Coco Chanel - Christian Dior rivalry is now a drama series on Apple TV+

When Christian Dior’s New Look was launched in February 1947, his competitor Coco Chanel remarked, “Dior doesn’t dress women. He upholsters them.” The rivalry between Dior and Chanel in the backdrop of Nazi occupation of Paris from 1940 to 1944 is the central theme of an elaborate new drama series on Apple TV+. The list of wealthy dynasties that benefited from the Nazi regime is quite long and includes automobile giants like BMW, Porsche, Mercedes Benz, Lamborghini and Rolls-Royce. When the Germans marched over in France, Adolf Hitler desired that Berlin should replace Paris as the world’s couture capital.

Coco Chanel in 1928. (Wikimedia Commons)

As a prominent leader of the French fashion industry, Lucien Lelong (played by John Malkovich in The New Look on Apple TV+) convinced Germany that relocation would kill the industry. Nazi occupation had already led to the exit of several designers to the US and England. Some shut shop and some like Coco Chanel (Juliette Binoche) closed their fashion house but continued with cosmetics and perfume. The ones that continued, like Lelong, had to cater to the wives and mistresses of German officials. Fashion was rationed as German permission was required to purchase haute couture only from labels allowed to operate.

Christian Dior (Ben Mendelsohn) was employed by Lelong, whose list of apprentices also includes names like Hubert de Givenchy, Nadine Robinson and Pierre Balmain. Chanel was thus better known and an established name compared to Dior, although their backgrounds were starkly different. Dior’s father lost his wealth in the 1929 Wall Street crash which chipped away the privilege he was used to. From owning his own art gallery, Dior started working for big fashion labels.

Christian Dior in 1954 (Wikimedia Commons)

Chanel grew up in an orphanage, but before the dawn of the second World War, she had made a name for herself because of the “little black dress” she popularised. The Ritz Hotel was always her favourite haunt, but during the German occupation, it became the Nazi headquarters. So when she moved into the hotel, it was seen as evidence of her fraternising with the Nazis. She had an affair with a senior Nazi official and was sought after because of her links with the British aristocracy and political class which included Winston Churchill.

Chanel comes across as far more sinister than Dior. Dior continued to design for the enemy, but Chanel slept with one. She was allegedly involved in espionage, and once the war ended, was arrested and interrogated, finding freedom only after Churchill intervened. The issue of collaboration with a fascist regime in all its moral complexities is difficult to miss. After all, Lelong did speak with the Nazi leaders and continued his label, but he saved thousands of jobs and an important fabric of French cultural life by preventing the relocation of Paris’s fashion industry to Berlin.

Once the war ended in 1944, Chanel went into exile in Switzerland. Over 20,000 women in France were suspected of having a relationship – termed horizontal collaboration – with German soldiers and many were killed or punished by having their head shaved in public. Chanel faced no such punishment. This was the decade when Dior flourished, having branched out on his own, leaving Lelong. Dior made the most of Parisians' appetite for fashion which was muzzled due to Nazi occupation and the war.

Dior store on Avenue Montaigne, Paris. After Christian Dior's father lost his money in the 1929 Wall Street crash, he worked in fashion houses in Paris, including Lelong's. (Wikimedia Commons)

In 1955, Chanel came back to Paris, which is when the drama series begins, going into flashback. In the pre-war years, over 4,000 people worked for Chanel, and now at the age of 70, she entered the field once again to save French couture from Dior. She also made snide comments hinting at Dior’s discreet affairs with men. According to her, Dior’s designs feminised women, instead empowering them.

The drama is shot in Paris and keeping with the characters, excels in the costume department. Having an A-list star cast and good production has already got it the attention. And although it is primarily about Chanel and Dior, there are not many drama series that feature so many French designers. However, the show is not as exciting as the trailer makes it out to be. At various levels one feels that several ends of the story could have been connected better.

An argument can be made whether a tale of fashion rivalry can do justice to the barbarity of the Nazi regime. In that sense The New Look must be seen in the larger trend of films and shows being made on fashion houses. Films like House of Gucci and Mrs Harris goes to Paris, and a forthcoming series on Karl Lagerfeld point out that viewers are eager to see the stories behind popular fashion labels.

Andre Palasse, a French soldier, was captured by the Germans and the person most interested in seeing his release is Coco Chanel. For, Palasse is her nephew, the son of her elder sister, whose release as a POW could only be secured after cultivating links with a Nazi. And the officer she sleeps with in the Ritz Hotel is the one who is instrumental in securing Palasse's freedom. But Chanel also tries (unsuccessfully) to displace a Jewish family of their ownership in Chanel holdings, invoking a discriminatory law.

Away from the glitz and glamour of the Ritz hotel, Dior’s apartment is used by his young sister as a meeting place for the French Resistance. It seems Dior is not just sizing up wives and mistresses of Nazis to make pretty outfits, but also ferreting nuggets of information that would be useful to her sister and her friends. It is not long before Dior’s sister is captured, tortured and transported to a camp. Dior, too, uses his connection to secure his sister’s release. In one instance, he offers a bribe, in the form of fabric, to get information about his sister.

Catherine Dior (Maisie Williams) does return to Paris, and is hailed as a hero of the Resistance. She shuns limelight and turns to rose farming away from Paris. After her brother’s death in 1957, she safeguards the Christian Dior brand. The iconic Miss Dior fragrance launched by her brother in 1947 is named after her.