BELLO mag #66 Art

BELLO ES DEVLIN

Opera Art Director

Tessa

THOMPSON

ART

JANUARY 2015

SHIRT AND SKIRT LINE & DOT

FABULOUS issue - BELLOmag.com

114

ART

ALLOW ME TO INTRODUCE YOU TO

Tessa Thompson WORDS BY DIO ANTHONY PHOTOS BY TAMAR LEVINE

LAST OCTOBER, AN INDEPENDENT FILM BY THE NAME OF DEAR WHITE PEOPLE WAS GIFTED TO THE WORLD. IT’S A FILM SO SELF-AWARE THAT IT WAS HARD NOT TO TAKE NOTICE. MONTHS LATER, THE JUSTIN SIMIEN FILM STILL HASN’T ENDED ITS RUN ON THE LIST OF CONVERSATION TOPICS AMONGST HOLLYWOOD, COLLEGE CAMPUSES, AND LIVING ROOMS, AND THE SAME COULD BE SAID ABOUT ITS STAR, TESSA THOMPSON, A MULTI-RACIAL CALIFORNIAN AND A BUDDING LEADING LADY.

The Dear White People star has had one hellueva day, and the grandfather clock above my workspace hasn’t even reached noon. On this December morning, Tessa Thompson has announced the nominations for the NAACP Imagine Awards - to others a job, to her an honor. “I thought it was probably going to be an opportunity to get to say the names of some people that I admire. And it was!” she says, the excitement clear in her voice. “The only two black directors that I’ve worked with - Justin Simien and Ava DuVernay - took home some nominations. So I’d say it was a pretty solid morning.”

Simien, director and writer of Dear White People, attended the predominantly white Chapman University in Orange Country, California. His experiences there as a black face in a mostly white place were the inspiration for his debut film. Thompson, one of the comedy’s vessels, plays Sam White, a biracial student at the very ivy league Winchester University. White’s humorous oncampus radio show lends the title its satire. The outspoken character takes it upon herself to instill some boundaries at her school, using her voice to gather the support of her fellow black friends.

But that isn’t the full extent of the character by any means; Sam White is refreshing, independent, and honest, and like all humans, conflicted. It is the type of character that sends airwaves 115

and penetrates through the tiresome, been-there-done-that nature of Hollywood films.

We got really lucky that Dear White People made a splash in Hollywood, and that’s been great for all of us,” says Thompson. “It’s changed the terrain and certainly put us on the map, which is really exciting. But I think what is most exciting about the success of Dear White People is that when we were at Sundance we were so happy to be there, but we felt like we were the little movie that could. Justin would say the little black movie that could,” she says, unable to stop her giggles. Having household names like Sarah Silverman and Questlove (to name just a couple) voice their appreciation for the film over the internet is definitely a gesture that has not been overlooked by Thompson, and neither is the massive success the film has garnered overseas. She says that above all else, in the context of Hollywood, it’s a testament to the hunger for such a film, certainly in the black community, but also in some unexpected places, too. “There’s a myth, this idea, that movies starring people of color don’t travel internationally. And we have fans from Scandinavia, which has got to be one of the whitest places in the planet.”

At 31-years-young, Thompson embodies the strength and gravitas of her

Winchester University equivalent, especially when it comes to the meaning and reach of art in early, late, and modern society. “With me, I think as much as media is a reflection of a culture, I think it actually creates culture.

So it’s been great being involved in two projects that have important things to say and important questions to ask,” says the actress. “ I loved playing Sam White, someone who struggles with her identity in a colorful and heartwarming way. If I would’ve seen a movie like that when I was in high school it might’ve helped me a bit. All sorts of girls come up to me, all kinds of people, telling me what the character or movie meant to them. There’s an incredible amount of power. Even if the movie has no political values, just seeing someone who looks like you, who speaks like you in a narrative, is a really powerful thing.” It doesn’t take much to see why Justin Simien saw Sam White in Tessa Thompson, an individual who holds the same charisma and intelligence as the on-screen early twenty-something.

Thompson may not have gathered friends in protest, but she certainly went through the same woes as the rest of us during her formative years in a Santa Monica high school. “I’m multi-racial, and that hasn’t been a huge struggle for me,” she admits. “The high school I went to was very racially diverse; there was someone from every which place.

