The Styles And Period Fashions Of Vanity Fair

30 November -0001

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A contemporary filmmaker who excels at blending the traditional with the modern, Mira Nair brings her own colorful and exuberant visual style and sensibility to Vanity Fair, as an Indian woman applying a fresh perspective to early 19th-century England.

There’s an incredible landscape in England to take advantage of. Mira is a connoisseur of photography and painting, and has a definite vision aesthetically; she is looking for images that can pull her aesthetic forward. Declan has a deep soul, and together they’re creating these images that come from the heart.

James Purefoy reflects, I’m not sure that I’ve ever worked with somebody who is this precise about what she wants to see in the frame. Mira is an intensely visual director; she brings a rigorous look to what’s in the frame and is very attentive to it.

There are lots of Indian motifs in the film wallpaper, cultural references, furniture, fabrics and so on. It was fascinating to see what she picked out and highlighted.

Production designer Maria Djurkovic adds that Nair’s influence certainly informed the design of the film: There’s a particular sort of energy that comes with Mira’s approach which I think we all successfully tapped into doing something that’s not at all like a traditional period movie in terms of the look or the feel.

Djurkovic, also inspired by the colonial influence of the era, notes that the film spans the first quarter of the 19th century, a time when Britain had colonies all over the world. Influences and references that existed in Regency England often came from the colonies Indian, North African, Chinese. Brighton Pavilion was built then. Reflecting the colors and the vibrancy of all of those influences was something that we felt was very important to convey.

We used an energetic range of colors that are true to the period, not made-up. There are a lot of Oriental influences, in textiles and papers, and even in the choice of locations themselves. It’s a mixture of everything Chinese gongs, Moroccan lanterns and Indian fabrics that we’ve had shipped over. Everything’s in there it was great fun.

On the set, remembers Bob Hoskins, we would walk into a room and it would be like a painting extraordinary.

The strong color palette also inspired costume designer Beatrix Pasztor. It was as if we were telepathic; her work and my work were very compatible, says Djurkovic of their approach to the colors.

Pasztor says that the influence of India is evident throughout the film with the use of different fabrics and textures. We used these very strong Indian colors all the way through, including purples, oranges and patterns, while also mixing in the muted English style.

Jonathan Rhys Meyers notes, It was a great era for men. They were allowed to be dandified. I loved my [character’s] uniform

Make-up and hair designer Jenny Shircore confides, It was Mira’s enthusiasm that encouraged me to do this film. The bigger, bolder, brighter aspects of this film comes from her; if you’ve seen her other films, you’ll note how she you pushes in that direction, where I was very happy to go. We’ve stretched the period, played with it, and enjoyed it. You can’t ever lose sight of where you’re coming from and the particular rules laid down by the period, but we have taken the most interesting aspects of 1800 to 1830 and made use of them.

Pasztor also adhered to the period while still exploring creative possibilities: Thackeray described costumes very well, and in detail, in the novel, so I tried to build costumes from his guidelines while introducing new textures. The silhouettes and shapes were of the era, and we used wonderful ruffled seams that are all handmade. By hand, stitching and gathering on pieces of fabric, we have created beautiful decorations on the costumes.

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