In working alongside costume designer Mirren Gordon-Crozier on Apple TV+’s miniseries Lessons in Chemistry, actress Aja Naomi King was impressed by the extent to which each costume brought forward was “grounded in this value system of who these people truly are.”
Offering a fresh take on midcentury fashion, the historical drama spans the years 1949-1957, centering the spotlight on women who reject what Gordon-Crozier calls “the traditional 1950s women color palette,” in favor of the “color palettes and textures and fabrics and patterns” befitting the more grounded image they want to project.
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An adaptation of the same-name novel from Bonnie Garmus, Lessons in Chemistry follows Elizabeth Zott (Brie Larson), whose dream of being a scientist is put on hold in a patriarchal society. When Elizabeth finds herself fired from her lab, she accepts a job as host of TV cooking show Supper at Six and sets out to teach a nation of overlooked housewives — and the men who are suddenly listening — a lot more than recipes.
Garnering her first Emmy nomination for her work on the show, as did Gordon-Crozier, King portrays Harriet Sloane, Elizabeth’s neighbor who comes to be one of her closest confidantes, fighting at the same time to stop the building of a freeway that will decimate the predominately Black neighborhood of Sugar Hill.
Whereas “the secretaries and the Fran Frasks of the show were mimicking what they were advertising in Sears or whatever kind of magazine they were reading,” says Gordon-Crozier, Elizabeth and Harriet “had bigger fish to fry than worrying about the newest fashions,” opting instead for a “more utilitarian” look.
Something that crossed King’s mind, in portraying a woman looking to be taken seriously within a patriarchal and still often racist society, was “how your appearance becomes safety, in a way, in terms of being taken seriously or being thought of or perceived in a certain way.” Adds the actress in conversation with Gordon-Crozier in today’s episode of The Process, “It’s like your clothing becomes your armor.”
With the looks of Elizabeth and Harriet, Gordon-Crozier says she had to walk “such a fine line” between something grounded or “boring,” trying to make costumes look “realistic without being too stylized.” If there was one phrase that captured the look Zott personally was going for, she says, it would be not “too frivolous, but…fashionable.”
This was what Gordon-Crozier had in mind when designing custom lab coats for Elizabeth, which she wears over the course of the series. In racking her brain about how she could make each one appear utilitarian while popping with a bit of style, she thought back to a traveling Dior show she’d attended in Paris, which comprised an entire room full of white dresses, each one stylistically unique. The idea, she said, was “using one fabric, similar silhouettes, and just literally changing the tiniest detail, whether it was black piping or…a scarf through the collar, and just different fastenings and ways of closing it,” to make each look stand apart.
While at the beginning of the series, Gordon-Crozier says, Elizabeth “doesn’t want to be noticed by any means,” dressing in sweater vests, a work-mandated skirt and the same muted color palette as the men around her, her style evolves once she’s in her element at Supper at Six. At this point, recalls the designer, “she started having fun and being playful, and you can see this weight is lifted off her shoulder a little bit. She loves her daughter so much, and this cooking show, she’s having fun with, even though it might not be her end goal in life.”
The color Gordon-Crozier used as a through line in depicting Elizabeth at each stage of her life was green, which was all too appropriate, King says, as “you literally get to watch her blossom” over the course of the show.
Developed by Lee Eisenberg, Lessons in Chemistry last month scored 10 Emmy nominations in total. Larson was nominated for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie, with Lewis Pullman landing a Supporting Actor nom. Beyond aforementioned nominations for Costume Design and Supporting Actress, the show also scored in Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series, as well as the areas of cinematography, directing, main title design, original score, and main title theme music.
Check out the full conversation between Gordon-Crozier and King above.