Daniel Selon is one of the most exciting costume designers working today. He’s already made an indelible mark on the MCU, acting as the costume designer for Agatha All Along and an assistant costume designer on projects like WandaVision, Multiverse of Madness, and Thor: Love and Thunder. This year has been busier than ever for the Emmy winner, with the release of both the highly beloved Muppet Show special and critically acclaimed Prime Video series Spider-Noir.
After doing a deep dive with Selon about Agatha All Along at last year’s San Diego Comic-Con, Fanversation was delighted to sit down with him again to chat about his newest pair of impressive projects. During the conversation, Selon discussed how his process differs with each job, designing outfits for Sabrina Carpenter, Miss Piggy, and Seth Rogen, how his experience on WandaVision uniquely prepared him for Spider-Noir, what Agatha Harkness would wear to host The Muppet Show and for a noir-themed Witches’ Road trial, and more.
FANVERSATION: You’ve talked about how you do very extensive research, both in terms of historical accuracy and source material when you have it. How does your process change from project to project?
DANIEL SELON: Every project has different needs, but I think that the first round of research is really for myself. I think of it like a painting, and you have to lay that first coat. You have to seal the canvas, and I have to bring myself into the arena of what we’re doing. Maybe I know something about what the subject matter is, or the characters, or the time and place enough to have gotten the job, but then I have to actually educate myself. So there’s the initial round of digging deeper into things that I need to know so that I can speak on them. And then, in that process, usually a bunch of other things are uprooted and brought to the light, and I’m like, “Okay, I need to pin that.” It sort of begins this way, and you build this web of things that we need to know about. I would say the structure of that process is the same for every project, but to what depth and how much time you have to devote to that is always a consideration.
That leads me really well to my next question, which is, are there times you have to stop yourself from going down a rabbit hole? And if so, how do you remedy those spots where you’re like, “Oh, I feel like there’s a loose end here. I feel like I don’t know as much here as I wish I did.” How do you balance that when there is a schedule to stick to?
Staying focused on the path of research is a big challenge for me. I have so many varied interests. I’m like a magpie — I see something sparkly over here, and I’m like, “Oh, what’s that?” And then I spend an hour and a half looking at things that have nothing to do with the project, but maybe it’s feeding my soul in some sort of way, so I try to indulge myself a little bit, but then sort of snap back to focus.
I’m a listmaker, so I love to have a long list of things. Sometimes, the best idea, or a kernel of an idea, or just something that needs to be researched will crop up at the most inopportune time — in the shower, in a dream, on a walk with the dog, whatever. So that just goes on a list, and then, I really try to chip away at it. Inevitably, I feel like my brain gets stuck on some things, and I’ll be like, “Oh, I never looked up what that thing was.” And at the end of the project, I sort of look back, and I realize that it wasn’t necessary, and it was fine. So I think that, as I get older, I have realized I can give my poor Virgo brain a break. It wants to tick off all the boxes that were ever created, but it’s not always necessary.
I want to go into The Muppets. I saw in another interview you did that you grew up making and performing with puppets. Can you elaborate a little bit on that?
I was an actor from the time that I was eight years old. I did a lot of theater, particularly at the Children’s Theater Company in Minneapolis, which is where I grew up. I grew up seeing plays there, and then eventually, I was a student in their theater arts training program, and then I was in the shows as a young adult in middle school and high school. I actually went back and was in the acting company there for a year, sort of in the middle of college, and during all of that time, their production value often heavily relied on puppetry of all different kinds. They have a whole cast of actors, and it’s very high production value. It’s a big, beautiful theater. So I had the opportunity to learn a lot of different kinds of puppetry — shadow puppetry, large-scale Julie Taymor stuff, and hand-and-rod puppetry. I think, because I was dexterous with my hand-eye coordination and was willing to do things that weren’t just taking center stage as an actor, singer, dancer, and so on, I often got assigned the puppetry track in these shows, and I just loved it. I still do, of course.
It eventually led to me working in a creature shop in Burbank post-college. It was called Le Chef Costumier, which is no longer around, but we built a lot of stuff for the Disney theme parks, Universal Studios theme parks, and stuff like that. It was big, walk-around costumed characters, so all of the famous ones that you know. And puppets — a lot of puppets. There have been these big periods in my creative life of a lot of puppetry, so getting to jump in with the Muppets, who are kind of like this Mount Everest of puppets, was just a total “pinch me” moment.
