Killer threads: the sartorial legacy of ‘American Psycho’ at 25
To celebrate the cult film’s anniversary, Esquire spoke to its costume designer
RELEASED 25 YEARS AGO this week, American Psycho – the provocative adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis’s equally controversial novel – continues to leave its imprint.
The film stars Christian Bale as Patrick Bateman, a wealthy, image-obsessed Wall Street banker in Eighties Manhattan who fancies himself a killer.
It nails themes of corporate culture, greed and identity fixation, while costume designer Isis Mussenden gave Bale’s Bateman an iconic, razor-sharp look loaded with meaning. Cerruti suits, power ties, slicked-back hair and polished shoes that all illustrate his obsessive attention to detail.
Two-and-a-half decades on, the American Psycho look is somehow more significant than ever. It inspires meme culture, music videos and is referenced by major fashion labels, including Saint Laurent, Bottega Veneta and Balenciaga.
Its current cultural impact makes the prospect of a remake by the equally image-obsessed director Luca Guadagnino (Challengers, Queer), rumoured to be starring Austin Butler, all the more intriguing.
Bale, despite being a Brit, flawlessly embodied the unsound yuppie lead.
He sculpted his body to perfection for the role, stayed in character on set, and studied the psychology of serial killers and narcissists.
In part, this was to combat the naysayers. Execs wanted Leonardo DiCaprio, but director Mary Harron insisted it must be Bale, or else she’d leave the project.
The gamble paid off, as Harron shrewdly leaned into satire –something costume designer Isis Mussenden completely got behind.
“I couldn’t wait to make fun of these people,” says the glamorous Mussenden from her just-as-glamorous West Coast home in LA on a recent Zoom call, as if she did not dream up some of the most seminal ‘fits in cinematic history.
Her killer yet camp vision of Wall Street grandiosity was the product of her time spent in New York City during the Eighties, the film’s setting.
“I went to school and got my first experience of costume design in the city,” she explained, “and I was surrounded by people getting finance degrees, making outrageous money for the time. I spent years riding the subway with those guys from the Upper West Side to Wall Street – years of seeing those suits with Walkmans and newspapers.”
Her eldest brother brought her even closer to the unique reality of these businessmen.
As Roger Mussenden – a man with his very own IMDB page, having cast some of the X-Men films, Selena, and more – was building his career in the decade, he often found himself dining with the three-piecers, occasionally bringing his sister along for the expense-free feasts.
Just as the film goes, the magnates would all throw their Amex Platinums on top of the bill in a ritualistic flaunting of wealth.
“I actually witnessed that scene,” Mussenden tells me.
“It was at a dinner with ten people downtown – they had the most outrageous amount of food, finished with a $60 glass of port.”
“The greed . . . the amount . . . the excess . . . It was insane! I had a front-seat experience with this. So, when working on the costumes, I knew exactly what suits they wore and what ties they had.”
By sartorially caricaturing the men of this subculture for the 2000 flick, not only was Mussenden serving the narrative – “the story asks us for all of this to be enhanced and hyperreal and because at the end, you’re like, ‘Oh shit, it never even happened’” – but she was also feeding the Eighties nostalgia prevalent at the time.
While sourcing costumes in 1999 NYC, Mussenden discerned the resurgence of Eighties nostalgia, notably exemplified by the prevalent business bro homogenisation in and around the World Trade Center plaza.
“I saw how similar they all were – a real identity crisis,” she says. “You couldn’t tell if it’s this guy or that guy, right down to their Oliver Peoples glasses.”
On a tight budget – “It was a $6 million movie, remember!” – she bought from off-price department store Century21 and rented the entire Eighties collection of her stylist friend, Irene Albright.
But mainly, the cast was clad in Cerruti, as the producers struck a deal with the luxury Italian label (by no coincidence, it’s a brand name-dropped in the American Psycho novel).
Mussenden, wary of fashion house interference from sorry experience, ensured it was a collaboration, not a takeover.
“I talked to them, and I had them pull Eighties patterns, fabrics, et cetera, from their archives. I had them make the suits in the atelier – at least one suit for each guy. It was all worth about $50,000. All the boys were tailored so well.”
A fastidious lead character necessitated a higher degree of meticulousness.
“He had to look perfect,” says Mussenden, having taken on the adjustments herself. Even the clothes that hung in his closet were scrupulously selected to reflect his compulsive tendencies.
(Bateman’s closet, she eagerly points out, is not unlike David Beckham’s, revealed in Netflix’s 2023 documentary Beckham. “Everything is like exactly an inch apart! So, I mean, it’s real. People do that.”)
His style is a crucial tool in his narcissistic arsenal – a uniform for his daily displays of one-upmanship. He almost blends in but exerts dominance by looking an edge better. It’s a dynamic memorably portrayed in the business card scene – a veritable dick-swinging contest.
Mussenden insists that the tenacity of the amplified Eighties fashions is inextricably linked to Bale’s major performance – why runway looks throughout the years are decidedly Bateman-coded.
“It was all Christian,” she says, patently proud to have worked with the well-decorated actor.
“He’s an amazing, amazing actor. His discipline on that film was insane,” she pauses, nods, and repeats herself: “Insane!”
“When we finally got to New York at the end of production – the majority was filmed in Toronto – I turned a corner on Fifth Avenue/57th Street, and there was a table with a load of food, and he was smoking a cigarette, and I said, ‘Oh my God! Christian!’”
We were used to him getting up at four in the morning and working out until six, and then going to the set, going home, eating, and doing it all over again. He looked at me and said: “Those nude scenes are over. I’m just walking in and out of doors now.
Regarding the rumours about Butler taking on the role of Bateman in Guadagnino’s take on the tale, she offers her approval.
“It’s a really good choice,” she says. “And Luca is a brilliant filmmaker.”
Would she work on the remake?
Probably not.
“I don’t do things twice. But I’m proud of what I did. I think it looks fantastic. It certainly holds up.”
And that goes back to her authentic perspective, moulded by lived experience.
Naturally, the approach of any new costume designer for a remake would be significantly shaped by the film’s chosen angle. Having read the book, Mussenden says there’s a lot of scope to make interesting cinematic choices about “where he goes mentally.”
“There’s a lot there to unpack.”
We discuss the possibility of it being set in the 2000s to kickstart a new tradition of looking back 20 years. Here, the virility and vanity of Bateman would find a new playground in the post-dot-com bubble and pre-recession, and Guadagnino could cash in on our Noughties nostalgia via BlackBerrys and Tom Ford-era Gucci.
Or perhaps a present-day Bateman – AirPod Maxs clamped over his ears, his skin rendered glass-like thanks to an investment in Korean skincare, a smouldering presence on Insta – would be even more unsettling, effectively amplifying the story’s intended teachings.
Mussenden has just one wish:
“It has to be pretentious. Fabulously pretentious.”
American Psycho is currently streaming on Netflix.
This story originally appeared on Esquire UK.
Related:
‘American Psycho’ is a perfect movie. Does it need to be remade?
