Courtney Howard // Film Critic
Mention Colleen Atwood’s name to any cinephile and, chances are, no less than five iconic pieces will spring to mind. Her signature style is indelible and her craftwork is impeccable, standing the test of time with textured fabric selections and chic silhouettes. Bringing tremendous insight to the characters on screen through their fashions is what this costume designer extraordinaire has done remarkably for decades now. And her work on BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE is no different, bringing beloved, pre-existing characters – and a couple of new ones – into the contemporary era.
I’m so curious how your creative process begins on any film, but especially with Tim Burton and specifically on a project like this where you’re stepping into a world that’s already been established by another costume designer.
“Tim and I always meet and talk about the project, the script, the characters. That’s my starting point with him. And once I go away, I gather ideas, fabrics and visuals of what each thing is and then I show him those. We have a kind of reactive relationship. He tells me what he’s excited about and what he isn’t excited about. Once that happens, I begin the process of making and gathering the pieces and doing fittings with the actors and we take it from there, collaborating with them and set their characters.
Stepping into the world of BEETLEJUICE, which I did not do – that was Aggie Rodgers. It was made 35 years ago. Thing have changed a lot in how movies get made, what you’re shooting with and materials and all that. The original Beetlejuice was based on a sketch of Tim’s and was all about that striped suit. You take what was there. And what was great about it was the amazing graphic simplicity of it – the use of color, the use of things to establish character. Then you imagine these people, probably not 35 years later, but in movie years, that’s probably 15 years later, but you imagine these people as to what’s gone on in life and what’s happened to them one by one and then expand on what was started by their characters as young people.
Even Betelgeuse got older – he got more of a stomach, his clothes are more rumpled and got more aging on them, like he’s been banging around in the underworld for a long time. Lydia is still a bohemian and leaning into black, but she’d gotten a little bit more savvy with her bohemianism. We’ve got Delia, who’s still striving to be in the moment, going with whatever trend is in front of her. So you take all those things and push them that way to get a new world. We had a little bit more going on in the underworld this time with specific characters – Astrid’s father, Richard and Betelgeuse has different disguises that are fun. We had a lot of things going on down there – Soul Train and all kinds of fun, festive things that gave it a whole new world, rather than just a waiting room, which is a big difference in the two shows.”
For the reoccurring characters, I loved that you pulled from their iconic looks that we all vividly remember and then add a fun little twist on top of the familiar legacy. Maybe I’m over thinking this, but were you able to maybe go into any archives and source patterns to add your own signature?
“No, you, just look at it. I don’t even think there are patterns for those archives, to be honest. It’s not that kind of movie. It’s also overkill. Like why would I wanna do that, because I can make different patterns to what’s more appropriate to what I’m doing than taking someone else’s patterns from 35 years ago and were basically off-the-rack stuff. That’s not part of my process on this movie, or any movie.
If you’re doing a historical movie, you look at historical clothes, you look how clothes were made and what they are and then you adapt them to peoples’ bodies today, which are basically twice as big as they were in 1850, for instance. It’s a whole different process. Actually going back and doing that is pretty unusual unless you’re being super precious and these kinds of movies are not those kinds of movies.”
Delia has always expressed herself through clothing. How creatively liberating was it to be able to dress an artist who has no boundaries? Did you draw any inspiration from schoolmates during your days at Cornish?
“When I went to college, artists didn’t dress to be looked at. It was before social media. Artists dressed as artists, which tended to more dress like Lydia, dark clothes with paint on them – that kind of creative vibe. People in fashion leaned into being looked at more than fine artists, except for today’s world where so much is required of people’s media presence.
To me, Delia was just a person who wanted to be so on trend and so in the moment that she embraced crazy fashion that suited her art. She was part of her own instillations, in a way, like big sculptural clothes and the jumpsuit that matches the wall painting. She was in that moment, mourning and overdramatic. All those things is what we embraced with her character.”
You had mentioned before a little about collaborating with the actors. I’d imagine you have the most amazing front row seat seeing them transform right in front of your eyes. What were some of the ideas they brought to you to work into your designs? Does it work like that?