I want to talk specifically about the “Manchild” sequence. That was maybe my favorite part. I loved how Sabrina’s dress felt a little bit feathery at times, and you had the trucker hats and the bandanas. I’m curious how you developed and blended all of those Western bar aesthetics.
The Muppets was a testing ground for me. I felt like I was auditioning the whole time for them up at the studio as an artist and as a designer, so I was always trying to find the line. But because I was seeking what the boundary was, I think we put a lot on camera. We didn’t have to print a specific trucker hat for all the ruffians at the bar, but we did.
Sabrina’s look was so fun, playful, and flirty. That whole sequence actually had a totally different concept initially that we were running with, and then Sabrina had an idea to kind of keep it in the country Western realm, which was more in keeping with that album and with the video that she had done. So we were like, “Yes, of course, great, we’ll do the honky-tonk.” I was like, “How do we make her that waitress that you know when you go in to get a slice of pie on your road trip without making her too St. Pauli Girl?” But she was just game, and she loves to look cute. The apron was something that actually she and Jared, her stylist, found, and they brought it to us and were just like, “We really like this apron. What can we do with this?” I was like, “Well, let’s remake it in another color in your way — to your scale.” That was kind of how we ended up there. We always knew that the dress would turn into feathers, so we had to sort of design towards that. That was so fun.
Can you reveal what it was going to be before the Western?
It was more of a ‘60s boudoir, Bettie Page noir, pin-up girl vibe. Obviously, seeing the final product with the chickens and everything, it’s like, “Oh, this is exactly what it needed to be.”
Sabrina and Miss Piggy’s similarities were kind of the running gag, but the outfits weren’t exact copies, which I liked. I’m curious if you can talk about creating harmony with those two characters’ looks.
Two dueling divas. They were really trying to out-diva each other onscreen and off-screen. It was really about pleasing everyone and making sure that Sabrina felt comfortable and was wearing something that she felt great in, and then making sure that it would actually work on Miss Piggy. There was a lot of, “If it’s this, then Miss Piggy can’t do that. If Miss Piggy has to have a boa, you need to have a boa.” There were a lot of back-and-forth, triangulated conversations between Sabrina and Miss Piggy. Some of the things were like, “Oh, this is what Miss Piggy’s going to wear, so we’ll make it for Sabrina.” And then there was a dress at the very end that Sabrina wears — this vintage Dolly Parton outfit with the big shoulders and all beads and rhinestones — and I was like, “Well, that’s fabulous. Let’s make that for Miss Piggy.” And they were like, “But it has these nude cutouts on the side.” And I was like, “Well, then we’re going to do a nude illusion for Miss Piggy.”
In addition to Sabrina, there were also celebrity guest stars. Did you work with Seth Rogen on his look at all? I loved his suit.
Oh yeah, for sure. Absolutely. We put our heads together about it, and he wanted to feel like he was part of the Muppet Theater in a way. He felt like he was of a piece with the Muppets. And we knew that he was gonna be doing this scene with Fozzie, so it was like, “Well, he kind of is Fozzie. He’s already got the orange and brown color story — let’s push that.” I found this great vintage, rust-colored tuxedo jacket, and it was a beautiful fit. He walked right into it, and we were like, “Well, this is obviously the choice.”
I have to ask about Gonzo’s sparkly roller skates. How did those come about?
Those were written in the script from day one. Redesigning Gonzo’s daredevil jumpsuit was kind of a big deal because he’s had lots of different iterations of that over the years, and it’s like, “We’re debuting a new look for Gonzo.” That look was mostly designed and finished by Dani Iglesias, who is the creative director of the Muppets Studio. They had made that previously and then not used it, so they were like, “Let’s use it here.” And we needed to make these roller skates, so between Theresa Corvino, who was the propmaster on The Muppets, we were like, “What’s going on here?” They ended up fabricating those skates, so it was a lot of collaboration back and forth between costumes and props. It was really fun because we were all smashed into one soundstage at Fox, and we could see across the room what they were working on on their table. We could just go back and forth, hold it up, and be like, “Here’s what this is looking like.”
