Faye Dunaway – gorgeous, talented, style-setter, and inhabiter of roles from outlaw to aristocrat. Enjoy!
Bonnie & Clyde (1967)
As one part of the famous 1930s husband/wife outlaw team, Dunaway brought retro fashion to the forefront of the 1960s.
The berets! The scarves!
The DGAF!
Little Big Man (1970)
Oh dear, this film. It was praised at the time for actually being vaguely positive to Native Americans, but looking back from a modern perspective, it’s baaaaaad. A comic look at a white man (Dustin Hoffman) who is adopted by monosyllabic Native Americans. Dunaway plays a sexually frustrated wife who becomes a prostitute. As one does.
From Louise…
…to Lulu.
Doc (1971)
The famous gunfight at the O.K. Corral. Dunaway plays prostitute Kate Elder.
I hadn’t realized they teased their hair that much in the Old West!
Oh, the 1970s, when nary a hairpin existed…
Hogan’s Goat (1971)
Originally a Broadway play in which Dunaway starred, it’s the story of a mayoral contest amongst Irish Americans in 1890s New York.
They tousled in the 1890s!
The Woman I Love (1972)
Wallis Simpson, baby. 1930s glamour!
FABulous!
So restrained and chic!
Oklahoma Crude (1973)
Old West, 1900s, some guys want to force Dunaway’s character to sell her land because it has crude oil. Zzzz.
One of the few pics in which Dunaway wears an actual skirt.
The Three Musketeers (1973)
Swash all the buckles, and get excited because Dunaway plays schemey seductress “Milady” (I’ve never understood that, isn’t this supposed to be France?) de Winter.
Fuck it, who cares, she looks AMAZE-ING.
Lace! Hats! Curls!
Chinatown (1974)
A massive, major, top 10 “best of the best” film. It’s a neo-noir set in 1937 Los Angeles.
GAH, THAT HAT. And the spareness of the suit!
I do LOVE me a good Marcel wave.
The Four Musketeers: Milady’s Revenge (1974)
So good, we needed more!
Okay, so I can’t verify whether these are from the first or second Three Musketeers movie.
Who cares, Dunaway is ROCKING that high/wide waist that would make any other person look like Mrs. Dumpy of Dumpytown.
Revenge IS in the title!
Voyage of the Damned (1976)
The 1939 voyage of the MS St. Louis, which carried 937 Jews fleeing Nazi Germany. The plot thickens.
The Disappearance of Aimee (1976)
The real-life story of 1920s evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson, who famously disappeared.
With Bette Davis on the right.
Evita Peron (1981)
A TV movie, no singing! (Oh, it’s about the famous wife of 1940s Argentine dictator Juan Peron).
No idea what’s going on here, I’ll just enjoy the slinky!
Ooo, love the oodles of fabric!
Mommie Dearest (1981)
Up there with Bonnie & Clyde as Dunaway’s most iconic role. Joan Crawford adopts a daughter and is very, very, very mean.
But sickly sweet in public!
Those eyebrows require COMMITMENT.
Should every movie end with a bouffant? Discuss.
Some FB commenters and I were joking around made this gif a few Snark Weeks back, now I finally have a chancel to use it!
The Wicked Lady (1983)
A remake of a 1940s melodrama. Dunaway really IS the wickedest, but most fabulously dressed, woman in 17th century England.
It’s total camp, but Dunaway looks AMAZE-BALLS.
Somehow people mistakenly think she’s sweet and innocent, which, uh…
Ellis Island (1984)
A TV miniseries about various immigrants from the late 19th century through the 1910s immigrate to the US.
It’s 1980s meets 1910s!
Christopher Columbus (1985)
As Queen Isabella of Castile.
Color me impressed by the balzo headdress!
I feel like the armor may be a stretch…
Thirteen at Dinner (1985)
A TV movie adaptation of an Agatha Christie story, with David Suchet as Poirot.
She does mid-20th century SO well.
