Costumes

in Romeo and Juliet (1968) and Fifteenth

Century Realism

A working paper by Peter Hibbert1



Danilo Donati, at the 1968 Oscars ceremony, won the Academy Award for Best Costume
Design for his work in Zeffirelli’s production of Romeo and Juliet. It was his first such
award; the second occasion was to be in 1976 for his work in Fellini’s Casanova. He is
one of just a handful of designers to achieve that distinction. He is very much regarded
as the most prominent costume designer of Italian post-war cinema.

Born in Suzzara in northern Italy in 1926, Donati studied to become a muralist and
fresco painter at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence. It may be that his studies there
helped to nurture his interest in Renaissance traditions and, in particular, his
understanding of the design of medieval costumes, exhibited on the walls of Florentine
churches and chapels.

His early career path was similar to Zeffirelli’s in that he began his career in the theatre
working for Luchino Visconti. He was an assistant costume designer on the director's
productions of La Vestale (1954) and La Traviata (1955) at La Scala with Maria Callas.
From 1960 onwards, he started working on a number movies, in particular developing a
long and productive working relationship with Pier Paolo Pasolini, winning his first
Nastro d‘argento (a presitigious award made annually by the SNGCI – the National
Union of Italian Film Journalists) for his costumes in Il Vangelo secondo Matteo (The
Gospel According to St. Matthew) in 1964. This also earned him his first Oscar
nomination. The movie was filmed in black and white

Donati’s work with Zeffirelli can be traced back to 1955, when Zeffirelli started as an
independent director, away from Visconti, and directing Callas in the production of Il
turco in Italia at La Scala in 1955. Donati became one of the director's acolytes. "We
shared all we had," wrote Zeffirelli later of his bohemian friends.2

It was his work with Zeffirelli in The Taming of the Shrew (1967) that Donati’s gift not
only for richness in colour and texture in costume design, but also for improvisation,
came into prominence. Donati, who was in charge of costumes for the cast, except for
Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, was brought in at the last minute to design
overnight a more flattering and comfortable costume for Burton, compared with that
designed by Irene Shariff whom the Burtons had previously insisted on using. With the
assistance of a seamstress, Donati was able to produce five costumes for Burton in just
thirty-six hours.3 He later shared an Oscar nomination with Shariff for this production.

It was against this background that Donati was commissioned to design the Renaissance
costumes for the Romeo and Juliet movie.

1 © Peter Hibbert and the Romeo & Juliet 1968 Movie Database, 2018: www.romeo-juliet-
1968.com
2 Tom Vallance in his obituary of Donati, Independent 14th December 2001
3 Franco Zeffirelli Autobiography (1986) Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, p. 214

1

Sources for designing fifteenth century style costumes

Designing clothes based on fifteenth century designs is not without its difficulties. The
primary sources, the clothes themselves, have rarely survived. It therefore becomes
necessary to turn to paintings and frescoes as well as literary records for information as
to how people dressed. The use of paintings as a source of information has not been
without its controversy. Jacob Burchardt in his Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy4
expressed the view that costumes in paintings did not express the prevailing fashions,
neither were artists under any obligation to paint authentically the clothes that were
actually worn at the time. Such a view is not necessarily surprising as the accumulation
of wealth and the secularisation of art in the mid-fifteenth century, together with the
increasing trend for personal aggrandisement, lead to fantastic creations in the style of
costumes worn by both men and women. A Stella Blum noted5: “Clothing became so
ornate that it approached pure fantasy; in fact some scholars have questioned the
authenticity of some of the garments portrayed in the paintings of this period. Yet when
one examines the mood wealth, and leisure activities of the mid-Renaissance elite and
reads the writings that have survived, the fantasy becomes a reality.”

If, as seems the case, Renaissance painters of the fifteenth century paid close attention to
representing the world around them, it is reasonable to assume that they paid equally
close attention not merely to the style of clothes of the people depicted in their oil
paintings and frescoes, but also to the weight, texture, construction and ornamentation
of those fabrics and clothes. Elizabeth Birbari6 has examined this in minute detail, even
to the point of being able to assess the weight of the fabrics depicted, by reference to the
type and number of folds in the material and the seams used in tailoring the fabrics, as
revealed in the paintings. Jacqueline Herald7 has not only examined paintings but also
the written records, such as clothing inventories, to discover what precisely existed in
fifteenth century wardrobes.


