Advertisement

Detective Work Led to Tracy’s Visual Appeal

Share

The movie: “Dick Tracy”

The setup: An old-fashioned, macho-type comic strip character played by Warren Beatty is resurrected from two-dimensionality along with his gal Tess Trueheart (Glenne Headly), moll Breathless Mahoney (Madonna), a cute little kid (Charlie Korsmo) and a bunch of ugly gangsters, including Big Boy Caprice (Al Pacino).

The clothes: designed by Milena Canonero, an Academy Award winner for “Barry Lyndon” and “Chariots of Fire,” and a trend-setter with her creations for “Out of Africa.”

The look: Forget about high fashion--this movie is a fashion high. Men’s costumes in particular are an artfully stylized, eye-popping parade of suits, topcoats and hats in aggressive shades of purple, ruby red, teal blue and burnt orange. (Canonero was restricted to working with the production’s seven primary shades.) Madonna’s wardrobe of sexpot gowns are dangerously curvy, decollete-revealing and midriff-baring--occasionally all at the same time. Suffice to say, they wouldn’t fly in Cincinnati.

Advertisement

The labels: Every garment in the movie was designed by Canonero. Tracy’s already-famous yellow felt fedora was made by Stetson, and his matching yellow raincoat was made to Canonero’s specifications by Burberry in New York.

The plan: After studying reams of original issues of Dick Tracy comics, Canonero went to the source--men’s wear from the ‘30s and ‘40s she found in antique stores from Los Angeles to New York. “I always look at the originals,” she says. The final inspiration was the L.A. County Museum show “German Expressionism 1915-1925: The Second Generation,” where she studied the works of such painters as George Grosz and Max Beckman. “Their colors are so grotesque,” Canonero says. Gangster coats and suits for the movie, she decided, should be similarly exaggerated and gross, so she styled trousers to be wider and more pegged than they should be, waists are higher, shoulders wider, jackets more nipped. Tailoring for Tracy and the other good guys, however, is traditional.

The payoff: A costume tour de force that not only contributes to the movie’s whimsical vision, but is a throwback to the golden days of Hollywood when visuals counted as much as stars.

Advertisement