Though the archetypal idea of a film director tends toward chin-stroking auteurism, the actual work of direction can be physically demanding. The hours are long, often spanning entire days, predawn to postdusk. Conditions can be extreme—weather is a factor. You spend a lot of time on your feet, on your knees, in the muck, bent double, contorted, crawling, sprinting alongside a tracking shot. Comfort, or tolerance for discomfort, is key. Proper attire helps, like the kaffiyeh, biker gloves, and ski goggles Kathryn Bigelow wore when shooting The Hurt Locker (2008) in the Jordanian desert. Her jeans offered protection enough for her to feel comfortable kneeling on dusty train tracks, and her long-sleeve top sheltered her skin from wind-whipped sand. Look at her wrist on the set of Blue Steel (1990): Notice the three stacked cuffs, heavy jacket atop leather atop a thick knit fabric. Look up toward her neck: The way the collar of the leather is folded over suggests it’s biker gear. It’s a strong look, totally cosmopolitan, still current 34 years later, and it kept her warm on a chilly day of shooting.
Even in more temperate, controlled environments, the director gets active, digging into scenes with their actors. Imagine John Woo, shirtsleeves rolled up on the set of Bullet in the Head. Though he’s one of cinema’s most celebrated and influential action filmmakers, known for his intricately choreographed shoot-outs and set pieces, Woo turns up on set almost exclusively in business casual garb—button-up shirts, typically white, tucked into chinos or generously cut dress pants. He would look at home behind the counter of a regional bank branch. Woo’s might not be the most durable garments, but they’re flexible enough, and, hey, similar slacks-and-shirt ensembles worked for many of his gunslinging protagonists, like Chow Yun-fat’s hero cop “Tequila” Yuen in Woo’s 1992 classic, Hard Boiled. There is something appealing about how white-collar workaday both Woo and his characters dress. It makes these pistols-akimbo fantasies feel somehow accessible. Little seemed to change in Woo’s wardrobe once he made the leap to American cinema—Woo went Hollywood in only the most literal sense.
There is clothing one wears to work, and then there is workwear, a term typically used to describe a category of garment and accessory purpose-built for specific types of physically intensive labor. One key storyline in popular fashion through the back half of the last century is the commingling of these two categories—this tendency hasn’t slowed in the slightest. Fabrics and cuts initially intended for manual blue-collar labor became commonplace casual garb, some of the most ubiquitous and anonymous garments available to us. Denim is probably the best example of this phenomenon.
Modern blue jeans were invented in the late 19th century by tailor Jacob Davis and businessman Levi Strauss and worn by workers like miners and cowboys for their durability before catching on with civilians. The T-shirt has a storied history as a military garment and was adopted by laborers too.
The entry of jeans and tees into the firmament of global style had as much to do with their material attributes as their seismic semiosis—it’s simply a very functional ensemble, whether for labor or for leisure. Directors wear it to work for the same reasons the rest of us do.
