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Dressed: The History of Fashion
Magic by Design: Behind the Seams of Wicked with Costume Designer Paul Tazewell (Dressed Classic)
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- [00:01]
Cassidy
Cass as you know i had a rather big birthday recently and while i am a makeup girly lately i've been more into emphasizing skincare and a look that says more glow than glam so i've become a big fan of jones rhodes miracle balm which was created by the legendary makeup artist bobbi brown and her miracle balm is perfect for just that little touch of color on the cheek you can use it on your lips you can even use it as a highlighter it's simply one product that does it all there's a reason why the word miracle is in its name.
- [00:35]
April
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Cassidy
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April
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- [01:56]
Cassidy
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- [02:12]
Zachary
One of our favorite episodes from the dressed archive of over five hundred plus shows the history of fashion as a production of dressed media.
- [02:26]
April
With over eight billion people in the world we all have one thing in common every day.
- [02:30]
Cassidy
We all get dressed welcome to dressed the history of fashion a podcast where we explore the who what when of why we where we are fashion historians and your hosts april callahan and cassidy.
- [02:43]
Zachary
Zachary dress listeners this week's episode is such a treat by now you have surely all heard about or seen the newly released highly anticipated film wicked which opened to record box office numbers this past weekend and this film is part one of a two part installment based on the wildly popular broadway musical of the same name which is still running after making its debut in two thousand three and the musical itself is a loose adaptation of a nineteen ninety five novel by gregory maguire entitled the life and times of the wicked witch of the west which as the title makes clear is itself a loose adaptation or revisionist adaptation i should say of l frank baum's nineteen hundred novel the wonderful wizard of oz and for those of.
- [03:33]
Cassidy
You who might not be familiar with the story the broadway production and now film takes us into the lives and complex friendship of elphaba who becomes the wicked witch of the west and glinda who becomes glinda the good and it is essentially the story before and after dorothy's time in the world of oz and these roles were originated on the stage by idina menzel and kristin chenoweth and are now being brought to the big screen by their fellow vocal powerhouses cynthia erivo and ariana grande in this two part film in theaters now and.
- [04:08]
Zachary
Today we are so pleased to be joined by the film's costume designer paul tazewell who is inarguably a powerhouse in his own right he is the best of the best at what he does and paul is an award winning broadway and hollywood costume designer who is responsible for designing some of the most important visual and groundbreaking masterpieces of our time.
- [04:30]
Cassidy
And while paul did not design the costumes for the original broadway version of wicked that was susan halferty he designed more than a few productions you all will definitely know of including revivals of classics like guys and dolls a miracle worker jesus christ superstar as well as the broadway debuts of the color purple and most recently suffs which is about the early twentieth century american women's rights movement and the campaign for the right to vote and also cast one of my all time favorite productions death becomes her which is of course based on the nineteen ninety two cult classic film of the same name but most famously he designed just you know a little this little thing you know groundbreaking earth shattering production known as hamilton and of course he took home a tony for that and he has been nominated for the tonys nine times but we are.
- [05:24]
Zachary
Here today because paul's talents are not confined to groundbreaking stage productions and his first feature length film was twenty nineteen's harriet about harriet tubman followed by stephen spielberg's west side story in twenty twenty one which earned paul his first oscar nomination but let me assure you this will be his last oscar nomination he surely has one coming his way very very soon and once you have seen wicked you will know why we are.
- [05:52]
Cassidy
So excited to go behind the scenes of this incredible production with paul today paul thank you so much for joining us on dressed paul welcome to dressed.
- [06:01]
Zachary
I am so excited to talk to.
- [06:03]
Paul Tazewell
You today i am so glad to.
- [06:05]
Zachary
Be here yeah i just saw the film with millions of others this past weekend i'm still on quite a high i have to say i've been singing the songs all weekend i mean such an absolutely visually stunning film such an incredibly moving film i think especially at this time right now we all needed some magic in our lives so i just wanted to start off by saying thank you and also congratulations thank you.
- [06:31]
Paul Tazewell
So much for saying that yeah i indeed i think that it has come at just the right time it is a story that fills our hearts and i'm so glad to be a part.
- [06:39]
Zachary
Of it and just the fact that you even have time to be here with me today there has been such a whirlwind of press surrounding this film's release it's been so much fun to watch cynthia and ariana just delivering on the fashion with what has become now known as method dressing i guess dressing for their character or an inspiration of their character throughout their press tour which has been so much fun i don't know if you have any thoughts on that but that's just been such a.
- [07:05]
Paul Tazewell
Pleasure to watch i didn't know that there was a term for an official term yet it is indeed you know on theme dressing which it speaks to i would say their excitement about the film overall i think that it also allows for the audience to really engage with the just just the lead up and creating excitement and they're both i've said it before they're huge fashion icons themselves they always deliver with their i mean even when they're when they're dressing they were completely giving their all with their fashion and i have to say.
