RESTYLE ICONS: Music to My Eyes!

 

Here's my follow-up on Operetta.

As I've already mentioned, Operetta was one of my favorite G1 MH  characters. Her Louisiana rockabilly theming was a fun American and more modern twist on the Phantom of the Opera, and I adored her bold colors and tough, assertive personality. However, Operetta was one of those characters who never had a doll release that I felt captured her character to the best. Her signature doll was probably the closest, but it wasn't worth tracking down a doll with elastic hips and hair that was gelled so heavily into shape. However, Operetta's had so many great costume pieces and there was one release of her with a faceup I really loved, so I thought maybe I could put together my own ultimate Operetta doll, perhaps an unofficial I Love Fashion release, to explore the character and style her in a way I felt was worthy. For a character I loved this much, I wanted to spoil her a little. Other RESTYLE ICONS won't be nearly as thorough!

I was inspired to do this by the mask from Fusion-Inspired Operetta.

Even though the mask is themed on evoking Frankie Stein, I was struck by the way it looked on her face, since it's the closest any Operetta mask has come to the classic half-face contoured mask design made famous by the Broadway Phantom musical. I thought I could sand this piece down to remove the edge ridge and molded scars and repaint it white as the anchor of a new Operetta look. 

For the Operetta I wanted to use as my base, I found myself drawn to her Killer Style release.

Mattel stock photo of Killer Style Operetta.

The Killer Style dolls were unusual, since they were unique base dolls, but dressed in the pieces of earlier standalone fashion packs, making them more like a "fashion pack+model" deluxe release. 

This was the original Maul Session fashion pack that Killer Style Operetta includes most of the parts of:

Mattel stock photo of the Operetta Maul Session fashion pack.
The glasses got swapped for a translucent mask on the Killer
Style doll ensemble.

Not every fashion pack was eventually paired with a unique doll base in a new release, but a few of them were, and Mattel called it Killer Style.

The listing of Killer Style Operetta I chose didn't include her mask, but what drew me to it was the way the hair looked. The previous owner had the front of her hair up in a top ponytail with the rest flowing loose. The restyle not only looked good, but her hair looked shockingly voluminous for what the stock photo depicted. I would have to find out in person, but it looked like Operetta had surprisingly long and/or thick hair, and that was promising. Of the three Operettas I've owned (FCA, Dance Class, and Freaky Fusion), none of them have had hair I was too pleased with, so maybe this listing's promise would hold true.

Here she is.

Killer Style Operetta is part of the good old days before Mattel started lightening (and I think, damaging) her wardrobe palette with pinks and lavenders, and I was especially attracted to this release of her because the doll has a unique faceup with dark purple lips. I love dark lipstick in MH faceups, and while it's not as fifties cherry-sweet as her typical red color, I think Operetta more than has the ability to go dramatic like this, and the I Love Fashion line is a good space for dolls to go more avant-garde and atypical. The Frankie from that line feels very modern-art to me, almost like a Mondrian composition, in an unusual non-everyday way, and it's one of my favorite stylings for her. 

And maybe I'm biased against the purple element in Operetta's palette since the first doll I got of her, her Frights, Camera, Action! edition, happened to have no purple whatsoever in her ensemble--something not even her signature doll could claim!

Mattel stock photo of the stunning retro-Hollywood FCA Operetta. I think the doll was less gorgeous than this photo due to the proportions and hang of the skirt, but I'd like to give it a second chance someday because I might be able to get more out of it.

I was a little nervous that Operetta's hair would be gluey, but I was pleasantly delighted to find it was perfectly soft and even tangle-free! Automatically, this is the best Operetta hair I've encountered. FCA felt a bit thin, Dance Class was serviceable but not too exciting and possibly a little gluey at the time I had her, and Fusion-Inspired was gluey and not well rooted. 

The hair is the classic Operetta colors, with primary red as the majority and black streaks on the sides and the underside. The hair has no parting in the way it's rooted, since it was designed to be in one high ponytail. The half-ponytail style the previous owner gave her works even better! Normally, I don't like this kind of hairstyle at all, but Operetta rocks it. (Then again, what can't she rock, literally or metaphorically?) 

The owner gave her a nice purple elastic to match her, but the band broke when I took the ponytail out to tidy it up, and I replaced it with a clear one that was newer.

Her face is really pretty, with her characteristic narrow eyes, beauty mark, and neutral eyeshadow. The eyeshadow is dark grey with a layer of pale taupe above it, which looks very pretty. While Operetta usually goes for a classic retro red lip, on this doll, she's wearing dark purple lipstick. 

