Like real teens across the decades (and the pond), students on the big screen this season succeed in presenting their status, aspirations and insecurities despite the confines of a school uniform — or dress code, like at Barton Academy, circa 1970, in Focus Features’ The Holdovers. To fill out the archetypes at the fictional New England boys boarding school, costume designer Wendy Chuck raided costume houses for late-’60s suit jackets, trousers, button-down shirts and ties. “Is he a kid that has to look disheveled? Is he the jock that is more put together?” says Chuck.
On the last day of class before holiday break, the brawny “bully” Teddy Kountze (Brady Hepner) glowers in a rugged brown corduroy jacket, mussed white button-down and a striped tie in an aggressive shade of red. Football player Jason Smith (Michael Provost) rebels against his aviation CEO father with his long, counterculture hair. But he exudes future investment banker in a collegiate gray wool jacket with framed lapels, khakis, a crisp light blue shirt and a navy tie. “He just looks like he stepped out of the helicopter that’s taking him skiing,” says Chuck.
Sullen Angus Tully (newcomer Dominic Sessa) is stranded over the holidays at Barton so that his mother can spend quality time with her new husband. Chuck hints at his deep sadness and vulnerability through Angus’ “little shield crest”-patterned navy neckwear, which bookends his coming-of-age journey. “That could have been his father’s tie,” says Chuck.
In researching yearbooks from the elite Deerfield Academy in Massachusetts (and even speaking with the school’s librarian from the time), Chuck noted sartorial humblebrags, which she interpreted for The Holdovers. “A lot of these real kids, they’re affluent, and they go to Europe and they bring back [mementos],” she says. When Teddy and the other held-over boys, sans Angus, manage to escape a bleak holiday at Barton, he excitedly dresses in a green T-shirt tucked into his jeans.
“I thought that had an Italian kind of feel,” says Chuck, emphasizing the students’ burgeoning interests and curiosity beyond the classroom. “I wanted to show they also embraced elements of the world outside Barton Academy, and brought that back.”
Jumping forward to 2006 and 2007 in Amazon MGM Studios’ Saltburn, scholarship student Oliver Quick (Barry Keoghan) eagerly enters the eminent grounds of Oxford to begin first term. He’s meticulously outfitted in the university dress code that he anticipated: a black suit, white button-up shirt with a starched collar and excessive amounts of school spirit on his Oxford-emblem tie and striped scarf. “Then he gets the shock of his life when he sees everyone in such a different light,” says costume designer Sophie Canale. That’s because the university’s posh set loll about campus in the sloppy-chic trends and labels of the mid-aughts. “Juicy Couture, pajamas and Ugg boots,” says Canale, also referencing Abercrombie & Fitch jeans and Tommy Hilfiger polos. “There’s just an air of not trying, really.”
2000s: In ‘Saltburn,’ Farleigh (Archie Madekwe, right) inspects Oliver’s (Barry Keoghan) too long jacket sleeves.
Courtesy of Amazon Prime
For dinner, an undeterred Oliver dons regulation subfusc, Oxford’s academic dress. His undergraduate-denoting “commoner’s gown,” a black hip-length pleated vest, is precisely positioned over his stuffy outfit. Meanwhile, at the popular kids’ table, reigning heartthrob Felix Catton (Jacob Elordi) has carelessly thrown his gown over his slouchy blue Ralph Lauren Polo sweater and jeans. His American cousin Farleigh (Archie Madekwe) didn’t even change out of his Adidas T-shirt; the exposed white athletic stripes practically mock the institutionality of the time-honored garb. “Farleigh’s [gown] was hanging off him,” says Canale.
With his mother exiled from the family fortune, Farleigh depends on Felix’s titled father for his fancy education and lifestyle. Even with his exquisite vintage and enviable wardrobe, featuring Wales Bonner and Gucci, the fragile Yank uses formal dress to punch down to Oliver — whose closet leans more Uniqlo and Marks & Spencer. Following the centuries-old Oxford tradition of wearing black tie and mortarboards to take final exams, Farleigh, clad in bespoke Chris Kerr, says to Oliver: “Nice tux. It’s a rental, right?” He smugly points to the offending giveaway: too long sleeves. “I did make sure that Oliver’s [rented tuxedo from Lipman & Sons] was definitely bigger and baggier, and just not quite right on him,” says Canale.
Canale also illustrated the privileged off-campus life of Oxford’s ruling class through costume clues. Felix accessorizes with colorful braided and woven friendship bracelets, which communicate more than an authentic mid-2000s fashion trend. “Felix has been on his gap year, and he’s been on these boys’ holidays, so he’s got the bracelets from traveling,” says Canale. Farleigh flexes with leather and woodworked styles conjuring jaunts to Bali and Marrakech. “They’ve started university, and it’s their first year, so it’s proof: ‘I’ve been traveling.’ ”
In A24’s Priscilla, the young ladies at Immaculate Conception High School in Memphis wear democratizing uniforms — prim pastel cardigans, plaid pleated knee-length skirts, demure Peter Pan-collar shirts and neat cross-ties — even the eponymous 17-year-old (Cailee Spaeny), who just moved in to Graceland with global superstar Elvis Presley (Elordi). The strict homogeneity sends a strong message about Priscilla’s status, nonetheless.
1960s: ‘Priscilla’s’ 17-year-old title character (Cailee Spaeny, center) might wear sophisticated frocks at parties with boyfriend Elvis Presley, but at her Catholic high school, she must dress like everyone else.
Ken Woroner/A24
“She is just this regular girl, but living this extraordinary life,” says costume designer Stacey Battat, who custom designed the 1962 period-correct uniforms around a seafoam green hue to evoke director Sofia Coppola’s “otherworldly” vision. “So at the school, Priscilla is generic. She’s one of everybody.”
Battat supplemented Priscilla’s skirt with one subtle differentiator: a flouncy petticoat. The “slightly fuller” silhouette underscores the impact of the teen’s black bouffant and dramatic cat-eye transformation into Elvis’ notion of a celebrity’s girlfriend. “It was important that this school uniform felt childlike,” says Battat, who collaborated closely with hair designer Cliona Furey and makeup designer Jo-Ann MacNeil, “in contrast to the glamorous life she was living outside of school.”
This story first appeared in a December standalone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.
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