Latest / The Art of Costume Podcast / Challengers & Queer with Costume Designer, Jonathan Anderson

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Challengers & Queer with Costume Designer, Jonathan Anderson · The Art of Costume Podcast

0:05
Hello and welcome to the Art of Costume podcast.
0:08
I am your host Spencer Williams, and thank you so much for
0:12
joining me for another bonus episode.
0:15
What's going on, costume nerds? It's been a little while since
0:17
we've done one of these bonus episodes, but we want to squeak
0:22
out this episode because it's really quite a monumental
0:25
episode as we have an incredible guest costume designer joining
0:30
us for a little conversation about two really incredible
0:33
films, Challengers and Queer, both directed by Luca
0:38
Guananinho. Let's get into it.
0:41
I'll start off with a summary for both of these films.
0:44
First, Challengers. Tashi, a tennis player turned
0:48
coach, has transformed her husband from a mediocre player
0:51
into a world famous Grand Slam champion.
0:55
To jolt him out of this recent losing streak, she makes him
0:58
play a Challenger event close to the lowest level of tournament
1:02
on the Pro tour. Tensions soon run high when he
1:05
finds himself standing across the net for the once promising,
1:09
now burnt out Patrick, his former best friend and Tashi's
1:13
former boyfriend. And that is Challengers.
1:16
Then we have queer William Lee is an American expatriate living
1:21
in 1950s Mexico City, passing time by bar hopping and
1:26
indulging in sexual activities with men quite younger than him.
1:29
While out on an evening stroll, he catches the sight of Eugene
1:33
Allerton AGI, who also is an American expatriate.
1:37
Smitten, Lee grows obsessed with Allerton, searching for him
1:41
throughout the city in the hopes of gaining his affection.
1:46
And that is Queer, which just hit theaters across the country.
1:49
Make sure you go check it out. As I mentioned, both of these
1:53
films were directed by Luca Guadagnino.
1:56
But let's meet the costume designer.
1:59
We are talking about someone quite extraordinary, also known
2:04
as a fashion designer, Jonathan W Anderson.
2:08
You will know Jonathan from his work on films challengers and
2:12
queer Challengers, for which Jonathan was just nominated for
2:15
a Costume Designers Guild Award in 2024.
2:19
But you also know Jonathan as the founder of JW Anderson, a
2:23
huge label and a creative director of Spanish luxury house
2:28
Lueve. Jonathan was also awarded by the
2:32
British Fashion Council Designer of the Year.
2:35
So Jonathan is quite the big deal, and I was absolutely
2:40
honored to talk with Jonathan about his work on these two
2:45
films. And right after this quick
2:48
little break, you're going to hear that conversation where we
2:50
go into both Challengers and Queer.
2:52
So let's get into it right after the break.
2:56
Hey, this is Dan who does all the audio and video editing for
2:59
the podcast. Just wanted to let you know
3:01
there were some issues during the recording or some of the
3:04
questions got cut off. So Spencer and I went ahead and
3:08
re recorded some of these questions.
3:10
So you may hear some splicing of audio quality, but just know
3:15
that we had to go back and make sure that those questions were
3:18
put in place for you guys to be able to hear what's being
3:21
answered. Thank you and enjoy the
3:23
interview. Hi, I'm Dan who does all the
3:29
magic behind the scenes. I wanted to say thank you.
3:32
And if you want to support the show even farther, go to
3:35
tpublic.com/user slash the Art of Costume where you can buy a
3:41
couple variations of our logo on T-shirts, mugs and stickers.
3:47
Also, be sure to leave a like comment and subscribe.
3:51
And if you're an audio listener, leave us a five star review on
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Apple Podcast. Now back to the show.
4:02
I am so honored to be joined today by founder, creative
4:06
director and costume designer Jonathan W Anderson.
4:09
Thank you so much for joining me.
4:10
How are you? Very good.
4:12
Thank you for having me. We're actually starting the day
4:14
off with some good news because you were just nominated for a
4:18
Costume Designers Guild Award nomination for the challengers,
4:22
which is huge. Congratulations.
4:25
We I just found out as we were about to come on to this so.
4:29
Me too. It was the first film I ever
4:31
did, so it's sort of kind of it's amazing feeling so.
4:36
So that kind of leads me into my very first question.
4:41
Fashion is about storytelling, and in many ways so is costume
4:45
design, talking about character through clothing and expression.
4:50
So just tell me a little bit about how you ended up in this
4:53
costume design space. I'm very interested to hear
4:56
about your interest in how you ended up in this position.
