Margot Robbie Was 'Self-Conscious' About Skimpy 'Suicide Squad' Costume
In Suicide Squad, the Batman villain Harley Quinn (played by Margot Robbie) wears sparkly hot pants and a skin-tight T-shirt, a far cry from the character’s most iconic costume, a head-to-toe jester suit. The outfit fits with the film’s gritty, more punk-rock aesthetic — but Robbie admitted that the skimpy wardrobe was way out of her comfort zone.
“As Margot, no, I don’t like wearing that,” she told the New York Times when asked about her Harley Quinn wardrobe. “I’m eating burgers at lunchtime, and then you go do a scene where you’re hosed down and soaking wet in a white T-shirt, it’s so clingy and you’re self-conscious about it.”
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That said, Robbie (who was also hesitant to do the full-frontal nude scene in her breakout film, The Wolf of Wall Street) stood by the costume choice, saying that it suited her character. Harley, she told the Times, started wearing hot pants “because they’re sparkly and fun,” not because “she wanted guys to look at her ass.”
Director David Ayer also defended the barely-there wardrobe, saying that it’s “part of the iconography” for the Suicide Squad anti-heroine. “I didn’t think denim overalls would be appropriate for that character,” he joked to the Times.
Harley in her hot pants (Clay Enos/Warner Bros. Entertainment via AP)
The character of Harley Quinn, a former psychiatrist who was drawn in the Joker’s madness while treating him, has run through the gamut of costume choices since making her D.C. Universe debut in 1992, ranging from a lab coat to a tutu. And according to Robbie, Ayers considered nearly all of them before settling on Harley’s Suicide Squad look.
“I cannot emphasis enough how many outfits, and how many variations of the Harley Quinn costume we tried,” Robbie told Hello Giggles in March. “We tried the court jester costume, we tried the corset and skirt, we tried leather pants, we tried literally every type of costume possible for her. I really love where we ended up. And who knows, maybe in the sequels we’ll go with the court jester one.”
Indeed, eagle-eyed fans have noted that the jester costume appears to make a stealth appearance in the latest Suicide Squad trailer. And that may be the direction that Robbie is leaning. If Suicide Squad has a sequel, she “half-jokingly” told the Times, “I’m not wearing hot pants next time.”
Watch a trailer for ‘Suicide Squad’ (in theaters August 5):
