The Greatest American Hero
and the group from the costume routine called “The Flash”
The video is below the pictures.
These costumes came from a crazy idea to throw some curves at the audience in the presentation. We had our own announcer who introduced “The Flash”. Everyone was expecting to see the comic book hero. Instead, they were given another “Flash”. Bill Maxwell steps out to arrest the “Flasher” who kept managing to open his raincoat, but not to the audience. Bill called in Ralph who subdued the suspect, but had to leave when they heard the police sirens coming. He couldn’t get his suit to work to fly away, so he had to locate something to cover the suit with. Of course, he used the raincoat. No one was ready for what was underneath it.
This is a recreation of the costume in “The Greatest American Hero”, or as the characters used to refer to it, “the red jammies”. Since the character was Ralph Hinkley (later Ralph Hanley, later Mr. H), we affectionately called it the Ralph suit. We had a wig for it, but did not use it as we hadn’t tested it in the acrobatics we did in the routine.
This was a two piece outfit with the shoes sewn to the pants. The belt buckle was actually a pin button designed with fabric paint. The belt fastened in the back.
“The Flash” actually turned out to be a raincoated flasher. The outfit underneath was imaginatively created to resemble that of a Las Vegas showgirl. The outfit contained its own body parts. In fact, from the waist down, the outfit and body are one.
Presentation VIdeo