4:59
Did you always see yourself going into costume at some
5:02
point? I I, I never thought when I was
5:05
younger, I went to drama school and I ended up being more
5:09
excited by the costume department than the actual
5:12
learning of becoming an actor. But when I started in fashion
5:18
and my life continued in fashion, I'd never crossed my
5:23
mind ever to go into making costume until Luca asked me.
5:29
It was, it was very kind of like I'd never, I didn't think my
5:34
brain could work in that way ultimately.
5:36
And I would, to be honest, when I first did challenges,
5:39
absolutely petrified, I think so I was a bit.
5:45
But weirdly, I think there's a, you know, even meeting a lot of
5:49
costume designers and, and, and doing the films, you start to
5:53
realize there's a lot of similarities between fashion
5:56
design and costume design. There's they're really, first of
6:00
all, it is an incredible amount of work.
6:02
It's one thing that I think everyone in this field of work
6:06
will agree with, but I think the biggest thing is I think to be
6:12
able to do clothing or to do costume design, I think you need
6:15
to be able to understand psychology.
6:18
I, I, for me, it's a lot to do with psychology of, of people,
6:22
you know why we wear things. And I think that's where I, I
6:27
find a huge amount of similarity from the runway to, for example,
6:31
Challengers, where you're looking at like the different
6:34
psychologies that you're either trying to sell in 15 minutes in
6:37
a, in a fashion show or in two hours in the film.
6:41
You know, so you're trying to get, you're trying to get the
6:44
viewer to grasp the character straight away, you know?
6:48
Right. And it's, you know, it's not
6:50
always something that you would wear or put on the runway, but
6:53
maybe something that character would wear to exactly that whole
6:57
difference. Well, I'm excited.
6:59
I have a million and two questions.
7:00
But before I start. Talking about the challengers
7:04
and queer, which I just saw last night, it was fantastic.
7:07
Let's talk about your collaboration with Luca.
7:09
You now have done 2 films together, both of which came out
7:13
in the past year, Challengers and Queer.
7:16
I could tell there's a lot of trust between the two of you as
7:18
collaborators and as creatives, so I'm curious to hear a little
7:21
bit more about how that collaboration works between the
7:24
two of you. You know what I've known Luca
7:26
for many, many years. When I first met Luca, it was
7:29
like I've always known him which hands very cliche, but it really
7:33
was like someone that I I felt like I've known in my entire
7:35
life. I feel like we we're in two
7:38
completely different fields, but we have got equal respect for
7:43
both fields. And I think sometimes as a
7:44
fashion designer, you know, you're trying to find, you know,
7:49
you're trying to find people that respect what you do or
7:52
understand the kind of mental process that that is.
7:56
And I think with Luca, he could finish my sentence and I could
8:01
finish his. I, I quite like that we, we are
8:05
very good voyeurs of people like I, I like to be a voyeur on
8:10
something, to understand something.
8:13
And Luca is very like that too. So I, I think for me it's a very
8:16
kind of equilibrium. I don't, I, I feel like I want
8:20
to do the best job for him. You know, I think that's what I
8:23
love about our relationship. It's like on my day job, I'm,
8:26
I'm, I'm sitting, I have all these people running around
8:29
making sure that like my vision comes up and it is so nice to be
8:33
able to work someone who I would say is one of my best friends.
8:36
He's one of those seven people I call every day.
8:39
I want to make something that makes him happy, you know, like
8:42
or or or makes his dream come true ultimately within the film.
8:46
Right. I mean, that really comes to
8:48
life on screen, too. You could really tell that
8:49
there's a very cohesive direction in the storytelling
8:52
and the arcs of all these characters.
8:55
Which brings me to our first film.
8:57
Let's talk about Challengers I. In my opinion, I feel like this
9:01
might have been a more difficult film to approach because
9:03
American sports are so centered and branding.
9:06
There's a logo on every piece of fabric you could think of.
9:11
Tennis is maybe a little bit more demure compared to some of
9:14
the other sports, say NASCAR. It's both understated yet over
9:19
the top. So can you just tell me a little
9:21
bit about your initial approach to challengers when in when
9:24
sports in America are very branded heavy?
9:28
When we when I, me and Luca were in script reading, we're working
9:32
with the actors and kind of doing the research process.
9:36
I was trying to think of like when they go back in time to
9:39
when they're younger is exactly when I was in school.
9:43
So it was like I could relate a lot to it.
