Costume designer Negar Ali Kline grew up surrounded by fashion and style. “My parents immigrated to the States in the ’70s, and they had a European sensibility,” Kline said. “They dressed really well. My grandparents dressed really well.”
After spending more than 25 years in the world of costume design and styling, working with the likes of Maya Rudolph and Jessica Lange, Ali Kline knew she had to work on the hit Netflix series Nobody Wants This after reading about it online and requesting the script. “It was so funny, witty. Erin’s writing, her banter is just of the time. She just created this world. Each character was so fully realized in the pilot episode. Knew exactly who they were,” she said.
On the latest episode of The Who What Wear Podcast, Kline shares how she got her start in the industry, how she developed those early mood boards for the show, and more. For excerpts from their conversation, scroll below.
Can we talk a little bit about your background and your career and how you fell in love with fashion? How did you land in the very interesting and specific world of costume design?
I fell in love with fashion, well, rather style, right? It was something that I would say I guess I grew up with it in the atmosphere. My parents immigrated to the States in the ’70s, and they had a European sensibility. They dressed really well. My grandparents dressed really well.
I’m an only child, and I remember my parents hosting parties where everyone was dressed really glamorously. I mean, this is the ’80s, right? You can imagine. Shoulder pads, jewelry. This is like Dynasty. Taffeta. That’s what was going on inside my home. I’ve always been obsessed with pop culture. This was the time of Madonna and Cyndi Lauper, and Prince. Now, looking back, I think this informed me, right?
I never thought to seek a career in fashion. I was going to college, and I started working for Paper Magazine, and I was an assistant to the publisher. This is like the late ’90s, and it was just a very cool place to be. These great contributing fashion editors were coming through, and they started asking me to assist them on their shoots. I just kind of fell into that.
Talk to me about working on season 1 of Nobody Wants This. How did you get connected with Erin [Foster], who’s the creator? What drew you to the story?
I read about—at the time it was called Shiksa, actually—I read about Nobody Wants This in Deadline. I thought, “Wow, this sounds cool.” I was familiar with Erin [Foster], and I reached out. I knew one of the EPs, so I reached out to Olly Obst and asked if I could read the script. He sent it to me.
It was just one of the smartest [scripts]. It was so funny, witty. Erin’s writing, her banter is just of the time. She just created this world. Each character was so fully realized in the pilot episode. Knew exactly who they were. I was obsessed, like, I have to do this.
I’m wondering how you approached those initial mood boards when you were in the process, whether it was interviewing for the job or first starting. Were there fashion pieces written into the scripts, or did you have total freedom to pull from whatever people you knew, muses, people you saw on the street, whatever it may be?
The way I approach early mood boards is that I’m trying to convey an approach to the character versus literal outfits, right? Very early on in that first meeting, it just felt like Erin [Foster] and I were naturally aligned in the way that we saw Joanne.
For me, it was really important that she had this versatility in her style. She understands putting herself together in a specific way for the environment that she’s gonna find herself in. The way she dresses for a Spotify meeting with executives is different from the way she dresses to go to a basketball game as a WAG versus how she dresses to meet the parents, right?
She can use style as armor. She can use style to garner attention when she wants attention.
Welcome to The Who What Wear Podcast. Think of it as your direct line to the designers, stylists, beauty experts, editors, and tastemakers who are shaping the fashion-and-beauty world. Subscribe to The Who What Wear Podcast on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
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