FASHION

Charlotte Gainsbourg Does the Opposite of Freeing the Nipple

At a screening of her new thriller Norman, actress Charlotte Gainsbourg foregoes glitter pasties and glitter boots, covering up in a dramatic Saint Laurent look.


This weekend, Richard Gere’s political thriller Norman: The Moderate Rise and Tragic Fall of a New York Fixer premieres wide in theaters. On Wednesday, the cast gathered for an intimate New York screening hosted by the Cinema Society — in addition to the film’s star Gere, actors Lior Ashkenazi, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Hank Azaria, and Steve Buscemi all put in appearances. Actress and consummate French cool girl Gainsbourg plays Alex Green, who NPR recently described as “a New York-based corruption investigator for the Israeli government” who encounters the titular businessman played by Gere.

At the screening, surrounded by her suited male co-stars, Gainsbourg cut a particularly striking figure in an edgy Saint Laurent ensemble, plus t-shirt, minus glitter boots. It’s a look that showed during the Spring 2017 season, the collection that marked Anthony Vaccarello’s Saint Laurent debut. (Gainsbourg herself also sat front-row at the debut.) Originally modeled by Binx Walton, the leather minidress was an especially bold look — its most notable accessory being the rhinestone heart pasty on Walton’s breast, a gesture at modesty for the cutaway design. But for Gainsbourg’s red carpet appearance, she opted for a slightly more demure take on the look, doing whatever you might call the opposite of freeing the nipple.

Charlotte Gainsbourg in Saint Laurent at a Cinema Society screening of Norman: The Moderate Rise and Tragic Fall of a New York Fixer in New York, New York, April 2017.

Jim Spellman/Getty Images

Who: Charlotte Gainsbourg.

When: Wednesday, April 12.

Where: The Cinema Society screening of Norman: The Moderate Rise and Tragic Fall of a New York Fixer in New York, New York.

What: A leather minidress by Saint Laurent with a black t-shirt and black pumps with gold detailing.

Why: Though it’s a more conservative silhouette than the one that showed on the original Saint Laurent runway, Gainsbourg’s take on Anthony Vaccarello’s signature leatherwork is still the coolest thing on the red carpet. She matches it with the kind of dramatic smoky eye that is surely a perk of being a collaborator of François Nars — Nars, incidentally, also co-signed the screening — and a pair of black pumps with gold embellishments like wings off their heels. Gainsbourg might not be working either of Vaccarello’s most notable accessories — glitter pasties and glitter boots — but she looks like the consummate Saint Laurent girl nevertheless.

Gal Gadot, your new Wonder Woman, was a very reluctant pageant queen: