Need some ideas for blood stage effects!!!?

Question

I'm putting on a performance of Peter Shaffer's The Gift of the Gorgon and it calls for my lead actor to appear entirely naked but wrapped in a towel. The actor has recently been severely cut up and the blood needs to seep through the towel. Any ideas as to how I can translate this onto the stage?! Thanks!

Answer 1

you could always go the whole hog and use real blood from the butchers?

ask a local butcher for pigs blood you can always water it down?

Answer 2

ketchup :D

dilute it with water

Answer 3

Red and Black food colouring mixed together more red than black then add some honey to make it thicker and sticky looking and there you go some rake blood!!!

Answer 4

abacaxit : is correct, corn syrup base is your best bet..as it looks realistic under the lights...remember when real blood spills it is not red..it can appear almost black..if it is arterial spary you want would have to move much more rapidly lol, but for your average soak through towel effect defo corn syrup

Answer 5

you could use

ketchup(wich might be kind of hard to show through)

red kool-aid or gatorade

tomato sauce

not for sure if any of these would work

but you can always try :)

Answer 6

Ah Sarah again.

   Forget REAL blood, and Theatrical blood can be made. The issue in a half pint at $26 approx, to purchase, is prohibitive.

   The substances can just be RED food coloring, or if applied to the body, be Strawberry jelly. As I said in my other answer, the actor may be 30 feet from any audience, and it is ACTING after all. Obviously a dyed corn starch and water mix can be made also, but why? Is it Broadway?

   More the issue is the substance be in quantity, as well as any garments it will be applied to, and I have no idea of your staging techniques in the scene, but you can assume at least one NEW, clean towel for every performance perhaps. The staging, especially if the action takes place without a fade to black, will be the challenge in the SEEPING. I'd rather MUSIC then fade, then lights, then action, already bloodied. BUT AGAIN, I have no concept of the staging/blocking/sequences involved. The blood could be applied on a towel already prepped and available to the actor. He can throw the clean one behind a set piece picking up the Bloodied one.

   Your notion of seeping will surely be another dynamic the actor doesn't need to engage in, IE: Squeezing a rubber "bulb" filled with stage blood, HOPING it will SEEP in the allotted time frame. And what of the actions or distractions of the actor committed to the scene? Will the blood squirt too soon? Be visible before any wound inflicted???

Just my 2 "scents"

Answer 7

There are several recipes for fake blood ... corn syrup and red food coloring is the basic mix.  Search for "moulage" and blood recipe.  It is realistic, but VERY sticky.

To get the seeping effect - make the bloody spot grow bigger - partly fill a balloon with some of the fake blood, knot it and tuck it into the towel or tape it to the actor's skin under the towel. Just before you go on stage, poke a hole in the balloon.

As the actor moves, the balloon should release fluid.  Or. the actor can clutch the 'wounded spot" and squeeze the balloon to get a sudden increase.

Answer 8

go out to a costume shop they will surely have some little fake blood capsuls!!   :)