Birds of Prey Costume Designer Explains How She Chose the Character's Looks

Birds of Prey is in theaters and many people have chimed in on the film's look and aesthetic. Parade interviewed Erin Benach, the movie's costume designer to talk about the approach that the filmmakers took during production. The designer actually ended up being a bit confused that the team wanted her to be the one to style this cast. Her work is distinctly modeled after the fashion of this time period. While Harley Quinn's last cinematic outing yielded the most popular Halloween costume of that year, it was time to take things in a bit of a more real-world approach. Female fans on Twitter have loved the changes and cited the fashion influences as a huge plus in their takes on the film.

"When they first called me [about the film], I sort of was like, 'Are you sure you guys have the right Erin?' Benach laughed. "Anything that I'm going to design is always going to be connecting with women in a strong, respectful way…I think that the world of filmmaking is evolving. It's opening up possibilities and options, just kind of expanding the ways in which we can interpret traditional comic books."

Director Cathy Yan had the utmost praise for the designers work. She told Entertainment weekly how the feminine perspective really boosted the film's identity.

"I had never seen that before, that level of understanding of the fashion zeitgeist in a superhero film," Yan, said of Benach's work. "We thought that was a really interesting way to speak to women without being overt. Just saying, 'We got you,' you know?"

Yan would also compliment the costume work with Comicbook.com during an interview.

"I love the costumes and so I'm so happy to talk about it. Erin Benach, our costume designer, is a genius and she really understands what women want to wear so the idea was like can we use inspiration from the comic books combine that with street style," she mentioned. "So, we're looking at what cool kids were wearing in Tokyo and New York and London and then also high fashion too because we both love fashion so we were pulling stuff from the runway and then we're considering each character separately because what's great about this movie is the team-up only happens a little bit later and so you get to meet these women individually first so we really wanted to give them individuality with their costume their personality."

Birds of Prey is in theaters now.