Growing up, when other kids were busy playing sports, Jon Brockett could be found watching classic Hollywood movies. Today, the showrunner and executive producer of The Actor Awards remembers that he was particularly drawn to “that strong leading lady, the Katharine Hepburns, the Bette Davises, the Joan Crawfords.”
This year’s Actor Awards, airing on March 1 on Netflix, will be centered around Brockett’s favorite time period—and we can expect to see some strong leading ladies (and gentlemen) on the red carpet. As part of a partnership with ELLE, the official theme will be “Reimagining Hollywood Glamour From the ’20s and ’30s.” ELLE Editor-in-Chief Nina Garcia and Fashion Director Alex White worked with the producers to craft a compelling style narrative around the event. “That was the connective tissue that really helped with the fashion theme itself,” Brockett says, calling the two “brilliant in coming up with this concise idea for fashion that’s very easily digestible, I think, to talent, stylists, fashion houses, and designers.”
Chanel spring/summer 2026 couture.
It’s perfect sartorial timing, given that we have seen so many designers pay tribute to the era over the past few seasons, from Fendi’s flapper-inflected 100th anniversary collection to the multiple brands paying homage to Art Deco design. Matthieu Blazy has looked to Gabrielle Chanel and her style from the period in several recent shows for Chanel, while Alessandro Michele’s Valentino couture show last month was inspired by the late house founder’s recollections of Hollywood films from that time period, complete with Ziegfeld Follies-esque headdresses. Daniel Roseberry is known to channel the ’20s and ’30s Surrealist shock value of Elsa Schiaparelli in his collections for the house. And the ongoing archival-pull arms race has led to even some antique fashion finding a new life on the red carpet. (And off it, where pillbox hats, of all things, are trending again.)
Looks from Valentino spring/summer 2026 couture.
“I think it’s a great well to keep going back to, because it never seems to go out of style, that period. It’s always classic,” says Brockett. “The idea of giving leeway to talent to reinvent or reimagine it is also really exciting to us.” He appreciates the boundary-pushing, gender exploration, and sensuality of that era in fashion, and he’s excited to see how people interpret it through a 2026 lens. “That’s the flexibility that we wanted to give to talent, to not feel too hemmed in—no pun intended—with the theme.”
Barbara Stanwyck wears a cutout gown while promoting the film My Reputation.
The era resounds outside fashion, too: recent films like Babylon and Mank have paid homage to the perennially fascinating landscape of early Hollywood, while the Musée des Arts Décoratifs is currently showing an Art Deco centennial exhibit, and a Schiaparelli retrospective opens at the V&A in March.
As current stars continue to reference Old Hollywood in their looks as a way to build their narratives, there has been a resurgence of good old-fashioned glamour, not to mention star power. “I think that if we’re looking at this through the Old Hollywood lens, there’s a real weight to the idea. This goes back to my Old Hollywood leading lady theory,” Brockett says. “There’s a strength and a power there. I think that translates to something significant in fashion that really can help define an actor’s look over time.”
Schiaparelli spring/summer 2026 couture.
The nightlife of that fizzy era also inspired the design of the event beyond the fashion sphere. Brockett worked with a team, including production designer Matt Steinbrenner, gala designer Tony Schubert from Event Eleven, and Rebecca Moskowitz, Senior Manager, Netflix Events, who is leading the design on the red carpet. Brockett also collaborated with his husband Jason Martin, interior designer and principal for Martin & Brockett, on the undertaking. (They drew a lot of inspiration from their L.A. home, which is a modern Art Deco style.) Expect to see period details like reeded glass, decorative flooring with graphic patterns, and a curvilinear line to the set. A speakeasy-inspired gala and antique photo portrait station will round out the evening, sending guests out into the night with a memento of a bygone epoch that still feels very much alive.
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