January 2015 - BELLO

TOP MARIMEKKO

FABULOUS issue - BELLOmag.com

116

But there were definitely pockets where I felt the segregation, and the more you fit in, [the trickier it gets] trying to figure out who you are in relation to what people talk about or what people see in us.” Such a statement could not be more relevant in light of recent current events that mirror accounts from our nation’s civil rights movements in the 1960s. The Interweb has been used more than ever to post opinions, “like” posts and share article after article. In all its 21st century glory, technology is the good, the bad, and the very clickable ugly. Naturally, someone like Tessa Thompson is apprehensive about such things. She tells me she has a love/ hate relationship with social media, deeming the Internet both inspiring and heartbreaking. “As a public figure you have the chance to use this platform.

People like Ava DuVernay who do it right inspire me. The Internet can connect us in ways so that we can have dialogue that passes country lines and race lines in a way that can be very valuable.”

Unfortunately, this isn’t always this case. “For me, you have to sort of take pause,” she confesses. “There’s this animosity to this retweeting culture where we retweet things without giving a thought to the implications or really making sure that we’re being as informed as we can be. I have a really touch-and-go relationship with social media.”

Of course, Thompson’s role following her Dear White People success is nothing short of inspiring. She plays the delicate Diane Nash in Ava DuVernay’s masterpiece of a film, Selma. The drama follows the very brave Martin Luther King Jr. (David Oyelowo) and his supporters during the civil rights marches of Selma, Alabama. Continuing on Thompson’s path of luck, she had the very rare chance of meeting the woman she portrayed in the 1960s-set film. It was during a screening of the project that Thompson spotted the original Diane Nash sitting a couple seats before her. “I spent a fair amount of my time kind of watching her watch the movie, and that was such a trip, really,” reveals Thompson. “We made this movie to honor the legacy of all these incredible peers and to bring it into context today,

117

to show the fans the sacrifices that were made so that we can live the way we do. So, it was tremendous to have Diane say, “I’m proud of you” and for her to like the film. It made me feel like I could breathe easy. To me, Diane was the person whose opinion I cared about the most.”

The real Diane Nash, born in Chicago, Illinois in 1938, is 76 years old today and is described by historians as “bright, focused and utterly fearless.” She’s the kind of woman to make moves, and she did just that as a leader and strategist in the Civil Rights Movement.

For Thompson, the name “Diane Nash” is one that she both knew about and heard about, but wasn’t necessarily aware of her story within the movement the way one would be with Dr. King or Malcolm X. “It was really just incredible to hear [and] learn about this woman who at the time was 21 years old and effectively started desegregating the lunch counters in Nashville and then the busses in the South. What was I doing at 21, you know?” she asks jokingly.

Thompson praises the sacrifice [made by] those who came and fought before her like Diane Nash, saying the film served as a reminder of our incredible responsibility and power as individuals, and as a community and society. “[Diane] has this incredible lightness of being and spirit and she’s really such an angel, which is what I felt like I saw in all the footage, but then I got to witness it first hand. Her son kept making jokes that I was his mom. If at all possible, that experience alone made me even more proud in being involved with the movie.”

As if Selma didn’t have driving force, one-woman powerhouse Oprah Winfrey co-stars alongside Thompson and a pack of leading Hollywood actors.

Although there are too many to name here, they won’t and don’t disappoint.

Winfrey loses herself in the role of Annie Lee Coope while also producing the much-needed film. So how is Actress Oprah vs. Talkshow Host/Network Owner/Publishing Queen/Big-buckmaker Oprah? Thompson says she’s just authentically Oprah: always, it seems. Winfrey, Thompson says,

connected the dots, made the phone calls to the family members, making them feel good about the film and her involvement, and essentially paved the way for production to begin. “I’ve read some critics say, and I think it’s so true, she disappears. For someone like Oprah, who is arguably one of the most important and famous women not just in the country, but also in the world, being able to seamlessly fall into this story of this woman who is broken in some ways, and struggling and not completely sure of herself was crazy to watch.”

She particularly remembers one day on set, Oprah’s first day, where hundreds of extras were present at the Tony Courthouse for a march scene.

The extras oozed with excitement to be standing at close proximity to The Oprah Winfrey, except not a single soul could spot the matriarch. “No one but the actors knew what she was wearing, because we’d been in rehearsal previously, so no one could find her. She was just one of the many people trying to stay out of the heat, with an umbrella and fan occasionally.

She was just preparing for the scene.

At one point, someone yelled “Oprah!” to get her attention, and you could see everyone collectively realize where she was standing. She yielded that with so much humility and kindness, and grace.

I thought that was just such a great moment.” The humanization of Oprah, if you will, did not stop there. “When we would get our per diem, she’d be excited like everybody else. She’s just a woman...which just reminds me of how incredible we can be when we are our best selves. She doesn’t walk around with the air of nothing else than just a person.”

