1.
Carrie Fisher detested Lea’s famous bikini from Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi. She said the costume “wasn’t [her] choice” and that when George Lucas showed it to her, she thought he was joking. “It made me very nervous. I had to sit very straight because I couldn’t have lines on my sides, like little creases. No creases were allowed, so I had to sit very, very rigid straight.” She was instructed to exercise in order to wear the costume, and later called it “what supermodels will eventually wear in the seventh ring of hell.”
She also later gave advice to the newer trilogy’s star, Daisy Ridley, saying Ridley should not “settle for simply being a sex symbol. You should fight for your outfit. Don’t be a slave like I was.”
2.
Jennifer Garner wore a similarly skimpy outfit for her role as Elektra in Daredevil. “I was just this close to a wardrobe malfunction at all times,” she later revealed. “There’s not enough tape in the world to make this stuff safe. I had to be cut out of and sewn into the pleather pants every time I had to pee, and that was like a 45-minute undertaking, so I definitely held it. I had so many chicken cutlet fake boobs in to make Elektra’s boobs. I think there were like three on each side of different sizes, and everything was pushed up and out.” She also said her nipples were “barely tucked in.”
However, Garner said, “I was so involved with the fittings that I was able to advocate for myself what I was going to need to be able to move…I was in stunt rehearsal by then, and [I knew] what kind of support I needed in my shoes and support I needed in flexibility, [the support] I needed in the pants or whatever they were to be able to fight because I fought. I fought a lot.” However, she later said of her corsets, “I was not comfortable ever once in any of those, but they do look good.”
3.
Michelle Pfeiffer famously hated her Catwoman costume from Batman Returns. “It was the most uncomfortable costume I’ve ever been in. They had to powder me down, help me inside, and then vacuum-pack the suit. They’d paint it with a silicon-based finish to give it its trademark shine. I had those claws, and I was always catching them in things. The face mask was smashing my face and choking me…we had a lot of bugs to work out,” she said. “Originally, they didn’t leave me a way to use the restroom in the suit, so that also had to be remedied as well.”
She could only wear the suit for a little bit before she’d risk passing out. “My first week was like this — my boots weren’t right. I couldn’t walk in them because I kept tilting forward, and my mask was smashing my face, and I couldn’t hear, and it was cutting off my vocal cords, and I couldn’t really breathe in the corset. And then they would have all of these lights in my way, and I would have to then change, on the spot, what I had planned and what kind of routine I had planned with my whip. And then I had to act,” she described.
4.
As Harley Quinn in Suicide Squad, Margot Robbie was famously sexualized and put in tiny sequin shorts (that were more like underwear) and a ripped white shirt (that later gets wet).
The outfit was a pretty large departure from the comics and cartoons, which usually feature Harley in a bodysuit. Robbie later spoke of the costume and the backlash surrounding it: “As Margot, no, I don’t like wearing that. I’m eating burgers at lunchtime, and then you go do a scene where you’re hosed down and soaking wet in a white T-shirt, it’s so clingy and you’re self-conscious about it.”
But Director David Ayers said, “I didn’t think denim overalls would be appropriate for that character,” and that Margot understood, “that’s part of the iconography.” Margot said that if there were a sequel, she would not wear the sparkly mini-shorts again.
Robbie’s costumes in Birds of Prey were notably less sexualized (including, yes, overalls), and The Suicide Squad featured costumes and hair much closer to that of her comic counterpart.
5.
For Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Angelina Jolie was reportedly unhappy with her character’s revealing and tight wardrobe and thought it sent a bad message to young girls. She also had to pad her bra for the role. Jolie disliked how the film marketed the movie based on her appearance, especially when potential product tie-ins made her breasts larger.
6.
When Scarlett Johansson first began playing Black Widow in Iron Man 2, her costume was much more revealing and sexualized than it would become in later films. Johansson herself called her character’s portrayal “hypersexualized,” saying, “You look at Iron Man 2, and while it was really fun and had a lot of great moments in it, the character is so sexualized, you know? Really talked about like she’s a piece of something, like a possession or a thing or whatever — like a piece of ass, really.”
“And [Tony Stark] even refers to her as something like that at one point … ‘I want some’ [says Tony] … and at one point calls her a piece of meat and maybe at that time that actually felt like a compliment.” Johansson also said her initial Black Widow costumes — like the one that she wore in The Avengers — felt like wearing a wetsuit. “It was so hot, I would wring out my socks at the end of the day,” she said, revealing that she once hallucinated while filming because of the heat.
Johansson said her character evolved over the years as she did, and that “Now people, young girls, are getting a much more positive message, but it’s been incredible to be a part of that shift and be able to come out the other side and be a part of that old story, but also progress.”
7.
However, while Johansson’s costume became less sexualized, Elizabeth Olsen was not as lucky with her character, Scarlet Witch. This was particularly evident in Avengers: Infinity War, when Olsen pointed out she was the only female Avenger to bear cleavage.
