TT Carnival costumes for Macy’s parade

For the first time ever, a local Carnival costume designer, Earl Beckles, has been selected to display five of his Trinidad Carnival costumes at this year’s Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York. Beckles, who has been designing costumes for the past 18 years, told Newsday in a brief interview that he learned his craft in high school under the mentorship of Norman Huggins. His costumes have been worn by thousands of revellers at the annual TT Carnival.

He has also participated in Miami Carnival for 15 years and the Brooklyn Labour Day Festival for almost ten years. His costumes have been featured in New York’s Chinese New Year Parade and recently at the Halloween Parade in Greenwich Village. During the Macy’s Parade, which has been held every year for the last 78 years and which will be broadcast live on NBC on November 25 from 9 am to noon, Beckles is carded to display “Zenn, The Unholy Medicine Man” and four other characters.

The presentation entitled, “The Other Side of Midnight,” will be a rendition of ghostly and fantastical apparitions comparable to those seen in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Zenn will represent the Grim Reaper. Beckles, who heads E and J Productions, a Caribbean-American organisation based in Far Rockaway, said the opportunity to showcase Trinidad and Tobago costumes at such a prestigious American street parade was “a dream come true.”  “Finally, my costumes, Caribbean costumes, will be there for the whole world to see,” an elated Beckles said. According to parade officials, more than 2.5 million people are expected to line the streets of New York to see the parade.