- [07:40]
Zachary
Too you've been a huge part of this press tour as well and i feel like this is next level promotion of a film's costume designer is this type of press tour new for you because you are everywhere they are essentially doing the same media interviews and you're really a significant part of promoting this.
- [07:59]
Paul Tazewell
Movie oh my gosh i mean it no i have never seen the ask for my part of it but it's i'm delighted to have a light shined on the work overall i mean you know it's for everyone that worked on the costumes for wicked it's an amazing thing for them to be able to see their work represented out there and just to show the importance of costume design in the process storytelling and all that is is just so great i am so grateful definitely yeah i think.
- [08:32]
Zachary
This is really significant and exactly what you just said in highlighting the significance of costume design which maybe is not something people always think about and if you're doing your job correctly right the costumes kind of play seamlessly within the narrative but i think this also just speaks to how again significant your costume designs are for this film you played such a significant and integral role in bringing this fantastical world to life and we're going to dig into that a little bit later but because this is the first time that you've been on the podcast i really want to get to know you a little bit and maybe talk about your personal journey to becoming a costume designer and to designing this film because in a small way it could be argued that this is maybe prophesied in your youth or you've come full circle in your youth but more on that in a minute but i i want to ask you a question i love asking people undressed which is do you have an earliest memory of clothing or the power of clothing from your youth that you'd like to.
- [09:29]
Paul Tazewell
Share with us clothing i mean you know just my own creative journey with clothing i think it started with a a bed sheet ripped off of my bed on a saturday morning as i went down to watch cartoons but i would drape it in some dramatic way you know it's by toga for the morning and that was probably when i was about about five years old or so and then i would say something that was very specific that i've always held onto and really even when i was designing wicked it came up but disney's cinderella and most specifically the transformation of cinderella when she goes from ra to her beautiful dress her ball gown and just the way that was represented and also what it says about yeah indeed it's a fairy tale but just how it's a metaphor for your evolution and how you see yourself and you know just how clothing changes who you are and how you represent yourself and how you take up space and that you can read a lot into that but it i think that the idea of that kind of magical transformation has always been a part of just how i imagine i don't know just how i imagine fantasy and designing in that way and you know it led into my interest in dresses overall in period and researching period and that led me to corsetry and petticoats and the underpinnings of historical clothing and then i was at the same time i actually fell in love with theater and performance but from the performance side more so than from the design side it was operating simultaneously but really my heart at that in my formative years that it was moving towards performance whether it was going to be in theater or as a dancer or as a film actor but when i was in college i ended up making the decision that it was best for me to go to costume design and that was where i ended up and that's i'm so grateful that i did i think i made the right decision for me i don't know if you want to get into it but you know the reasons that i chose that route some of that was how i was imagining what my career would be as an actor at that time and that was coming up in the eighties and i just wasn't seeing reflected people that looked like me being in leading male roles and musicals which was actually my focus so i made a choice to go towards costume design because i thought that my longevity would be just more more possible with the world of costume design which is really.
- [12:19]
Zachary
Interesting when you actually look at a lot of the productions that you have gone on to design are groundbreaking productions featuring all black casts or just in terms of their representation like you have still been there at those really significant moments in theater history but behind the scenes dressing those actors so i think that's actually that's really cool yeah i.
- [12:41]
Paul Tazewell
Mean i just to tag onto what you said and i've not talked about that so much i've had opportunities to do hugely ground groundbreaking theater productions like noise funk that kind of production that was never had never been seen before caroline or change that again it was the george wolf production by tony kushner again representing story in a way that was just pretty remarkable and then you go into something like hamilton that really captured the zeitgeist of i think america overall and what was going on it has been a huge and really wonderful.
- [13:18]
Zachary
Journey and i want to talk a little bit more about that journey before we dive in to get into more of your current career because as you mentioned so in high school you went to a performing arts high school i believe and that's where you i believe starred in and also designed the costumes for the wiz which you will go on to design the live production of the wiz and then of course that ties into wicked today but then you went i think to pratt for fashion.
- [13:48]
Paul Tazewell
Design i did yeah so i was right out of high school and then.
- [13:52]
Zachary
You were designing you got your big break i think in the early nineties and you're working on broadway throughout the nineties right i'm just curious about paul in the nineties in new york what's.