Aaand the eyebrows are dark brown. Oh, well.

Operetta also has her signature elaborate scarring.

Operetta's outfit consists of a top, a skirt, and a belt and pair of shoes.

The top is a strapped cropped tank with a sweetheart neckline and purple trim, as well as black-and-white striped segments. This color contrast is common on Operetta, evoking music sheets, piano keys, and, sometimes, dice.

I was curious about the small red plastic spiderweb piece, because neither the original fashion pack stock photo nor the doll stock photo offered any clear indication of what it was or how it was used. Here, it's on one of the shoulder straps of the tank, and makes an attractive accent.

However, while the piece is shown loose in both stock photos, it's sewn on pretty securely on the doll costume. It has an open bracket clip that lets it just slide onto the strap, but it's not coming off easily the way it's been sewn, so I wonder if it was meant to come off at all. I'll probably need it removed for my wardrobe plans.

Operetta's skirt is both atypically high-waisted and atypically long, with it coming down to her knees. The length of the piece and the body-hugging cut are very retro.

The skirt is white with black print in a pattern that mixes leopard spots with musical symbols. I'm not super on board with the leopard-print idea for her, but I do like the subtle incorporation of the musical symbols. 

Over her waist, Operetta has a cobweb-themed red belt. It works easily and looks really nice.

Operetta's shoes are not identical to the Maul Session release. These shoes don't have the striped platforms shown in the fashion pack photo and the heel cups are not black. They're mostly white with leopard on the toes and red trim.

Operetta's bag is shaped like a vinyl record, with red trim and a spiderweb pattern on the front side. The pattern has slipped a little onto the unpainted center circle on mine. The original fashion-pack release of the purse, like the shoes, had more paint, with a white ring around the inside of the red ring, and a Skullette in the middle circle.

The bag is fairly wide and is open at the top and fully hollow, so it could hold a decent amount of things.

Killer Style Operetta has very gestural hands, which I love. I believe they're the same mold as fellow fifties ghoul Oozie (officially known as the Create-a-Monster Blob). This hand shape has appeared on some dolls of a few other characters with unmonstrous hand shapes.

So the first piece I knew I needed was the mask that inspired me. I sanded down the piece so the ridge and the sculpted scars disappeared, and spray-painted it white. The plastic is a little soft so it didn't sand perfectly smoothly, but I think it looks alright finished, and definitely suitable for shelf display.

I knew Operetta needed a leather jacket for the right ominous rockabilly-Phantom vibes, so I looked on eBay for what kind of jackets were offered by MH and EAH. Ultimately, I found the best MH option was from 13 Wishes Howleen--a dark purple leather jacket with silver accents. Clawdeen has had a black leather jacket, but it had gold accents and that just seemed wrong to me for Operetta. Purple is in her palette and would work well with her lips in particular. 

I also found an EAH piece I've long admired and suddenly realized would be perfect for Operetta-- Cerise Hood's gorgeous checked hooded coat! The grey, black, white, and red felt perfect for Operetta, the cherry leaves weren't green, and the hood would allow Operetta to fully play into her skulking dramatic father's image. This could be her day-out metropolitan shopping look--a formal, practical fifties-ish update on a Phantom cloak. Yes, I'm indulging my inexplicable admiration for the jacket-and-big-skirt fancy look! This coat can make the "showstopper" look of Operetta's fashion set, much like the Dot Dead Gorgeous dress in ILF Venus's release. 

Mattel stock photo of Spring Unsprung Cerise.

Scarily Ever After Clawdeen's red hooded cloak with leopard print would also be theoretically amazing on Operetta, but the hood has ear holes, there are no listings of the cape alone, the piece seems more suited to an uberfancy collector-doll version of the character, and I don't know what clothing would work underneath the cloak while remaining in tone with Operetta's fashion sense...so it's not worth it to me to pursue that option.

I also decided to order the elaborate mask-style abstract glasses from Operetta's deluxe fashion pack, as well as a lot containing clothes from that pack, including her versatile black corduroy skirt from her deluxe fashion pack, which I thought would pair well with the top, hat, and leather jacket for an all-dark look.

Of the pieces for this project, the Cerise coatdress arrived first of them all, including before Operetta herself.

The body fabric is a glossy satiny material I hadn't expected (I'd have expected a matte fiber), but it still works, and I was very surprised to see something I've never encountered in MH or EAH before-- the coat closes in the front with a plastic snap, not velcro!

I'm sure there are other mainline MH/EAH pieces with snaps in them, including the other Spring Unsprung coats probably, but this is the first time I'm encountering a piece done this way. 