9:46
But what I really wanted to kind of do is that we we live in the
9:49
era of the brand. Like the last 20 years is the
9:54
birth of brands equaling something when you still for me,
9:59
when I was like when I would like land in Boston to go to
10:02
work, I was like the minute you get off a plane in any country
10:07
now, you probably see a million logos before you go to bed.
10:11
And I think sport is that society is that the the
10:16
restaurant is that. So for me, I wanted to in a
10:19
weird way, use that in the screen as a kind of mirror to
10:24
everyone to be like, this is what we see today, you know, And
10:28
sometimes when you see it on the sort of like on the silver
10:30
screen, you, you then realise how much of it is there because
10:36
in a weird way, sometimes in film, we dumb it down to kind of
10:40
get the romance. But the reality is in today's
10:43
society, the logo has become part of the kind of window.
10:48
So I, I, I kind of enjoyed playing with like tropes of
10:53
power or tropes of like endorsement power, you know, and
10:57
the, and the great thing about the film was that which I was
11:01
Lucas, that's a genius, but he was like, we're not taking any
11:04
corporate deals here. This we're going to decide,
11:08
we're going to decide who's going to be in the, in this and
11:10
we're going to, we're not going to be told by the brands.
11:13
And I didn't quite enjoy this. Yeah.
11:15
I mean, it's very fascinating and to me just seems like it
11:18
would pose such a challenge, but you guys really rose above that.
11:22
One of my favorite things about Challengers is actually the
11:25
gradual shift in time between the past and the present.
11:29
Like you mentioned, it takes place between 2006 to 2019, very
11:34
familiar to me who grew up during that era.
11:38
So how do you convey the passage of time with our three
11:41
characters, Patrick, Art and Tashi?
11:45
I think what was I think if you take for example, like Tashi, I,
11:48
I think in the beginning, when you go back in time, when you
11:51
she is younger, you, you, you see that she is, she has the
11:55
body, she understands what she is, but she made me like she
11:59
knows how to wear clothing, but it doesn't really like the shoe
12:02
is a bit wrong that you know, there's a kind of like there's a
12:05
naivety towards like how acrylic everything is, where as she gets
12:13
older and, and gains more power within the relationship and more
12:17
power within the structure. I'm working with Zendaya who
12:20
knows everything about fashion more than I do.
12:23
You start to kind of for me it was like the the cashmere
12:28
sweater became the kind of like I have made it because therefore
12:32
I do not need to wear it. But at the same time I still
12:35
need the Chanel shoe. You know, like there was like
12:38
there is this like kind of like psychology thing of power of
12:42
dressing and the power of the relationship that she has with
12:46
art. So I think as you see her kind
12:49
of like evolve, it becomes more refined as from when she's
12:55
younger. Whereas in a weird way, what I
12:58
think is interesting with art, you are you you sort of see him
13:02
kind of have this like freedom that sorts of nearly becomes
13:06
slightly because he becomes more and more and more and more kind
13:09
of like polished. He becomes more, but he's he
13:13
becomes a character ultimately in this in armour of clothing,
13:17
whereas Josh is the same like he he he has the kind of same
13:23
arrogance you get through cockiness, you know, and and his
13:27
character was really solely based around JFK junior, hence
13:32
why the T-shirt I told you, comes from.
13:34
But I, I, I for me, he was JFK Junior was a really good symbol
13:39
of like affluent America. That is just the the pin up.
13:44
And no matter what you put on this person, it will always look
13:47
good. You know, it's sort of like this
13:48
idea of well stated society. You know, there was something in
13:52
that I thought that, you know, and, and, and, and I think the
13:56
arc of both of them, you know, of all of them as you see the
14:00
kind of that early 2000 and six, 2007, you know, the birth of
14:04
Abercrombie, you've got the birth of all these like you must
14:07
as a student have something to say who you're part of.
14:12
And you see how how that morphs as they get older, how their
14:17
relationship to who they physically are.
14:22
Some use it as an armor and some use it as a Liberator
14:25
ultimately. It's really fascinating to see
14:28
their silhouettes transition or not at all, as you said, You
14:31
know, Patrick, very much the same.
14:34
Let's talk about queer now. I'm very excited to talk about
14:37
this film. It's very quite beautiful, and
14:39
I'm so fascinated with the suits that Lee wears throughout the
14:42
beginning of this film because you can really see the breakdown
14:46
of his character on his sleeve, honestly, throughout his
14:49
journey. But this is a period film, which
14:52
is not something I think you've done before.
14:54
So tell me a little bit about that research process.
14:58
For me, this was like, you know what?
14:59
Someone's like, OK, this is what it's like to work in film.
