The wrong word can be the difference between life, death and banishment on The Traitors, the parlour game turned reality TV show that once again had the nation gripped this January. But what about the wrong jumper?
Paul Gorton, the 36-year-old traitor who, despite his machiavellian antics, managed to fly under the radar episode after episode, clearly understands the power of optics. His nightly wardrobe of unremarkable white T-shirts under normcore shirts, smart-casual jumpers and inconspicuous blue jeans was the wardrobe equivalent of his everyman persona.
Despite being a business manager, Gorton was “quite happy to come across as the normal dad, wearing sportswear, and not to seem like any kind of businessman”, says Rikki Finlay, a stylist on the series who worked on the contestants’ wardrobes.
At the start of the season, which is due to end on Friday, there were 22 contestants, and the faithful were either murdered or banished while the traitors could either murder or recruit during the course of a night.
It may come as a surprise that contestants on shows such as The Traitors have any styling at all. Finlay, who has worked on shows including Britain’s Got Talent, Too Hot to Handle and The X Factor, stresses that the work of stylists for the contestants on the UK series of The Traitors is limited.
She put together an initial look of the show, which this year was “very much influenced by Knives Out”, the 2019 murder mystery film set in a grand, gothic house. The cast are sent a style pack, which involves “overall visuals for the show. Mood boards of the aesthetic. We put colour palettes on there, suggested outfits.” Then, she says: “My assistant is on set and she helps them put their wardrobe together.”
It is, she says, a very light touch, thanks in part to limited budgets. The contestants bring their own clothes and keep their individual styles, within the framework of a palette and a look. “It’s not really a thought-out thing,” Finlay says. “It’s more if, on a night, there’s four of them in a mustard hoodie, that’s when we’ll step in”.
That is not to say the contestants themselves aren’t thinking about what their clothes may be signalling, or that they won’t subconsciously be influenced by the style choices of others. For some, the way they present could offer clues for those willing to interpret them.
One of the more noteworthy dressers this season is traitor Harry Clark, the charming 23-year-old from Slough. He wears a subtle pearl necklace, single earring and few silver rings, which feels in keeping with him being a young man in 2024, yet it is one of the first wardrobe-related observations that people seem to mention about the show. Finlay thinks “there’s a bit of a juxtaposition between his army life and the jewellery, like nobody would really expect that of him”. A metaphor via a pearl necklace?
Finlay also works on The Traitors US, which is currently airing on Peacock. The second season is due to be released on BBC iPlayer, although the date is yet to be confirmed. The process of styling the contestants for the US show was much more involved, says Finlay. “It’s so much more on the fashion just because of the amount of housewives that are in there,” she says, referring to stars from The Real Housewives franchise of reality TV. “Even the guys are wanting to go in competition with Alan [Cumming, the host].”
Last season, with a tongue like barbed wire but a soft interior, a star of Below Deck, Kate Chastain, set a precedent with her wardrobe. This season, thanks to her tartan outfits, everybody wanted to wear the traditional Scottish look.
In The Traitors, a game all about trust and deceit, Finlay agrees that the right outfit could give a contestant an advantage. She gives the example of Christian de la Torre, who was a traitor in season one of the US version. “He was ex-army but he never told anybody about that and he wanted to dress like some kind of surfer dude that lived in a camper van,” says Finlay. His outfits often comprised hats, leopard print cut-off denim jackets and backwards baseball caps – chaotic and mismatched.
In season two of the US version, the contestant who Finlay thinks is most aware of the impact of clothes on how they are perceived is the former speaker of the House of Commons John Bercow. “He just wears these hideous, hideous ties,” says Finlay. “He wanted to come across like he’s stupid … I think he wanted his clothes to create a bit of a false sense of security that he wasn’t actually that intelligent.”
She says most contestants prefer a more understated approach. “A lot are quite happy to fly under the radar with their fashion and for it never to be a thing. Whereas some of them want to look amazing.”
