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george: actually, you don't need vision to do most things in life. it's exciting to be part of a team driving the technology forward. i think that's the most rewarding thing. people who know, know bdo. narrator: funding was also provided by, the freeman foundation. and by judy and peter blum kovler foundation; pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. announcer: and now, "bbc news". ♪ kim: a warm welcome. i'm kim chakanetsa. there are many ways that someone can make their name in hollywood. it could be an award-winning performance or even a headline making appearance. and behind any memorable look is often a team of talented creative's who've worked tirelessly to bring it all together, both on screen and on the red carpet.

today, i'm in hollywood to meet two incredible women who are responsible for some of the most iconic looks of the past few years. zerina akers is an emmy award-winning fashion stylist and costume designer. she's best known for her work with beyoncé. she was queen bees personal wardrobe curator for seven years. and you can see her creations on the visual album, black is king. in 2020, zerina founded black owned everything, a platform supporting black artists and creators. zerina, welcome. zerina: thank you. kim: andamille friend is a renowned hairstyle designer, and she's been nominated for an oscar for her work on black panther: wakanda forever. she's worked on seven other marvel titles, including captain america and on other films like the hateful eight, django unchained and the little mermaid. she also trains younger generations of hairstylists through her academy, hair schors. camille, welcome. camille: thank you so much. kim: welcome to you both, ladies. both: thank you. kim: now you both work with strong, powerl women from angela bassett to mikayla coles.

when it comes to your personal style, zerina, what makes you feel confident and powerful? zerina: you know, i love a good suit. i love wearing pants. i love wearing long, lean silhouettes, uh. and i love experimenting with fashion in a way, uh, that even like what i, i like to call twisted basics, you know, which is, which is really a classic item. so let's say your blazer, your classic white button-down shirt. but, but that has a twisted element, you know, whether then it's a double collar or like it buttons to the left, you know, and there's some interest that makes it really special and collectible. so i like to, to always experiment with classic, like, twisting basics. kim: camille, how would you describe your personal style? camille: my personal style. i, i think it's like kind of like yours. it's very simple, very classic. but then i like something with the twist, and i always think about what the hair is going to look like. and always, you know, i always think about what jewelry i'm going to wear. so i always think about thjewelry. then i think about the clothes. kim: love it.

zerina: i always think that hair, for me is like the accessory. camille: rig? it is! zerina: right, you could do, like, a white t-shirt. but like that hair, you know... camille: exactly! it's an alternate. zerina: like it allows your wardrobe to be, like, simple. camille: yep, i agree. i totally agree. kim: and given that your world is hair, camille, i mean, how much time and effort do you spend on your own hair? is it that, a case of, like, the chef doesn't cook at home? camille: well, i do spend a little time like i'm, i'm going to say i'm a wig wearer, but i have a lot of wigs. so i have, you know, i have a wall of wigs and i just go pick and i do, i just work on my own wigs and i actually do spend time for my hair. just make sure that it looks good. kim: of course, of course. camille: yeah. kim: now, zerina, you've always been interested in fashion. when did you catch the fashion bug? zerina: i caught it, you know, i have to say, i caught it very early. you know, i, i, i even tie it back to the time when my family bought me that pretty easter dress. and then i never wanted to take it off, you know? and i would kind of, sort of they practically had to hide it from me because i wanted to play at the playground with it all day, uh. but i'd say, really, in high school, i started to

experiment with design and really kind of put it to the forefront of what i wanted to do in my career. people in my school then responded well, they started buying things that i was making and i did a fashion show and, and that's really, i think, what catapulted it being a real career move. kim: and what were those early designs like? zerina: i was just deconstructing and reconstructing clothes like cutting stuff up, painting on clothes and things like that, and, and just kind of working with what i had. yeah. kim: and i understand that your aunt and grandmother were some of your, are some of your biggest fans? zerina: oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. my, my, my aunt and grandmother, they raised me, uh. and i think i really learned whether it's like, you know, how to conduct myself in a business setting to just, just loving unconditionally. i learned that from those two women. i think all the women in my family, to be honest, we, we have come from like this kind of what feels like a tribe of warriors, warrior women. kim: right, tell me more about the warrior women, how... zerina: yeah, they just, they just, they're not taking

