The PONIES Costume Designer Had a Trick for Filming Cold-Weather Scenes in the Summer
When Peacock's PONIES had to do some cold-weather scene reshoots in Budapest during summer, it posed some problems.
Key Takeaways
- The costume team for Peacock's PONIES used creative tricks, including cutting sweaters in half, to keep actors cool while reshooting winter scenes in summer.
- PONIES actors praised cRead More
- The costume team for Peacock's PONIES used creative tricks, including cutting sweaters in half, to keep actors cool while reshooting winter scenes in summer.
- PONIES actors praised costume designer Anastasia Magoutas for her clear vision, collaborative approach, and ability to create authentic 1970s looks.
- The detailed costumes and set design helped the cast feel fully immersed in the story’s 1970s setting.
Peacock's espionage thriller series PONIES stars Emilia Clarke as Bea and Haley Lu Richardson as Twila, the wives of two CIA agents stationed in Cold War-era Moscow in 1977. When the women are told that their husbands perished in a plane crash, the pair are left with no real answers about what happened to their spouses, so they ask the CIA if they can work as operatives.
In their new roles, the two end up taking on KGB spies — and they look amazing doing it thanks to their 1970s outfits. In fact, the whole PONIES cast looks like they were plucked out of a catalog from the decade.
RELATED: This PONIES Character Was Supposed to Die in the Finale (EXCLUSIVE)
Costume designer Anastasia Magoutas dressed everyone in the cast, including actor Artjom Gilz, who plays KGB officer Andrei Vasiliev, and Petro Ninovskyi, who portrays CIA informer Sasha Shevchenko.
"Anastasia had such a great vision," Gilz told Peacock Blog. "I feel like she had such a clear picture of where it's going to go and what she was going to use. And that team made it so easy for us."
There was one issue though — wearing all that wool during a summer shoot in Budapest, Hungary, where the series was filmed, with the city standing in for 1970s Moscow. Gilz and Ninovskyi shared with Peacock Blog the production secrets that made wearing those costumes bearable.
Artjom Gilz reveals the fix that made the PONIES wardrobe bearable
Born in the Soviet Union before moving to Germany, Gilz is very familiar with the weather shifts in Eastern Europe. He said that primary production on PONIES took place during the winter months in Budapest, but that the cast and crew were called back to do some reshoots in the summer, which made matching the costumes they previously wore, and not melting in them, a challenge.
"I think it was maybe one of the first scenes we shot in January and then we had to reshoot it in July, obviously wearing winter clothing," Gilz told Peacock Blog. "The costume department just cut the sweaters in half, so we only have like the front part and the jacket over and on top. The back part was really just nothing."
Ninovskyi very much appreciated the workaround, but admitted, "It looked very funny."
"The head of the costume department, Anastasia, she did an incredible job in terms of all the costumes that we've done," Ninovskyi told Peacock Blog. "And I think we vibed with her from the very beginning, from the very first measurements."
Ninovskyi added that in those costume fittings, Magoutas showed him sample outfits and gave him options to try on to gauge his taste. "She was like, 'What would you wear? What do you think is going to look good? Do you want to try this?' She actually gave me a lot of leverage in terms of my say on some of the stuff," Ninovskyi said. "And that felt amazing, because I felt trusted immediately."
RELATED: Why Artjom Gilz Found Filming Andrei's Menacing Acts on Peacock's PONIES "Quite Fun"
Both the costumes and the PONIES set helped transport the actors to the 1970s.
"The world that she created and the set designers created, it was just incredible," Ninovskyi continued. "Every time you would step onto the set, you would just feel transported into some kind of other world. It was very easy to work as an actor, because everything around was just there for you."
Keep your eyes open for the fashion tricks as you watch PONIES on Peacock, where all eight episodes are streaming right now.