Comparisons between Donati’s costumes and fifteenth century sources

During his studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence, Donati would have had
considerable exposure to Renaissance paintings, both in oils and as frescoes. I propose
in this paper to look closely at the style and construction of mid to late fifteenth century
costumes as revealed in Italian works of art, for both men and women, and to compare
them with Donati’s creations.


MEN’S CLOTHING


Introduction

In the decades leading up to 1450, patronage in Italy no longer lay in the confraternities
and guilds but increasingly in the powerful families of the Republics and in the courts of

4 Jacob Burckhardt Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (1860) reprinted in Penguin Classics;

New Ed edition (28 Jun. 1990)

5 Stella Blum, Review of "Renaissance Dress in Italy, 1400-1500. Jacqueline Herald”, in Renaissance

Quarterly 36, no. 3 (Autumn, 1983): 418-422 at pp.40-421

6 Elizabeth Birbari, Dress in Italian Painting, 1460 -1500, John Murray, London (1975)
7 Jacqueline Herald, Renaissance Dress in Italy, 1400-1500, Bell and Hyman, London (1981)

2
princes. This accumulation of wealth and power was reflected in the style, fabrics and
ornamentation of clothing for both men and women. In this first section I shall look at
how this was translated into the apparel worn by men.

Colours

A preliminary observation of particular relevance is that the master of the household
would have dictated and distributed the clothes worn by the male members of the
household. This extended not only to knights and their entourage but also to all male
servants. All of the same station were dressed in the same fashion and in similar
colours.8 This applied to most of the powerful families and courts of Western Europe.
Thus, in the image below from the French painter, Jean Fouquet’s Les Grandes
Chroniques de France (1460)9, the servants carrying the food are dressed in identical
colours.

Style and colour could also be dictated by the head of the household to members of the
family as well. Thus, in Montegna’s The Gonzaga Family10, the members of the family in
the focal point of the painting are shown wearing yellows, gold and reds. The image
(below) shows the detail from the painting.















8 Birnari, at p. 11
9 Departement des manuscrits, Paris, cat. 6465 fol. 444v
10 Andrea Mantegna The Court of the Gonzaga family, 1465–75 (Fresco) Camera Picta, Palazzo

Ducale, Mantua

3
In Romeo and Juliet, members of the two rival households of the Capulets and Montagues
are identifiable by the bright yellows, reds and orange colours of the Capulets and, in the
case of the Montagues, by the more sombre greens, purples and blues. Observers of the
movie point to the fact that this helps the audience to distinguish the members of the
different households (especially the men) in large crowd scenes, such as the riot at the
beginning of the movie. However, this is not purely artistic licence on Donati’s part. It is
also consistent with the practices of fifteenth century elite households. This is
reinforced by the script (at page 6), which refers to the Montague servants as “wearing
the livery of the Montague family”.

(i) Members of the Capulet household (Peter, Gregory and Sampson). Script, Scene 2
page 5:
















(ii) Members of the Montague household in livery (Abram, or “Abraham” in the script,
right, and another) :

The shirt

In the mid to late fifteenth century, men wore three layers of clothing: shirt, doublet,
hose, and often an over-tunic. The shirt was worn closest to the body. This was a

4
loosely fitting garment with sleeves, pale in colour and reached below the waist. It was
much wider at the base than at the neck and shoulders – almost triangular in form. This
basic shape can be seen in many paintings of the time.

In Carpaccio’s Miracle of the True Cross11, in the background of the painting, white or
cream coloured shirts with wide bases can be seen hanging on a clothesline.

















In Signorelli’s Figures in a landscape12, the central figure is removing his shirt,
emphasising the wide circumference of the base of the shirt.
























11 Vittore Carpaccio The Miracle of the Relic of the True Cross on the Rialto Bridge, 1494 (oil on

canvas) Galleria dell' Accademia, Venice, Italy

12 Luca Signorelli Figures in a Landscape: Two Nude Youths c.1490 (oil on wood panel) Toledo

Museum of Art, Toledo, Ohio, USA

5
Donati adopts this basic shape in his designs for the shirts worn in the movie. A good
example appears in the bedroom scene.





