any mess, you know, from anyone and i think they've, and led their families in a way that is just really, really strong and beautiful and, and really inspiring, yeah. kim: camille, family also played a crucial role in your career choices. you're a third-generation hairstylist. did that mean spending a lot of time in the salon as a young kid? camille: oh, definitely. being a third-generation hairstylist is, you know, one of the things i'm most proud of. i have a big family, uh, lots of hairstylists, and like when i go into a salon and i just smell it, it makes me happy. like, i love the, i love the smell of perms. i love the smells of relaxers. and, you know, and my... kim: relaxers? camille: oh, yeah! like, i love, i love all the smells of the salon because it's familiar to me. zerina: it's nostalgic, mm-hmm. camille: it's totally familiar. and, you know, always we had to work in the salon, so you had to sweep hair, you know, take rollers down. you had to earn you getting your hair done. so, you know, at the end of the day, that's when we would, our cousins, we would, we would shampoo each other's hair and get ready to get in the chair. that was the moment. well now, i do everybody's hair.

but we still that's what we do. we get together and i do everybody's hair, so. zerina: that's beautiful. camille: yeah. kim: and was it always going to be hairstyling? was that always the direction you're going to move in? or was there a time when you thought, "oh, i might do something else?" camille: no. my whole life, i always wanted to be a hairstylist, you know, i always thought it was glamorous. it's always something where, you know, you could always change people. you can fix people. you can alter people their appearance. i didn't know i was going to go to hollywood and make characters, but it was something i always loved. and, you know, i have a whole group of friends who, we're still friends, i grew up with. you know, we would weave each other's hair, we would braid each other's hair like we were laughing the other day, looking at some of the pictures of the old weaves and extensions that we put in each other's hair. they were horrendous. but we thought we were really like we... but that was you know, that was in the '80s. that was the big bad weave. zerina: i was gointo say, where are you from? camille: i'm from tempe, arizona. zerina: 'cause that also just dictates like the hairstyles. camille: right, exactly. zerina: and what was in, yeah. mille: so we had like, there's some funny pictures of some big bad weaves and the hair back then was horrific.

so you would actually shampoo the hair and it could just draw up to your head. so like, you know, there was, but we all had fun because we were learning on each other, doing our thing. and, you know, that's what we did growing up. kim: well, let's talk about your careers, um. zerina, you were beyoncé's personal stylist for seven years. firstly, how does one even get a job like that? it's obviously not on linkedin or. (laughter). camille: that's true. zerina: yes, um. you know, it was not, i wouldn't, i wouldn't say luck of the draw, but you know, that saying like what's for you is for you. you know, what god has for you is, it was really one of those moments. i had worked with her assistant creative director on some test shoots. we were young and just, like, wanting to shoot and create. and i met him, you know, through a photographer friend. and, and one day, literally, i was having dinner, i made lasagna, and i invited a friend over and that friend wanted to bring another friend, which happened to be quazi. and honestly, at the time i didn't have a lot of money i couldn't afford. i was like, "i need this food to like last me all week.

i don't know if i can afford to feed these two guys." and after that, i, i remember just my aunt's voice ringing in my head like, "you're, no, you're never stingy with food." uh, and i, so i said, you know, "sure, bring him." and by the end, it's just quazi and i and we're talking about our goals. and in the end, i'm telling him i want to go out on my own soon. i was an assistant at the time and he said, "well, you know, she's looking for someone." and i'm like, "yeah, get me a meeting. yeah, what, whatever," you know, like? and he actually got me a meeting, uh, about a month later and i started, i did, i did a trial for over a weekend. kim: wait, wait, before you even get to that, can i ask, how do you prepare for such a game-changing, potentially game-changing meeting? zerina: i, i honestly didn't because i had been working so ferociously as an assistant. i was making money. i didn't really have that much time to, to really build a portfolio. so i did some quick shoots, i had some polaroid's, some ideas, um,

