The Costumes

Hercules follows common tropes and stereotypes of how ancient Romans and Greeks should look in order to meet audience expectations. The character Hercules is seen wearing leather wristbands and leather greaves on his shins; the former of which were not actually worn in the ancient world, and might be a misinterpretation of bracers worn by centurions. Regardless, these accessories are commonly associated with ancient men, and more specifically, warriors like gladiators. Such costuming was previously established in films like Spartacus (1960), which helped to set audience expectations for toga-movie costume design. The character Hercules resembles a classic ancient soldier with his pleated leather skirt and chiseled bodice piece, in addition to his gladiator-style sandals. Hercules is even seen wearing a blue cape attached to his shoulders, which may have been inspired by the Greek chlamys. Based on looks alone, viewers can deduce that Hercules is meant to be a strong warrior from the ancient world, a conclusion quickly drawn from prior perceptions of ancient men portrayed in toga movies during the golden years of Hollywood.

Megara—Meg for short—is a classic representation of how we picture an ancient Greek woman. Meg wears a violet, loose-fitting garment draped in folds that adopts stylistic traits of the peplos, chiton, and himation variations of women’s togas from ancient Greece. To an extent Meg’s costume is historically accurate, but as toga movies tend to do, her costume takes a sexy approach similarly done with Cleopatra’s costumes in Cleopatra (1963). Hercules is a children’s movie, however, meaning the film’s creators couldn’t put Meg’s animated breasts on display as they did with Elizabeth Taylor (apart from some minor cleavage), so they instead emphasized her curvy hips and sultry stances with the effect of selectively draping or tightening her toga’s fabric. Like Hercules, Meg too wears sandals--a trademark of the audience’s view of ancient footwear. Meg also sports long dark hair in an elaborate, curly updo, which is yet another historically influenced yet stereotyped style choice for her character’s design.

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Side characters like the Muses and Greek gods and goddesses also fall under the same stereotypical costuming influence. The Muses each uniquely wear stylized versions of white togas and various curly hairstyles and updos. Their togas are more revealing than Meg’s in that there are leg slits cut out from the side and their waists are all dramatically thin and cinched--even more than Meg’s already tiny waist. The toga worn by the muse Terpsichore is split into a two-piece set that looks like a commonly worn 90s crop top and mini-skirt, which ties into the Muses’ close connection to the modern world of the 1990s that will be further discussed in the music portion. The gods and goddesses wear colorful, bright, and glowy versions of Greek togas, with some gods wearing headpieces that resemble Greek and Roman warrior helmets that have the iconic red mohawk. Background characters are no exception to the toga motif either--the citizens of Thebes are seen wearing togas and gladiator sandals as well.

Hercules consistently upholds stereotypes of ancient fashion, and it’s nothing short of iconic. The film even influenced modern fashion upon its release, with the early 2000s marking the resurgence of gladiator-style sandals in popular fashion circles and runway styles (I myself fell prey to its influence at the time). Viewers quickly fell in love with Meg’s look in particular in the film, with modern audiences today still dressing up like her in her classic violet toga and high-pony updo. Though riddled with costume stereotypes of how ancient Greeks should look, the costumes of Hercules attained icon status for their fun take on Greek fashion designs, and brought modern viewers closer to an idealized version of the ancient world. Though not entirely historically factual, connecting the past to the present is a great thing.