I tried the dress out on the CAM Mummy body I had sitting next to me, and grabbed the head to demonstrate the hood.

The red layer under the checked fabric is supposed to function as an underskirt and should make this piece into a fairly modest standalone dress, rather than just a top. However, this layer of fabric came curled inward such that it didn't cover the doll's belly or hips.

This will be easily fixed with heat. 

The hood of the dress is loose on a bald doll, but it's really meant for a doll with hair, and like lots of hooded doll clothing, it has a large gap vertically up the back for loose hair to stream out of so it doesn't get in the way on the front of the doll.

I took the dress downstairs, held down the curled edges with a fork, and poured boiling water over the dress to straighten the fabric out and undo the curl. Here it is on the in-process Freaky Fusion Operetta with the red layer fixed and doing its job as a modesty skirt.

She'll still want something under the dress, but her stomach isn't exposed now. 

The jacket collar of this dress tends to stick up, but it will lie flat when pushed down, and a popped collar isn't out of line for Operetta's fashion rocka-sensa-bill-ities. 

Since this piece and the mask and a pair of black Jane Boolittle pants were the only pieces for this doll I had acquired at this point, I tried them out together.

Operetta with her belt, the coat dress, the Freaky Fusion shoes, and the Jane pants.

The top ponytail doesn't like the hood, but no way am I taking it down. To ensure none of the hair is stuck in the hood, it's helpful to pull the hood forward completely over the face using the open back, and then pull it back up onto her head so all the hair is out behind the doll.

I felt underwhelmed by this. Something wasn't clicking. My plan! Was it collapsing?

But I found the answer--this outfit surprisingly made more sense to me when I included the added chaos of the leopard pattern!

The skirt changes the balance and makes this into a believable modern Phantom robe for Operetta and a cohesive fancy city-shopping costume. Somehow, the coat needed to look more seamless with the layer underneath, rather than be more delineated as a jacket like I'd thought. This is the showstopper Phantom look for Operetta that I needed.

The poor ghoul deserved at least one hooded costume!

And don't worry, it's Operetta--she can make any fancy clothing tough as nails.

Already, this is an Operetta design that I'd have raced to buy.

When looking more at Operetta, I was struck by another effect of her dark lipstick-- it made her look more pale, dramatic, and purple to me. 

Operetta's skin tone is kind of an indecisive pale Caucasian-analogous shade between proper pink and purple, but I think most of her dolls land pinker to me due to their red lipstick. The contrast of the pieces, the lighting, but also the purple lips for this Operetta make her look closer to purple in a way I really like.

Here's pinkish Draculaura from G3 (I think her G1/G2 dolls are pinker), Operetta, and actually-purple Twyla for a comparison.

So that's one great look for the doll sorted, and more pieces on the way...

...then I had to add one. I remembered that the classic Phantom look is paired with a flat hat, not a hood. The hood is a great and welcome option that fits well with the character, and I'd have been proud of the coat dress on her even if it was hoodless, so the hood didn't lead me astray...but this is the full Phantom in truth:

The Phantom with the hat from one of the productions of the musical.

So Operetta needed a hat. And fortunately, there was a perfect option: Music Class Ari Hauntington.

Mattel stock photo of the Music Class Ari set.

The G2-exclusive character Ari Hauntington felt heavily derivative. She was the G2 face of the ghost archetype like Spectra was for G1. She also visually resembled Spectra with her purple and pink theming, giving fans fair reason to accuse Mattel of replacing the character they knew with a needless substitute. Furthermore, Ari had a seventies boho theme already covered by Viperine, and she had a musical motif very similar to Operetta.

But that last part is to my benefit, because an elegant purple piano-keys hat suits a classic operatic Phantom who wears purple very well. I'd believe you if you said the hat was in the works for an Operetta before getting retooled for Ari with chains getting slapped on the sculpt...but it's just as likely that when responding to calls for musical costuming for Ari, the designers just reflexively dipped into the visual language they'd developed previously for Operetta. It might work with its purple color, but I can repaint the hat black if the color doesn't look right in person. The chains aren't out-of-place either. Although they're not an Operetta motif, Haunted classes Operetta as a type of ghost by making her vulnerable to the ghostly chains wielded by the Red Lady, and chains have kind of a biker connotation that'll work great with the leather jacket.

The hat did, of course, threaten the custom styling job Operetta was wearing. I was fairly certain the hat would look best with Operetta's hair tied in a low ponytail, and her top ponytail looked like it would totally get in the way. I think she'd honestly wear the hood more cleanly with a low ponytail too, but I can't deny the hairstyle she arrived in looks fantastic with the hood down. I'll see what I can figure out, and maybe the hair has to change.