Olsen said she didn’t mind wearing a corset but preferred that it hadn’t been so low-cut. “I’d like it to be higher. Everyone has these things that cover them — Tessa Thompson does, Scarlett does. I would like to cover up a bit. It’s funny because sometimes I look around, and I’m just like—wow, I’m the only one who has cleavage, and that’s a constant joke because they haven’t really evolved my superhero costume that much.”
“But then you look at where it started in the comic books, and it was a leotard and a headband so…oh, it’s horrible, it’s so horrible. So at least they know that’s not cool,” Olsen did acknowledge. Notably, her costume was much more covered up in WandaVision and Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
8.
Another superhero who was not thrilled with her costume was Malin Åkerman in Watchmen. Comparing the tight latex suit to putting a condom over her whole body, she called the Silk Spectre costume “so uncomfortable.” She also revealed it was cinched in with a corset and that “They wanted to cinch my waist in three inches smaller than what it actually is every day so that my shoulders looked broader.”
The suit also pinched her when she bent her arms and knees and smelled like “a human condom” when she took it off. She also said, “It takes on whatever temperature it is and then magnifies it. So if we were shooting outside and it was freezing, it made me extra cold, and if it was indoors and hot, it made it extra hot.” Plus, the suit “showed all [her] contours,” so she had to undergo intense exercise training. After all this, Åkerman would later say she’d only reprise the role if she could ditch the costume.
But it wasn’t just that the costume was physically uncomfortable. “It didn’t feel as powerful,” she said. “I think that the cool thing for me playing Silk Spectre was her being this powerful vigilante woman, aside from the costume. I actually think the costume kind of took away a little bit from it. I wanted to have combat boots and get rough and tumble.”
9.
At age 12, Miley Cyrus was cast as Miley Stewart, a character who frequently took on her popstar persona of Hannah Montana. While Miley dressed much like a regular preteen, Hannah was outfitted with sequins and a long blonde wig. Cyrus later spoke of the psychological effects of playing a character who was so made-up at a young age. “From the time I was 11, it was, ‘You’re a pop star! That means you have to be blonde, and you have to have long hair, and you have to put on some glittery tight thing.'”
“Meanwhile, I’m this fragile little girl playing a 16-year-old in a wig and a ton of makeup. It was like Toddlers & Tiaras. I had fucking flippers.” She continued, “I was told for so long what a girl is supposed to be from being on that show. I was made to look like someone that I wasn’t, which probably caused some body dysmorphia because I had been made pretty every day for so long, and then when I wasn’t on that show, it was like, Who the fuck am I?”
10.
In the wake of former Nickelodeon star Jennette McCurdy’s bombshell memoir, I’m Glad My Mom Died, Victorious actor Daniella Monet said that she was forced to wear outfits she was uncomfortable with.
“I wouldn’t even wear some of that today as an adult,” Monet said, and a costumer on the show pointed out that teenage cast members often didn’t bring up their outfit concerns due to a fear of retaliation.
11.
McCurdy herself was forced to put on a bikini and take photos in it for Nickelodeon despite begging to just wear a one-piece for an iCarly scene — she did end up in a one-piece in the episode, but photos were taken of her in a bikini to show an executive (likely Dan Schneider).
12.
Jessica Alba hated wearing her famous blue bikini in Into the Blue. After she called it “not fun” in a People interview (which started with specifically praising Alba’s bikini-clad body, rather than speaking about the movie), the interviewer asked, “Was there one body part that you thought, “Please, can I not show it?”
“All of it,” Alba answered. “Every time the camera shut off, I was covering up in a towel and hating my life and calling my mom, and being like, ‘I can’t do this! I hate this movie!'”
In fact, Alba’s character was originally meant to be a marine biology student who would wear a wetsuit. “But then the people in charge decided to dumb it down,” she said, and by the time Alba got on location to film, they had already filmed underwater scenes with her body double in a bikini. “I had to match what they’d already shot,” she says. “If I’d bitched about the change, I would’ve been called a diva.”
13.
Charmed star Alyssa Milano didn’t name a particular outfit but said that she felt that her character’s costumes were overly revealing on the show. In the ’90s, she said, it was like it was necessary to sexualize the characters in order to sell the show.
14.
Kaley Cuoco also disliked many of her Charmed costumes, including her wig and black vinyl outfit in early Season 8 and her superhero costume in the episode “Battle of the Hexes.”
15.
Sophia Bush hated how often her character’s costume was simply her in underwear on One Tree Hill and had to request that it happen less. Her boss replied, “He literally said to me, he goes, ‘Well, you’re the one with the big f—king rack everybody wants to see. And I was like, [gasp], ‘What? Well, I’m not doing it!'” For the next episode, she showed up in a turtleneck “to be spiteful,” saying, “This is just how I’m gonna dress on the show from now on if you don’t stop writing these scenes.”
16.
Marina Sirtis hated her cleavage-bearing Star Trek outfit, saying she had no say over it and was, in fact, told to lose weight to fit into it. “I was just the clothes horse, and they put stuff on me,” she said. She also suggested her character was just there “for the boys to look at.”
Sirtis was originally “supposed to be the brains of the Enterprise,” but when the decision was made to put her in a skimpy outfit, she said she “became decorative, like a potted palm on the bridge.” When her uniform changed and hid her cleavage, Sirtis said her character became more capable: “Consequently, I got all my brains back because when you have a cleavage, you can’t have brains in Hollywood.”