Necklines in paintings can either be nothing more than a large round hole to enable the
wearer to pull the shirt over his head, similar to the neckline of a modern day t-shirt, or
have a slit down the front in the centre of the shirt. In the latter case, the shirt may have
a set of ties to enable the opening to be closed. A good example of the latter is the figure
on the right in Pietro di Domenico’s Adorazione dei Pastori (image detail below)13:





















Identical examples can be found in the movie:

13 Pietro di Domenico Adorazione dei Pastori, 1460, Pinaciteca Nazionale, Siena, Italy

6

















The doublet

The doublet was a jacket that fitted closely to the body. As the hose (or leggings) could
only be held up by being attached to the doublet, there had to be some means of
strengthening the doublet, often in the material that was used or by having a lining. This
had to be strong enough to resist the pull from the “points” or ties by which the hose
was fixed to the doublet, to ensure the close fitting of the hose on the legs. In many
paintings, the points or ties cannot be seen, because either the figure is wearing an over-
tunic, or else is wearing a second doublet. An example of a painting showing the points
tying the hose to the doublet is a figure in Piero della Francesca’s Battle between
Heraclius and Chosroes14:





















Donati authentically uses the same device in his designs of doublet and hose in the
movie, as can be seen in the image below, showing the points tying Romeo’s hose to his
doublet:

14 c. 1466, Fresco painting, San Francesco, Arezzo

7



















However, the design of the hose worn by the cast in the movie makes it self-supporting
around the waist. This can be seen in the fight scenes, when the doublets are removed,
whereas in the fifteenth century the doublet would not be removed – the points would
merely be loosened in a fight, as they were the only means of support15.














The name doublet referred to the duplicate layers of material used to make the shirt.
The inner lining was usually made of linen, while the outer layer was made of heavy silk.
Often sleeves were separate items that were fastened at the shoulder and with the
forearm section attached at the elbow. From the elbow to the wrist, the doublet in the
later fifteenth century was often slashed, opening up the outer layer to reveal the inner
lining. Although the doublet and hose might be worn alone informally indoors, it would
normally be worn with an outer tunic in public. The length of the outer tunic varied
considerably, with or without sleeves.

Pietro Perugino’s Bottega of 147316 is an excellent example showing the different styles
of doublet (with or without slashed sleeves) and the different lengths of outer tunics
(with or without sleeves)

15 Birbari, ibid p.43.
16 Pietro Perugino 'Bottega of 1473': Nicchia di San Bernardino, Stories of Saint Bernardino. 1473.

Cat. no. 8 in Vittoria Garibaldi: Perugino. Catalogo completo. Octavo, Firenze 2000, ISBN 88-8030-
091-1.

8
















The detailed construction of the sleeves for the doublets in the movie can be seen in this
image (taken from Romeo’s wedding costume on display at Juliet’s House in Verona):




















The hose

The hose in the late fifteenth century can be in the form of separate leggings for each leg,
joined at the waist, as in Piero della Francesca’s Battle between Heraclius and Chosroes
(above), or as a central back seam similar to modern tights. An example of the latter can
be seen in rear view of the left crossbow man in Pallaiuolo’s Martyrdom of St.
Sebastian17:






17 Antonio Pallaiuolo and Piero Pallaiuolo Martyrdom of St. Sebastian 1475 (oil on wood) The
National Gallery, London, England

9













A similar type of construction for the hose is used by Donati in the movie, revealed in the
above image of the side angled view of Romeo. Mention has already be made above as
to how the hose was tied to the doublet for support by means of “points” around the
waist of the hose, copied by Donati in his creations.

Fifteenth century hose were often made particolored or mi-parti, having each leg a
different color, or even one leg made of two colors. An example can be found in the
illustrated panel in the medieval French manuscript Croniques abregies commençans au
temps de Herode Antipas, persecuteur de la chrestienté…(at folio 19 recto), and which is
followed by Donati in most of his male costumes.




















The codpieces used on the hoses have been the subject of comment in most reviews of
the movie18. Perhaps this is not surprising as the camera zooms in to the lower portions
of the bodies of Samson and Gregory within seconds of the start of the movie, as the two
men swagger down the market street. This is not a homo-erotic sequence, but rather as
academic commentators such as Kenneth S. Rothwell have indicated: “The riot sequence
between Capulets and Montagues again shows words being changed into pictures.

18 For example: Peter Travers, RollingStone.com, 1st November 1996; Peter Bradshaw, The
Guardian, 19th May 2016; Courtney Lehmann Screen Adaptations: Romeo and Juliet: A close study
of the relationship between text and film. Bloomsbury. London (2010) at p. 230.

10
“Codpieces in close up replace the opening exchange of bawdry between Samson and
Gregory about ‘thrusting maids to the wall’ and the ‘heads of the maids’”19.

