‘This Is F*cking Perfect’: Crafting the Costumes of ‘1923’ with the Cast
The latest series in Taylor Sheridan’s “Yellowstone” franchise, “1923,” tells the story of a world in transition. The rural, classically Western values of “1883” are colliding with the modern technology of washing machines and automobiles, and the scope of the mythology has expanded beyond American borders to follow characters all over the world. That meant big challenges and exciting opportunities for costume designer Janie Bryant, who was tasked with creating wardrobe for hundreds of speaking roles and stunt players as well as thousands of extras. “We shot the show on three continents and I had four costume teams: one in L.A., one in Montana, one in South Africa, and one in Malta,” Bryant told IndieWire. “You have to take it a few days at a time, or a week at a time. You can’t think of the whole all at once because it’s too overwhelming.”
Bryant began with meticulous research into the period and the cultures under examination, collaborating closely with Native American consultants to dress Teonna Rainwater (Aminah Nieves) and her classmates at a Montana school for indigenous students. “That was actually my favorite part of the story,” Bryant said. “I love that Teonna is pure survival, and I love that story of the strength of the human spirit.”
Advisor Mo Brings Plenty came from a school like the one depicted in the series and proved to be an invaluable resource. “We talked about how a lot of their clothing was darned. It was all hand-me-downs and would have a very aged, distressed look to it. The color gray was also very important because it’s institutional. The uniforms were all different shades of gray, and there were a couple of different fabrics within that world for the girls’ clothing; the idea was that the tops and the skirts had all been washed with different clothing, so they wouldn’t all be the same tone of gray. And then a lot of the costumes had hand darning on them where a garment had been torn and then sewn up.”
While designing the schoolchildren’s clothes was about creating a cold, institutional feeling, Bryant took an entirely different approach to Alexandra (Julia Schalepfer), an English noblewoman who falls in love with adventurer Spencer Dutton (Brandon Sklenar) while on safari in Kenya. “It was important for her to start out glamorous because we want to see her world of opulence and money and privilege,” Bryant said. “Then when we see her in her safari costume, I wanted her to have a costume where she’d be able to peel off the pieces as she was peeling off the pieces of her societal roots, so to speak. So the first thing she loses is her scarf, and then as she loosens up her hair is a mess. She’s not wearing makeup, she loses the belt. She gets dirty, and the safari costume goes through this whole journey with her — as her world is being stripped away, her costume is being stripped away at the same time. Then she ends on a super glamorous moment in a ballroom that is the world she came from, and she does fit in there, but the irony is that she doesn’t really want to be in that world.”
In the video below, Janie Bryant discusses these and other key costumes of “1923.”
Costumes of “1923”
Of course, some of Bryant’s most iconic “1923” looks were designed for lead characters Jacob Dutton and Cara Dutton, played by Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren. Bryant worked closely with both actors, finding common ground with Mirren early on. “We both thought very similarly about what Cara Dutton was gonna look like,” Bryant said. “My idea was that she would be more old-fashioned and in clothes from a decade or two decades before. The waist was accentuated, the A-line skirt was very much of that period. She is a woman from a different era and it was good to make her look different from the rest of the cast, like she would be more comfortable in an almost Victorian period like the time when she was growing up. When they’re older, people aren’t going to keep up with fashion, so that was an important aspect of her character.”
For Ford, the right hat was key to creating a new classic Western hero. “Oh my gosh, I tried so many hats on Harrison,” Bryant said. “There were probably 50 to 75 hats that he tried on. But the hat that I always kept coming back to and that I talked to Harrison about was a hat with the Montana peak crease. That’s just what I kept envisioning and he loved that hat too. I named the hat we ended up with the Jacob because it was created specifically for him.” Other Jacob Dutton costumes were considerably easier to decide upon. “I remember we had our first fitting and he looked in the three-way mirror and put his hands in the pockets of his navy wool pea coat, and he said, ‘This is fucking perfect.’ I thought, ‘Well, you can’t get better than that.'”
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