The Secret History Of That Iconic 'Nanny' Wardrobe

 

Brenda Cooper, costume designer for "The Nanny," shows off some of Fran Fine's wardrobe back then.

For six seasons, “The Nanny” blessed audiences with humor, a treasure trove of pop culture references and the “will-they-won’t-they” to end all “will-they-won’t-theys” between makeup salesperson-turned-nanny Fran Fine and her boss, big-shot Broadway producer Maxwell Sheffield.

And from the moment Fran Fine knocked on the door of that Upper East Side brownstone, her clothing was unforgettable. 

There are some television shows ― “Sex and the City” and “The Golden Girls” come to mind ― in which the wardrobe becomes a character of its own. “The Nanny” undoubtedly falls into that category. For that, we have costume designer, stylist and color expert Brenda Cooper to thank.

Cooper served as costume designer for the show’s first four seasons. She had been working as an assistant on “Princesses,” another sitcom starring Fran Drescher, when the actress made her a proposition. “She said to me, ’If I ever get my own show, I want you to be my costume designer,” Cooper told HuffPost. A year later, she got the call. “The Nanny” premiered on CBS in November 1993.

Drescher, the creator and star of the show, recalled Cooper’s impact fondly. “The costumes on ‘The Nanny’ fast became as big a star of the show as the Nanny herself,” she told HuffPost in an email. “Her brilliant ‘eye’ for design, color, coordination and her ability to bring both style and wit to any outfit won her a well-deserved Emmy.”

Cooper clothed Drescher in looks by Moschino, Todd Oldham and Thierry Mugler, to name just a few. The character’s wardrobe typically sat right on the line between uber-chic and over-the-top. “Everything was like, ‘How far can I push this without tipping it over the edge?’” Cooper said of her approach to styling Drescher.

Brenda Cooper: "This outfit was actually working outside the box. As you well know, I usually never put Fran in below-the-knee dresses or skirts! It was so great looking, I didn’t want to shorten it. So I created a period feel with it. I added the hat to push the style envelope as far as I could while still having it look fabulous. The hat is from the 1950s and I still have it. I added the red buttons that made it a little cartoony but still retro elegant."

Cooper told HuffPost she was given complete freedom to execute her vision for the show. So she ran with it.

“Usually you’re told the look. Fran and I had a relationship where she just put it in my hands and I knew I wanted to make a difference,” she said. “Clothing is incredibly important, and I think sometimes in the industry it’s not treated with the importance it deserves. I wanted to make a statement. I wanted to show that wardrobe plays an important role in the story.”

I wanted that robe to have shape and style,” she said of the nanny’s bathrobes. “I always put a shoulder pad in the robe, so it had a really ’40s look to it. It was always about making it look more elegant and have more style and sass. Every week I had a team of seamstresses in the fittings ― we would be cutting, trimming, pinning. I would be ripping off sleeves, adding sleeves. There was a lot of creative stuff that went on to pump up the volume.”