The luxurious tactility and visual appeal of silk provide a striking contrast with the panic room Nessa, the star of 2014’s The Honourable Woman, sleeps in every night. It is in this room that Nessa’s layers of identity are removed to reveal her fears and secrets.
Set in a white, upper middle-class environment in New York City, the series follows the life of best friends Will Truman and Grace Adler, a gay lawyer and a straight, Jewish interior designer, and their friends Jack McFarland and Karen Walker, a flamboyant failed actor and a socialite with a penchant for drinks and pills who works as Grace’s assistant to escape her motherly duties. As expected, fashion is central to the characters.
The first TV show to feature a transgender protagonist, Transparent’s protagonist Mort, and her transition into becoming Maura, sets into motion a process of self-reflection, dialogue and exchange for the Pfefferman family, who find themselves in the situation of having to reconsider and rebuild their relationships with themselves, with each other and with the rest of the world. Their wardrobes reflect these drastic changes in an organic way: sartorial transitions correspond to the characters’ life transitions.
While initially the difference in ‘UnREAL’ between those dressing for the part – the reality TV show contestants – and those who dress them for the part, the producers, is quite clear, as the series progresses the boundaries become more loose, and the characters’ ethical concerns – or lack thereof – are reflected in their fashion choices.