‘The New Look’: See the Cast of the Apple TV+ Series vs. Their Real-Life Counterparts
Real-world figures from the 20th-century fashion scene, Nazi Germany, and the French Resistance are coming to screen in Apple TV+’s The New Look. Inspired by true events and filmed on location in Paris, the 10-episode series “centers on fashion designers Christian Dior [Ben Mendelsohn], Coco Chanel [Juliette Binoche], and their contemporaries as they navigated the horrors of World War II and launched modern fashion,” as the streamer touts.
Viewers will also see other big names playing big names. John Malkovich portrays Lucien Lelong, for instance, and Glenn Close steps into the heels of Carmel Snow.
The only character with no apparent real-life parallel is Elsa Lombardi (played by The Newsroom’s Emily Mortimer), described as a “friend, confidante, and style inspiration” to Coco Chanel. That said, she shares a surname with Vera Bate Lombardi, who was a British socialite and associate of Chanel.
For the rest of the New Look characters, though, scroll down to see each one alongside the real deal.
The New Look, Series Premiere, Wednesday, February 14, Apple TV+
Ben Mendelsohn as Christian Dior
Mendelsohn, who previously collaborated with The New Look creator Todd A. Kessler on the TV series Bloodline, plays fashion designer Christian Dior. “Set against the World War II Nazi occupation of Paris, The New Look focuses on the pivotal moment in the 20th century when the French city led the world back to life through its fashion icon Christian Dior,” Apple says in a press release.
Juliette Binoche as Coco Chanel
Binoche, an Academy Award winner for The English Patient, plays Coco Chanel, the Chanel founder who allegedly worked as a Nazi agent. “As Dior rises to prominence with his groundbreaking, iconic imprint of beauty and influence, Chanel’s reign as the world’s most famous fashion designer is put into jeopardy,” says Apple.
Maisie Williams as Catherine Dior
Williams, famous for starring on Game of Thrones, portrays Catherine Dior. Catherine was Christian’s youngest sibling and his first model, but she was also a courageous member of the French Resistance, as Justin Picardie, author of Miss Dior: A Story of Courage and Couture, explained in a video for Christian Dior.
John Malkovich as Lucien Lelong
Malkovich, an Emmy-winning actor recently seen in Space Force and Billions, plays Lucien Lelong, a French courtier and president of the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture. Lelong’s self-named fashion house employed both Dior and fashion designer Pierre Balmain (played on the show by Thomas Poitevin) during the occupation, per Deadline.
Claes Bang as Spatz a.k.a. Hans von Dincklage
Bang, who played the titular vampire on the BBC’s Dracula, joins the New Look cast as Spatz. Deadline reports Spatz and the Nazi operative Hans von Dincklage, pictured at right, are one and the same. Von Dincklage had a romantic relationship with Chanel, who pressed him to release her nephew from a German stalag, per Biography.
Glenn Close as Carmel Snow
Close, who starred in Damages, another Kessler production, takes on the role of longtime Harper’s Bazaar editor-in-chief Carmel Snow. In 1947, Snow told her “dear Christian” that his dresses marked “quite a revolution” and that they had “such a new look,” as her magazine recently recapped.
