Whenever I say Halston, most people have no idea what I am saying and that I am referring to a person who was at one point tremendously famous. I usually have to resort to spelling his name then maybe people will vaguely show some sign of recognition. The few people who know his name don’t care. Even those who used to love him look quizzically at me when I mention him. I asked my mom, “Do you want to see a documentary about Halston?” “No.” Not “can you wait and watch it at home,” or a wavering “sure,” but a firm, unequivocal no as if she did not create my first impression of the designer.
I have two solid memories of Halston. When I was little, I loved special, little boxes or bottles so once her perfume bottle was empty, I claimed it. I didn’t know anything about design or font, but I knew that it was beautiful and should be treasured, not discarded. Then there was the man. No one talks about it, but I think that he was quite striking, and he may cringe in the afterlife at the thought, but I think that he influenced a lot of what I like to wear. Because white is not a popular or practical contrasting color, I would often wear light brown against an otherwise all black outfit. When I saw the previews for the documentary, I decided to buy a white blazer (sadly I couldn’t find a long one, but it is still beautiful). I did not look at the clothes that he created for women, but when it comes to clothes, as soon as my hair grew long enough so people would not mistake me for a boy, and as a child of the eighties, I’ve always been into gender bending before I realized that what was what I was doing. His personal taste suited me more than the clothes that he designed.
Sadly Halston the documentary only lasted a week in theaters, which is a shame because if you’re interested in fashion, it is a must see, but if you are interested in the intersection between art and capitalism, it is urgently relevant. Even though it was legally and fiscally appropriate, Halston was professionally assassinated, which probably contributed to the lack of interest about or knowledge of him today. Halston was huge. He flew so Isaac Mizrahi and Christian Siriano could run. He was a genius, definitely ahead of his time and underappreciated in spite of all the accolades and success that he experienced in his lifetime.
Halston the documentary does a great job providing context about the time period when he lived, contrasting his work to other designers and explaining his ambitious goals to design everything for the world, which is probably when he sowed the seeds for his professional destruction. He never failed as a visionary, and because of his work, we still see the meritorious effects of his work: body positivity, black as beautiful, gay men claiming their rightful place in society. Honestly I wished that the documentary was longer because I would have loved to branch off and seen separate documentaries about Elsa Peretti, a jewelry designer who made the aforementioned perfume bottle, or such Halstonettes (think the women behind Robert Palmer except real supermodels) as Pat Celeveland or Alva Chinn, whom I criminally know nothing about, but still looks fabulous. Goals!
Halston the documentary also does a tremendous job of not hiding his flaws. It shifts focus on them and devotes the right amount of time to them without detracting from the greatness of the man or minimizing any pain that he inflicted on others. Without rationalizing away his negative qualities, it does seek to understand them without excusing them. When there are moments of contradiction in accounts, the documentary does highlight and confront it without being aggressive or feeling as if the filmmaker is trying to mess with the interviewee. More importantly the filmmaker deliberately omits himself from the proceeding instead of participating on screen. We don’t even hearing his voic. It is an honest piece of filmmaking that has integrity and style.
Unintentionally I have seen all of Frederic Tcheng’s films, the director of Halston: Dior and I and Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel. Even though Halston appears to be his least successful project, I think that it is my favorite in spite of all its flaws, an unnecessary fictional narrator-framing device and using the how we got here trope. I’ll sign a waiver on the latter because it successfully provided context, foreboding and tension, but while the prior did not hurt the film because it was barely used throughout the film, it was a brief detraction and betrayed a lack of confidence in the inherent power of the trajectory of Halston’s life story. Also I will mitigate my critique with a compliment. Usually I hate when films do not tell a story in chronological order, but I did like that as Halston the designer and icon had to return to being a man, we get glimpses of that man before he achieved success. The time jumping worked and wasn’t confusing.
Of all of Tcheng’s films, Halston is also the saddest. The last third shows how Halston’s creative success came to an abrupt end. I’m fascinated at how bureaucracies want success, but they want it done according to the bureaucrats’ formula, not the person who created the success. To be fair, when Esmark took over the company that originally owned Halston, they aren’t the ones who originally made the deal so there was never a meeting of the minds, just an asset that was part of the package. Any responsible businessperson should be appalled after auditing his expenses to see so many extravagant costs, but it is stunning that when they valued items in Halston that could have been priceless, they treated it like a bargain basement sale instead of an auction at Christie’s (only a philanthropist at the helm of a corporation would give it to a museum). It could have been a combination of stupidity or spite to literally erase any trace of him so they could use his name as they saw fit, but what a loss of financial value. Only God knows a man’s heart, and aren’t corporations people?
Tcheng briefly shared a hive mind with Werner Herzog because both Halston and Meeting Gorbachev end on a personal note to reflect on the man, not just the professional. Unlike the last Soviet leader, this legend died too soon and succumbed to a global pandemic, but his end was still a triumph of love, joy and style.
I highly recommend that you see Halston in spite of its flaws. It was an incredibly thrilling biography of a legend that deserved better. I’m glad that filmmakers are insuring that we don’t forget him!
(Side note regarding legends: do you know who Phil Donahue is? He is featured prominently in this documentary and Finding Vivian Maier. If you do, remember that no one could imagine anyone taking his place as the king of the talk shows hosts. Guess who was next? Oprah. Everyone is replaceable.)
