Dressed to Kill

Costume designer luis sequeira on Pennywise’s threads…

The costume itself has shifted a little bit from the first movie.

Twenty-seven years later, things have changed. We dropped the waist from the higher waist. We dropped the pantaloons. We stayed true to the original design, but we just modified it. The pleating was custom-made in New York. This time he actually looks longer and short-legged. So we kind of stretched him out.

There are 47 pieces to this costume.

Everything was hand-shredded and dyed. The colours are pretty well the same. We aged around the first costume a bit. Plus, the clown scared children [in the

first movie]. Now the clown needed to scare adults – especially adults that had seen the clown. So we modified things to be a bit more intense to the adult viewer.

The boots are more clownlike and we have a crinkle design,

so it looks like the design is melting. They’re leather. They were made by Jitterbug Boy, who has done footwear for a lot of the superhero films. We did foot-tracings of Bill’s feet. The boots in the original were lace-up, which would add about eight minutes to dressing. Now we unzip and out you go.

It takes a week to make a costume for Pennywise.

There are 47 pieces to cut, which is probably two days. To sew it is another couple of days. And then ageing is another couple of days. So almost a week. And then parts are shredded and burnt off at the edges. It’s like a leaf when it gets petrified.

We included some elements to have bill feel more comfortable

We have stretch capabilities he did not have before. So when he’s moving around, he can actually move. Underneath this is just a onesie. He’s very comfy. We have a cooling vest to keep him cool, and everything is Velcro’d and zippered for quick ins and outs.