Costume & wardrobe

Tim Lucas

He's played by Jose Marco, who you may have seen in the Richard Harrison costume pictures, The Invincible Gladiator, Gladiator 7, and The Secret 7, all pretty good pictures. He also played the role of Paris in Ricardo Freyda's now rarely seen 1964 adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. In later years, you could find him in Compañeros, The Horrible Sexy Vampire, several Paul Nash-y werewolf films, and toward the end of his career, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.

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Tim Lucas

Indio gives us a great deal of verbiage to prepare us for a single, simple visual, proving that a picture is literally worth a thousand words. And there is a bit of Alfred Hitchcock in this moment as well, because Leone cuts from the maquette in Indio's hand to the disguised safe as it presently appears in the office of the El Paso bank manager, who is played in a winking cameo by the film's production and costume designer, Carlos Simi.

40:00 · jump to transcript →

Tim Lucas

and that he died wearing his Once Upon a Time in the West costume. He had only one shot that remained to be filmed, but evidently he couldn't wait. Sergio Leone never forgave him. He reportedly stepped over Mulock's dead body, telling the wardrobe man to take off his costume, which was then handed to a stand-in who took his place in that last shot, viewed only from behind. There is some masterly interplay with props here on the part of Mr. Wallach.

1:46:19 · jump to transcript →

Tim Lucas

As was not unusual in Italian cinema, the production designer was also responsible for the film's costumes. In both capacities, Simi specialized in westerns, ranging from that early Franco and Ciccio spoof to Minnesota Clay, Django, the big gun-down face-to-face, Sabata, and Kiyoma, not to mention Once Upon a Time in the West. Was this the first sideways gunshot in film history? You tell me.

1:47:12 · jump to transcript →

I was lucky. Ursula Andrus recalls how she and Dr. No's costume designer, Tessa Pendergast, created the now famous white bikini. When I got there, we had no wardrobe. So we had to get right away the bikini, right away the little dress for the Chinese dress. And it was so strange. There was a girl who had a boutique, and she was also making dresses.

1:02:49 · jump to transcript →

You know, the whole function of those machines. I love the costume, too. Look at that. Little cat dance. That's the cat girl? Yeah, that's the cat girl. But you're supposed to, a fog machine is supposed to blow in the air, then you waft it, you know, and, you know, dissipate it. Not, just bursting out of the ground like a volcano in this. It's pretty cool. Imagine this is Texas Starr. Who the hell is Texas Starr? Well, no one else is ever going to mention it. That's why we have you here.

35:12 · jump to transcript →