15:01
This is what this film was about.
15:02
Like, it was like for me, like being like going back to school
15:06
and like learning. Like, first of all, like
15:10
Challengers, I was like, OK, Lucas, you want me to have a
15:13
period film how I can do this? You know, for me, the I've loved
15:21
the book and I love the script. And for me, what I wanted to do
15:25
with the clothing was that first of all, in challenges we did a
15:29
lot of remaking, a lot of like, you know, building things from
15:32
scratch because they immediately didn't exist anymore.
15:35
Possibly had to kind of make fact odd types of facsimiles of
15:39
things to kind of accurately get it to tennis.
15:42
Whereas with queer, I wanted everything to be historically
15:46
accurate. So everything had to be found
15:50
from the period. It had to be real.
15:52
It had to be. I didn't want to remake
15:54
anything, which in a weird way in the beginning I thought was
15:58
going to be easier and then became like harder and harder.
16:01
But I wanted this idea that these garments felt like they
16:05
were lived in. When you take Lee's character
16:08
from the beginning of the film, he you open up on a crisp
16:13
original 1950s shirt which is optic white, which for me was
16:18
this idea of like cocaine in its purest form to the end of the
16:24
film where he is in what we historically know that William
16:28
Burroughs was buried in. So for me, it was this idea that
16:32
as the film progresses, Lee becomes more and more
16:37
deteriorated as he goes because in a weird way, it's nearly like
16:41
the drugs are seeping out of his skin and staining the clothing.
16:45
Like I was, you know, I've said that, you know, when I first
16:48
started doing, I had this like, but we couldn't do it in the
16:51
end. But I, I really would love, I, I
16:53
loved this idea that we would have dyed everything in heroin
16:56
at one point, you know, because I think heroin is such an
16:59
amazing pigment. You know, it's sort of like, you
17:02
know, when we were doing the, when the, when the, the research
17:05
was showing us how heroin was taken by William Burroughs.
17:09
You know, this idea of like the chemical of it, the color, the
17:12
coloration of something which goes from quite pure to
17:15
something quite grotesque ultimately, like, nearly like
17:19
tobacco, I found really fascinating.
17:22
And I felt like this was a very good psychological way to get
17:26
the viewer to follow or invest in the character through without
17:30
forcing it down. Because I, I, I think the
17:33
interesting thing about menswear, because obviously
17:36
primarily menswear in the film is we underestimate how
17:41
transformative the 1950s is in menswear fashion.
17:45
It is, you know, men come out of the war.
17:49
It is this like period of where it's not like pre war where
17:52
things were adapted because of expense.
17:55
It is this moment where there is like America becomes the
18:01
superpower. It becomes this moment where
18:04
fashion goes through this incredible industrialization,
18:08
you know, and I and I feel like what I loved about doing this
18:12
film is like, I work in fashion, but I've never learned so much
18:15
about menswear. And I think there's incredible
18:18
subtleties in menswear that I think, I hope that when people
18:23
see the film that they realise that as much as it is the most
18:27
simplest thing menswear, sometimes it is actually
18:30
incredibly difficult to to depict subtlety.
18:33
I think, you know, the suit that Lee wears took us many months to
18:38
find because I really wanted to find an industrialized suit,
18:41
which would have found at Macy's, which would have found
18:43
at different places. But it's where nylon was
18:47
introduced through linen, which gives it this like, kind of
18:50
overt linen texture. And because Luca was shooting on
18:54
the only shirts on film, it was very important that the lens was
18:57
able to pick this up so that you were not looking at a kind of
19:01
textual kind of beige. You were looking at something
19:04
which had like a kind of depth of feel to it, you know?
19:07
So I became completely obsessed, like to the point where you
19:11
probably affected my work at like Luafi because I just felt
19:15
like the suits that we found for Allerton on the like, for me,
19:20
there's some of the most like that.
19:22
So I mean, like the 50s is such an amazing period.
19:25
And I think when men had clothing, they didn't have huge
19:28
amounts of clothing because it was incredibly expensive.
19:31
Especially after the war Rash still existed.
19:34
So, you know, this idea of the reversible jacket in the 50s
19:38
really comes out of this idea of two for one.
19:40
Do you know what I mean? So which I find quite
19:44
fascinating. Yeah, it was really cool to see.
19:47
And also, by the way, when I saw him walk out in that almost all
19:50
black look, I audibly gasped in the theater because I could tell
19:54
that this character is really going through a rough time right
19:57
now. And that was definitely the
19:59
case. But let's also talk about the
20:02
complete contrast to the at times, though, I do feel like
20:05
these characters really merge together toward the end.