- [14:04]
Paul Tazewell
Interesting because i was i was at nyu in the late eighties i was getting my graduate degree in costume design costume and set design and then i was invited down to the arena stage in washington dc which is a regional theater one of the first regional theaters to be established in america and they had a huge just a huge program but i was led by zelda fichandler and i was invited down to first to design a production called stand up tragedy and then i was asked to be the resident costume designer so i was designing there for then the next eight years living in dc and designing there what was beautiful about being there was that there was you know a staff of amazing creatives meaning costume makers that had been there for a long time and that was their chosen career and so i was able to work with them and really hone my skills as a designer and it gave me basically access to a workshop of very talented craftspeople to investigate whatever it might be and they they had seasons that were varied but very exciting where they might find do a musical or they do a fantasy or they do a classic some either shakespeare or ibsen or something like that and so my work was realized at a level that was pretty high and i think that work was seen then by people in new york and that was when i started to get invited to new york and one of those happened to be bring in denoise bring it da funk and that was directed by george c wolfe and at the time he was the artistic director at the poplar theater in new york and then it built on that as far as my you know a broader professional career i was also doing other productions at other regional theaters around the country it gave me the opportunity to introduce myself and my work to many other theaters around the country much of that work tended to be as you were saying tended to be stories about people of color whether it was an august wilson play or other classics at the time some theaters were doing classics but cast with black people with black actors so i was often invited to be a part of those productions and then i might get invited back a second or third time because they saw what i could do not just limited to not that it was limiting but not just limited to stories about people of color but a broader scope of what theater was theater that was being done yeah and i think.
- [16:48]
Zachary
When you reach a certain level too of being a costume designer where you you're really respected you've earned all of these tony awards and nominations like you have that you get to start being able to choose which productions you do and i think when you look at your resume it becomes very clear that you're very thoughtful about what you do and it just so happens that a lot of those projects turn out to be incredibly successful and really important of course very familiar very beloved stories things like even like death becomes her which is on broadway right now which is a movie that from my childhood that i grew up watching it's a cult classic that's on broadway or something like wicked but then there's also very real historical figures like alexander hamilton ida b wells harriet tubman you've costumed all of these people at one point or another does your approach to costume design change if it's for elphaba versus harriet so a fictional versus a real life figure.
- [17:48]
Paul Tazewell
What stays the same because yes indeed it is different the storytelling can be different it is often defined by how the director wants to tell the story what is that point of view and it might be you know the questions of are we representing realistically what the historic figure say with hamilton did we want to be beholden to the specifics of that period or were we going to expand beyond that that was a huge conversation that we had as we were trying to figure out how do we want to tell this story and do we want for it to be in contemporary clothes as opposed to in period clothes we where we ended up and this is with tommy kail who was the the director and also lin manuel miranda who wrote it i don't know if it's obvious but he's yeah.
- [18:38]
Zachary
Obviously very famously yes yeah but we.
- [18:43]
Paul Tazewell
Had to decide what serves the way that we want to tell the story given the style of the presentation of it the music and the language that create what hamilton is what is our visual going to be for that we ended up arriving somewhere in the middle of that and always thinking about what is the most dynamic way to do that when you're thinking about something that is more like a film like harriet was important to give an accurate view of what that world is and what life was for harriet at that time and the slaves and the plantations and how those operated and there's still design that's involved there's color palette that becomes controlled and the level of detail might shift or change the distressing or the breakdown of the costumes and to what level and what are we trying to say about the people and how do we honor their dignity and self respect and as a designer i'm balancing a lot of those questions and making choices about all those questions which is exciting it was hugely exciting the commonality of all of that is that we want for i want for the character to be as honestly represented as i possibly can meaning i want for the actor to be able to deliver their performance in a way that the audience can engage with that performer and they feel like there's just a connection whether it's visceral it's emotional it carries a poetic essence or weight my hope is that it will embody all of that whether it's represented in a directly historically accurate way or if it is represented in a more abstract way so it it just depends on what what the style will be of the overall production and it's always decided with the set designer and the lighting designer or the production designer and the cinematographer and we were always working together in an organic way to decide what is the look of this piece going to be and i.
- [21:01]
Zachary
Have to say harriet specifically is such a masterclass and wicked is too and we'll talk about that very shortly but in how dress is used to tell stories and how you use things like color and texture to tell the evolution of harriet's journey throughout this film and just a couple things before we move on because i just think it's so fascinating you talked about in interviews how you use this newfound photograph of harriet tubman that i didn't even realize existed but prior it had just recently been discovered and used that as inspiration she's younger gives you a sense a sense of her style i think and then in that same interview you talked about how in your process you immersed yourself in her world by tracing her footsteps because you wanted to kind of incorporate that environment into her clothing can you just talk a little bit more about that because i think that's a very special and not necessarily typical approach to.
