January 31, 2013

Oscar nominations by gender - Costume

There have long been quiet but persistent complaints of discrimination against women fashion designers in the NY-Paris-Milan world of haute couture. This 2005 NYT article lays out the evidence than an Old Boys Club of male designers discriminates against women. 

We can test whether women are as discriminated against in the parallel but separate world of designing clothes for movies by looking at Wikipedia's lists of Oscar nominees. Best Costume Design nominations generally go for work on period films or fantasy films aimed at girls. For example, the current nominees are three 19th Century period films -- Lincoln, Anna Karenina, and Les Miserables versus two versions of Snow White: Mirror, Mirror (a film with a wild Eurasian aesthetic, centered on the Punjab) and Snow White and the Huntsman.

So, Costume Design Nominations aren't an apples-to-apples direct test of the sense of where fashion is headed next fall, like haute couture designers attempt to do. Instead, Hollywood honorees are designed for accurate and exquisite reproductions of past fashions, usually with some attempt to make them accessible to current tastes. Either that or some kind of timeless fairy tale fantasy.

Thus, Hollywood's top costume designers are conservative restorationists or fantasists, rather than on the fashion forward cutting edge like the Old Boys Club of New York design. And, to be a name in high fashion requires relentless self-promotion.

Still, these Oscar nominations allow a sort of oranges and tangerines comparison.

The Best Costume Design award was invented in 1948, and Edith Head quickly emerged as the most honored designer, garnering 35 nominations and 8 Oscars. (The character Edna Mode in Pixar's The Incredibles reminds many of Edith Head.) Before Head's rise to dominance in the later 1940s, the most famous Hollywood designers tended to be male, such as Adrian, who designed Dorothy's ruby red slippers. "Gowns by Adrian" was a prominent credit in many 1930s movies. Wikipedia explains that Head revolutionized movie dress design by actually listening to the leading ladies.
Head was known for her low-key working style and, unlike many of her male contemporaries, usually consulted extensively with the female stars with whom she worked. As a result she was a favorite among many of the leading female stars of the 1940s and '50s such as Ginger Rogers, Bette Davis, Sophia Loren, Barbara Stanwyck, Shirley MacLaine, Anne Baxter, Grace Kelly, Audrey Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor, and Natalie Wood. In fact, Head was frequently "loaned out" by Paramount to other studios at the request of their female stars.

Over the last ten years, women have earned 80% of nominations.

So, designing clothes for Hollywood is much less male-dominated than designing clothes for the runway.

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

Speaking from the site of the XLVII Super Bowl San Francisco 49er Chris Culliver had no comment.

Shawn said...

Don't these guys feel gay designing clothes?

Dennis Dale said...

Just glib theorizing here, but isn't the potential for gay male out-group discrimination greatest against women? I mean gays are impervious to the charms that women use to advance in heterosexual environments.
And even the queeniest alpha gays display very masculine modes of behavior--impatience with sentiment, rigid adherence to aesthetic ideals, cutting sarcasm in the face of mediocrity or kitsch.
It's all reminiscent of the modern/postmodern (masculine/feminine) modes of discourse recently discussed here.

Straight men have had at least to learn how to condescend toward this feminine way of thinking. It's part of our socialization.
Homosexuality can almost be seen as flight from everything feminine, not just sex.

But the gays have the ladies convinced they're natural allies. Every girl wants a cuddly gay friend. American womanhood is one big, annoying fag-hag!

wren said...

I'm a fan of Eiko Ishioka who did the Mirror Mirror costumes (before she passed away). I'm not sure she could really be called a conservative restorationist.

She did some amazing work over the years, including for Tarsem's other movies as well as stuff for Bjork, the Beijing Olympics, Cirque du Soleil, etc.

Anonymous said...

Designer clothes are meant to show off the assets of a man's trophy wife to other men. It doesn't surprise me that men dominate the field of wrapping rich women.

On the other hand, the crafty bent in white women is given full expression in the design of elaborate period costumes. The more frills and frippery, the better. So I wouldn't be surprised if women with Joann's charge cards dominate the design of costumes for stage and set.

diana said...

"Thus, Hollywood's top costume designers are conservative restorationists, rather than on the fashion forward cutting edge like the Old Boys Club of New York design."

Oh, isn't this just like you, Steve. Women aren't even creative in the one area where we could expect them to be?

Tell me, exactly what DO you know about fashion?

Can you supply one name of a creative fashion designer in the Boy's Club of NYC?

The fact is that virtually all designers recycle the ideas of two women: Coco Chanel, and Madeleine Vionnet.

The best designers nowadays are Miuccia Prada and the Missoni girl. Alberta Ferreri is pretty good too. All Italian, all women.

There is very little creativity in NYC/Paris.

as to golfing, top one percent golfer said...

Steve, did you write this by yourself, or did you have help from some really smart girl?
In either case, excellent post
BTW, as a DC not an LA resident, with better access to good art museums than cool movie theaters, I can confidently state that the most inspiring non-classical fashion designer of all time is the Italian painter Titian. 60 seconds on Google Images should convert the doubtful

Anonymous said...

"And even the queeniest alpha gays display very masculine modes of behavior--impatience with sentiment, rigid adherence to aesthetic ideals, cutting sarcasm in the face of mediocrity or kitsch...
Homosexuality can almost be seen as flight from everything feminine, not just sex."

You don't women that well, I take it, sir. When competing against other women (even when we pretend not to be) we are quite ruthless, unsentimental and sarcastic. How could you miss that?

Anonymous said...

Anecdotally the costume designer in every DVD extra features segment I've watched has been a woman (and more often than not a Brit).

And the costumer will enthuse about the freedom that was given to her for work on the attached film, which doesn't sound quite as interesting as it seems to be to her.

Anonymous said...

So when the New York playwrights moved in, women's % screenwriting dropped.

In New York, the gay segment is preventing women designers.

So Jewish/Gay domination is really bad for women.

Steve Sailer said...

"And the costumer will enthuse about the freedom that was given to her for work on the attached film, which doesn't sound quite as interesting as it seems to be to her."

It's a niche interest, but for people interested in old clothes, it's a dream job.

Dutch reader said...

When do you reckon we can expect the first disparate impact lawsuit for discrimination against men in the Oscar Best Costumes awards?

Dennis Dale said...

You don't women that well

No, alas, I don't women much at all, anymore. And I used to women so well!

See, Miss, that was we fellas call sarcasm--oh who am I kidding, she'll never get it.

Anonymous said...

In New York at least, Asian Americans (both men and women) are making a big showing in the fashion design industry so at least in NYC there isn't much evidence of an old guard elite.

"Asian-Americans Climb Fashion Industry Ladder"
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/05/fashion/05asians.html?_r=0

Hunsdon said...

Costume design is an area I know very, very little about. I remember Ridley Scott talking about the cost of the costumes for The Duellists, but that investment paid off.

Hunsdon said...

Anonydroid, 5:48PM said: Designer clothes are meant to show off the assets of a man's trophy wife to other men.

Hunsdon: Designer clothes are whimsical things gay men design to look good on sixteen year old anorexic girls that look like Justin Beiber.

Anonymous said...

Yea but it wasn't very good sarcasm so going off your principles you are either a really low on the totem pole fag or a woman herself. Picking on a typo and trying to discredit a person with that is basically quintessential mean girl/ feminine discourse. Indeed, of the posters on this site I'd say only Steve when he isn't writing his woe is me posts and that Aaron guy consistently post using the hallmarks of male discourse. Just about everyone else makes recourse to a lot of resentiment-y tactics. Like they say if you can't sleep with them act like them.