There are so many little Muppet extras, which you kind of alluded to in the “Manchild” scene, but was there an outfit you wish had gotten a little more screen time?
[Nods emphatically]
Please, tell me about it.
Well, there are two. There’s Miss Piggy’s Aphrodite dress that she wears. It turned out so beautifully, and she loved wearing it. It had all this great movement. We knew that she was going to fall into the swamp when she was chasing after Kermit and Sabrina, and I was like, “Oh, let’s do a thing where it sort of soaks up all the swamp water.” So we made two versions. She wears the pristine version, and then, once she crawls into the boat to finish the song with Sabrina, the soaked version that she’s wearing, you can barely see on camera. I really learned my lesson that, anything for the Muppets, the visual impact needs to be basically from the chest up because of how much of their body you see. That was my greatest teacher — the swamp dress. Because we made this beautiful ombré down into all these green and yellow swampy colors, but you can just glimpse it a little bit. I put it on my Instagram.
The other one was this character named Larb. He’s a lesser-known Muppet, but we made this really sweet velvet usher uniform because he’s one of the ushers at the Muppets Theater, and he presented tomatoes to Statler and Waldorf to throw at the Muppets in their little opera box. We made him this little pillbox hat, and we made him the gold epaulettes on his usher uniform. His uniform is so cute, and sweet, and old-timey, and I wish it got more play, but it’s in there.
I have to weave in Agatha a little bit, of course. What do you think Agatha Harkness would wear to host The Muppet Show?
Oh, that’s such a good question. I think she would wear something fashionable but perverse. She would wear a dark, snatched-waist jacket with a big belt or something, but made of faux fur, you know? Something where it’s a little like, “Did a Muppet have to die for that coat?”
Sticking with Agatha, but now transitioning into Spider-Noir, I wish we could have gotten a noir-themed Witches’ Road trial. What do you think everyone would be wearing for that?
Oh, I love this question. Rio would, of course, be the femme fatale, so something with a peekaboo shoulder — very body-conscious and vampy. Sort of the Cat Hardy of the Witches’ Road. Agatha, of course, would be wearing a suit. It’s the ‘30s, and the tailoring — the men’s suiting — she would be the first to that.
We need some fan art.
I want to see it.
Spider-Noir is so rich in detail. I know that, for Agatha, you put in a lot of hidden little Easter eggs like the runes in the coat. Was there any of that on Spider-Noir?
There was a bit, yeah. The spider costume itself, really every element of it directly correlates to pieces from World War I that were from the military. We had some really good motorcycle jacket references as well. The mask itself was the most challenging part of that costume to design and execute, because it has such a form-fitting shape, and it needed to be synthetic so that we could make it consistent. We imagined that as if it were a military sweater — a wool sweater that he had preserved from the war, and then cut up and stitched himself, and made a knit mask. We kind of had to go the route of making that practically so that it could be replicated. So there was a little bit of, “Where did that mask come from? What is that?” And then revealing the storyline that is in the show of him having been in World War I.
There’s also, on the back of his coat, on the underside of the collar, we made this really beautiful Art Nouveau pattern that is essentially a spiderweb. That was printed with thin black in the classic way that Spider-Man’s costume’s webs are printed on the suit. We printed it that way on the back of the collar. Sometimes, you can glimpse it. And there was a billboard — I think on Sunset Boulevard when they were really promoting the show — where you could see it, and I was like, “Yes, I’m so glad we did that.”
There’s obviously this unique challenge of the show being available to watch in color and also black-and-white. I know you had some experience with black-and-white on the first couple of episodes of WandaVision, so I’m curious if that experience proved helpful for knowing how to do that on Spider-Noir.
Totally. Yes, it absolutely did. On WandaVision, I would say it was like the beta version of me understanding how to work in black-and-white. Spider-Noir was like the full 2.0 iOS. Because on WandaVision, it was just [costume designer] Mayes C. Rubeo or me on our phone in the black-and-white filter looking at the fabrics, which helps, and it gives you a little bit of a guess. But on Spider-Noir, the actual lut that was created for the black-and-white film process and the color process. Those pushed the colors to some extremes, and the black-and-white was a lot of silver tone, and so we would photograph every single fabric that we wanted to maybe use, and then we would process it through those lut filters on the computer so that we could see them side-by-side. Every fitting photo was also done that way, so we could see how it would actually show up. It was a much larger, longer, more laborious version of running through the fabric store with my phone on black-and-white for sure.