- [21:52]
Paul Tazewell
Costume design sure i think that it is for me entering into the journey of designing harriet i did want to just better understand who this woman was potentially and in a way again that as you were stating that i could feel so that i can then make choices about what she would wear i think that that speaks to what my process is you know i step into the shoes of a character to make choices about what they're going to wear that feel accurate to a person's choice and we all get up every day and we put on clothes to face whatever event that we have in front of us in the day and we may choose to wear the same thing that we wore yesterday but you're making a choice to do that and that is the reality of of dressing ourselves so pulling that idea into how i'm going to dress someone else and be reflective of their character in an honest way and what their journey is in an honest way i felt that i just wanted more information some of that was as you said it was inspired by a photograph of harriet tubman when she was younger and it's at the smithsonian now but it was a portrait of harriet younger in her younger years and she is dressed up in this beautiful mid nineteen th century dress and her hair is pulled back and it's a fairly formal photograph but it was harriet tubman represented in a way that i had never seen where we'd come to know her as this woman who always had a head wrap on and who dressed in dark clothes and just had a very stern and doer expression and this photograph opened up the possibility that just like it makes perfect sense i mean that when she was younger yes indeed she had lighter clothing that was more formal than the kind of somber clothing that she ended up wearing what could be seen as somber clothing that she was wearing when she was later in her life but most of those older pictures are the pictures that we collectively refer to in in history classes and that's how she's represented in books and as she's depicted in history and you know i guess the idea of slavery and how it is seen through media and through stories and indeed it was a grim life absolutely but that was one of the elements that we wanted to open up which even though it was a grim life she had internal dignity that inspired her and moved her to make a change in her life by freeing herself and then freeing multitudes of other people and that is huge and so where does that come from and how do i project that underscore that with the clothing choices that i make for her and that was part of what defined some of where we went with her clothing that was part of her later journey where her earlier journey was actually embracing the truth that yes she would walk through the swamps in bare feet and trap beaver and other small animals and she was laboring on a plantation and just all the disgusting things that she had to live through which actually compelled her then to make a difference in her life as well and find her own dignity and i think showing that emotional arc and also arc of reality from her life to see incidents in her life it gives you a bigger broader sense of who this woman was as much as we can say who she was from everything that you can read.
- [25:57]
Zachary
About like i said masterclass in storytelling and again something you might not necessarily know until you talk to you and hear from you about the thought that goes into the character development it's incredible and of course cynthia played harriet so you had a lot of experience working with her she's embodying this iconic real life character and now you're working with her embodying this iconic fictional character in wicked which you know is also very familiar very beloved story even as wicked's plot challenges everything we know about the so called wicked witch of the west and glinda the good witch audiences are still coming into this movie saying i have an idea of what this world should be i have an idea of what this world should look like and that's not just the broadway production that's of course the nineteen thirty nine film there's a lot of visuals associated with this story and this narrative can you talk a little bit about how you negotiate honoring those original sources but then coming in and making the costumes your.
- [26:56]
Paul Tazewell
Own and bringing something new sure i mean you know you mentioned it a little bit with the introduction you know the the story of wicked and those characters and also the story of the wizard of oz has been in my life at least since nineteen seventy eight and that was when i was introduced to the film of the wiz and embraced that i mean you know it became one of my favorite films and then when i was sixteen years old i was given the opportunity to design the costumes for my high school production of the wiz and then i was also i played the wiz in that production as well which i always think is pretty funny but it speaks to just everything that i was trying to embrace at that time and figure out but the it is the characters that and our experience with those characters as americans because it really is the the quintessential american fairy tale that is germane to to us as americans that we kind of can can own ourselves you know from frank baume's the wonderful wizard of oz and those books that series of books because it's been a part of american culture everyone has their own ideas of what this world is and how whether it is the wizard of oz the mgm movie that judy garland was in or it's the wiz that was either on broadway or the one that was made into a film or it's wicked and wicked has been hugely embraced it's got a huge fan base as we've seen represented in the wonderful you know box office numbers which amazing but how people want that story served up i made it important to acknowledge what that might possibly be as i was starting to redefine who these characters are visually and the ask was to because i said to john chu when we were starting i said how do you imagine that this world will be represented you know and it was leading the question was because you know i was wondering if they wanted to recreate what had been done on broadway or if they wanted a brand new world a brand new vision for what the world of oz would be and indeed i was so glad to hear that both john and the producers were very much interested in recreating redefining what our visual world would be for oz that said acknowledging the fan base and also everyone that was familiar with the wizard of oz and everyone that was familiar with the wizard i thought that it was important to be able to pull them in in a way that felt where they feel familiar and comfortable in the world that we're creating where the way that we are serving up is taking a hold of the same spirit and that it doesn't become so so foreign that it becomes distracting and that thankfully i had the opportunity to do something in a little bit smaller scale with west side story when i designed that for steven spielberg but we're talking about another musical west side story a film that is hugely beloved and i love that design i love it's always been a go to to watch and to study and others as well so when i'm tasked with reimagining what this world would be i go after how do these scenes how does this movie overall make me feel and how do the different scenes make me feel one against another and how can i imagine a world or a visual that will make me feel the same way but be different and so i applied that to the approach with west side story and then carrying that to its next level applying that to wicked as well and really studying how i feel about certain scenes and when i listen to the music what comes out of it and just really paying attention to what effect all of it has on me and then being able to reimagine how to get that same effect in a different way but we're always gonna have glinda as a character glinda the good and elphaba and the wizard of oz all of that still needs to be present and also they need to talk to each other they need to make sense within each other as well so it is a more organic process than it's not just kind of intellectual okay well you do do this and this and this i mean it's it really is how does this world make me.