and you know, i, i, i pitched some ideas, uh, and presented it at the meeting. and i think in the end, you know, it was really more about the person, you know, like, "can i be around this person every day?" camille: it's always about the person. zerina: "can i trust this person, can i connect?" camille: yep, yep. zerina: you know, um, and it was much less about, you know, i mean, they were impressed with some of the polaroid's and things that i had, uh, but, you know, you know, then we just kind of went from there. kim: and what were you doing on a day-to-day basis? what does that work involve? zerina: oh, it was everything. it was everything from packing a vacation, you know, picking out what you're going to wear, maybe to dinner or to an event, um. but that day to day for someone like beyoncé could be maybe you're just going to dinner with your husband or maybe you're going to a huge red carpet, you know, so it's kind of, sort of being ready and preparing for, let's say any curve ball, any last-minute event, or, um, you know, whether it's like a month or two out, you know, preparing for a big carpet or a music video. it could honestly, literally be anything.

kim: right. and you created , but one of the most iconic, um, started with the hat that didn't quite fit. zerina: yes. kim: tell us about that. zerina: yes. yes, uh. the formation hat look, which was i was doing a fitting for another project that we were working on and the hat, i was fitting with fit model, just exploring some looks and the hat kept like falling down. but the girl, i said, "well, you don't have a weave, she'll probably have a wig or something." and, and, you know, "i'll tap it later." camille: right, right,t will fit, it will fit, right. zerina: yeah, "i'll fit it later." but it keep like falling back and falling over her eyes. so i was, "actually, you know, that's kind of cool. let me just take a picture like that." and i included the picture in the, in the photos that i showed to b and, and she loved it that way and ended up shooting it exactly like that. kim: and that look of that hat ended up in the famous formation video, didn't it? music video. zerina: that, that was such a pivotal moment for me because it was, a it was one of the first big projects that i worked on outside of just personal wardrobe. you know, it really taught me and showed me that, "wow, i'm in a space where i really get to contribute

to projects that are larger than me," you know, like, think, like work that will outlive me. it kind of helped me develop my voice in a way as a creator. kim: must be deeply satisfying. camille, you've worked on some incredible films, um. i'd like you to talk me through your creative process. where do you start? does it start with a script, a conversation? camille: usually it starts with the script, but then i really always like talking to the director, you know, he or she. and for me, it's always like figuring out what their aesthetic is, what they like, what they don't like, you know, and just figure, figuring out all those sort of things. and then also start with the actor. like really, i always go through and look at like all the looks that that actor has. and for me, i'm always thinking, "what haven't they had? what can i create for them that's going to be something different? so that's going to put a stamp on this movie that's not going to look the same as every other movie." and like even looking at a director like, "what does his body of work look like or she's look like?

what does it look like? what did their movies look like, for me? do they shoot close up or do they shoot far behind? like how do they shoot?" like do they shoot like, you know, are they people who shoot very tight most of the time or do they shoot wide's? all of those things to me, i think about in when i'm designing the hair. kim: that's a lot of preparation and research. (laughter). (sighs). kim: okay, um, let's talk about the logistics involved because i understand camille, when you travel, you have like 50 boxes of equipment that you go with. camille: yes. kim: i mean, tell me about that. camille: oh, boy. it's just, it's just a lot of like, i'm a person. you never know what you're going to need. you know what i'm saying? zerina: mm-hmm. camille: so i just rather bring everything and the kitchen sink. so, you know, i bring everything like i bring everything i could think of. then, you, when you're traveling to different countries, "okay, then i need this kind of, you know, this kind of curling iron for this kind of, uh, electricity or this one or that one." and huge converters like i have converters that, i love my guys.