Thompson is one of those rare faces and talents that comes along and saves us from the one-trick-ponies of the entertainment industry. With a voice so kind and genuine, she offers the vibe of a very kind and interesting neighbor, the neighbor we watch and so desperately wish to be like. But what does she say? “At the end of the day, for me, everything is all just filling. We’re just people.”

January 2015 - BELLO

SHIRT AND SKIRT LINE & DOT

FABULOUS issue - BELLOmag.com

118

JACKET, SHIRT, SHORTS AND BELT MARIMEKKO SHOES COYE NOKES

119

January 2015 - BELLO

JACKET MISSONI PANTSUIT LINE & DOT BOOTS COYE NOKES

FABULOUS issue - BELLOmag.com

120

DRESS MARIMEKKO

Photography TAMAR LEVINE www.tamarlevine.com Illustration ANASTACIA GOODIN http://www.littleanniemotel.com Styling ALVIN STILLWELL @ Celestine Agency Makeup LEXI SWAIN @ Celestine Agency Hair SIENREE @ Celestine Agency Photo assisting KRISTI NEILSONÂ Fashion assistant JOVANIE NARVAEZ Location HQ AVALON STUDIOS http://hqavalonstudios.com Dpecial thanks to CHAD SCHOLLMEYER 121

January 2015 - BELLO

ART

ES DEVLIN Meet the Art Direction Queen Behind Kanye, Miley, and the World’s Greatest Operas

BY BRENT LAMBERT

When some of the world’s biggest pop superstars decide they’re ready to hit the road for a world tour, one of the very first phone calls they make is to design queen Es Devlin. But the road to the top of the world of set design was a meandering one for Devlin to FABULOUS issue - BELLOmag.com

say the least. After all, the Londonbased art director began her university career studying English literature.

Feeling as if something wasn’t quite right with that path, Devlin made a dramatic course correction when one day she walked into the Motley Theatre

Design Course in London. As soon as she entered the studio, she knew she was at home. “I just went to the course and really liked the room. It felt good. It was red, and everyone there was slightly rabid, eating pot noodles and making set models; they clearly 122

hadn’t been to bed for days. I felt really at home,” Devlin tells Will Georgi in a recent issue of FRAME magazine.

Fast forward several years and Devlin is now the most famous graduate of the Motley school. Known for ingenious design concepts that powerfully convey their own visual narrative, all while effortlessly supporting the message of the main act, Devlin’s career has successfully bridged the two divergent worlds of popular and classical culture.

When she’s not designing a new production for Kanye West, Miley Cyrus, Jay Z, or Rihanna, she’s busy working on a new set of costume designs for the Scala in Milan or London’s Royal National Theatre...or even the closing ceremonies of the London Olympics.

Her ingenious designs have won her numerous accolades as well, including the prestigious Olivier Award for Stage Design in 2014 for her design of the play “Chimerica” and the TPi Set Designer of the Year Award three years in a row.

At 42, Devlin is at the top of her game.

In an interview with the Financial Times, she describes her thoughts on her place at the leading edge of this new generation of art directors: “When

123

January 2015 - BELLO

I was a student I was intoxicated by the work of Robert Lepage, Robert Wilson, [and] Pina Bausch. That was the work we absorbed and aspired to. And now we have come through our 10 years of 10,000 hours, we are the next step.”

In a summer 2014 profile for INTELLIGENT LIFE, writer Matthew Sweet caught up Chloe Lamford, a former employee of Delvin’s, who had nothing but full praise for her former boss. “She’s a visionary. She has big, bold, light-filled visual ideas. The next lot of set designers coming up now can think bigger because Es went first. She allowed us to be freer and bolder, to enter a more abstract world.”

Sweet also spoke with the director of “Chimerica,” Lyndsey Turner, who confessed that she practically begs Devlin to design her shows. “An hour of her eye and her brain is worth ten hours of somebody else’s,” Turner raves. “She receives story, image and spectacle with ferocious clarity and bravado.”

FABULOUS issue - BELLOmag.com

When asked by The Guardian to choose a song that would be a perfect soundtrack for her life, Devlin answers, “Good Morning” by Kanye West, praising the song’s optimistic outlook. When asked to define her greatest ambition, Devlin replies, “To refine the art of seeking a balance: between opera and

pop; between big projects and small children.”

Es Devlin lives in South London with her husband and two children. You can see all of her work by visiting www.

EsDevlin.com.

124