'Hocus Pocus 2' costume designer Salvador Pérez Jr. takes us through every step of recreating (and updating!) the iconic look of the Sanderson sisters for 'Hocus Pocus 2.'
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00:00 - Sisters, focus!
00:01 We must fly to our ancestral cottage,
00:04 get book, and brew our potion.
00:06 - Then what, Winnie, then what?
00:07 - Then we run amok in Salem!
00:10 - As much as it was a lot of work,
00:11 I think every day was just so much fun.
00:13 Ben and Mary arrived first,
00:14 and we had their first on-screen camera test,
00:17 and it was the night of my birthday.
00:19 And we were supposed to be done early,
00:20 and my crew was allowed to go to dinner,
00:21 and then we ended up shooting until like 11 o'clock at night,
00:24 and my crew was like, "Aren't you sad
00:25 you missed your birthday party?"
00:25 I'm like, "Are you kidding?
00:27 I hung out with Winifred and Mary Sanderson
00:29 on my birthday, it was the best day ever."
00:31 (orchestral music)
00:34 Winifred's original shoes were just a pair of like,
00:47 1980s Steve Madden's ankle boots,
00:49 and they put the point on them,
00:50 and I'm like, "No, no, no, no, no, no.
00:51 I have the money and time."
00:53 And so I went to the cobbler at Western Costume Company,
00:56 and I showed him the picture,
00:57 and I'm like, "I need you to make this."
00:58 So he did her last for her shoe with the point in it.
01:02 And then Kathy had a broken foot,
01:03 so I had to make her boots that supported her foot,
01:07 and I thought she did an ankle support.
01:09 So I'm like, "Well, let's just make a boot,
01:10 but let's do like the man's shoe version of it."
01:12 Sarah needed a dance boot because she dances so much.
01:15 I couldn't skimp on the shoes.
01:17 Like, I think the easy way out would have been
01:18 to buy a shoe and put a point in it,
01:20 but I'm like, "No, no, no, it's the Divine Miss M.
01:23 We're gonna have the proper shoes for her."
01:25 One of my favorite things are those handmade shoes,
01:27 because they're so beautiful to look at.
01:28 When I got the call for the interview
01:31 for "Hocus Pocus 2," I was immediately excited
01:34 and then instantly terrified,
01:36 because it's a daunting task to, like, you know,
01:38 come back and revisit these characters.
01:40 And we had like a three-hour meeting
01:42 with Ann Fletcher, the director,
01:43 and Lynn Harris, the producer.
01:45 And they're like, "Look, the edict is that the studio
01:47 knows these costumes are iconic,
01:49 and so we have to hearken to them,
01:51 but we want them freshened."
01:52 And I had the benefit of being friends with Mary Vogt,
01:54 who designed the original costumes.
01:56 And so I called her and I said, "Why aren't you doing this?"
01:58 And she's like, "I designed the first one.
01:59 I don't necessarily want to come back."
02:01 And then we just talked about where she started
02:03 and how they were made and all the details.
02:06 And I said, "So what was your lore for the details?"
02:08 She's like, "I just made things up."
02:09 She's like, "I didn't want it to be negative.
02:11 I don't want it to be bad luck.
02:12 I didn't want to put anything that was evil."
02:13 And one of my customers happened to be a witch.
02:16 So she was able to, like, talk to me about the details
02:19 and, like, what the meaning was.
02:20 And I'm like, "Well, I want things on the costumes
02:22 that are positive."
02:23 The brooch on her coat, you know, I thought,
02:25 "How can we make it more special to Winifred?"
02:27 And so I had a jeweler make me this beautiful brooch
02:30 that was the forest with a moon and a star in it.
02:34 But I wanted to have that malachite stone
02:35 like the original one.
02:36 So it was little bits of detail in the costume
02:38 that sort of, if you squinted,
02:40 you would think it was the same costume,
02:41 but then there was just more rich details on it.
