Warning: mild spoilers for Babygirl below.
In Babygirl, an intense, fiery affair between high-powered CEO Romy (Nicole Kidman) and her enigmatic intern, Samuel (Harris Dickinson), is fueled by an ongoing, ambiguous game of power plays. In the production notes, director Halina Reijn — who also brought us the quintessential Gen Z horror comedy Bodies, Bodies, Bodies — explained, “That whole relationship between the two of them is just going: Who’s the cat? Who’s the mouse? Who’s using who?”
During a brief interaction in the sleek office pantry, an enthralled Romy commands Samuel to make her a coffee. The subordinate, sensing her intrigue, cheekily counters by shaming her afternoon caffeine habits.
“How many coffees do you drink a day?” he asks, with a glint in his eye. “None of your business,” retorts Romy, wearing a soft pink blouse and skirt, wrapped in a dove gray Max Mara wool-cashmere coat. She then yields: “Seven.”
“We really wanted to show the amount of control she had in how she presents herself,” says costume designer Bart, one half of Kurt and Bart. “Part of that was [her color] palette. Even though she’s this super calculating and controlling executive, she [has] this hyper-feminine, but really neutral presentation. It’s tone-on-tone and very pale colors. There’s a level of remove.”
Same goes for the luxurious, tactile fabrics and textures — cashmere, silk, and sheer organza — in her sumptuous wardrobe: “It feels very inviting and feminine. We wanted to show what happens when she loses control and goes down the rabbit hole,” adds Bart.
This is also reflected in her mannerisms, specifically how she handles her clothing. For instance, Romy pristinely ties the belts of her coats, further exerting (or presenting the facade of) control. “She’s a little more belted tightly, a little more closed-off,” says Kurt.
At the company holiday party, Romy paints an ideal picture of a woman who has it all, wearing a blush Giorgio Armani bodycon dress with subtle cut-outs, delicate pleating, and draping at the neckline. But, even surrounded by her perfect family — doting theater director husband Jacob (Antonio Banderas), plus teen daughters Isabel (Esther McGregor) and Nora (Vaughn Riley) — all clad in white, she’s distracted by Samuel.
In the production notes, Kidman described Romy as “not capable of being completely authentic with her husband or herself because she’s so frightened of revealing her innermost thoughts and desires and feelings and secrets, and what she considers shameful.” Through her exhilarating, often surprising, and dangerous tryst with Samuel, she’s able to explore and express her sexual desire, usually considered a societal taboo. Her wardrobe responds in kind.
“Harris’ character, obviously, lets her open up and explore another side of herself, and that’s when [her clothes] get looser and more open,” says Kurt. (As for Dickinson’s costumes, he googled “interns on the subway” to inform his ill-fitting but actually custom-made suits and Men’s Warehouse ties. “I find that contrast really, really interesting,” Kurt notes.)
Arriving at Samuel’s low-rent hotel room with the intention to put a stop to the mutual flirtation, Romy sends a mixed message armored up in a severe, almost dominatrix-like all-black outfit: a sculptural Khaite coat over a sheer, high-neck floral Etro blouse and custom-designed, ultra-tight pencil skirt.
“She felt overexposed, so she’s closing back in — and she ends up getting overdressed for this meeting,” says Bart. “The idea is that she’s trying to assume control again, and not let him seduce her, but she’s not sure about it, so the blouse is blue and black sheer lace. She’s also wearing the highest heels that she wears in the movie, all for that scene.”
Strolling in late with snacks from the bodega, Samuel professes confusion about Romy’s intentions by referring to her sartorial messaging. “You show up dressed like this,” he says, gesturing to her ensemble, down to the towering Valentino stilettos.
“It’s what I love about the whole movie — it’s not straightforward,” says Bart. “[Romy and Samuel are] both awkward in these roles that they’re assuming, and sometimes dress completely wrong or uncomfortable for the occasion.”
Adds Kurt: “The fact that Samuel kind of doesn’t give a shit, and shows up in his dirty [Nike] hoodie, he has no sort of premeditated anything about their encounter.”
As Romy submits to her own sexual impulses and desires through the thrilling, clandestine relationship, her color palette also shifts. “She’s starting to blossom,” Kurt says. “Those colors are getting more hot and more saturated, just like she’s becoming hotter.”
Reijn’s vision for Romy’s tipping point features a sartorial tableau of sorts: As the camera shoots from overhead, she writhes on the floor of her walk-in closet, struggling to change from a signature-pink pantsuit into a sapphire velvet Zuhair Murad gown with slashes, cut-outs, and asymmetric details.
“Romy’s shedding her skin. She’s transitioning in real time,” explains Bart. “We rehearsed [the changing scene] together, like how she was going to get it all off, while she’s also pulling the dress, which is so tight, on.” Romy wears the stunning dress to supposedly support Jacob at his play’s opening night — but then lies and fakes a work emergency after receiving a text from Samuel.
Deep into the affair, Romy lies to her family, again, and rushes from the office to an outer-borough rave, to meet a tank top-clad Samuel. She’s still wearing her work outfit: a lush marigold pussy-bow blouse by Jason Wu, a custom-designed cream pencil skirt, and her camel coat (which she miraculously didn’t lose in the sweat-soaked, tweaked-out crowd). As the two engage in a sultry dance amidst the pounding music and erratic lights, Samuel slowly unravels Romy’s long ribbon tie at the neck, and peels off her blouse down to a Journelle cami.
“Seeing the blouse ripped off of her at a rave [by Samuel] is actually really exciting — there’s an abandon to that,” says Kurt. “Also, because all of her clothes are really beautiful and expensive, to see something like that just torn off her in a sweaty club was really, really exciting and really symbolic of her letting go, honestly.”
Romy opens and closes the film in a different blouse with an intricate pussy bow flourish. At first, she’s flustered, thanks to a late arrival to work and a cluster of new interns in her corner office — including a brazen, outspoken Samuel — and keeps fussing with the haphazardly-tied neck on the dove gray Saint Laurent top. In the finale scene, though, Romy, reappears in the sheer shirt, sitting tall at her desk with an immaculately-tied bow.
“When we first meet her, when she’s at her most controlled, she’s already starting to unravel a little bit,” says Bart. “It’s not like she ends up as some completely different character. She’s wearing the same clothes, but the real big difference is she’s herself. It’s really Romy that has made the change.”
Babygirl will be in theaters on December 25.
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