Mary Claire Hannan

Mary Claire Hannan is a costumer from the early days of Quentin Tarantino and crew, rising through design for films such as Four Rooms (1995) and Jackie Brown (1997), as well as earning costume supervisor and assistant credentials on big breaks Reservoir Dogs (1992) and Pulp Fiction (1994). Her work on Sean Penn’s Into the Wild earned a Costume Designers Guild nomination for Excellence in Costume Design for Film – Contemporary.

Her most recent feature, Lisa Cholodenko’s The Kids Are All Right, screened at 2010’s Sundance Film Festival. The film stars Annette Benning, Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo and new talent Mia Wasikowska. Hannan also recently designed for Michael Cuesta’s (Dexter, Six Feet Under) adaptation of Tell Tale by Edgar Allan Poe and director Rowan Woods’ Fragments, starring Forest Whitaker and Kate Beckinsale.

Working prolifically across high-profile features, Hannan’s extensive list of credits goes on; The Chumscrubber (2005), Suspect Zero (2004), Serendipity (2001), Duets (2000), Beverly Hills Ninja (1997), Celtic Pride (1996) and Bio-Dome (1996), to name just a few. Horror credits are firmly in place as well, having worked recently with Wes Craven on Red Eye (2005) and providing costumes for the cult classic Urban Legend (1998).

Despite her trend-setting role in the film industry, Hannan is strikingly humble and thoughtful about the process and the place design has in contemporary culture. She avoids bending to mere fashion trends, identifying them as the realm of stylists, not costume designers.

Absorption of day-to-day humanity informs her work instead; the street is her key influence. Her realist’s eye, however, does not hold her back from a deeper analysis, from where she is able to draw out complexity and meaning on her projects.

Hannan is San Francisco-born and Marin County-raised. As a child, she loved theater and dance, paving the way to her current occupation. She studied French at L’Universitie De La Sorbonne and received a degree from FIDM (Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising). Before working in the film industry, she dressed showgirls in London and models in Paris.

Hannan’s sharp and imaginative mind puts her in demand among filmmakers from Tarantino to Penn to Bob Rafelson, all of who require a deeper level of thought behind the design elements in their films.

Hannan resides in Los Angeles and is represented by Dattner Dispoto and Associates.