02:43 When I showed this to the actors
02:45 and they just fell in love with it.
02:46 They loved the details to it.
02:48 And that was the fun of taking these characters
02:51 that everybody loves and knows so well
02:52 and bringing them to life again 30 years later.
02:55 - Yes, Salem, we're back!
02:57 (laughing)
02:59 - Are those the Sanderson sisters?
03:02 - They're broken.
03:04 - I had touched the capes many times over the years
03:07 because they were in the rental house.
03:08 And they're so, it's the lightest silk hobbit tie
03:12 because you want them to flow
03:13 and you want that sort of flutter in the wind.
03:16 We had been working on it for three months.
03:17 I had made the costumes.
03:19 Then Bette came in and did her first flight test.
03:21 And it was like, "Please work, please work."
03:24 And she got up there and the cape just, it comes alive.
03:27 And I love that each of the ladies put their costume on
03:30 and immediately started to twirl.
03:32 And they really dictated how much weight was in the capes,
03:35 how long they were.
03:36 And you probably don't notice, but when they're walking,
03:38 they had walking capes that just grazed the ground.
03:41 But when they fly, they magically get four feet longer.
03:45 And you really see that fabric behind them.
03:47 So they had walking capes and flying capes.
03:51 And when I had Waddingham in her costume,
03:53 we made the cape extra long because she's so tall.
03:56 And I thought, "Well, once I get it on her,
03:57 I'll cut it to her length."
03:59 And she puts it on and starts doing this,
04:01 and she just becomes this bird that came alive.
04:03 And I'm like, "I'm gonna cut it."
04:04 She's like, "Don't you dare.
04:05 I'm gonna work this cape."
04:07 And I'm like, "But you're gonna be in the forest."
04:08 She's like, "I'm gonna."
04:10 And true to her form,
04:11 if you see her in that cape on camera,
04:13 she is just, it's part of her character.
04:16 That cape is flying behind her.
04:18 And then we added a little bit to sparkle
04:19 because I just love that there was something magical
04:22 like fairy dust on them.
04:23 Each lady had about 250 yards of silk in her capes
04:27 that had to be crystallized.
04:29 So I think that, yes, capes can be the detriment to you,
04:32 but every single actor in this movie loved their cape.
04:34 (dramatic music)
04:37 - Winnie!
04:38 My broomies are misbehaving!
04:42 Oh, Winnie!
04:42 I'm surfing, cowabunga!
04:45 (laughing)
04:48 - Poor Sarah was freezing 'cause we were in
04:51 Providential Island in the dead of winter, 20 degrees,
04:54 and she's wearing this little wispy outfit,
04:57 which is why I ended up using cashmere on her sleeves
05:00 because the director, she's like, "Can we knit spiderwebs?"
05:03 So I have a knitter, Krista Allen at Knitsy Knits,
05:05 and I'm like, "Krista, what can we do?"
05:06 She's like, "Well, you can't knit a spiderweb,
05:08 but you can crochet it."
05:09 So she crocheted individual spiderwebs
05:11 that she then joined.
05:13 And as we were looking for fabric, she was like,
05:15 "Well, this is really expensive,
05:16 but does this really gossip her cashmere?"
05:18 I'm like, "Great, cashmere will keep her warm.
05:19 Let's do cashmere sleeves."
05:20 And so those sleeves are hand-knit spiderwebs
05:23 joined together to make her sleeves.
05:25 I wanted the jewelry to be authentic.
05:26 I wanted her to believe that that jewelry
05:28 had been made in 1650 and what techniques they used.
05:31 That necklace is so iconic that I thought
05:33 I could not change that.
05:35 And so I found a jeweler in San Francisco
05:37 who hand-makes jewelry.
05:39 She hand-forged the silver and knotted each piece.
05:42 It's all real amethyst stone.
05:43 And then we added the same details to Mary.
05:47 Mary's rings on her corset were decorative.
