Jonathan Anderson, when you first met Luca Guadagnino years ago, I'm assuming now, did you ever imagine you guys would have two movies, Challengers and Queer, out in the same year?
It would never have crossed my mind at all. It has been such a surreal year. You know, when I met Luca years and years ago, I never imagined that we would have done this. And I know it's a bit of a dream come true for me because when you're able to work with one of your best friends and make his dreams come true and make it all kind of come to life, it is kind of slightly surreal. I'm still trying to piece together this year.
Well, when you met all those years ago, was this ever brought up, discussed, like, hey, one day, you know, you designed clothes for my films?
I think he had suggested that we would work together one day. And I think when someone says that, you're just like, sure, you know, it was a bit kind of... And then we just became very good friends over the years. And then I think just before the pandemic we were about to do a project and then it didn't happen. And then suddenly Challengers came up and then I was like, the pandemic had happened, I was like, why not? What have I got to lose? I have no idea how I'm going to do this, but we'll make it happen.
I love that Challengers was your first film together because I love tennis and I love all your work in it. And I felt like you really captured tennis gear and tennis kits. And I know you have a history with Uniqlo and Roger Federer as well, but I guess how familiar were you with tennis going into the movie?
You know, I grew up in a family which was all about rugby, so tennis was never on my radar. I know some people are obsessed by tennis, and me and Luca were kind of joking that we didn't really know anything about it. But it was amazing that when you start to research something that you don't know enough about, how obsessed you become. It's like Justin Kuritzkes, you know, how he came to the script is so fascinating. It's this idea that when you become obsessed by something that you had no knowledge of and then you become a fan. I think for me it was like delving into something that is foreign to you is actually really, I think sometimes quite good because you come in with naive eyes. You're seeing things in a different way, and I find it really fun actually. It was so not on my radar that I became completely hooked with the perfection of finding the technicality of what that should be.
Yeah, and Luca, yeah, for sure, he's said in the past like this is not a tennis movie, it's a movie about people. But did you also look at the tennis kits the same way?
I did actually, because you know, I've worked with Uniqlo and designing stuff for tennis, and I had completely detached from this whole thing. No, I think what I like about working with Luca is it is all about the psychological act. So in a weird way you are looking at what is the notion that you're giving about the world that you're entering when you walk into the cinema. And for me I became really obsessed by this idea of, you know, I work in fashion and I work in these big brands, and I was thinking of when you get off an airplane in America, it is amazing how we are so immune to the idea of the brand. Or when we watch sports, anything to do with sports on television, it is brand, brand, it is so many brands. They become nearly obsolete because they are part of the patchwork of everything. And that's why when me and Luca were working, we were thinking it's good that we don't take any endorsement from anyone. We have control over what you see in this world. And the psychology of what brand means, it's this idea of why Uniqlo is being used and why Juicy Couture in one period in the early 2000s was a thing. It was the idea of Abercrombie & Fitch, it was the birth of teenage angst in the early 2000s. So for me it was an interesting period in clothing.
Like Queer, it's two interesting moments I find in fashion that are quite subtle. Because in Challengers you're looking at nearly the birth of capitalism, really, of a new type of capitalism in fashion with younger people being hooked by image that ultimately means status. And you see in Tashi's character how status changes over the years. It's about power with her. And I think this is what I love about my job, and it's such a dream. This year I've been kind of like, wow, clothing has so many meanings. And it's not until you do a film that you realize how much meaning clothing has, because you've got to get an audience to be able to see the character straight away in this two-hour, three-hour film. You need to be able to know where you are, so that on work with the actor, you're giving them the confidence as well of a knowledge that they have that they want to bring to that character.
Yeah, for sure. And you could really clock all three of them immediately. Like you said, Tashi was all about power, and then she lost all of her potential endorsement deals with her injury, right? That's like an undercurrent in the movie. And now she's living vicariously through Art. He's still active, he's all dressed in Uniqlo, and he's rich but a journeyman. And he's running low on money so he's just using old clothes during endorsements.
Yeah, and I think what is interesting about it is that there is a psychology about the aloofness that only nearly comes through wealth somehow. There is a nonchalance, there is a cockiness that ultimately no matter what you wear, you just ooze appeal. And whereas Art becomes this sort of archetype, it is nearly like a vehicle of the precision of tennis, the togetherness. And it's also his game too, right? He has the perfect game, the one-handed backhand, he has the quiet nerve of course. And I think for me it's sort of like when you're looking at a contemporary piece of costume design, you're trying to... I actually think it's incredibly difficult. I only realized this by going into historical period film like Queer. Within Challengers you have to take something that exists in a very short period of time of history and make you realize that you are getting history in a flashback that is so accurate that you feel that you're in that period. So it became quite hard, and when you're doing it for the first time you become very conscious of trying to really dive into the research on that part because it's easier said than done.
Ultimately what I realized after doing Queer, which is in the 1940s and 50s, where you're going back in time, there's this... but when you're dealing with a period when I was at high school in the 2000s, I remember the birth of Abercrombie & Fitch, I remember the obsession over Juicy Couture, I remember those moments. So it was kind of an odd experience because you're trying to find newness in something you've already lived.
Yeah, I think I guess also with contemporary fashion, like Challengers too, modern fashion, the audience is more likely to latch on to something like that "I told you" shirt. Did you ever expect people to be like, I want one?
Yeah, this I never saw coming. I had already planned that we would remake the T-shirt because I've always loved that image of JFK Jr. And I planned that I wanted to do it as a kind of creative exercise. I had no idea that it was going to be able to be bootlegged globally. I was walking down streets in New York and I was like, this is what is going on, what is happening? This is your impact, this is what you did. And it was really fast, it was so interesting to watch. I think the power of this film, this is why I think Luca is such a genius, is that it transcends off the screen. This has been the most remarkable thing about the film. It has gone into the subculture. And this I find you can't even control, this just happens. It's just something you just don't imagine.
Yeah, for sure. Well, I definitely want to get to Queer, and like you've said, that's obviously period and Challengers is modern. But I felt like some of the fashion, especially that Drew wears, is kind of modern too, like that sheer shirt. So what kind of research do you do into the 50s, and specifically I guess expats in Mexico in the 50s?
You know, I think I have always been obsessed by this moment. Pre-war for me is one of the most fascinating moments in men's wear fashion because it is the birth of the industrial suit. The war happens and then suddenly everyone is liberated, there's this growth spurt in industrial practices and fashion. But you still have this idea of classicism. So for me, for Queer, everything had to be original. I wanted everything from the period, the underwear, the sock, everything had to be original. And I wanted it to be singular pieces, so that's all they wore. There were no duplications. It was very much like, this is the linen suit, as it ages through the film it will age through the process. And I loved this part because I think as a fashion designer, men's wear in the 50s just has this amazing moment because the fabrications in the 50s are very difficult to reproduce today. We don't have looms that do some of the things that existed. And when I look at Allerton, for example, we found a series of three suits that used to belong to one person that I had found, and they are so contemporary. The see-through shirt, they were dead stock that I found from the 50s. They were leisure shirts, you bought them, they came in packs of three. And I loved how strange they were, but they are from the period. And you kind of realize sometimes we think we're so modern, but some of these things were already part of the public domain.