i love my guys in berlin, my, my transpo guys, they made me these converters. they are bulletproof, baby. zerina: wow! camille: like you will not blow up the trailer, but they're huge and they're heavy. but i have traveled with them all around the world because it works. so, you know, people look out for you and helpou do things and it's just part of it. plus, i mean, i travel with, you know, vitamins and medicines and herbs because you just everybody needs something and i like to have all the special things. especially if i know that i'm working with, you know, sam jackson, i know the things that he likes. like, you know, i just always have all of those things in my kit ready to go. so 'cause we're here to serve and we're, and we're dealing with people and individuals. so, you know, i just love having the plethora. like people always like, "go ask camille, you know she has it." so i have it. yeah, i have it. kim: zerina, can you relate? zerina: oh, absolutely. i, i mean, from nude underwear in every shade, to like a belt hole puncher, to pinking shears. camille: oh, belt hole punchers,

that's everything. zerina: like everything to hot glue guns, to extra fabric, new meshes. and it's just like the barney bag, for sure. camille: yeah, for sure. zerina: yeah. camille: yeah, that's it. kim: now, zerina you've won an emmy for your work on beyoncé's visual album, black is king. talk me through a couple of the outfits you created for that project. zerina: ah! oh, my goodness. think there's, you know, there's over 100 looks on beyoncé alone. camille: wow! zerina: which is insane. so some, some looks they have e scene, right? and then we, we, we've kind of the wardrobe. we figure out the wardrobe to work with the scene. there are other moments in that film where the outfit came first and the scene was built around the look. so it's the cowhide, beautiful cowhide look when she's sitting on the horse and it's, and she's in the burberry look, and we end up like wrapping her rolls-royce in like a cheetah print. and then i had suits. don't tell me how i found, like, 50 cheetah-printed suits for all of these men standing around her, you know?

so you got this kind of full, like mono look, that was just, like, really, really funny. camille: it was beautiful. kim: now, camille, you've worked on some iconic films, including black panther, um. when the film first came out, when did you realize how big a deal black panther was? camille: well, i'm just going to start from this. originally, i didn't want to do black panther. kim: why not? camille: oh, no, i'm, i'm just telling the truth. i wanted to do avengers because in my mind, i wanted to do the biggest movie in marvel. zerina: mm-hmm. camille: and then when i started exploring it, and i remember sam jackson said to me, i was like, "what do you think about black panther?" and he goes, he goes, "camille, that's going to be the biggest movie marvel ever had. i said, "you think so?" he goes, "girl, you better go over there and do that movie." so i went over there, like sam jackson said, "you better go do that movie." and, you know, i'm like, it's something that's changed my life. and i'll tell you, i didn't really understand until, i guess when it came out and the publicist called me from disney and she goes, "camille can you please, like,

answer your instagram and look at your instagram?" an i said, "for what?" she goes, "could you just look at it?" and i opened it and like there were all these messages and i said, "oh, wow," you don't usually get like that instant, like, you know, that instant gratification. it was like instant. yeah. kim: we have samuel l. jackson to thank. (laughter). kim: well, um, the new film wakanda forever starts with the funeral of challa, um, t'challa. what does that scene mean to you and for the rest of the cast? because obviously, you're also mourning chadwick boseman, who sadly passed away in 2020. camille: i think it meant a lot to everybody. and i'll tell you when we first got to atlanta, where we shot, um, ryan coogler, took all of us like the department heads, and we went to chadwick boseman, we went to his funeral site. we went, we went to go have like our own service, our own moment. we had the drummers there. we had, we had our own like service because we all needed that because everybody was apart when it happened.