Finally, we’ll end on a few examples where the actors actually liked their costumes — though they didn’t necessarily enjoy the process of wearing them.
17.
Wearing bandages as Leeloo in The Fifth Element had actually been star Milla Jovovich’s idea, and she didn’t mind the costume itself — but she called the experience of wearing the “skimpy” outfit “a bit embarrassing.” While she had grown up as a model and was used to being dressed by others, she said, “In the fashion world, most of the guys are gay, and they have the etiquette not to notice. But these English guys working on the set were whistling and stuff.”
However, she ultimately said, “My character’s all about what’s inside…It’s not really about her clothes.”
18.
It took Jeri Ryan twenty minutes to get into her costume for Star Trek: Voyager. “Someone has to dress me and undress me. It’s a production break if I have to get out of the costume to use the restroom or something. It grinds to a halt unless they can shoot something without me,” Ryan revealed. “So, in the interest of being a team player, the first season, I would not take restroom breaks; I just didn’t drink anything on set, which is not the healthiest thing to do.” While she said she was given input and asked if she minded that it was tight, she called the costume “very uncomfortable. It looks very simple — it looks just like a leotard, but it really was a feat of engineering on Bob Blackman’s part to design this costume. There’s a corset, one-piece undergarment. It’s constricting, and it’s not comfortable.”
“You can’t really bend, you can’t really sit comfortably in it,” Ryan continued. She later revealed she’d have liked to burn the corset. However, Ryan had no issue with how “sexy” the costume was. “The overt sexiness of the costume, I had no problem with. I have no problem with it because of the way the character was written. … She’s a brilliant character, she was strong, and she was a wonderful role model for young women, and I have no problem with it. We have intelligent women in every physical form in real life, so why shouldn’t we see that depicted on television?”
19.
Kate Beckinsale also said she liked her super tight leather outfit from the Underworld series. However, it was difficult to get into. “You have to have another person there because you can’t do up your own corset,” she revealed. “Someone has to put their foot in my back and wrench it tighter and all that embarrassing stuff. It’s latex with a leather corset, and it’s very squeaky all around. You come striding into a room and it’s squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak…everyone knows you’re there.”
20.
This isn’t necessarily a sexualized costume, but it did set an unrealistic expectation for women’s bodies. For her role in Cinderella, Lily James wore a blue ballgown with a tiny waist. “The dress that [costume designer] Sandy Powell created — I mean I think she’s a genius and I’m grateful for that dress — but it was like torture. It was so tight and delicate,” she said. In fact, she had to go on an all-liquid diet just to fit into the corset, and couldn’t digest food while the corset was on. However, she did say, “It did feel quite magical every time I put it on. So it kind of does all the work for you.”
21.
Nicole Kidman also had to wear a corset for Moulin Rouge — which was a far more sexualized role. Kidman felt pressure to make her waist as small as possible — “I had this thing that I wanted to get my waist down to 18 inches, which Vivien Leigh had on Gone with the Wind, and I was just like, ‘tighter, tighter!'” It was so tight that she actually broke a rib while getting into it.
22.
Olivia Newton-John had to be sewn into the famous pants she wore at the end of Grease, which were made out of shark skin. She also could not eat or drink while filming that day. “I limited myself to a few sips of water and no food, and joked that I was getting dehydrated and #2, might pass out,” she wrote in her memoir. “At lunch, they actually had to unstitch me to eat and then re-stitch me after a bathroom trip.” However, she felt it was worth it. “It felt empowering as pure adrenaline and the idea of claiming my own sexiness rushed through my body. All the men on the crew began to do double and triple takes as they turned around to stare at me with jaws that headed south. I think a sandwich or two hit the floor.”
23.
Another famously sexualized costume? Mystique in the X-Men films. Rebecca Romijn loved her costume, but she did express some frustration with the level of nudity. “I’ve been in denial about the nudity,” she said in an interview for the second film. “‘No, no, I’m VERY covered up.’ I kept checking with the rest of the cast, ‘You guys, I’m totally covered up, right?’ And they’d tell me, ‘No, Rebecca, you’re naked.’ I’m hoping by X3 they can do it digitally. Maybe I won’t even have to show up [laughs]. One time, [director] Bryan [Singer] opened the tent where I was literally bent over a chair getting my crack touched up. And I was like, ‘Don’t come in here, Bryan! You don’t need to see this.’ And he said, ‘You really need some white wine.’ And he brought me some.”
The makeup process also took nine hours (which was later reduced), and Romijn would work for 24 hours straight because it was so arduous to get into the makeup. Still, she says it was worth it and that the makeup process helped her get into character.
24.
And finally, Jennifer Lawrence, who also played Mystique, similarly struggled with the costume and makeup, which took eight hours to get on. Lawrence had to stand during this process or sit on a bicycle seat. She had to pee out of a funnel and worried about all the fumes and chemicals she was breathing from the paint. Lawrence even almost quit the franchise over the costume, which was later simplified to a suit she could put on, so only her face and neck had to be painted.