CHALLENGERS: The Clothes

I LOVE clothes and their ability to tell a story.

Challengers changed my life. I have never been a big movie person, up until this year. The most anticipated movies people watch within the first two weeks but I usually take my sweet time. I didn’t watch the first Black Panther movie until a month or two after it had hit cinemas. I was excited about Barbie last year but, didn’t watch it until August. When it came to Challengers, I was at the cinema opening day!! I don’t know how people can say Zendaya is not a star, because my sister got me there. Three things brought me to the cinema, Zendaya, the trailer, and Jonathan Anderson. They had me at Zendaya and then announced that Jonathan Anderson was the costume designer, and fashion-obsessed me was sold!! Jonathan is the creative director of Loewe and his brand, J.W. Anderson. He makes weird but beautiful clothes. His clothes make me think, excite me, and bring meaning to my life. So, I was thrilled and intrigued to see what he would do with the film and he did not disappoint.

If you are a Jonathan Anderson fan and have not watched the movie, I would suggest you go in with no expectations and be surprised. On the opposite, if you know nothing about him, I suggest looking up his work after you watch the movie and marvel at his excellence. I have watched the movie twice in theaters and twice more at home. There are so many things that caught my attention and made Challengers climb in my top 10 movies of all time but I’m not a movie expert, so I will stick to the one thing that I can talk about with some confidence, and that is the storytelling through the clothes. Nobody should come and shout at me about being wrong because this is simply my opinion and what I observed, art is subjective, after all.

The legends, costume designer Jonathan Anderson and Luca Guadagnino.

ART

One thing I noticed about the way the character was styled was he was a person who did not have a personal style. He had a style but it was dictated by who was sponsoring him or who he represented. Off the court, he also puts just as much thought into his looks. We get the class status of the other two main characters; Tashi and Patrick, but we know nothing about Art. We know he got a scholarship to play tennis at Stanford but sports scholarships are not based on your economic means, so it’s not a giveaway. However, he is not as good as his bestie Patrick, so for him to get a scholarship to a D-1 means he worked his ass off to get there.

Back to Art’s style. The audience met Art when his Alarm went off and he had to get up to train. He was shirtless for most of that time. A few more minutes into the movie, he was dressed and heading to a competition he would be in. In that scene, he was wearing a white polo with Uniqlo branding. I registered that as he was sponsored by Uniqlo. He lost that game and it cuts to a scene of him and his coach, who was also his wife, watching the game he lost. In that scene, he was wearing a white tee and some sweats, very laid-back and chill outfits. As the movie goes on, you realize this is his style. After that scene, there is a flashback to his teenagehood days, he and Patrick were playing in a competition and that is where the audience begin to learn who Art is.

In the match, Art was dressed in all Adidas. He was not sponsored by Adidas and this is only known because when Patrick asked him if he was going to the Adidas party later, he said no so fast, until he saw Tashi and was all of a sudden interested. But before that, I was under the assumption he was sponsored by Adidas because Art is the kind of person that you would love to have as a sports brand ambassador, he wears the clothes so well. Adidas might not have sponsored him but maybe they gave clothes to athletes during the tournament and Art was more than happy to wear the full set he was given. He was wearing a full white outfit plus a hat. His shirt, shorts, hat, and shoes all had the Adidas stripes in black, he looked smart.

Art in his Adidas clothing for the game where he and Patrick were teammates.

At Stanford, the uniform for the team was made by Nike and that is all he wore. He looked smart in it as well. Art was just someone who adapted to the role that was needed from him.

Art at Stanford where he was a college athlete.

When he was not on a tennis court, the costume design team signaled to us that he still cared about his outfits and how he presented himself to the world. After he and Patrick won, he changed into a green shirt with white stripes on it and jeans. The shirt looks very loved, it has been worn for some years. Later that night, he attended Tashi’s Adidas event and he wore a pink shirt, jeans, and white sneakers. That shirt was more well-fitting and he had it buttoned all the way. This goes back to Art always dressing for the occasion. He is very aware of the class system, unlike Patrick. This leads me back to the belief that he was not as privileged as Patrick. I read a New York Times Article with the cast and director and the director; Luca Guadagnino mentions how America has a class system thing, even though they pretend not to, and it is portrayed in the three characters. Art is someone who will use clothing to get to the higher economic class. In a W magazine, Jonathan, the costume designer confirmed all these theories I had. He said “Art, her husband, is a vessel for whatever you want him to be. So if he’s going to be Adidas, he is Adidas; if he’s Uniqlo, he is Uniqlo. There is no aesthetic—it is just whatever is there.”

The first picture is of Art and Patrick after their game, the second and third pictures are from Tashi's Adidas party.