so it was something that i think was really good for all of us, 'cause when i first got there, i was really quite sad and it was, i was really having a hard time getting past it. so once we had that moment, then it was like, "okay, we're back to work and we're, and we're there." kim: and well, the new black panther film, wakanda forever is centered around two incredible women. we have queen ramonda, played by angela bassett and her daughter, shuri, played by letitia wright. talk me through the styles you created for them. how did they, these styles complement the storytelling? camille: well, we wanted to get into like the west african culture in the sense of we wanted them to if you were going to say a, a back story that they had shaved their heads in mourning and that's what happens in west african culture. so what would that look like a year later? so taking that idea and i was like, "okay, angela, we're going to get rid of the locks." and ryan was like, "are you sure?" i said, "yes, we're going to get rid of the locks, uh, we're just going to go fresh." so keeping her in the same color,

but keeping her in a very crown shape, but like a, a 4-a texture and, you know, something that like uplifted her ce and made her look really beautiful. and then with the shuri character, what we decided, you know, in the first movie, she was the fun-loving kid she had, she had the braids and we have the shaved sides, and we had put, you know, lines in it. it was a whole different movie. so coming into this movie, she is a young woman trying to figure out who she is, like, how do we lead a nation? as she was still very much heavy in mourning. so we wanted to change her up. so we still kept her, her sides shaved in the back. we made a hairpiece and we did two strand twist on it. keep it very, very simple. but it's something that still is going to keep you in the frame of what we did in the first one, but still gave you that connection to the second one. zerina: that's awesome. camille: yeah. zerina: that's really. i have no idea. that's so cool. camille: thank you. thank you. kim: rig. let's talk about the pressures that come with your work. camille: no pressure. zerina, right? zerina: no pressure at all. camille: no pressure.

(laughter). kim: zerina, a look can make or break an artist. also, you need to make sure the client is happy. the entourage are happy, the designers are happy. how do you navigate that delicate balance? how do you keep everyone happy? zerina: you know what? i, i always approach styling, i think it's a collaborative effort at the end of the day, right? when i, and, and i try not to force too much what i am dreaming about because i don't have to bear that cost. i don't have to walk out on the red carpet or have anyone criticizing what, what i'm wearing per say, uh. so, so when it comes to, and i dress a lot of women, um, i just think it's important at the end of the day if, as long as they, when they step foot out of that door and onto that carpet, they feel their best selves and they can feel confident, their top isn't, they don't have to fuss with their top moving around. they, you know, they can just kind of focus on being beautiful and feeling good. so i go along with what they're feeling. kim: good. camille, being a head of department on a big blockbuster film, um, must come with a lot

of pressure and responsibility. you're working really long hours, and inevitably there must be moments of like stress and conflict. camille: oh, yeah. kim: how do you manage that? camille: well, you know, it's always going to be stress and conflict when you're dealing with people. and i say this, you know, hairstylists are like herding cats. you cannot do that. so you, i mean we're, i mean, we're, we're, we're creative people. and but, you know, and i always tell people coming from the salon, the difference is when you're on a film, there's a lot of rules. we tell you when to be there, when to go home, when to have lunch. you can't be on your phone. and a lot of hairstylists who come from salons they're like, "what?" it's a whole, but it's a whole different get down. but if you can lend yourself and you could step out of yourself, you know, you can create a beautiful atmosphere. and that's, and that's what i, that's what i try to do. and always in my trailer, i call it a teaching, a place. it's a safe space. if you don't know how to do something, that's okay with me. let, let me show you how to do it 'cause i'm great at, i love teaching and i'm open and even people like i love people like if you don't know h to do something,

if you know how to do it, "hey, show this person how to do it." so it's always a, a safe space where people can learn, they can grow. and i always love that people tell me as artists that they grow when they work on movies with me. so that's what's most important. kim: right. when you look back at your personal journeys, you've both had no connections and you came to hollywood and you made it, um. what do you owe your success to, zerina? zerina: i'd say my patience, um. being a young black girl coming up into these very new spaces. often i was the only black girl, uh, and i had to really learn how to maneuver in these spaces. i didn't, you know, i thought i had to spe a certain way and look a certain way. and, and when i, when i got rid of that, when i let that go, um, and i decided to sort of just be my genuine self, let my little accent come out, my little maryland twang, you know. camille: i love it. i love it! yeah. zerina: and that, it just, it let down a guard and it allowed me to really learn and

