Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/1333810
Winter 2021 The Costume Designer 21 mine because my family immigrated to California in the late seventies." Of course, she still had to convince the producers. "They said, 'She does a lot of TV, and we don't want it to look that way.' They were afraid it would look too sitcom-y. I reassured them, I'm a Korean American. I lived this culture. My family didn't dress the way most people think of the '80s, the big shoulder pads, the bright neon colors." Authenticity was particularly important for such a personal story. "I sourced from my own family. My eldest brother is about the same age as Isaac, so I went through his photo albums and Polaroids. Other Korean American peo- ple on the production—actor Steven Yeun and Christina Oh, who is the producer—would chime in too. So I had plenty of different resources. Of course, everything got Isaac's approval but I interpreted it my own way. That was great. He had confidence that I could do that." Making each of the characters distinct involved a lot of interaction with the actors. "Steven was obsessed with his red hat. I said, 'I'm going to dirty it up. I'm going to damp down the color. Don't worry, it's still going to be bright.' That was his amulet. I'm glad that we made that choice because I feel that if we didn't have that red hat, everything else would have been even more muted." The result is a look that Song relates directly to her own background and experience. "I wanted to dress the kids dif- ferently from the parents and the grandmother, because the kids were born in the US. I could relate to that because that's what my parents wanted for me too. The first thing I told Isaac was I'm going to put David in primary colors, mainly in reds and blues. He was just so vibrant and his personality is just so noticeable and irresistible that I had to put him in these stronger colors." Monica (Yeri Han) also wore outfits that reference Song's upbringing. "There's this poly polka-dot skirt matched with a blue blouse that had a little tie in the front. That is what my mother wore in the eighties. I would always try to yank Photo: Josh Ethan Johnson, Courtesy of A24 Will Patton as Paul and Steven Yeun as Jacob Alan S. Kim, Steven Yeun, Noel Cho, Yeri Han Photo: Melissa Lukenbaugh, Courtesy of A24