20:09
Eugene is very put together, more colors, more patterns.
20:13
He really is. When he walks into the room,
20:16
he's that light that everyone kind of looks up to.
20:18
There's a brightness and energy coming off of him.
20:22
But it does kind of fade toward the end though.
20:25
Do you feel like there was an intentional costume arc for this
20:28
character? You know, you have that a very
20:31
initial moment where you see Alison for the first time.
20:34
And I, I think, you know, as someone who's queer, there's
20:38
always that moment when you see someone across the room that you
20:40
fall in love with and you've never met.
20:43
And usually that involves like your eyes kind of telling you
20:47
something, maybe what you're not saying, you know what I mean?
20:48
You're kind of like it exaggerates everything.
20:52
So for me, I I wanted in the very beginning part with
20:57
Allerton to feel like there was an exaggerated beauty, which
21:01
then midway you start to in the book, there's a lot of merging
21:05
and melting into each other or like loose you're trying to work
21:08
out if it's a dream sequence or not a dream sequence.
21:12
Is it real? Is it not real?
21:14
And, and I was very obsessed with this idea that that, you
21:18
know, when you fall in love with this with someone, you sometimes
21:22
exaggerate the truth. And I feel like when you read
21:24
Burroughs, he exaggerates the truth.
21:27
So I feel like this moment suddenly where his shirts become
21:31
transparent. And, and for me, this was like
21:34
playing on the idea of like, is Lee looking at something that he
21:38
is seeing in front of him? Is it a real or is it a
21:42
psychology? You know, it's sort of like
21:44
you're actually he's testing different things, like in his
21:48
own mind. So I wanted the audience to kind
21:52
of feel this thing like, yes, you can see through Allerton,
21:56
which maybe was the real aspect that maybe Lee was exaggerating
22:00
in terms of the morphing. And then you have moments where
22:03
he morphs in. So it's like drugs, not drugs,
22:06
Reality, not reality. A very trippy experience.
22:11
Well. Jonathan, this has been such an
22:13
honor, such a joy and just has a final question I just really
22:17
want to ask you. I mean, looking back on this
22:20
past year, named Designer of the year by the British Fashion
22:24
Council, 2 films have come out this year.
22:26
And just a few minutes ago, you were nominated for a CDGA
22:30
nomination. So just what has this journey
22:33
over the past year really meant to you?
22:35
I can't even begin to imagine. I, I think it's, you know, I,
22:39
I've worked at the world probably now for 10 years and
22:42
this year is the, is one of the most amazing moments because I
22:46
feel like I can't reiterate, I feel like a student again.
22:51
I feel completely like mesmerized by things and like, I
22:56
feel I want to let go and make mistakes.
23:01
I've been so controlled. And I think, I think being able
23:04
to work in film has, has been able to kind of help me to kind
23:08
of like find newness within myself and kind of love what I
23:11
do. And when you look up to film and
23:15
you look up, you know, for me, some of costume designers have
23:19
been my greatest inspiration for my own job.
23:23
And I, I think by doing it, I've really understood how, how
23:29
important film can be for people, you know, And for me,
23:34
it's been, it's really helped me in terms of like confidence and
23:38
in terms of like letting go to myself.
23:41
Like sometimes as a fashion designer, you've got the machine
23:45
of the business around it. And, and I've never felt so
23:48
free. And, and I'm, I'm really
23:50
honoured to be able to be given the chance And like even talking
23:54
to you right now, I feel it's all, it's all new to me and I
23:57
and I, and I, I feel completely rejuvenated ultimately in what I
24:02
do. And I feel I've never felt more
24:04
creative ultimately for a long time.
24:07
That's amazing. I mean, all you can really hope
24:10
for too is just to keep on learning.
24:12
So this is really an exciting chapter for you.
24:15
I'm really excited to see where it goes from this point forward.
24:18
Well, thank you so much for wanting to you and and I hope we
24:23
meet again. Well, I hope to see you at the
24:25
CDGA Awards. Costume designer Jonathan W
24:29
Anderson, thank you so much for joining the podcast.
24:31
This has been such a joy. Oh.
24:33
Thank you. And also don't forget next week
24:36
on December 31st, our season 4 finale is going to be with
24:41
Twilight costume designer Wendy Chuck.
24:44
Get ready for that. We just had a child for the
24:47
other day, Elizabeth and I, and it was insane.
24:50
We had so much fun and I hope you all enjoy it.
24:53
Happy holidays everyone.