HALSTON AND LIZA MINELLI SERIES
The series shows Halston’s initial corporate backer, a relatively benign owner called Norton Simon, being swept up in 1980s acquisition mania and being bought by a more hard-nosed giant corporation called Esmark, a subsidiary of bra-and-girdle-maker International Playtex. Warhol also sketched portraits of Halston’s family members. Halston also gave Warhol elaborate birthday gifts ranging from a white fur coat to a box of Muppet items provided by Jim Henson after Halston sent a box of his cosmetic products to Miss Piggy.
For years Warhol and Halston celebrated Thanksgiving and Christmas together at Halston’s townhouse. Warhol frequently wore Halston menswear, for which he created an ad campaign in 1982. He later designated Warhol the unofficial photographer for subsequent shows. Not only did Warhol and Halston collect each other’s work, they often collaborated creatively, beginning with the 1972 Coty American Fashion Critics’ Awards, where Halston put Warhol in charge of his runway show. By this time Halston was head milliner for Bergdorf Goodman, New York’s swankiest department store, where his client list included Greta Garbo, Barbra Streisand, and most of the city’s leading fashion plates and socialites.Īlthough Warhol’s silkscreen paintings are glimpsed on the walls of both Halston’s and Minnelli’s residences and he is name-checked once or twice, the artist is largely absent from the story even though he was one of Halston’s closest friends (“Whenever there was a dinner or something at H.’s house, he would be there,” Minnelli recalled) and as much a part of the core Studio 54 group as Jagger or Minnelli. This is true, although Oleg Cassini, Kennedy’s official designer, maintained, not entirely believably, that he actually designed the hat and Halston merely fabricated it. The next we see of Halston, it’s 1961 and he’s making Jackie Kennedy’s iconic pillbox hat. Halston’s father, a CPA, was known for his hot temper, but his being physically abusive may be pure invention, and according to friends and family, Halston’s childhood was wholesomely middle-class middle American. Halston was indeed from the Midwest-originally Iowa, then Indiana-and according to biographer Steven Gaines, he did make hats for both his mother and sister from an early age. The series depicts little Halston (then Roy Halston Frowick) making hats to comfort his beloved mother after her irascible husband, Halston’s father, physically abuses her in their Midwestern home.
We look at how much of the series is real and how much a synthetic blend. Now, the designer’s glamorous, turbulent life is the subject of a five-part Netflix biopic that reunites the star ( Ewan McGregor) and producer (Christine Vachon) of Velvet Goldmine, another tale of ’70s excess, with most episodes written by Glee co-creators Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan. Before Tom Ford, there was Halston, sharing the same model-like looks, penchant for black turtlenecks and black sunglasses, exquisite taste, flair for creating beautifully cut clothes that expertly walk the tightrope between sophisticated and sexy, and determination to pursue world domination through branding, slapping his name on everything from lingerie and perfume to luggage and bedding (though it’s now commonplace, Halston was the first high-end designer to pioneer such diversification).īut while Ford has maintained a steady grip on his business and personal life, Halston got sucked into the “divine decadence” of the ’70s, embracing a party-hearty lifestyle that led to him neglecting the day-to-day workload and resulted in his eventually losing control of his company and even the use of his name when his corporate backers’ patience became exhausted.
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