I imagine that it made the need for silhouettes and patterns more necessary, too.
Yeah, silhouette is always important, but especially in a genre like noir where you’re playing with really strong shadows, and you’re not always seeing someone in the full light. You really need to recognize who they are very quickly, so silhouette becomes important. Texture and sheen were the other major players in how the costumes would reveal themselves in these two different mediums. But it’s one of the things that I think is so interesting about it as a product of something to watch these days. Like when Cat Hardy comes on screen, you can tell that there’s a fabric she’s wearing that’s kind of glimmering. And then when you switch and toggle over to the color version, it’s like this bonkers flip-flop between copper and green. You all of a sudden get flooded with all this other information, which was really kind of fun.
The color palette is beautiful in the show. I love the greens, purples, and oranges.
That’s all Trayce Field. She had really, really strong ideas about what the characters’ color palettes would be.
I want to talk a little bit about Cat. You were kind of alluding to her intro with the yellow dress and that almost halo crown. I’m curious if you can talk a little bit about that look. It’s a difficult challenge to pick because I loved all of them, but that might have been my favorite look in the show.
That one was so wonderful. Trayce Field has this deep love for the color gold — the material, the way that it glitters, the value of it. That look was always going to show that she is a trophy. She’s sort of a caged bird of Silvermane’s, but she’s there, and she’s glimmering and sort of a goddess. So it was about creating an ethereal queen’s glow. We worked with a really wonderful milliner — Stacia Lang, who I adore — who did a lot of prototyping. Originally, we had designed it to be much larger in scale, and then wanted to have the option for her to take it off on camera. In order to do that, we made it a little smaller scale, but it’s a fun piece. It turned out beautifully.
From Marvel to Muppets, you’ve worked on so many iconic franchises already. Is there one that would be your dream to work on next?
I’m such a fan of Guillermo del Toro’s work. I think he cultivates this incredible culture around the art itself, the making of the film, the way the concept art is created, and beloved, and shared across departments. Maybe someday.
We’re manifesting it right here, right now. I think it’s so cool how you work with a lot of the same people, especially Maddison Carroll. Can you talk about that partnership?
Maddie is a ride-or-die, and we’re family at this point. There’s so much value in those kinds of working relationships where you do multiple projects together because we have a shorthand. She learns what’s in my brain. I know what’s in her brain. We know each other’s strengths and weaknesses, edges and curves, and you can really get more work out of each other. More beautiful ideas are born when you’re deeply comfortable with someone. I feel that way about Maddie, certainly, and also Christine Casaus, who was my other ACD on Agatha. We call each other our film family, and it’s true. It’s so real. It’s the highs and the lows. They’ve just left an indelible mark on my life, certainly, and I am always trying to work with them.
My last question is kind of a random one, but when I was on your IMDb, I saw you were credited for costumes on the documentary Middletown, now named Teenage Wasteland. I saw that at Sundance a couple of years ago and loved it. I’m curious if you can talk about costume designing for documentaries and what that process was like.
It was a total outlier for me. I just recently watched it and was blown away. It’s so good — very powerful. My contribution to that was pretty small, but it was this recreation of these very real people who were students in high school from 1991 to 1993. That was a unique exercise because I had a bunch of photos of these people. I knew what they were wearing. I knew the vibe and how they were representing themselves on camera, because they were both the journalists and the interviewers on camera. It was kind of like, “Let’s travel back in time to 1991 through 1993.” I did a lot of real vintage digging and found the classic brands from the time and the cuts that they would have been wearing. I had to find the exact hat that one of the kids was wearing and paid a pretty penny for it. It’s the only one in the world, but it was worth it at the end of the day. Then getting to kind of build on that world a bit and add some looks to it was both an accuracy challenge — a recreation challenge — and also just a creative vintage styling adventure.
The Muppet Show is now streaming on Disney+. Spider-Noir is streaming on Prime Video.
— Taylor Gates