The Venice Film Festival starts tomorrow, Cate Blanchett is the jury president, and 90 percent of the events are slated to take place in person — including screenings, which the jurors are urged to attend to get a feel for audience reaction. Take it away, Doc:
It MEANS we are going to GET SOME REAL RED CARPETS. But it won’t all be new: Cate, in the name of sustainability, has picked up a thread she started in Cannes two years ago (when she re-wore an Armani) and announced she will revisit things from her closet. ENTER THE LOGISTICS:
WWD: When it comes to deciding what you’re going to re-wear on the red carpet, how do you remember what you have? I’m guilty of that and I don’t have your wardrobe!
C.B.: Quite a few phone calls, because having moved countries, I have beautiful things that are in museum boxes in storage in Sydney but with COVID-19 restrictions, I can’t get in and get them. And when you are talking about sustainability do you really want to fly a dress halfway around the world? I am working with what I’ve got in the attic. It’s an opportunity to clear the cobwebs out and see what I’ve got. And it’s fun, I remember seeing my mother’s wedding dress, and it was the first time in my life I truly appreciated the history of a garment. So whenever you do re-wear something, you have this shadow memory of the time you wore it before.
In sum: Perhaps not EVERYTHING will be a re-wear, but certainly some will, so let’s cherry-pick! Here is the recent Cate Blanchett retrospective we published; above, I’ve selected the ones that… well, that I guess I think are most likely to be in her attic and not in a museum box? Or which are the right notes of elegant but not super extravagant or specific. Like, I LOVED that Mary Katrantzou, but that might’ve been too big a deal to pull out again and may have been archived with a quickness. Then again, that Armani she rewore was from this Cannes run, so maybe it’s handy. MAYBE.
