Rita Skeeter

In October 2013, TGTSNBN at long last had another Cosplay Day, their first since 2010. For such an occasion, everyone brought out their best outfits. After much contemplation, Irvin decided to try his hand at Rita Skeeter, who seemed like such a natural fit for Irvin that many were surprised he had not cosplayed her previously. The costume and the event were both big successes, with pictures of Rita gossiping with Umbridge, interviewing McGonagall, interrogating Ginny, eavesdropping on the Weasleys, and generally causing havoc wherever she went.

More work went into this outfit than any Irvin had previously done. Every bit of the outfit was newly bought for the event except for the glasses, which had lain at Irvin's for years awaiting this character. But the wig and gloves, the dress and pearls - all of it was new. The wig needed to have Rita's "rigid curls," the pearls were to keep with the day's theme of "glamour," the gloves were to cover up the lack of scarlet talons, which Irvin attempted to include through press-on nails but failed. As to the dress, it hearkens to the "banana-yellow" robes Rita wears in Goblet of Fire, and Irvin spent hours altering it to suit the character. While Rita did have balloon boobs as expected, they were by far the smallest Irvin's ever done - since he never pictured Rita being all that busty.

In terms of props, Irvin carried with him a notebook and quill as any journalist should. It was unfortunately not an acid-green quill, which proved impossible to procure at the time. There was also a wooden beetle to represent Rita's Animagus form, and the beetle ended up photo-bombing most pictures throughout the day. Best of all, Irvin wrote a fake gossip section of the Daily Prophet and distributed it to everyone, including the headlines, "Severus Snape's Salacious Secret," "Weasleys Give Birth to Another Son," and "Astoria Malfoy's Cotillion Turns Violent." All of these had full-length articles written in Rita's style, accompanied by pictures of Group members in character, and were based on numerous inside jokes in the Group.

Irvin brought the costume to MISTI-Con 2015, and wore it on the very first night. This time around, Rita was carrying an enormous green quill with her, and kept asking people if they had fresh gossip for her. Most people proved more than willing to talk, and chats with various Malfoys proved especially fruitful. In return, Rita gave out the gossip section of the Daily Prophet, this time with two additional pertinent articles: "Hermione Granger's Controversial Advancement in the Ministry" and "Ministry Mess-Ups at MISTI-Con." All of the articles had people roaring with laughter, and that issue of the Daily Prophet "sold out."

Four years later, Rita got a very big update for Leviosa 2019. At a local theater that was selling off costumes, Irvin found the magenta jacket and skirt, which immediately invoked the magenta robes that Rita was wearing when we first meet her. Building on that, Irvin committed even more to getting all the details right this time: acid green quill, scarlet nails, and having actually published a book titled The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore.

Irvin also decided to add a layer to Rita's gossip articles. Now, not only would they entertain, they would also craft a storyline that Irvin could play out through the con. The organizers of Leviosa had requested that Irvin emcee the Fashion Show, and Irvin thought that would be a natural place to debut his Ludo Bagman cosplay. So Rita Skeeter wrote a scathing article about Ludo Bagman, discussing the rumor that he would be emceeing the Fashion Show, and making all kinds of insinuations about the corruption behind that Fashion Show. Rita was Irvin's first cosplay of the con, providing a perfect opportunity for her to hand out copies of this Daily Prophet to get everyone intrigued by said Fashion Show.

Rita was so much fun, Irvin made an eleventh-hour decision to bring her to MISTI-Con 2019 as well. Here, he upped the ante once again. The MISTI-Con 2019 Daily Prophet would have two articles in it (both of which were written around 4 a.m. as one of the very last preparations for the con). One, in a similar vein to the Ludo Bagman "exposé," made some truly shocking allegations about Sir Cadogan and his pony (allegations that would definitely feed into Cadogan's appearance at the Founders Ball two days later).

The other article, which discussed "celebrity guests" at MISTI-Con 2019, served as a preview of Irvin's entire MISTI-Con 2019 program. It surreptitiously mentioned every single one of the fourteen characters Irvin would cosplay at MISTI-Con 2019. (Irvin had often received requests for a list of costumes at MISTI, and this seemed the most engaging and least arrogant way to do it!) It also discussed a dance troupe (the Dancing Death Eaters), the lip sync battle, and Irvin and Lorrie Kim's respective books about Dumbledore and Snape (Rita's not a fan).

In general, Irvin's found that Rita is a perfect opening costume for conventions. It's a great chance to go around to everyone to chat and gossip, and there are lots of fun character interactions to be had. It also sets the tone for the con, in terms of both creativity and camp. This may just become a regular thing, to mirror Lockhart closing out the con (so the con would be bookended by campy published authors, which is on brand!).

Rita was such a big hit at MISTI-Con, the organizer of TGTSNBN requested her to appear for Bingo the next month. At this point, Irvin was in the groove of writing Rita's articles, writing a scathing deep dive into TGTSNBN's tradition of Bingo. The article also broke the fourth wall by writing about Irvin himself - though Rita mis-characterized him somewhat, she did express her disdain for his Dumbledore book again - Rita and Irvin are apparently rival authors, which is definitely breaking some kind of fourth wall somewhere. A few people were surprised that Rita had come with new articles only a few weeks after MISTI-Con, but that's the standard they should expect! Rita was fun to do Bingo, as she kept getting distracted with salacious gossip.

You can now read all of Rita Skeeter's Gossip at your leisure!

Note: not to be confused with Rita Scooter, the Puffs version of the character.