The construction of the codpiece in the latter part of the fifteenth century was in the
nature of a front triangular flap, seamed to both hose at the crotch and tied at both sides
to each hose20. Donati follows a similar pattern, except that in the movie, the codpieces
are not functional, being stitched at the apex of the triangle to the hose, as in this
example on exhibit at the Juliet House, Verona:

















Sumptuary laws

In the fifteenth century, as in previous centuries, dress was goverened by strict
sumptuary laws, restricting style and materials to specific social class. Although in the
context of a movie, costumes for the supporting cast would have been made on a
production scale with similarities of materials and style of dress, nevertheless Donati
does make the distinction of social class in the costumes worn by the adult members of
the social elite. Examples can be found not only in the costumes of Lords Montague and
Capulet and in the formal costumes worn by Paris and Tybalt, but also in the supporting
cast members at the mask ball where the social elite wear elaborate costumes of velvets,
silks and furs.

19 Kenneth S. Rothwell Zeffirelli's "Romeo and Juliet": Words into Picture and Music
Literature/Film Quarterly Vol. 5, No. 4, Shakespeare on Film III (FALL, 1977), pp. 326-331 at p.
327.
20 Grace Q. Vicary, Visual Art as Social Data: The Renaissance Codpiece, Cultural Anthropology, Vol.

4, No. 1 (Feb., 1989), pp. 3-25 at p.5.

11




WOMEN’S CLOTHING


In the same way that men wore a shirt close to their body, women wore a chemise. This
was often cut in a similar style to the male shirt, but usually made of finer material. Over
this a woman would wear a dress and, often almost compeletly covering this, an
overdress. Although a single dress could be worn over the chemise, the social elite
would have taken advanatage of wearing an overdress, not only for warmth, but also to
show off the expensive materials of damasks and brocades, as well the fineness of the
complex embroidery, employed in making these items. The overdress was often worn
longer than the leg length so that it could be lifted up when walking.

Under-dresses and overdresses worn in the second half of the fifteenth century were of
two main designs: those cut in one piece, and those cut in two parts (a bodice and a
skirt). An example of the first can be seen in Benozzo Gozzoli’s, Madonna della Cintola21:



















21 Benozzo Gozzoli, Madonna della Cintola, 1450-52 (tempora on panel) Vatican Museum, Italy

12
An example of the latter can be seen in Cossa’s Triumph of Venus22:





















Donati adopts these two styles, especially in the dresses worn by Juliet. In the wedding
scene, we see a one piece under-dress with sleeves attached, together with a one piece
overdress:

22 Francesco del Cossa Allegory of April: Triumph of Venus 1476-84 (fresco) Palazzo Schifanoia,
Ferrara, Italy

13
Whereas in the opening appearance of Juliet in the movie, we see a one piece overdress
covering a finely embroidered two piece bodice and skirt:






















As can be seen in the above image, where an overdress is worn, the neckline of the
under-dress can appear to lie square to it, and all that can be seen of the under-dress is a
straight neckline to the bodice. This is consistent with fifteen century design, as in the
example of Ghirlandaio’s Birth of the Virgin23:




















The design of the sleeve can be such that it is separately attached to the under-dress at
the shoulder, as well as being slashed along its length - in both cases revealing the

23 Domenico Ghirlandaio Birth of the Virgin c. 1485-90 (fresco) Cappella Maggiore, Santa Maria

Novella, Florence, Italy

14
chemise underneath. A good example is one of the figures in the detail to Piero di
Cosimo’s Virgin and Child24:






















Donati uses a similar construction for the sleeves of Juliet’s dresses, for example in the
garden scene:
























24 Piero di Cosimo Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints Elizabeth of Hungary, Catherine of
Alexandria, Peter, and John the Evangelist with Angels 1493 (oil and tempera on panel) Museo
degli Innocenti, Florence, Italy

15
 SUMMARY


This paper is not intended to be an in-depth examination of fifteenth century constumes
or paintings, and the comparisons have largely been limited to the main characters of
the cast in Romeo and Juliet. Nevertheless, within the constraints of the budget for the
movie, Donati’s designs show a remarkable attention to the detail of fifteenth century
Italian oil and fresco paintings for both male and female costumes. Italy in the fifteenth
century was the centre for the most lavish and rich textiles used in Europe. This has
been reflected in the vivid colours and materials, as well as the detailed tailoring, of the
costumes in the movie. The conclusion that one can reasonably draw is that Donati’s
designs reflect his close study of frescoes and panels, since the start of his career, and
elegantly and effectively uses this detailed knowledge in the designs of his costumes for
Romeo and Juliet.

16