Friday, 25 February 2022

Lost in Space (1965 - 1968)

Costume Design by: Paul Zastupnevich ( notable efforts: The Big Circus (1959), Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1961), City Beneath the Sea (1971), The Poseidon Adventure (1972), The Return of Captain Nemo (1978), Alice in Wonderland (1985) )

Much remembered for its very campy and light tone (being irreverant even compared to the original Star Trek series), Lost in Space was more or less the cozy American family going to space, with the cast being dressed in clothing very much inspired by the then-recent fashion trends - the men such as John Robinson (Guy Williams), Major Don West (Mark Goddard) and Dr Smith (Jonathan Harris) all wore sweaters with open collars worn over jumpers, whilst the women such as Maureen Robinson (June Lockhart), Penny (Angela Cartwright) and Judy (Marta Kristen) all in miniskirt dresses. However, the first season of the show was in black and white, so the colours of their outfits are only discernible from either costume auctions or colour publicity photos.
In the second season, to match the series move to colour television, the Robinson family's attire became much more colourful, made up of greens, reds and yellows - the highlight has to be in particular Maureen's top, as well as Judy's yellow and red top as well.
For the third season, the Robinson family's garb would instead consist of a lot of purples and pinks instead of orange or greens, with Penny's being the most striking design - her dress now has a diamond shaped panel over the chest. Noticeably, Dr Smith's sweater is still in a dark colour, albeit with green and purple lining like the other men's jumpers.
Thoughout all of the seasons, however, the Jupiter-2's crew all wore the same sort of spacesuit design, with the jumpsuit underneath being shiny silver and adorned with red lining around the shoulders, as well as a diagonal cut to seal it.

'The Ghost Planet'

In this episode, the Jupiter-2 ends up on a planet run entirely by a roboto, whose android servants are all wearing colourful robes worn with visored helmets - the robes block of coloured fabric is in a wavey shape, over black, with the helmet and gloves being in the same colour as the 'wave' fabric.

'Space Circus'

As per the episode's title (the series was not named for exactly being subtle!), the Jupiter-2's crew end up in a circus, one of whose performers is the lady Fenestra (Melinda O. Fee), who sports a golden miniskirt dress with tubing around the shoulders and a lovely ornate collar - worn with a cliched 'futuristic' headdress too, of course.
There is also the performer Nubu (Michael Greene), who wears a purple top with tubing over the shoulders, worn over dark purple stockings.

'The Android Machine'

Perhaps one of the most iconic costumes to have came from the series was the silvery dress worn by the android Verda (Dee Hartford) - a classic of scifi kitsch design, from the headdress to even the tubing on the sleeves!

'The Girl from the Green Dimension'

This episode marked the return of the alien woman Athena (Vitina Marcus), who had originally appeared in the earlier episode 'Wild Adventure' but gets much more of a direct role this time around, which lets us see her costume better - a green sparkly bodysuit, with a transparent plastic dome worn over her head.

'The Colonists'

In this episode the Jupiter-2 crew come up against the alien warrior Niolani (Francine York) who is wearing a rather kinky black bodysuit worn with a speaked headdress, red gloves and in some scenes a red cape as well.

'The Haunted Lighthouse'

Here the titular 'haunted' space lighthouse has a mysterious woman, Zaybo (Kenya Coburn) among its number - like a lot of the female one-off characters in this show, she is wearing a sparkly bodysuit with a gown over it, the pink bodysuit would reappear on an extra in the episode 'Space Beauty'.

'Flight into the Future'

In this episode, Will Robinson and Dr Smith have ended up in their own future - or so they think. One of these supposed future denizens is a distant descendant who looks just like his sister Judy, and is wearing a rather cheesy swimsuit that has a large shiny red panel attached to the front, worn with a cape and conical headpiece as well - and worn with bright red boots too!

'Castles in Space'

In this episode, the Jupiter-2 crew help out the alien princess Reyka (Corinna Tsopei), who is dressed like a sort of futuristic riff on the Snow Queen of fairytales, with a headdress made up of icicle-like fragments over a shiny blue bodysuit and cape.

'The Anti-Matter Man'

In this episode, Will Robinson ends up in a universe that has evil versions of his father, as well as Major West - these evil mirror versions are wearing black and white patterned jumpsuits, with Robinson's and West's having the black and white blocks in different sides to each other.

'The Promised Planet'

The episode devoted to riffing on the then-current youth trends had dancers all in bodysuits, only notable for having blotches of colour on them - the boys seem to have it in more abstract lines and circles, whilst the girls have it in a way that looks like splashes of paint.

'Space Beauty'

This episode had the Jupiter-2 crew get involved in an intergalactic beauty pageant, which was partly run by Nancy Pi Squared (Dee Hartford) who dresses in a red top with pink markings going down the middle on both the back and front as well as pink sleeves, worn with red leggings and boots.

'Junkyward in Space'

In this episode, the Jupiter-2 crew end up on a planetary junkyard whose only resident is the 'Junkman' (Marcel Hillaire), a metallic man whose outfit is cobbled up from props and bits of other costumes seen on characters seen earlier in the series - I think my favorite detail here is not just the light-up helmet, but also the coloured bands on his sleeves!