Daniel Day-Lewis (actor): “Sandy Dow-
ell's work on the tilm (which I personally
think is magnificent), apart From the sig-
niticance it has for the tilm as an entire
piece ot work, makes a huge ditterence

to us as individuals. Clothes become
part 0t your lite, part ot the lite that
you're trying to re-create. Sandy and

I had a chance to meet in Dublin
betore we started shooting. She
spoke trom her point of View, and I from

mine, and then she showed me a collection

 

0t pictures, etchings, ideas that were beginning
to move her imagination. And then we went our
separate ways, and when I came back a month
later, to my astonishment l tound the rack 0t
clothes she had created. I hadn't imagined
Bill being such a peacock, but the discovery
was a really wondertul one, a hooligan
dandy. It made me think a little ditterently.

In tact, the more you disguise it the more
remarkable the stench, the greater the
menace. That we should wear our new-

tound wealth so ostentatiously seemed
fitting—an almost consciously obscene
parody ot the uptown swells. Yet the threat

is a kind otjoke, because whilst everybody

else making money in the city thinks only to

 

emulate their ‘betters,’ we, through a blend of
fierce tribalism and working-class pride, are
inextricably bound to the streets we come trom.
From the moment I tried on the costumes, l was
utterly delighted."

GANGS OF NEW YORK (2002) -
SANDY POWELL, COSTUME DESIGNER