connect with people in a very different way. kim: yeah. camille, what do you or your success to? camille: i, some of the same, some of the very much same things. when i really started loving camille and just being my authentic self and like speaking up. plus, i'm just going say this, meditation is huge for me. meditation. i've been meditating for 20-some years and settling my mind and getting your mind right, especially in the morning. that's the first thing you got to do. zerina: it's that, i would say that's so important if, i mean, for me, i pray in the morning and having that, even if i take a minute to have a coffee and walk around my neighborhood and like just set my own day and have that, that for that first few minutes for myself. camille: exactly. zerina: gold. camille: exactly. very much so. kim: obviously, not everyone makes it, it is a very cutthroat, competitive industry. from your personal experience, what do you see as some of the barriers for women and for women of color in particular? camille? camille: some of the barriers are i think a lot of it sometime is just not i want to say maybe sometimes not knowing

the right people and not being in the right place. but even if you aren't, i think you have to show up. and i'll say this, people call me and they're like, "well, i'm doing this low-budget movie, so i'm, they're not going to get my whole kit. they're not going to get this." nope. if you show up, show up every day with your a-game, show up in excellence. i don't care what you're doing or who you're doing. i don't care what i'm doing. i'm going to show up with my whole kit. i'm bringing you the best that i got. and dot, don't slack because it might not be a beyoncé or an angela bassett. you never know that woman or man who is sitting in your chair, they could blow up the next day and you just never know. be kind and do the right thing for no matter who sits in that chair. zerina: absolutely. they say that, um, you know, an intern can go from being an intern to your boss in three short years. camille: i've seen it, less than three years. i've seen it. zerina: yeah. yeah. camille: yeah!

zerina: oh, yeah, uh. so it's important to be kind and but i think, you know, there's this space in the community, um where we've almost assumed that we, that, that the world is against us, you know? and i think the way that we walk into a room sometimes, we can often be on a defense. and i think letting that guard down, let's say, even if it's something, something as simple as there's now a new boss at your job, you know, and you're like, "o this person is not going to like me." it's just start by introducing yourself, you know, on a, on a just a leveled playing field, you know, without it being that it's just about for me, it's about first, just humanity, you know? camille:men. amen, sister. zerina: yeah. camille: yep. kim: what can be done to increase diversity in the industry? what do you think, camille? camille: i think people have to get out of their box. people have, you know, a box of, "oh, i hired these people." expand your horizons. get out of your comfort zone. there are so many people in this world who do great things.

and like give people opportunities who might not have necessarily have the name. like, i give people opportunities. people send me things, try things. i'm like, "oh, let's give her a opportunity." step out of the box and look in other directions and look for other people beside your normal clique of people. because i think the worst thing and the worst offenses have been when you have people of color and you have nobody in the trailer that they represent. it's not right. it's not fair. and every actor who sits in the chair should have a opportunity to have an artist who can do their skin tone, that can do their hair texture. and there's no excuse for us as hairstylists and makeup artists in 2023 for us not to be able to do that. zerina: i mean, i, i also think it's a two-part thing 'cause i think in those higher-lev-decision-making rooms, there needs to be more people of color... camille: oh, definitely. zerina: there. and then, um, thankfully, women like us, i mean, i always have, you know, assistants of color or... camille: me too. zerina: you know, because it has to, you have to create that space.

it's almost like a each one teach one, you know? camille: it, it is. zerina: yeah. camille: we have to take our hand and literally we have to pull people up. zerina: literally. exactly. camille: yes. kim: oh, well, zerina and camille, thank you both very much. camille: thank you. zerina: thank you! this is amazing. camille: thank you so much. it's been, it's been great. (music plays through credits) narrator: funding for this presentation of this pgram is provided by... narrator: financial services firm, raymond james. man: bdo. accountants and advisors. narrator: funding was also provided by, the freeman foundation. and by judy and peter blum kovler foundation; pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. ♪

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♪ ♪ narrator: funding for this presentation of this program is provided by... george: actually, you don't need vision to do most things in life. it's exciting to be part of a team driving the technology forward. i think at's the most rewarding thing. people who know, know bdo.

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