The series flips our ideas of period television inside out,
pairing a modern vernacular with a soundtrack that features
A$AP Rocky, Billie Eilish, and Ecca Vandal’s uncanny
“Future Heroine.” It’s a smart homage to Dickinson herself,
whose clipped lines and slant rhymes, scribbled on envelope
backs and receipts, packed the sort of linguistic punches
that quietly—secretly, really—reinvented the idea of what
poetry might be. Now—inside the relatively small box of a
30-minute bildungsroman-cum-comedy—Smith and Dunn
have turned the poet into a pinwheel of riotous flair.
Steinfeld, who made her big-screen debut in 19th-century
clothing, laughs when she points out that the attire in
Dickinson is much less dusty than True Grit’s earthy woolen
coats. The poet’s wardrobe, in fact, offers up no small dose
of glamour: Dickinson appears tattooed and corseted
in chartreuse silk for a circus segment, and with crimson
hands and a regal gown to play
none other than Lady Macbeth in
a homemade production.
But, most strikingly, in a midnight
scene, Dickinson floats out of her
house and toward Death’s carriage in a
scarlet silk charmeuse gown, her lips
so violently stained that they too
appear bloody. “Who in their right
mind would ever think that Emily would be in this gorgeous
and extremely sexy red dress?” Dunn asks with a laugh. For
Steinfeld, the dress was a tease throughout production: She’d
see sketches and swatches but was still dazzled by the final
reveal. It’s fitted and sumptuous, equal parts a presentation
of the poet’s nubile self and her fiery mind. “I would visibly
see my waist go down in size as I looked in the mirror while
I got dressed every morning,” Steinfeld says, drawing a line
between the dress and Dickinson’s poetry. “The constraint—
and the discomfort—look so elegant and effortless.”
This is an Emily Dickinson we’ve never glimpsed in
black-and-white photos or oil portraits. Forget the demure
white dress that still stands on its mannequin in her
bedroom—what the modern world wants is a Dickinson
who, as her poetry exclaims, “sweeps with many-colored
brooms/ And leaves the shreds behind.”—hillary k e l ly
take on her coming-of-age story—one of the first shows
out the gate for the new streaming service Apple TV+.
Smith—a playwright and former writer on The Affair and
The Newsroom—calls it “a modern American gothic story,”
and by modern she means entirely remixed out of any
fusty, puritanical expectations into a period piece that only
tangentially honors its period: We see Steinfeld’s angsty,
rambunctious, queer Dickinson passionately kissing her best
friend, Sue (Ella Hunt); telling a suitor that she’s “in love
with Death”; and exclaiming, “This is such bullshit” when told
to fetch some water as part of her chores. (Also starring
are Jane Krakowski as Emily’s persnickety mother and Anna
Baryshnikov as uptight sister Lavinia Dickinson.)
“Emily’s inner consciousness doesn’t fit in its own time,”
says Smith, “and it’s bursting out.” Cue the untamed
paisleys and lush silks that swaddle her body, alternately
confining her and providing a tableau
as exuberant as the poet herself.
If the white dress is a hat tip to
Dickinson obsessives, much of the rest
of the costuming is a conscious
implosion of expectations. John Dunn,
the Emmy-nominated costume designer
known for aesthetically immersive
shows like Vinyl and Boardwalk Empire,
says that in designing Dickinson’s deeply researched, hand-
sewn wardrobe he wanted to quash the “warped idea of
what this period looked like... all those sepia tones and dark,
gloomy colors.” Instead, with the Civil War still a decade
away, the era was decidedly upbeat: Palettes were vibrant, and
patterns layered like patchwork quilts. In concert with the
set’s rich, jewel-toned walls, hand-painted French wallpaper,
and plush, tufted couches, the gowns—and even the men’s
attire—swirl into an explosive aria.
“I wanted to show Emily as she was exploring the world,
trying new colors and different silhouettes on herself, testing
the limits of the world she inhabited,” says Dunn. The
clothes as a whole are a mix of exacting and adventurous—
keen to honor the strictures of the day, but daring in their
understanding of how a poet’s attire can mimic the wheeling
nature of her mind.
The costumes are daring
in their understanding
of how a poet’s attire can
mimic her mind
YOUNG AMERICANS
DICKINSON’S CAST INCLUDES ADRIAN ENSCOE
(ABOVE) AS THE POET’S OLDER BROTHER, AUSTIN,
AND ELLA HUNT (RIGHT) AS SUE GILBERT.
VLIFE
COURTESY OF APPLE (2)
74 NOVEMBER 2019 VOGUE.COM
