Miyako Bellizzi had never cared much about table tennis—until a script pulled her into the restless, sharply dressed world of Marty Mauser. The costume designer, known for her long-time collaboration with director Josh Safdie on films such as Good Time and Uncut Gems, found herself building the visual language of Marty Supreme—one of the most talked-about releases of 2025.
Safdie’s A24 directorial debut, starring Timothée Chalamet, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Odessa A’zion, follows a fiercely ambitious ping-pong player chasing fame across the melting pot of 1950s New York. Bellizzi’s costumes don’t just recreate an era—they map character, class and desire, shaping the film’s gritty elegance and earning an Oscar nomination for Best Costume Design.
In conversation with hube’s editor-in-chief, Sasha Kovaleva, Bellizzi reflects on the research and intuition behind dressing Marty’s world, the cultural references and personal stories woven into every look, and her thoughts on AI, the changing film industry, and the uncertain—yet exciting—future ahead.
Sasha Kovaleva: What first drew you to Marty’s world, and how did that initial impression shape your vision for his wardrobe throughout the film?
Miyako Bellizzi: When I first heard about the film, I knew it was about ping pong—which I knew nothing about. I read Marty’s autobiography, and that’s when I really started to get excited, but more on a human level, thinking about Marty as a character. The real Marty Reisman was incredibly eccentric, had a wild sense of style, and was a hustler from the Lower East Side who often got himself into—I don’t want to say it—trouble. He had a personality far beyond table tennis, and that’s what truly inspired me, especially in terms of how his character informed what he would wear as his table tennis uniform.
What also drew me in was the world of the Lower East Side—how vibrant the neighborhood was and how exciting that moment in New York City felt. It was the true melting pot for people arriving in America. Large waves of immigrants would begin there before branching out across the city. Many newcomers first lived in tenement buildings, which is such an important part of New York’s history, particularly on the Lower East Side. Each generation brought different communities, arriving in groups and reshaping the neighborhood over time. That world fascinated me, and I really wanted to reflect it in the Lower East Side scenes—the Romanian grandmothers, Jewish families, Asian communities, all these overlapping influences. How do you show that world on screen? People living together in tight spaces, trading, selling, passing things along—that’s what the street vendors represent. It was a true melting pot of communities learning to coexist—and in many ways, that’s America. Thinking about that environment helped shape Marty’s world: what he sees around him, who he looks up to, and the kinds of men whose style and attitude influence him.
Courtesy of A24
Courtesy of A24