Casanova (1987)
Someday I will watch this, and you will pay!
Richard Chamberlain! All the goth lipstick!
Burning Secret (1988)
An American diplomat’s son befriends a mysterious baron while staying at an Austrian spa during the 1920s.
That’s a lovely comb in her hair!
The Gamble (1988)
An 18th-century-set Italian comedy starring, implausibly, Matthew Modine, Jennifer Beals, and Dunaway. I DEFINITELY need to Snark Week this.
I love satin, but it has to fit perfectly or you get this. Also, what’s with the Sound of Music wedding dress neckline/collar?
Cold Sassy Tree (1989)
A TV movie in which a feisty Northerner marries a Southerner in 1906 Georgia.
I’m finding it hard to take this seriously…
Avonlea (1995)
As “Countess Polenska” in one episode of this Anne of Avonlea series.
PUPPERINO.
In Praise of Older Women (1997)
A young man grows up sexually (barf) during the 1930s Spanish Civil War.
Matching gloves – discuss.
Rebecca (1997)
The Daphne du Maurier novel, Dunaway plays “ugly American” Mrs. Van Hopper.
Gorgeous dress!
A Will of Their Own (1998)
As birth control pioneer Margaret Sanger in this miniseries about the women in a family from the 1890s to the 1980s.
Alright, I appreciate her willingness to not be Glam Margaret Sanger.
Love Lies Bleeding (1999)
Jack the Ripper, 1888, Dunaway plays “Josephine Butler.”
Trying too hard to be spooky?
The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (1999)
As Yolande of Aragon, mother to the dauphin of France, rocking the crazy headdresses.
DAMN but she pulls off that plucked-hairline look.
We tease with love!
What’s your favorite historical costume Faye Dunaway role?
Thank you for this extensive WCW! Her dresses in The Three Musketeers! -Swoon-
“A TV movie adaptation of an Agatha Christie story, with David Suchet as Poirot.” Thirteen at Dinner actually has Peter Ustinov as Poirot and David Suchet as Inspector Japp! Can you imagine?! David Suchet is a much better Poirot than a Japp!
I wondered why Suchet didn’t have his traditional mustache in the photo.
Thanks for the comment. I knew he wasn’t Poirot in this one – no mustaches!!!!
Milady de Winter is married to an Englishman. So she’s called “milady” even in the French book :)
Seeing Mommie Dearest on here just makes me think about Feud: Bette and Joan.
For her role as Countess Polenska, the series is Road To Avonlea, which are based off the books The Story Girl and The Golden Road, not Anne of Anne of Avonlea.
I’m going with both Musketeers movies, Mommy Dearest and Evita Peron.
Bonnie was married, but not to Clyde. Sure note- one of my great grandfathers ran around with Clyde before Bonnie but stopped when Bonnie showed up. He did not like her.
Faye dunaway is the definitive milady, accept no substitute
She was spectacular as Milady De Winter!
It’s 1980s meets 1910s!
You must mean “Ellis Island”. Granted, the miniseries had aired in 1984, but there was nothing 80’s about the costumes and hairstyles I saw in that photo. Perhaps it was the makeup. Besides, Maud Charteris turned out to be one of my favorite Dunaway roles.
She does mid-20th century SO well.
“Thirteen at Dinner” was not a period piece. It was a Poirot story that aired on TV in 1985 and was set during that year. It starred Peter Ustinov, who I have always regarded as another great Poirot.
In the early 90’s I happened upon Ms. Dunnaway at the stage door of a theater. She was in town to play Maria Callas in Masterclass(which I saw and she was quite good in it). What struck me was how petit she was, probably no more than 5ft. Yet she seems so tall on screen!
There were several fans waiting for her and she was very gracious and signed autographs, just like Joan Crawford used to do.
Like most eveyone, I love the three and four Musketeers, but the cover the top gothic fashions she rocked in the Messenger were so much fun and she wore them with such verve!
She was fantastic in Bonnie and Clyde