- [31:53]
Zachary
Feel yeah and i think that's when you learn about your history as a performer that approach it feels like you brought some of that to your costume design process because i don't think this is necessarily typical costume designer approach but i think it brings something really special.
- [32:07]
Paul Tazewell
To your designs definitely i mean it's definitely the case with you know think about hamilton i i wouldn't have been able to design hamilton way the way that i designed it until i had the collective of what my career was and all of the different experiences that then led me to design hamilton because i had tried things out i had just investigating different kinds of storytelling and then how to be in control of clothing and what those images become when you strip them of detail and when you sort them in different ways for wicked you know it was much the same where i was looking at the wizard of oz studying that and looking at how period silhouette is depicted within this fantasy world and also acknowledging the fact that it was done in the nineteen thirties or in nineteen thirty nine so that defines how we see some of these shapes as well the glinda dress is an eighteenth century silhouette which is mid nineteen th century as well and that collective then that moves it away it becomes an icon and it moves it away from being a specific period and that was what i was going after with wicked is that my lens is the twenty twenty four lens and everyone coming into for right now everyone coming into the film has all the imagery that we see day in day out that's in you know our instagram and on tv and in films and in magazines there's so much information that we take in visually and how can i maximize that really take hold of that and maximize it and create a world that feels nostalgic of or familiar to a throwback to whatever that moment might be and then orchestrate it in a way that tells the story and makes sense where it defines itself and that was largely what what i was after overall.
- [34:25]
Cassidy
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- [38:09]
Zachary
And i would say you absolutely brought something new even while paying homage and being respectful of what people expect which you certainly delivered on your genius is the details which you don't get necessarily on a broadway stage right when you're doing theater the person in the front needs to see the costume just like the person in the last row but in film it's all of those details are right up there where we can see them and something i so appreciate about you is that you have thought through every single detail and i when i say every single detail i mean down to elphaba's pinky ring which i think is so interesting because each and every piece has a story and a reason behind it and can you talk a little bit more about maybe elphaba's pinky rings and what they symbolize and their connection to nature and her role within this larger wizard of oz world what.
- [39:02]
Paul Tazewell
You'Re pointing out is where with nathan crowley the production designer and myself what we realized is that we had to create rules for this world to live to be believable and nathan was big on representing a sense of reality and quite literally represented in all of the sets that he designed there are huge sets some that were four football fields big of scenery that was created so you've got real actors on real scenery and real crowds needing to fill these spaces for me i was really quite interested in everything down to how something was going to be stitched and all the embroidery and all the different buttons that i was making decisions about every different element that we were going to have represented within the clothing so that it was all there it was all real and you could feel the the world this palpable sense of this world albeit fantasy that it actually existed and that the audience could then immerse themselves in nature was one of my first inspirations for the world partly because of its timelessness quality that you can't pin it down to a specific year and then also because i felt that elphaba you know i was seeing the world through the characters of elphaba and glinda and that that is the focus which is the beauty of their relationship and how they change each other's lives nature felt directly connected to who elphaba is as a character because of her advocation for animals because it is a grounding for her and also she is in control of the elements she's in control of gravity and so therefore is connected to nature and that idea led me to look at different kinds of textures of nature because then i'm starting to think you know it's like how can i represent that in clothing and where i went to was there was a documentary on on mushrooms and so i was looking at that and i you know they were showing images of the underside of mushrooms and other kinds of the fungus that was growing and you know it just all looked magical and the way that the world of mushrooms was presented is they were talking about the interconnectedness of those systems and how they talk to each other and also how trees talk to each other as well and then i started to think of how magical that is as an idea that we have this whole this energy that is synergistic that that is moving and flowing around us that idea led me to the world of spirals which just get this sense of inherently this sense of movement and thinking about the fibonacci spiral and the golden spiral which is the definition for formulas for creation and creation in nature and so that as an image seeing appropriate and so i was pulling all of this together threading it to create this world that doesn't exist that we're trying to give some kind of imagery to so collectively that at least helped me to walk into what are those shapes that i want to use on elphaba how do i want to use fabric on elphaba much of that was just my knowledge of pleating and how you can manipulate it and i was looking at you know inspired by lots of of research imagery iris van herpen has done a huge amount of really interesting kinetic feeling design so that was one of the ways that i you know inspired by fashion and pulling that kind of idea into what this world might be and also like for glinda the idea of the spiral and some of the imagery on her the bubble dress and then also throughout and even into the second film and just to say what people don't realize is there's this whole other part of story that they haven't seen and there's a huge amount of design that's in that film as well that i'm really excited to be able to share in a year but it provided a literal cornucopia of imagery in thinking about nature and thinking about spirals and how i could manipulate that to create a world yeah and once you.