05:50 They were like little filigree flower,
05:52 but I wanted them to have a meaning.
05:54 So we came up with the words, "Fire, water, air, and earth,"
05:58 and we wrote them in the alphabet of the Magi,
06:00 and each ring has them.
06:01 So it was more like the alchemist that she was
06:03 and the elements that she uses for her magic.
06:05 - Oh, oh, oh, oh.
06:07 - No.
06:08 (camera shutter clicks)
06:08 - So good.
06:10 - So good.
06:11 (laughing)
06:12 (screaming)
06:13 - We are ravishing!
06:15 - We are very veggie.
06:16 (laughing)
06:17 - The idea to make the young witches inspired
06:20 by the new witches was from the director, Ann Fletcher.
06:22 She's like, "You can very subtly,"
06:24 and I don't want it to be obvious,
06:25 "use their colors and use bits of them on the young witches."
06:29 And so then it was just about going out and shopping
06:32 and just sort of like having that in mind,
06:34 like greens and purples for Winnie,
06:36 reds and browns for Mary,
06:37 and pinks and purples for Sarah.
06:39 And it would just feel like it was very sort
06:40 of psychic shopping.
06:41 Like one of my shoppers came back
06:43 with that fabulous Victoria Beckham blouse
06:45 with the eyeballs on it.
06:47 And it was really lavish, but I'm like,
06:49 "But it's so perfect.
06:50 "So how can I take this very lavish blouse
06:52 "and make it look like a high school girl wore it?"
06:53 So then I got that checkerboard sweater vest over it,
06:56 which Mary has the gingham pattern on her skirt.
06:59 And it was just like these pieces sort of appeared.
07:02 And both of Izzy's changes have inspired
07:05 by each of the characters.
07:06 And it was just finding pieces
07:08 that had a little subtle version of it,
07:09 like there's, you know, the colorways.
07:11 And then when Cassie, when I needed to do her pajamas,
07:14 and I found that tie-dye t-shirt in her colors
07:16 that reminded me of Max from the original one,
07:18 it was just sort of like,
07:19 there was a psychic costume designer on my shoulder
07:21 guiding me through this whole movie.
07:23 - Wait, wait, we're not teenagers.
07:25 No, we only look young, but really we're 40?
07:29 - 40?
07:29 Ooh, 40, old folks.
07:31 - I'm physician.
07:33 - I say, as much as it was a challenge,
07:36 and it was, 'cause on top of, you know,
07:38 we had to do the characters and the new characters
07:40 and like 1,300 Halloween costumes,
07:43 we probably dressed 100 actors in the background
07:45 for every scene, even though you never saw them.
07:47 They were just walking into the background.
07:49 Then we did the Santa's sister Halloween costume contest.
07:51 And so a lot of the things that I did in the background
07:54 were ideas that I came up with for our actual witches.
07:58 So that it was like, what's the version of it?
07:59 I think that there's like iconic things like the color.
08:02 You gotta have a green one, a red one,
08:03 and a pink and purple one.
08:04 But then you don't have to be verbatim.
08:07 I think you can bring your personality to it.
08:09 And like, what would you do?
08:09 And that's, I think, which is why I had fun
08:11 with the drag queens too,
08:12 because a lot of times when I was doing working sketches,
08:15 the director was like, "You went too far, Sal.
08:16 You went too far."
08:17 So those drag queens are actually versions
08:20 of what I would have done for the three witches.
08:22 (laughs)
08:23 - Ooh, they're doing a bit.
08:25 That's right, girls.
08:26 Take all this blood.
08:28 - You should always do things that scare you.
08:31 This was daunting.
08:33 I feel like I'm a working costume designer
08:35 and I'm fairly confident in my work,
08:37 but I think you need to be a little afraid
08:38 to make magic happen.
08:40 (upbeat music)
08:42 (upbeat music)
08:45 (upbeat music)
08:48 (upbeat music)
08:50 (upbeat music)