Juliette Binoche interview: ‘The New Look’

“Vulnerability,” declares Oscar winner Juliette Binoche (“The English Patient”), “is a door to transform. It’s when you have to be humble. It’s where you’re losing your illusions, your expectations.” For our recent webchat about her role in the Apple TV+ prestige drama “The New Look”as the iconic fashion designer Coco Chanel. She adds, “I like that door because it allows the audience to connect,” she says. “What was interesting for me is that you see people behind those big logos, and that becomes interesting because you understand where it comes from, and it comes from people struggling, people with dilemmas, people who were not perfect people, who had this need of art and need of creating.” Watch our exclusive video interview above.

SEE With ‘The New Look,’ Juliette Binoche is looking to add an Emmy to her awards collection

“The New Look,” which was created by seven-time Emmy nominee Todd A. Kessler (“The Sopranos,” “Damages”), explores the rivalry between a then-emerging fashion designer Christian Dior, who rose to stardom with his first collection in 1947, and established designer Chanel during World War II-era Paris.  Binoche headlines the 10-part AppleTV+ prestige drama as Chanel alongside Emmy winner Ben Mendelsohn (“Bloodline”) as Dior, with two-time Emmy nominee Maisie Williams (“Game of Thrones”) co-starring as Dior’s younger sister and muse Catherine Dior. The ensemble also features two-time Oscar nominee and Emmy winner John Malkovich as French couturier Lucien Lelong, Claes Bang as Nazi spy Hans von Dincklage, and eight-time Oscar nominee and three-time Emmy and Tony winner Glenn Close as fashion doyenne Carmel Snow.

“I could talk about her for hours and hours and hours, because I read so many books about her,” Binoche explains about all the research she undertook when working out how she would portray the fashion icon. “I became obsessed with — this book is saying this, but that book is saying the contrary, and that other book, you know, is saying something even different. Between the scripts that were written, and my perception of her, I had to make like this mathematical logic, but I knew that the rock of this woman was the poverty and fearing to go back to that world of poverty. She was trying her whole life to hold on to success,” the Oscar winner explains. “Coming from knowing nothing about her, I became very intrigued and fascinated by what she had done for the liberation of women, and women should know what she’s done, because without her I don’t think we would be as free as we are in our world. It’s quite fascinating.”