The glasses arrived in the meantime. They're a very cool arsty piece that abstracts her heart flourishes into a frame of a mask. It's maybe my second-favorite Operetta face covering due to how creative and weird it is!

I think the white mask will be best paired with the hat, but the glasses might be the best piece to use with the hood up! Good; I'm glad there's a piece that justifies and encourages the hood option!

We're reaching peak beautiful chaos here.

And I loved the way her arm tattoo interacted so seamlessly with the coat and mask in this picture!

Operetta is the look.

And have an edited comic-style version for fun!

I knew I was a fan of Operetta's style in personality and theory, but with ensembles that finally click for me, she's rapidly turning out to have one of my all-time favorite aesthetics! Without dolls that hit the mark, she was out of my top favorites list, but now she forms the third of my top 3 with Frankie and Twyla.

Ari's hat arrived next.

The way the hat is sculpted, there's a definite "forward" angle where the hat dips down in the middle and flares up on the sides like a fedora. It doesn't look great at all rotations.

Here's a "full Phantom" look with the hair tied back (top ponytail still tied, just tied into the rest of the hair here).

I think this looks good, but something about the hat and this hairstyle seems to de-age Operetta and make her feel more soft and childlike to me...and that's kind of the opposite of her appeal to me.

Here's the glasses mask with the hat.

Not bad.

The hat doesn't have any trouble sitting over the top ponytail, so that's not an issue--thank goodness.

I also got Howleen's jacket, so I tried out a tougher, darker look for Operetta with the Fusion-Inspired shoes, the Jane leggings, the crop top (web accent removed) and the white mask and hat. 

I don't think the short length of the top works at all without the long skirt underneath it, and this particular pair of Jane leggings is not super snug at the very rim of the hips, making it look untidy. The hat's color also doesn't work here, and it feels too elegant and big. I'm not super sure about the piece now. We'll have to try out the other top with the pants, and maybe the other skirt, when those arrive.

Here's the other mask in this configuration.

At this point, I decided the hat needed to be sprayed black, since the color wasn't dark enough and definitely amplified the untoughness of the hat's shape. I also tried letting the hair down with this costume, and that worked better. 

And I think it was the ponytail, not the hat, that was making Operetta look too childish to me. With her hair down, she wears the hat with tough maturity. 

Realizing that this doll doesn't call for her rearmost hair being tied up
saves me lots of hassle! And it fits the ILF design ethos better--those dolls
never suggested hair restyles for their different ensembles!

The hat is technically too extravagant to qualify for inclusion in an I Love Fashion doll's wardrobe assortment...but this is Monster High (the land of "no such thing as 'too much'")...and this is Operetta. She deserves it.

The final pieces arrived--some elements from the deluxe fashion pack the red mask came in. Here's the rest of my play with these pieces. I didn't put together every combination or permutation I could, but I got some good exploration in.

A red off-the-shoulder top (with arm holes), a black corduroy skirt, a red dice belt, and a purple
knitted cardigan I'm not putting on this doll.

Like the red mask, I've owned these pieces before, but I think they look better on this base doll than they did on the Dance Class Operetta I was using then. 

The skirt is a beautiful piece, and it's real micro-corduroy with stitching forming the white swooshes, but the problem with that is that it makes the skirt very tight and inflexible, and it really wants to force her legs out of alignment to cross them over each other. Worth it, though. 

The skirt is also good because it's high-waisted kind of like the white one, so it complements the black crop top to give her outfit a darker base--much better than the Jane leggings.

Here's a full dark costume with the hat and white mask for a tougher classic-Phantom look, also using the red belt to disguise the waist gap to make the outfit look more seamless.

Awesome.

This look also looks great with the red mask.

The tough look doesn't look too bad using the red top:

I think the red mask works better in this setup, though.

The "basic red" costume looks great with the hat alone, too.

I think it's easiest to see the visual echo of the abstract staff
swooshes between the top of the hat and the skirt in this
setup. 

And the "basic black" look works with the hat, too.

Red top plus white skirt is also a decent combo:

And coatdress with repainted black hat and loose hair was something I needed to try:

This is the ultimate Operetta ensemble. 

I'm so relieved the hat just needed repainting and the rearmost hair to be loose, because it does so much work on this doll and makes her look fantastic. Most of my favorite looks for her include the hat! I was really worried while she was ponytailed and the hat was purple that it was the wrong choice.