- [43:40]
Zachary
Learn if you haven't seen it dress listeners if you have not seen wicked or you now need to go back and watch it again because all the things that paul's talking about now when you start looking for it it's there and it's absolutely incredible the spirals are there also the asymmetry i think is maybe one of the more more obvious or something you might notice watching especially in the shiz university uniforms the asymmetry is pretty much consistent throughout every wire and and that's individualized across all of these different background characters and main characters everybody again has been thought out and given the attention and the detail and then to come together to create this incredibly magical world and just a couple other things just in terms of learning the story just from articles i've read with interviews with you the stories some of those stories that you kind of have sewn into these characters are like the reason why elphaba wears black to begin with i never even thought about that or considered that can you tell us a little bit about that decision.
- [44:40]
Paul Tazewell
Sure and what was so wonderful just about the process we were always asking questions of each other what defines this world why are they wearing what they're wearing or why is as you just asked why is alphabet in black i designed alphabet to be in black because i was inspired by the wicked witch of the west from the mgm film and that as an icon and then deciding that that ties her or connects her to a story as a young girl it makes for a clear through line and making that choice but we also needed to have an intellectual idea behind why she was in black and why is she wearing black as a little girl and i knew immediately you know and that's where you know as a designer there's a part of my brain is working things out and then i'm i'm making it more specific and literal as as i draw it out and you know and then working with literal imagery but what that where that comes from is her mother dies early in her life her mother dies when she's a little girl when actually in giving birth to her sister and you realize in the story of the film is that elphaba is carrying around a lot of guilt around that because the reason that her mother dies is because the father forces her to eat this herb which will hopefully make her elphaba's sister nessarose not green he's concerned that they're gonna have a second green child and so elphaba has been carrying around this guilt for at least up until college age and so with the intensity of that as an idea my thought that she is emotionally stunted because of that trauma that she received when she was a young girl a little girl so when we first meet her as a little girl she's dressed in completely dressed in black but that black the interest is very very intricate these leaves that spiral around her pinafore and then also her sleeves are micropleted so that they have texture as well and she's in boots that are appropriate for a little girl but all of this lead up to where elphaba ends up being when she enters into shiz and then from the point that she enters into shiz then she continues her style trajectory in a way that makes sense that she she goes into uniform and that first uniform which is a tailored suit it's a skirt suit or a dress suit that that suit it makes sense because it's reflected in her victorian silhouettes from when she first arrived at shivs albeit those victorian silhouettes are there's creative license there as well because it's not literal to the nineteenth century but it has reference to that in the corsetry and what that shape is and what this overall silhouette of the skirt is and then with the uniform it has steps where we go to a dress that has a blouse that feels a little more opened up and then we go to a trouser look that interaction in the asda's ballroom where she has the hat that was given to her by glinda as a joke and then she imbues that hat with power and then after popular she changes and she opens up and she softens and she becomes more agile with her trouser silhouette and the short kilt and the vest and then has that moment in the forest with fiyero and there's this visual growth in her character that i was working to show so that you are following what's going on internally and i think that that all the way through is what i'm looking for as i'm designing any character really is that we get this sense of from day to day over this year the growth for this woman is represented in these different.
- [48:59]
Zachary
Kinds of silhouettes yeah and i read an interview with you too where you talked about how that's even in conversation with glinda who would appear to be her polar opposite but that by the time they go to the emerald city together they're wearing almost a similar silhouette which again is is without saying a word communicating to the audience that they are in tune with one another exactly.
- [49:20]
Paul Tazewell
Exactly and it gets them to a place of zero so knowing that going into the second film they're gonna go in two different directions really their choices are defined by what is important for them while still carrying a bond of.
- [49:37]
Zachary
Friendship which is the heart of this story and just so incredibly beautiful i so reading and watching interviews with you which i've spent the last couple of weeks doing a lot of things become very clear your intentionality behind everything of course but also that you really value this collaborative nature of what you do and of course is essential to what you do you're very much part of a team be it the larger production team there's the director set designer all of the actors you work very closely with but then of course your team and you've talked about all of these details and none of this could be possible without all of these people that you work with and in a recent interview i read you said that you there's over a thousand costumes crafted by a team of i think one hundred thirty costumers of various professions across four different countries can you tell us about your team's role in bringing your vision to life and this is something that you've called a quote true labor of love and collaboration that's filled absolutely and.