Art is not confident, so the way he wears his clothes calls him out. Even when he can afford it, he makes it seem like it was gifted. When he became a professional tennis player, though this played in his favor. He was sponsored by Uniqlo and I assume by On, the sports brand because those are the shoes he wore. As I said earlier, he wears the brands so well and looks good in all of them. So, even if he can’t convince you he bought the clothes, he can for sure convince you to buy them.

Art when he is older and a professional athlete wearing Uniqlo clothing.

PATRICK

25 to 30 minutes in, the audience finds out Patrick was wealthy but the way the movie played out, the audience quickly forgot, so his wardrobe made so much sense. The movie is set in the present and the past, and there are a lot of flashbacks. So even though class-wise, Patrick belonged to the upper class, he spent most of the movie, which was most of his adulthood struggling. Class-wise, he was rich but his bank account said otherwise.

Patrick was a mix-and-match person. Some people wear a bunch of different sports brands because they like to get their tops, bottoms, and sneakers from different brands because of comfort. Then, some people wear different brands because they buy things that are affordable at different times and put them together really well. There are the majority who buy different brands because they have no identity and just follow what everyone else is doing. Patrick was a mix of one and two.

The audience met him as he was trying to get a hotel room but his card declined and he begged the receptionist to let him stay for a night and he would pay the next day. In that scene, he was wearing a light purple windbreaker, blue shorts (men need to wear short shorts again), and sneakers. Great legs in that scene!! I couldn’t make out the brands in that scene, it came off as if he picked up some random clothes and put them together. In the flashback to the game where he and Art were teammates, he was dressed in a white polo and black shorts. His shoes were unidentifiable, which was common throughout the movie. There are maybe two or three times when the audience can identify his shoes.

The first picture is Patrick getting to New Rochelle for the tournament. The second and third are from the competition where Patrick and Art were teammates and won.

After the game, he dressed in a blue polo and khaki shorts. He wore that same outfit to Tashi’s tennis match and her Adidas party. Art changed because he knew those were two different events that called for him to change. Patrick thought highly of himself and did not think anything he wore was inappropriate for an event and he was right. The outfit worked for both events. This also speaks to how he was raised, coming from a wealthy background, he was probably taught how to wear one outfit that would work for multiple occasions that could take place in a day.

Patrick was in the same outfit for two different events. The first picture is after both boys win a game where they were teammates. The third and second are from Tashi's Adidas party.

Patrick was also a character who was comfortable with the people he was around, so comfortable he borrowed their clothes. There was a scene in their teenhood when Tashi knocked on their hotel room and Patrick grabbed the first shirt he saw, which happened to be Art’s green button-down. Then, in another scene, still in the past, he went to Stanford to visit Tashi, who was his girlfriend at the time. He and Tashi got into a fight and again, mindlessly grabbed the first shirt he saw, which happened to be Tashi’s. The shirt was grey and had bold writing in black, it read “ I TOLD YA”. Jonathan got the idea from a shirt John F. Kennedy Jr. wore in the 90s. Anderson mentioned that Patrick was supposed to be considered wealthy and to wear a shirt inspired by a Kennedy is poetry, really. Kennedy Jr. was considered stylish in his day and he and his wife, Caroline Bassett were considered a power couple. It is another symbol in a way that Tashi and Patrick are together and out of the trio, the two of them are the best at tennis.

The first picture is of JFK Jr. in the shirt that inspired the one worn by the characters, Tashi and Patrick seen in pictures 2 and 3. The shirt belonged to Tashi but Patrick borrowed it.

Art and Patrick in the same shirt. Patrick borrowed it from Art

TASHI

The costuming of Tashi from teenagehood to adulthood, always communicated confidence. It communicated assurance of oneself at all times. In her younger days, she was a free spirit and it showed in the way she carried herself and in the way she dressed. Her clothes spoke, in the words of Beyoncé “comfortable in her skin”. It was the movement and the presentation in her body language that showed it all. When one is uncomfortable in their clothes it can be obvious. They are self-conscious and timid, that was not the case with Tashi.

She was an Adidas ambassador, so on the court, that is all she wore, except for college where she wore a Stanford uniform with a Nike logo. In her first game where the boys got to see her play, she was wearing a simple but elegant short white Adidas dress. Her shoes were Adidas too and white. Her confidence came from being good at tennis and enjoying being competitive but a good outfit that did not get in the way allowed her to focus. Off the court, her outfits were outfits of a teenager, colorful and fun! After her victory, an Adidas party was thrown in her honor as mentioned earlier in this post. she wore a striking blue dress, a person has never looked that magnificent and mesmerizing on a screen. She was dancing, and she and the dress were a sight to see.

