The Temptations ” The Missing Costume”

Recently I supplied entertainment for a $1,000,000 50th. Wedding Anniversary party at the Royal Ontaro Museum. It was a spectacular event!  There was lots of entertainment throughout the evening ending with a performance by the legendary Motown group The,Temptations. The client was a huge Temptations fan, and he specifically requested the singers wear their sparkly suits.

I picked up the 5 singers up at the airport, and low and behold, the airline lost a costume bag containing one of the sparkly jackets.  The Temps were in a panic. Although they had 4 of the 5 jackets, they insisted they all had to wear the same costume.  Our Limo bus drove them to the sound check, and I proceeded to call every costume shop in the GTA to find 5 identical sparkly jackets. No luck.

After the sound check I took them to the Eaton Centre to see if they could find anything there. No luck again.  Around 5:00 pm we all agreed the sparkly jackets were not possible and the only solution were some cool, matching tuxedos. The show Producer, Trudy Moffat, found a tuxedo shop in the Little Jamaica part of town which was just about to close for the day. When the shop owner heard it was for The Temptations, he agreed to keep the story open. The Temps and I jumped into the limo bus and headed for the store. Luckily their performance wasn’t until 11:00 pm.  It took some time to decide on the tuxedo, do the fittings and complete the alterations. At 8:30 pm we paid the bill and headed for the door to return to the hotel.

The Temps stayed calm throughout this ordeal and were appreciative that the tux store had stayed open to accommodate them. As the guys got to the door, the band leader stopped and suggested the guys should give the store owner and staff a taste of The Temptations. It was truly a magical moment when they sang “My Girl” acappella style.

We arrived at the hotel at 9:00 pm. As soon as we got there the airport called to say they had found the costume bag. I told the bus driver to take the band to the ROM at 10:00 pm and I would drive my car to the airport to retrieve the costume bag. I arrived at the ROM 15 minutes before showtime, and the client was very happy The Temptations were in their iconic sparkly jackets.