Designer Easter Eggs: “Jurassic World: Rebirth” Costume Designer Sammy Sheldon Differ Reveals the Wardrobe’s Hidden Details
Jurassic World: Rebirth isn’t costume designer Sammy Sheldon Differ‘s first time at the dino rodeo. Having previously worked on Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, the British artisan relished the opportunity to return to one of the highest-grossing film franchises of all time.
Set five years after Jurassic World: Dominion, Rebirth sees Scarlett Johansson’s Zora Bennett lead an expedition into a no-go zone to extract DNA from three prehistoric creatures in the hopes of manifesting a groundbreaking medical breakthrough. Rebirth also stars Oscar winner Mahershala, Wicked‘s Jonathan Bailey, and Rupert Friend. It’s directed by Gareth Edwards, best known for Monsters, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, and The Creator.
Here, Differ reveals where she found inspiration in classic Steven Spielberg films (including, of course, the original Jurassic Park), how shooting on film informed the color palette, and some of the Easter Eggs hidden in the costuming.
Is there a franchise Bible that you use as a guide?
Not really, but there’s a theme, and there is definitely a look. You don’t want it to have fashion in it. It’s not generic, but it’s about trying not to place it in a specific period in time. For this film, we looked back a lot in order to make it feel nostalgic.
Where did you start?
Reading the script is always my first stop. Scarlett Johansson’s character, Zora, is the linchpin and driving force in the story, so we had to ensure she isn’t represented in a comic book way. There is a reality to her, but in that reality, there is also a practicality. There’s nothing frivolous. We started with Scarlett because we met her first. We didn’t want Zora to feel too special ops or ‘girl in the field,’ but her costume had to have functionality. Zora is a very motivated and strong person, so we had to accommodate her and ensure everything else fit around her.
Is there a Jurassic palette you needed to bear in mind?
We were shooting on film, which was amazing because you knew the colors and textures would appear slightly different from those of digital cameras. Gareth wanted to make it almost feel like a film that was shot in the 1980s and rediscovered. We looked at several Spielberg movies and noted the colors used, particularly where red, yellow, and blue stood out. We also looked at what colors weren’t there as a period thing. There are different shades of green, purple, and yellow today than there were then. The color theory across the film was very strong, particularly in terms of what we decided to place in each scene. A lot of it involved balancing the green of the trees and the textures of the dinosaurs.
How much of the costuming was off-the-peg and adapted, and how much did you create from scratch?
When you watch the film, you think, ‘They’re in the same thing throughout,’ but we had to do somewhere between 20 and 35 duplications of each character’s costumes. That included trousers, tops, kit, boots, and so on, because they traversed various terrains, ranging from wet to dry, muddy, and more. We had a very short time to prep. We met Scarlet about seven weeks before we started filming, but we met everybody else two weeks before production started. We knew the looks we wanted, but the fittings had to be quick. As a result, a significant portion of it was purchased and adapted, while some items were disassembled and completely remade. There was a lot of breakdown, dyeing to change the color of things, taking pockets off and putting pockets on, and having a kit made that you can’t buy. We put it together like a big jigsaw. Gareth also wanted prints on t-shirts, and that is always tricky because if it’s something that already exists, you have to get it cleared. Teresa has a David Bowie t-shirt that we managed to get them to let us use. It’s an old one from the Glass Spider era. We wanted it to make you wonder whose t-shirt it was or if it was something she likes. Isabella’s t-shirt features a print that we created from various references to past Jurassic movies.
Tell me more.
Gareth wanted a logo that resembles a t-shirt you might have purchased from a place like Gap, but upon closer inspection, you notice specific details. We asked ourselves what the famous quotes and imagery of the early films were, and there also had to be a creature. We were trying to riff on the fact that Isabella doesn’t like dinosaurs, so it had to be an animal related to a dinosaur, but still fun. We came up with the pelican because, at the end of Jurassic Park, there are pelicans flying, and they serve as a crossover to the pterodactyl. So, we created an image of a pelican wearing a cap because caps are featured in many ’80s movies, and there’s also a tiny little helicopter in there, too. Additionally, since the family has a Hispanic background, we decided to reflect that in the writing behind the image, so it reads ‘life finds a way’ in Spanish.
Did you find yourself leaning more into the original trilogy for inspiration?
Very much so. There are loads of little things we looked at, including specific shades of red and yellow. There’s also the yellow raincoat that the little girl wears, which is a direct link to the first film. We dressed Ed Skrein to give him a Bob Peck feel when he was on the boat. He also has a badge that you don’t see in the movie. We wanted to find an animal that his character related to, and we came up with a mongoose. Around his badge, we had written, ‘We need a bigger boat,’ which is a reference to Jaws. We also looked at E.T. and The Goonies for the kids.
Since you had such a small window for costuming, did you need to start filming without everything finished?
We were prepping and buying items in advance because we knew who the cast members were, but we didn’t always get to fit them. As soon as we liked something, such as a top, we would have to see if we could get 30 or 40 of them. There were a couple of characters for whom we only had a limited number of pairs of trousers, and we had to hope they would last until the end of filming. We had most of the items on time, but because we were filming in Thailand, shipping them over created an additional complication. We would have some items shipped from the UK before they were fitted, and then we would do the fittings when we arrived. We also had buyers in England sending stuff out.
How much work was done in Thailand rather than the UK?
Quite a bit. We had a lovely team in Thailand. Mai, our supervisor, was amazing, and she had a great team. All the alterations were done there. I brought a couple of people from the UK, but it wasn’t just a British crew, by any means. In Malta, we had the same thing. We had a local team there, although that was more about maintenance. I remember we had to do a rush ride over 24 hours to Phuket for a character that came very last minute and had to work on the first day. I took the local crew with me to navigate everything. We had great support in all the countries we went to.
Were there any instances where you had to rethink a costume design to work with the vision of the set designers or something specific that Gareth needed to shoot?
For the opening scene in the lab, we had to design a hazmat suit that worked for both the action and the setting. Hazmat suits are clumpy and serve their purpose, but they’re not aesthetically pleasing. Our biggest challenge was that the scene was set slightly in the past, and we’re 17 years in the future, but it needs to look futuristic for that time. Gareth has a very strong aesthetic when it comes to tech. He likes everything to have slightly round corners with layers, and it needs to be believable. What we built was a fully working hazmat suit with an opening visor, allowing Gareth to get a shot of the guy eating. You would never do that in a real hazmat suit! We created a mechanical device that had the shield rise and fall over his face. It also had lights and a breathing apparatus inside because it kept fogging up. We also installed fans to prevent it from fogging. Funnily enough, they ended up putting fog back in afterwards.
Jurassic World: Rebirth is in theaters now.
Featured image: L to R: Scarlett Johansson as skilled covert operations expert Zora Bennett and Jonathan Bailey as paleontologist Dr. Henry Loomis in JURASSIC WORLD REBIRTH, directed by Gareth Edwards.