Tashi in her teenage years. This was her playing in a competition with so much passion.

Tashi Duncan in THE blue dress at her Adidas party.

After her party, the boys invited her to the beach to have a conversation, and at the end of the night she was heading home and they invited her to their hotel room to keep hanging out. She showed up wearing a pink hoodie and black shorts. I don’t know about the rest of the world but having lived in the U.S. for a minute, I have realized that is a very common outfit for teenagers, especially if they play sports. An athlete always has plenty of sports gear to throw on. It was mentioned in interviews that the zip-up hoodie was juicy couture and it is genius costuming because their teenagehood was set in 2006, which is a time when juicy couture sweat suits were popular.

Tashi in her teenage years. This is one of the outfits we saw in the trailer

Tashi as an adult who was a mother and wife was still someone who owned herself and the clothes spoke to that. The movie started with Art’s alarm going off and he woke up and then stayed in bed, The camera panned to Tashi as she was coming out of the bathroom, she was wearing a matching black set of bra and underwear with a white hotel robe. There was a flashback that explained how she and Art got together again after college which led to them getting married. In that scene, she was wearing what seemed like a light blue flowy romper. They were in a diner and when they were leaving, she put on a leather jacket and we saw her shoes, which were wedges. That outfit made Tashi look like a supermodel.

Tashi outside Applebee’s in conversation with Art after dinner.

There were two outfits of Tashi’s that screamed grown, fearless, and “I run this shit” to me. When Tashi and her family got to New Rochelle where her husband would be competing with nobodies, the first outfit, she was in the hotel lobby grabbing what seemed to be a tea in coffee-to-go cup, she then handed it to her mom along with a bag, which appeared to be a Loewe Flamenco leather tote in a tan color. In that scene, her mom went into the elevator, and she stayed behind to have a conversation with Patrick Zweig, who was there on a date. The outfit she wore in that scene made me feel like she was prepared to be confrontational. She wore a dark, green long-sleeve top with black pants. The outfit looked like a pleats please outfit from the line by Issey Miyake but I have no sources to confirm that. She also wore Chanel Espadrilles. The outfit could be very fancy loungewear but the way Tashi wore it made her command a room or the space she was in.

Tashi in the hotel lobby having a conversation with Patrick.

In the second outfit, she wore a tan sweater with black pants. She was sitting in the hotel lobby working on something when Patrick came and asked her to talk. They headed out and he made a ridiculous ask of her and she looked perplexed. She put her hands in her pockets and continued to look at Patrick with disgust for proposing something so stupid. She walked away from Patrick with so much boldness and swag. I wanted to scream at the screen “Yes! Go girl!!” until she did something silly that made me laugh.

The sweater Tashi was wearing plus her facial expressions were the stars of this scene.

Two outfits screamed confidence but Tashi was the most unsure of herself. The first one she was wearing a silk slip dress. She was walking around the hotel room after putting her daughter to sleep with all the confidence of the lady of the house. Then, she goes to the bedroom and has a tough conversation with Art. It is a heartbreaking conversation but she has to deliver it with a convincing voice and cold, stern body language. Art crumbled and there was a very emotional, gutwrenching exchange between the couple. The second outfit is the one she wore at the New Rochelle challenger final, which was between Art Donaldson, her husband, and Patrick Zweig, her ex-lover. That game was more than tennis, there was so much history being exchanged in the game. Tashi wore a Loewe shirt dress, which is now on my wishlist, and Chanel Espadrilles. She was nervous and that is when accessories became important. She wore some dark shades at the very intense moments of the game. She played with her rings and her necklace. The audience sees a lot of emphasis on those accessories in the crucial moments of the final match.

Tashi was dressed for bed and she ends up having a conversation with Art before they sleep.

Tashi at The New Rochelle Challenger final supporting her husband.

I enjoyed the movie Challengers and I very much enjoyed writing this piece. I could go on and on but I think I will save the rest for later, when the movie has been taken in by many. In 6 months, I might do part 2, who knows. I love clothes and their ability to change the world. Most importantly appreciate and love designers, stylists and since we are talking about movies, I appreciate costume designers. These are people who shape the world in one way or another. I dream of being one of these things or all three, so it is an honor to have the opportunity to study their crafts. Jonathan Anderson, thank you for all you continue to give us, and a special thank you for your work on this movie. If you haven’t watched Challengers, I am jealous of you that you get to experience it for the first time and I really hope this post moves you to go watch it.

p.s. I wish I could credit people for the pictures but I found them all over Pinterest without any credit. shoutout to all the people who shared these images, so I could get the chance to use them.