With the release of Lee Daniels’ film The United States Vs Billie Holiday this week, the jazz star’s signatures (dresses, gloves and gardenias) are being reassessed Could they be a radical act?
Finally, on Monday, February 22, 2021 at 14:05 GMT
For her concert at Carnegie Hall in March 1948, after 10 months in prison, Billie Holiday wore a long dress, gloves and this gardenia, she was, as always, every square inch the star. With off-level imitation diamond coats, ponytails and sunglasses, Holiday exuded mid-century glamour.
The United States Vs Billie Holiday through Lee Daniels opens this month. The film, starring Andra Day, focuses on Holiday at the height of her fame in the late 1940s and early 1950s when she was attacked by the FBI, after she began making a song Strange Fruit, a protest song about lynchings in the South. Considered by the firm to be a troublemaker when he refused to avoid making a song that was considered a debatable song, the FBI recruited Jimmy Fletcher, a rare black agent, to arrest Holiday, a well-known heroin addict, for drug food offenses. Daniels’s film, Johann Hari’s 2015 e-book Chasing the Scream as the basis, tells the story of that era, and taste is a component of that story.
Paolo Nieddu, the film’s costume designer, said he had begun researching the costumes by combining an album of images. “I set out to locate as much as I could at the time, but I came back more alone to help me get a concept of all the elements of his taste,” he says. What were you wearing in the 1930s?You’ll find shots of her at dinners, smoking at a table, sitting with Hazel Scott and other jazz musicians. “
Nieddu followed the way Holiday experimented with his clothes. “I’m chasing her and I like her, ” What year is this?He says, “[Or] she doesn’t wear a bra at a time when underwear is so tight. “emphasizes his penchating for imitation diamond sunglasses: “You’re like, “Those glasses are wild. “
Perhaps it was Holiday’s avant-garde reputation that attracted Prada to the film. Nieddu has worked with the logo on 8 outfits, adding a yellow sequined satin dress that, along with the ponytail, becomes a reference for new party fans. It was kind of a “wish list” collaboration. “I would show them a get dresseded, locate a file and say, “I love the Resort 2011 handbag, but can you get dressed up from it and make it yellow?”And they said, yes, ” said Nieddu. It was crazy, it was literally like customizing Prada pieces. “
Daniels’ film focuses in part on Holiday’s drug use, which has had an effect on his taste. Nieddu pulls out the long gloves, “an iconic detail of Billie’s fashion, but the genuine fact is to hide the marks of the needles. “is a pathetic in general to his taste in some way. “
Above all, Holiday, in Daniels’ film and in the symbols of the time, never fulfilled the stereotypical symbol of a drug addict, but enjoyed fashion and had the joy of seeing the performer in satin, silk, heels and hairstyles. Perhaps for Holiday, who was abused as a child and was probably traumatized by his persecution through the government, the garments were a type of armor. At one point in the film, Miss Freddie, Holiday’s closest friend, told Jimmy Fletcher, “It looks like a million dollars, but the fees are worthless. “
But for a black woman in the United States at the time, this glamour can also be perceived as a kind of resistance. In fact, it was a concept that That Day saw in his character. Don’t forget how radical it was for a black woman to be in her position at the time,” the actor told Vogue. “Traditional society had the challenge of seeing black women in a context of success. At the time, hate was still a component People were like, “How dare you use diamonds, how dare you wear furs?” however, she dressed like a woman of her stature. She represented herself precisely as she sought and that in itself was revolutionary. in a star costume, photographed at a court hearing in San Francisco in 1949.
As the singer acknowledged, racism was there, no matter what you wore. Speaking of concerts in the south, he said, “You can live up to your white satin lunatics, with gardenias in your hair and no sugar cane in miles, yet you can still paint on a plantation. “However, he persisted, and his impressive visibility contributed to his persecution. Federal agent George White, who also investigated Holiday, discovered that her taste was a component of what made her so dangerous. “, with their coats and luxury cars, their jewellery and their dresses, ” he said. She was the wonderful girl wherever she went. “
There is a sure challenge in every element of his life, says Nieddu. “The vanguard in it, I don’t know if she came here because of the way she saw things,” she says. Fruit] proves that this woman is not afraid and takes a chance. I think that’s reflected not only in his music, but also in his style.
United States vs. U. S. Billie Holiday will be at Sky Cinema from February 27