Company Players. She works there after a 42-year career in television news.

Covid and sewing

As a girl, Booroojian sewed some of her own clothes. And when her children were young, she made Halloween costumes for them. The sewing machine came out again during Covid 19 when she made masks, and it stayed out as the pandemic brought on social isolation.

“I started sewing with a vengeance, and I really enjoyed it,” she said. Booroojian sewed clothes she could wear doing the nightly news, and some of those outfits became her favorites. Making her own things also solved the problem of finding clothes in her petite size that she liked.

With a heightened interest in sewing, Booroojian found an online community of influencers and pattern makers who had YouTube videos that helped improve her skills. “I wanted to do it better, especially for the dresses I made for work,” she said. She also upgraded her equipment, adding a high-quality sewing machine from Sweden alongside her Singer.

When retirement came in June 2024, Booroojian knew she wanted to stay busy, and she first took classes to qualify as a Master Gardener. One day, she and her husband, Marc, attended an estate sale where she connected with Lewis-Reed. They’d met years before when Booroojian did a television story about GCP’s costume shop. Lewis-Reed had an opening for a part-time costumer, and a week later Booroojian started her new gig.

Lewis-Reed immediately recognized Booroojian’s talent. “I could tell she’s a perfectionist. Takes one to know one. So I knew she would be just wonderful at it and probably really enjoy it, which is a good bonus,” Lewis-Reed said.

The costume shop is stuffed with recycled outfits from decades of GCP shows. Much of the work in the shop involves taking clothes worn in one show and adapting them to another production. It could be adding trim or reshaping the silhouette. “All the finishing touches are so impressive,” Booroojian said.

Other work is less glamorous but essential. Fittings for actors. Zipper replacements. Repairing tears during the run of a show. Doing laundry once a week. Some clothes have to be washed because the actors wear them for a two-month run. And, yes, if clothing needs pressing, Booroojian irons.

Pictured: Booroojian with Zöe Zamora and Ginger Kay Lewis-Reed in the Good Company Players costume shop.

People willing to donate items from their past help clothe GCP’s performers, as Boorroojian recently learned. She took a call from a woman whose father had been a country and western singer.

The woman brought in some of her dad’s jackets, and one of them – a forest green gaberdine with rust piping – ended up in “Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story,” currently on stage at the Music Hall. It’s worn by the actor (Erik Bako) who plays the real-life manager of rock ‘n’ roller Holly. The manager had country and western roots.

Other pieces of history are sometimes discovered as clothing passes through the costume shop. For instance, a 90-year-old suit from an estate sale appears in “The Front Page,” a comedy set in the late 1920s that’s now playing at 2nd Space. Booroojian was sizing it to fit an actor when she found an inside tag with the name of the original owner and the year he bought it: 1936.

Booroojian’s mother was a girl in 1936 and perhaps learning the way with a needle that she would pass down to her daughter. Roxie Booroojian, who passed away in 2023, saw the results of her daughter’s sewing skill. With material brought from Armenia while reporting from there, Stefani Booroojian made tote bags for her mother. Fleece-lined jackets were created from other material.

Their lives had come full circle. A mother sewed for her daughter; a daughter now sewed for her mother.

Booroojian believes her mother would be pleased to know that she now uses their shared artistry in theater costuming. “I didn’t say this to her but I wish I would have: ‘You inspired me.’ ”

The Munro Review has no paywall but is financially supported by readers who believe in its non-profit mission of bringing professional arts journalism to the central San Joaquin Valley. You can help by signing up for a monthly recurring paid membership or make a one-time donation of as little as $3. All memberships and donations are tax-deductible.