Dressing a Texas Double Act: Colin Wilkes on Costuming Matthew McConaughey & Woody Harrelson in “Brothers”

One guy eats meat and hunts deer. The other guy smokes weed and won’t even wear leather. But Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson also share a lot, including a gift of gab and a fondness for Austin, Texas. Building on their real-life friendship, Brothers (Wednesdays through November 4 on Apple TV) makes the most of their big personalities, pegged to a storyline about the possibility that they might have the same dad. To accentuate the movie stars’ differences, costume designer Colin Wilkes returned to her home state of Texas, where the series was filmed, and dressed the cast, which also includes Holland Taylor, Natalie Martinez, Brittany Ishibashi, Nolan Almeida, Ella Grace Helton, Noah Carganilla, Highdee Kuan and Oona Yaffe as members of the movie stars’ tight-knit families.

A CalArts graduate, Wilkes has done her fair share of women-centric shows and quirky films, like the trippy, hilarious Palm Springs, as well as rom-coms including the Emmy-nominated People We Meet on Vacation. Brothers proved to be an Americana-themed change of pace. “I got a lot of creative free rein,” she says. “I wanted to earnestly portray the fictionalized version of Matthew and Woody, so there was a lot of generating ideas with the actors.”

Speaking from Los Angeles, Wilkes discusses McConaughey’s well-worn jeans, the cowboy hat that accommodated Harrelson’s vegan values, and how her Texan background informed Holland Taylor’s formidable “Ma Mac” character. 

Brothers casts Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey as characters named Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey, who may or may not be half-brothers. Did Woody and Matthew have their own ideas about how they should be dressed?

Yeah. With Matthew, we talked in broad strokes about keeping the look very Americana and rooted in Texas. With Woody, it was about being “perennially island-minded,” which is how I heard him described. I remember the first time I talked to Woody [over Zoom], he was eating a bowl of yogurt in Hawaii, where it was breakfast time, and wearing this big Baja hoodie. So I was like, “Let’s lean into who you are with this kind of loose clothing.” That’s partly where we get the contrast of this odd couple, because you see more restraint in Matthew’s tailored, straight-line silhouette, where everything is very thought out.  

Can we talk about blue jeans? They seem to be Matthew’s favorite article of clothing.

Those jeans are a heritage brand, Double RL jeans, and Matthew knows, to the inch, how they should fit. He’d say, “This rise is different. I really liked the Double RL they did in 2006,” which is a lower rise. We couldn’t find the old ones he loved, so we bought a bunch of pairs of newer Double RL jeans. Then we sent them out for stone washing, dyed them, and distressed the jeans to make them feel well worn. We had about six pairs of those jeans, and we had to get them all to match. 

And then, standing next to Matthew in his slim-fit blue jeans, there’s Woody wearing plaid pants!

That’s the Ikat pant.

What are Ikat pants?

It’s a pattern you see in Bali and India, made with a beautiful woven process using dyes and colors.

Wearing plaid pants to a rodeo, I’m guessing that’s not something you see every day in Austin, but somehow it works for Woody. 

Exactly. And the shirt that Woody’s wearing with the Ikat pants is a brand called Story mfg. We were trying to focus on “circular fashion,” which is so important to him. Story mfg. uses eco-friendly materials and zero waste. That’s a cool thing we incorporated into all of Woody’s things because he backs the soil, regenerative farming, and good systems for our planet.

The cowboy hats really sell the idea that this story’s taking place in Texas.

So special, right? Matthew uses a guy named Chris [Roberts] who has a place called Aspen Hatters in Austin. He’s been making Matthew’s hats for a while now. They have a very distinct crown height and brim height. We’ve also seen Matthew recently wearing distinctive hat bands, so we made one with a turkey feather we found on the ranch and some horsehair. We wove that into the band because we were building our own reality of Matthew having this ranch.

And where did you find Woody’s hip hat?

Woody is vegan and doesn’t wear felt hats, which is why I’m grateful we shot in Texas. There’s no shortage of vintage straw hats in Austin. We found Woody’s hat in one of our rental houses, at the bottom of a barrel, so it already had all this wear and tear that made it kind of perfect for Woody. We did have to stretch the hat a little to fit it just right on his head. 

Matthew wears boots. Woody does not.

Matthew loves this pair of Frye boots he’s worn for the last fifteen years, which we couldn’t find. Finally, we found one pair, but it was half a size too small. We stretched them out as much as we could, and they worked. 

Whereas Woody is known for walking around barefoot.  

I remember watching an interview with Woody, and over the course of ten minutes, his shoes were completely off by the end. They were just slowly coming off while he talked. Woody loves slippers; he loves house shoes; anything that came off easily, he was down for it.

What about Matthew’s formidable mother, “Ma Mac,” played with great zest by Holland Taylor? How did you home in on her character?

I grew up on a ranch in East Texas. I had a Southern grandmother and spent time around a lot of Southern women at church, so I knew how to do this character, and so did Holland.

Did you and Holland discuss references from movies or TV shows?  

I presented six or seven pages of inspiration boards I had taken from Facebook of real-life characters, and we also looked at the socialite era of what it means to present yourself as a Texas woman.

For example?

The stacking of Ma Mac’s jewelry and all the bangles. She’s wearing silver on one arm and gold on the other, and everything means something. She wears the class ring of her deceased husband around her neck and has all these other little charms. 

What about her clothes?

I really liked early and mid-2000s Chico’s, particularly their Travelers collection. Late at night, I’d just deep dive on eBay, shopping for Chico’s.

In terms of palette, Ma Mac’s outfits seem to favor cool tones.

I wanted to use chrome colors for her, like metallic chrome. My formula for Ma Mac was to always include an element of sparkle and an element of snakeskin, leopard, or any kind of animal print.

As a native Texan, it must have been gratifying to make Brothers in and around Austin. What kind of impact does a project like Brothers have on the local filmmaking community?

There are so many very skilled people who have been around for decades and taught me about aging and dying! Now being able to have them be part of my team was such a gift, and also the vendors. We had Texas hatters who have been there forever, and we had a silversmith making jewelry for Matthew. Even our leather guy, who made Matthew’s leather outfit, is from Austin, Texas. We tried to stay local as much as possible.

Featured image: Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey in “Brothers.” Courtesy Amazon Prime.