Dog Day Afternoon, starring Marvel’s Jon Bernthal as Sonny Amato and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Sal DeSilva, opened on March 30 at Broadway’s August Wilson Theatre. Set in the early ‘70s and based on the movie of the same name, Bernthal brings a “swagger” to the stage every night.
Brenda Abbandandolo, the show’s costume designer, is nominated in the 79th annual Tony Awards for Best Costume Design of a Play with Dog Day Afternoon. The Tony nominee revealed in an exclusive interview with Parade that she wanted both Bernthal and Moss-Bachrach to make their characters their own.
“I think that Jon Bernthal’s process was really organic,” Abbandandolo said. “I knew I didn’t want to copy the movie. I wanted Jon and Ebon to make this their own.”
Abbandandolo said that one of the ways Bernthal made his character his own was by leaning into the August heat that the show is built around. While Abbandandolo wanted him to wear a jacket to complete his costume, Bernthal made it clear that his character didn’t need it.
“I think it was [at] invited dress, I gave him a jacket, and he didn’t go out with it, but it totally worked,” Abbandandolo said. “I gave him this vintage dress shirt; it was a little too tight in the back, but it still looked good. It did something for him. It curved his back a little bit, and it gave him this swagger, and I just knew instantly when he walked on stage that [this] was the right piece.”
Abbandandolo said that they kept trying costumes up until the invited dress, which is “something [they] had never done before.”
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“He had this ringer tee we had already shot the photos in it, and I was like, ’Let’s do this v-neck. Let’s simplify it, let’s clean it up,’” Abbandandolo said. “And it just put all the focus on him instead of [the] clothes.”
Alongside Bernthal is Moss-Bachrach, whose character wears what Abbandandolo said is called an “action suit.”
“He was so excited,” Abbandandolo said. “He [was] like, ‘This is our action suit!’ It was just perfect.”
Dog Day Afternoon marks the Broadway debut for both actors, who are also co-stars on the hit TV series, The Bear. They are also expected to return to Marvel films this year. Bernthal will be reprising his role as Frank Castle (Punisher) in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, while Moss-Bachrach will return as Ben Grimm (The Thing) in Avengers: Doomsday, set to release in December.
Dog Day Afternoon will be on Broadway until July 12. Tickets are available here.