- [50:38]
Paul Tazewell
The importance i stand by that just with all my being i could never do it alone even a reflect back on designing the wiz when i was sixteen i corralled my whole family to be a part of that experience and with everything that was required of this film and every production it's that is also that's what brings me joy is opening it up and collaborating in different ways with the people that are part of my team because they bring insight that is additive as i'm directing them to do x y and z or engage certain people that their input the people that they know is additive to then the experience of designing and that is i respect that and it's huge for me when we were setting up for wicked originally we were planning on shooting in in atlanta and then for certain reasons they made the decision that we would film in london which was hugely beneficial just because of access to amazing craftspeople and artisans tailors and mainly because the system bare tends to be like a cottage industry it's people that are working out of their homes or in small smaller shops and only able to take on smaller projects and because i had done musicals and other stage productions i knew that was part of the system dulcie scott who was the wardrobe supervisor on my team she actually is from london so knew who to go to who to engage to bring on board because what seemed to be the best approach was to create our own workshop on the studio lob to then be able to have everyone under the same roof you know it was just invaluable to be able to go downstairs you know and what was also wonderful as well and i just so memorable is the way that the workshop was set up is you could passed through our offices which is where we were you know that was where the buyer was where i was choosing fabrics we had a huge it must have been twenty foot long table that you know where we would lay everything out and make decisions daily and then you'd walk through the door and then and you were in the elf of a room and you were surrounded by all this black pleated textured felted fabric but it was kind of you know it was because of the amount of black fabric that was in the room it had a dark feel but specific to elphaba you know and there was the person who was her tailor amazing and she had worked with vivienne westwood but just had this really just her personality in general was also a little moody which was great it was perfect she's great but then you pass to the right and push through this barred door and when you opened it up there was this pink sparkly bubbly you know light a room full of gossamer fabrics and just all of this light that was generated and it was also on the side of the building that was getting all the light was flying into it but it became like a willy wonka adventure that process of creating i think it just turned out that way but it was all part of the experience and everyone the one hundred thirty people that were under that roof i think were really inspired by that kind of energy and being surrounded by other people who were hugely talented and having all of the custom embroiderers and knitters and weavers that those were downstairs and that's where so much of the kind of nitty gritty manufacturing was happening as well and i think that we set up an environment that always felt very creative and where things were being researched and developed and sampled and there were long boards of different kinds of pleating and different kinds of origami patterns and also just patterns of fabrics and different of kinds sewing techniques that all made for this hugely creative space and i think that i give up to the idea of having a team that understands what it takes to create this kind of world and then they go about collecting as much as possible what's necessary to then be able to approach it and i always want to set up an environment where that kind of engagement is really encouraged because i think that's where you get your best work and i think that we definitely did it.
- [55:41]
Zachary
With wicked absolutely i mean i'm getting excited you just talking about it and of course your team has been so generous with sharing images with me which i will also share with our listeners that take us behind the scenes into this process there's this wonderful board that comes to mind immediately that has all of the different experimentations right because it's not like you design something and then it's just made there's a process all the different experimentations coming up with the alphabet fabric and how that fabric's going to move on the body and do you want it closer together do you want a wider wave and we get to see that process and then you get to see that process on the mannequin so not only is your team creating the fab different fabrics then they're creating it on the form and then of course actually getting it on the actor is another process so that was really cool to see also i have to say i think it's very obvious that john the director also appreciates how much work you've done because i thought i was gonna have to tell people okay you're not gonna get to see the shoes but here's the shoes because the shoes are insane and there are so many shoe moments in the film where you can see the handiwork of these cobblers who handmade these shoes john.
- [56:53]
Paul Tazewell
Was it was such a joy to work with him one but then also throughout the filming and the pre production as well but when i think it was probably inspired you were speaking of all the research and development that we were doing on the forms you know and i john would come through and he was just delighted by our whole world and you know it's rare to have a director be excited about what we're doing in the costume world it just doesn't usually happen but he became really excited about it and also the producers were very excited about it but then when we had fully realized costumes that with the performers in those costumes stepping on to said you know he made it a point to and he actually said you know i want to capture as much as i can get of everything that you've done that you've designed and how you've created helped to create this world and he did you know there indeed there are still things that didn't make it into the film but he made every attempt to capture all the detail the same for alice brooks the cinematographer and how things are lit how she carefully lit elphaba so that you really see all the variants of of textures and detail and depth and that's something that's very very tricky to do and making it intentional and making it you know a priority to pull that into defining what our world of oz is really what that's all about i mean it's you know and i give that up to them but it was so beautiful to be able to offer them this canvas of textured world that they could then define our film is just wonderful ye i was.
- [58:42]
Zachary
Gonna say you made it really easy for them i'm sure and there's a lot of attention obviously on galinda and elphaba but morribal's costumes are just so exceptional and what i loved too again i got a sneak peek at some of these details before i saw the film but you could see the hand embroidery on her costumes and every single thing and the collars paul her collars light as air yeah yeah just again.
- [59:13]
Paul Tazewell
It was just the joy of dressing somebody like michelle yeoh who loves clothing and i do want to give it up to all of this this amazing cast of people who love dressing in clothing and value what costumes bring to their performance it made the job just that much more joyous in being able to create create the different characters definitely.
- [59:38]
Zachary
Well and i think costumes is such a big part of character development for a lot of actors and so you really help them literally step into that role so it's a very significant thing that you do and do incredibly well so you've been so generous with your time i just have one more question for you because i haven't been this excited about a movie in a really long time i know i'm not alone the excitement surrounding this movie is palpable i'm sure you feel it this is just such a gift right now for so many of us so i know what this film means to me but what does it mean to you oh.
- [60:15]
Paul Tazewell
Boy i mean you know it's when i was asked to design wicked and i started to listen to the music over and over again and i realized that this story speaks to me so directly because it speaks of a person who is different struggling to be seen and then moving towards and moving towards the second film that she's vilified for the way that she looks and you know it's in in a very real way my connection to elphaba's story is reflective of me as a person of color in our country and the structure of our social world here and that that's what is very important for me is to represent this this metaphor for where we are and it is this wonderful love story between these two friends that were polar opposites but in being put into the same space they find a relationship that creates this huge bond and they change each other's lives and the magic of that you know when you think about that in reality is also representative of how i relate to people and and so overall as a big life story it speaks so directly to how i walk through life and what i think is important about life.
- [61:57]
Zachary
As well thank you for that and thank you so much for being here this has been such a pleasure for.
- [62:03]
Paul Tazewell
Me as well thank you paul thank.
- [62:06]
Cassidy
You for being so generous with sharing the stories literally sewn into the seams of the wicked film's costumes he truly.
- [62:13]
Zachary
Is such an incredibly thoughtful designer and when i say every single detail was thought out i mean every detail and the meaning is layered and it runs really deep i mean there's so many details that we didn't get to touch on in this interview and that includes things that he mentioned in a recent playbill interview that i read in which he shared that there are triangles that are threaded thematically throughout elphaba's wardrobe and her buttons which all are meant to link her to her iconic hat and then there's also nessa rose's silver shoes inherited from her mother that have tornado like swirls april have you seen the.
- [62:52]
April
Film if you have did you notice.
- [62:54]
Cassidy
These details i have not seen it yet but i plan to do so as soon as i get back to new york city i'm visiting my mom right now so i'm recording from her house but yes that is on my to do list for the next few days coming up soon i had the.
- [63:09]
Zachary
Pleasure of seeing the film on friday it does not disappoint it is so incredible it's so heartwarming it's so beautiful and then to be able to have talked to paul and learn all about his and his team's work made that experience all the more special i really cannot say enough wonderful things about this movie and even now that i've had this interview with paul i'm gonna go back and look for more details that him and i talked about because there really is so much to unpack there and so much to see which our.
- [63:34]
Cassidy
Listeners can do too if they haven't seen it yet already so we're giving you guys the inside scoop well i.
- [63:40]
April
Think that does it for us today dressed listeners may you consider the magic.
- [63:44]
Zachary
That resides in your life and your clothes next time you get dressed please.
- [63:49]
Cassidy
Head to restpodcast on instagram or rest podcast without the underscore on facebook to check out the visual content associated with.
- [63:59]
April
Each week's episodes and remember we always love hearing from you so if you'd like to write to us you can do so at hello at dressedhistory dot com dressedhistory dot com is also our website where you can sign up for our monthly newsletter our in person tours and online fashion history courses and you can check out whatever else we have up our finely tailored sleeves we get.
- [64:19]
Cassidy
So many questions from you all about our recommendations for fashion history books so if you are interested you can always find a link in our show notes to our bookshop bookshelf so that address is bookshelf shop dot org shop dressed and there you can find over one hundred and fifty of our favorite fashion history titles and do you love dressed.
- [64:41]
April
But want to skip the ads you can now sign up for ad free listening with any tier on our dressed.
- [64:46]
Cassidy
History patreon we are also excited to now be part of the airwave network and their premium ad free history subscription airwave history plus available in alpha apple podcasts the subscription brings dress and also twenty seven other popular history podcasts ad free for just five dollars ninety nine cents per month more information on patreon and airwave is available at the link in our bio thank you as always.
- [65:11]
April
For tuning in and more dressed coming your way very soon the history of fashion is a production of dressed media.
- [65:23]
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