The belts aren't pieces I find as easy to drop into all looks. The web belt looks best to me in the default Killer Style top and skirt setup or on the waist with the coatdress, and it doesn't feel as right on the red top or the black top and black skirt. Contrariwise, the dice belt looks better on the top-and-skirt looks than it does on the coatdress. Likewise, the shoes feel a little less all-purpose. The leopard shoes really need to be used with the white skirt for me; otherwise, it's the Fusion-Inspired shoes. 

Here's the "final cut" of stock I ended up with for this custom deluxe fashion assortment. This is everything that's going to be packed together while Operetta is stored off-display:

The full list is:

* Killer Style Operetta base doll (with restyled hair)

* Killer Style Operetta top

* Killer Style Operetta skirt

* Killer Style Operetta belt

* Killer Style Operetta shoes

* Killer Style Operetta purse

* Fusion-Inspired Operetta mask (sanded down and repainted)

* Fusion-Inspired Operetta shoes

* Operetta deluxe fashion pack top

* Operetta deluxe fashion pack skirt

* Operetta deluxe fashion pack belt

* Operetta deluxe fashion pack glasses mask

* Music Class Ari Hauntington hat (repainted)

* 13 Wishes Howleen Wolf jacket

* EAH Spring Unsprung Cerise Hood coatdress

Most of these pieces are from the character originally, and those which weren't feel (to me) eerily well-matched to Operetta. The final assortment feels pretty plausible to me for an ILF release-- there's technically three complete outfits if you count the coatdress as one, and the two mask and shoe options are just enough-- one more wasn't necessary for either, in my opinion. The hat is, again, a bit extravagant for an ILF piece, but it's perfect for Operetta and adds so much more permutation and style to her looks, so she gets to have it. The fact that she also has two separate tops and skirts makes her permutations higher than I'd think for an ILF release as well. 

I think maybe I just took the ILF concept and pushed it further into personal appeal, since I've never really been excited by the mix-and-match options of the real ILF dolls. One outfit was clearly the focus and the other pieces weren't interesting enough, so I pretty much just kept the dolls from the line I owned in that central showstopper look. With Operetta, though, I think I designed a mix of clothing pieces that does what the line is meant to--offer a multitude of good, exciting display options so you can't settle on just one look for too long. ILF should be about getting you excited to keep playing and shuffling the clothing pieces around, and I think I got that with Operetta.

During this project, there were three pieces in the pool of stock which I took out by the end when I settled on the final assortment. 

• The Jane Boolittle leggings were something I purchased for Operetta, but I ultimately decided they didn't work well enough with any look for me to keep them in her stock.
• I removed the red web clip that came with Killer Style Operetta's stock and threw it in my accessories bin since it had no real worth to me on this doll and it limited the black top's usage with a jacket.
• Finally, I received the deluxe fashion pack Operetta cardigan alongside pieces I used--the cardigan just went right into the clothes bin because I knew even Operetta would struggle to wear it well. 

Here are my top favorite looks with this doll now:

Gosh, this was a fun and rewarding exploration. I'd always adored Operetta's character and aesthetic concept, and to finally have many display options that bring out her style in a way I find really attractive and well-rooted in both her scaritage and unique touches has made this Operetta into a precious doll in the way her offerings never were for me before. I could honestly consider myself done collecting her now...but I expect I might dip in least one more time to get her FCA doll again to see if I can make that one work. She may have suffered from being only the second doll I opened in my original collection when I knew less about doll care. 

I feel like Operetta is a character I'd both be excited and scared to see revived by Mattel. She wasn't in G2, possibly because her monster type isn't too popular or known to kids (she was allegedly kept from being one of the Original Ghouls during early G1 development for this reason!)...or because G2's sweet and deliberately-inoffensive nature would have mangled everything that makes Operetta great. Her fierceness, scars, alternative style, rockin' confidence, and bold visual impact would hit a brick wall in G2, so perhaps the designers omitted Operetta because they realized there was no way they could retain her for G2 without changing her beyond recognition. I think G3 could fit Operetta back in, but I'd still worry about that execution because I still have reason to believe it'd be lesser. I'd also be unsurprised to see her get a G1-esque collector release at some point...or at least be offered as a contender for one in a Fang Vote. But whatever happens (or doesn't) with the character in the future, I'm very happy with the work I've done with the version from the past. (And grateful to the previous owner's fantastic hairstyle insight, because that did so much for her!) Operetta has reached her full awesome potential in my eyes. She has her definitive doll for me now, and has become a RESTYLE ICON.