Margot Robbie’s character, Nellie Laroy, has one of the most memorable outfits in Babylon, writer-director Damien Chazelle's Oscar-nominated ode to Old Hollywood. You’ll likely recognise it, even if you haven’t watched the three-hour film yet; the blood red mini has been plastered across billboards and Youtube adverts for months. Off-kilter, seductive and barely held together, it's a good fit for the cocaine-fuelled character who wears it. What it isn’t, however, is an accurate reflection of that period’s clothes.
That was entirely intentional, says the film’s costume director, Mary Zophres. “[Damien Chazelle] didn’t want it to look like a traditional 1920s Hollywood film,” she says. Even so, hours of historical research went into the costume prep. It took Zophres and her team most of 2020 to analyse thousands of images that could act as inspiration for the characters' ensembles. Paired with the imaginations of the leading individuals and their exuberant adventures – “reading that script was like riding a roller coaster” – Zophres was able to concoct sartorial designs that said more than any monologue could.
Look past the contemporary cocktail attire that's purposely designed to turn heads, and you’ll see that the movie is packed with some exquisite tailoring – the film does start in the 1920s and finishes in the 1950s, after all. While you watch the evolution of cinema from silent pictures to talkies in colour, studio execs, film producers and behind-the-scenes crew are often dressed quite wonderfully for business.
There's an abundance of three-piece suits, ranging from classic pinstripe to more colourful iterations, that give its wearer some gangster notoriety – even for the characters that supposedly mean well. “I wanted it to be grounded in authenticity,” says Zophres of her choice of tailoring. “In that case, I did follow what was sort of period correct. It just felt like the right thing to do.” Constructing each suit themselves, the team would look to samples as the basis for each character’s slim-fit design, crafting them from traditional wool sourced from Italy and the UK. “I was very careful about the fabrics that I chose. They felt really textured and the same weight of these samples, which are pretty heavy.”
This attention to the cut and fabrics didn’t stop at the men’s suits. Lady Fay Zhu makes a memorable entrance in a tuxedo, decorated with a yellow rose corsage and top hat. A photograph of Anna May Wong (of whom much of Zhu’s character is based off) in a suit was a key source of inspiration, and Zophres crafted a design that would allow for the actress Li Jun Li to prance about the stage with feline-like stealth. “I think that was the only costume that was actually written [in the script],” she explains. “I found an original top hat from the late 1800s and it fit her perfectly. It was cocked to the side a little bit and to me, that was such a key moment.”
All of Brad Pitt’s character’s clothes were also custom-made – a common practice for movie stars of that time. “All the tailoring was done by a single person, we made all of his shirts and we knit all of his sweaters; it was a lot about the fit,” says Zophres, going on to explain that his wardrobe swerved in a different direction.
You can quickly guess after a few minutes onscreen that this character isn't just any actor, he’s Jack Conrad; a leading man based off the Hollywood’s OGs – John Gilbert, among others – that defined what a movie star is today. That entailed a laissez-faire wardrobe that a man who dictates an industry can possess without judgement; think open-collar shirt, leather jackets and sportswear for the to-and-fro between set and trailer. It also came in the form of fashion-forward knitwear, apparent in his interview with Elinor St. John (played by Jean Smart). Conrad bats aways questions about his slowly dying career like a Grand Slam winner, all while wearing a sky-blue shawl cardigan and dark-tinted sunnies. “To me, there's nothing more luxurious than a hand-knit sweater,” says Zophres. “And by using that kind of silhouette on him implied this implicit swagger and ownership of the town in a way that [shows] he's in command.”
Of course, that macho narcissism doesn’t last forever. nor does the pristine quality of the costumes. Barely five minutes into the film and you’re gagging over the obsessive use of faeces (non-human, if that makes it any better) setting the precedent of how abused some of the looks were. Poo, urine, dirt and vomit are all key perpetrators in the costume's demise, which was particular agonising for Zophres to witness. “It was like seeing your child get hurt,” she says of Nellie’s throwing up scene, where a black-tie suit becomes the target for the contents of her stomach. “It was actually painful for me to watch that puking. I watched one take and then I couldn’t anymore.”
Even after a projectile wrecking, you’re still not put off the time-period tailoring. See it as prime sartorial inspo for an extravagant formal affair; just take it easy on the drinks to avoid the same fate.