“Generally, not so much. I mean, you talk to them about their character more than their designs per se. We spent time with each actor. For Delia, we leaned into fashion, heavily noting the 80s, which all these characters have their moment in time. Jenna [Ortega], we talked about who Astrid was and where she wasn’t like her mother, she was in a way. She was really into 90s music, so her costumes are more leaning into that style, but today’s version of it with denim and vintage fabric made into dresses and torn sweaters – Seattle grunge kind of vibe.
Justin’s [Theroux] clothes, we had a great time with his character. We had him be like LA agent meets New York art dealer hustler – super fashion, but the kind of fashion that isn’t in the magazines, like Maxfield-esque brands. That was fun in the man world of it. Betelgeuse is leaning into some fun shrink outfits in the mix.”
You had brought up the Soul Train sequence. I was blissing out on all the costumes there. How intensive was that?
“It was great. We had fittings where everyone got painted the color that they were going to be and then we keyed their costumes and makeup together so they evoked a great time and great era for fun clothes. We muted the clothes a little bit. A lot of the 70s stuff is a lot brighter, but because of the lighting in the underworld, we dimmed it a little bit so it’d be like they’d been down there dancing for a while, getting ready to get on the Soul Train.”
I also loved Wolf Jackson’s great leather trench and Delores’ black lacey gowns. How do you go about choosing the fabrics and textures for these characters?
“I read who the characters are and I just see them. Dafoe I just saw as a 70s police detective with the leather. I came up in New York in the early 80s and there was all those SERPICO cop shows, like FRENCH CONNECTION too, with those leather coats. So I was training into that for his look. With Delores, Tim and I talked about her and she’s a combination of an old horror movie and a Mario Bava thing with the low cut, shredded tops. So we had a plan in mind for those characters in that way.”
Are there things that you’ve learned on other productions early on in your career – like in FOR KEEPS, CABIN BOY, MANHUNTER, or MARRIED TO THE MOB – that you continue to apply today?
“The thing about design in film is that it always changes. So you learn everything you apply and you forget it. When you’re as old as me, you forget a lot of stuff. You learn things and then you know you have them inside you and they just come out on different jobs in different ways. I don’t think there’s anything beside the blue painted person in CABIN BOY, and who remembers CABIN BOY [laughs]….”
[raises hand, laughs] I saw it opening day and I loved it!
“[laughs] God bless you. I know it’s now a cult-y kind of thing, but it was fun to work on. There’s something in everything that circles back in your life and it sometimes takes you by surprise. You don’t know really where it came from, but it’s in there somewhere.”
This might be like asking to choose your favorite child, but do you have favorite pieces you’ve designed that you’re most proud of?
Yeah, I kind of forget about what was and then I re-watch something. Like recently there’s been a lot of attention on SLEEPY HOLLOW, which I really love what I got to do on that show. I love the hand-painted stripe costume of Christina Ricci’s. Charlize [Theron], on the first HUNTSMAN and Emily [Blunt], as a bake-off on the second HUNTSMAN, was so much fun to do that. It was full on. Every costume was trying to outdo the last one, which was really fun for me. This sort of magic concept of Tim and Alice, getting her out of this blue dress, shrinking and growing, was a really great experience for me, before technology took over in a way that it does, we had to figure out ways to make costumes and big heads fit together without it being a digital thing. It was really a great experience I remember fondly.
I actually had “the entirety of the ALICE movies” written on my list – and the coats in FANTASTIC BEASTS. I call that one FANTASTIC COATS AND WHERE TO FIND THEM. They’re in that movie.
“Yep. It was all about the coats and I so wanted to get rid of capes that I had to do coats. We were in the 30s, which is really a great era for it.”
You’ve dipped into costume design in so many different eras and film genres. Do you have a favorite?
“What I like about my career and my jobs that I’ve done is that it is so all over the place and that I don’t know what’s next. I really like mixing it up. I just finished a super contemporary film with Paul Thomas Anderson and I’m still doing WEDNESDAY and I did MASTERS OF THE AIR. Every time you do something different, you learn more and you get better at what you do. To me, rather than spin out just doing futuristic or modern day, isn’t as interesting as getting to do what I’ve done. I’ve always tried to do different things. Part of that is because of the directors work a lot and they change what they do. It helps me.”
BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE is now playing in theaters.
