How molded fruit inspired ‘Great Expectations’ costume designer Verity Hawkes’ clothing for Miss Havisham

Literature’s all-time jilted spinster, Miss Havisham, has been played by Martita Hunt, Anne Bancroft, Gillian Anderson and Helena Bonham Carter while also inspiring other memorable screen personalities, most notably “Sunset Boulevard’s” Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson). In “Peaky Blinders” showrunner Steven Knight’s adaptation of “Great Expectations,” Olivia Colman dons the tattered veil of the iconic character to whom unwitting orphan Philip “Pip” Pirrip (Fionn Whitehead) turns as he pursues social repute in Victorian England.  

Though Knight’s amendments to Charles Dickens’ source material have gotten a mixed response, the show continues to draw praise for its production value. Costume designer Verity Hawkes, whose credits include “Snatch,” “Inkheart” and “Black Mirror,” recently gave an interview to IndieWire’s Sarah Shachat in which she detailed her approach to the unenviable task of distinguishing Knight’s rendition of the character from more than a dozen others. 

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SEE ‘Great Expectations’ creator Steven Knight responds to criticism he strayed from Charles Dickens’ novel: ‘What’s the point?’

For inspiration, Hawkes turned to the work of artist Kathleen Ryan, who makes sculptures of molded fruit using semi-precious stones. The costume designer has “always been slightly fascinated by [how Ryan has] made mold beautiful, so [the process of dressing Havisham] was researching mold and the beauty of mold.” The on-screen result also draws from the sculptor’s work thematically. Ryan explained in a New York Times profile that the rotting fruits’ “opulence and overripeness…comment on worldly excess” – fitting, given that Havisham’s wedding dress is embroidered with “Chinese motifs of birds and flowers” to reference her family’s opium fortune. 

Grey Gardens, the East Hampton estate of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis’ aunt and cousin, “Big” and “Little” Edie Bouvier Beale, where the 1976 documentary about the pair and eventual Emmy-winning HBO film of the same name starring Jessica Lange and Drew Barrymore are set, also provided a visual framework. Shachat writes that Havisham’s home “hews to a Grey Gardens aesthetic, with a tree intruding past broken windows and a sense of rewilding taking place as moss creeps along the corners. That sense of encroaching rot also influenced Havisham’s look, as opposed to the cobwebbed, dusty look that most adaptations have gone for.” 

SEE ‘Great Expectations’: Olivia Colman’s chilling performance is red-hot Emmy contender

Hawkes explained that she wanted the residence to be an extension of its occupant: “That sort of damp, decrepit nature has crept into the house, and it’s crept into her as well.” Discussing the role with Parade’s Walter Scott, Colman said she was able to access the character after hearing Hawkes say, “I don’t see [Miss Havisham] as dusty, I see her as rotting from the inside.” “I thought ‘Oh my god, that’s it’…the costume literally looks like mold is growing up it and you can see her heart is rotting,” the Oscar and Emmy winner, ranked fifth by Gold Derby’s Movie/Limited Supporting Actress odds, said of her creative breakthrough. 

Will “Great Expectations” compete in Best Period Costumes and score Hawkes a much-deserved first Emmy nomination? If so, how will the limited series that’s currently streaming on Hulu fare against the final season of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” and reigning champ “The Great”? 

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