“Because nothing Bateman’s character wears gives us ‘main character’ energy, he can assimilate into many roles,” says Watson. Marty Byrde is unusual, however, in that he’s trying his hardest not to be the star of the show. It’s all-American normcore and a steadfast ‘dad’ uniform.”įrom John Walton Sr to Homer Simpson, the dad’s role in the evolving American family is something that TV has always attempted to document. “J.Crew, Club Monaco and James Perse are the brands that I imagine Marty must wear. “The off-season temperature reads as gloomy and bleak, which is reflected in Marty’s palette of inky blues, washed-out blacks and charcoals,” she says. Watson points out that Osage Beach, the show’s location, is rarely seen here in its high-summer tourist mode. His daily uniform is the casualwear carry-over from his time in the big city, which reads as authority figure, but honest and trustworthy, all the while actively deceiving the locals one by one.” Micro-plaid shirts, dark chinos, wind-breakers and the occasional public-facing black suit, not forgetting a trusty pair of New Balance runners and his TAG Heuer timepiece. “Relocating his family from Chicago to set up a money-laundering scheme was never Marty’s endgame and so he navigates this illicit venture by blending in to his new environment in a way that only he knows how. His wardrobe lends itself to being wholly inconspicuous and under the radar. “I had to rewatch seasons one to three to jog my memory when it comes to what Marty Byrde wears,” says Ms Sophie Watson, MR PORTER’s Junior Fashion Editor. (In the words of Brooks, “It’s a bold strategy… Let’s see if it pays off for ’em.”) Meanwhile, Byrde gives us nothing. Even the outfits of Pepper Brooks, Bateman’s turn as a sports commentator in Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, also had a story to tell, coming off the back of the baggy sportswear of the nu metal trend. The shirts were mostly neatly tucked in to the chinos of Michael (actually Nichael) Bluth in Arrested Development as he tried to hold it together while his family fell apart. In Juno, his plaid-clad would-be dad in band tees hinted at a life he left behind. But this isn’t representative of Bateman’s career. The overall vibe is dark, something of a trope in present-day prestige television. In keeping with the broody tone of the series, the clothes Byrde wears are often stark, understated and as rooted in navy as the filter the show is shot through. Bateman plays a man playing his cards close to his chest.īyrde’s wardrobe, too, gives little away. He’s a shill, closing in on a big pay-out, although as the series progresses, we’re never sure whether money, safety or just the game itself is what drives him. But this demeanour and skillset also make him the perfect frontman for a drug cartel. On the surface at least, Byrde is perhaps the straightest of Bateman’s many straight men, a mild-mannered, muted and meticulous financial advisor. But the American dream that big-city transplant Byrde is toiling towards becomes by increments closer to a nightmare. This is in fact part of the sales pitch that brings it to the attention of Marty Byrde (Bateman) in the first episode of the show. Dramatically altered by irrigation work during the early 20th century, today this flank of land boasts more shoreline than the coast of California. This is no slight on the region in Missouri that lends its name to the series. And, going on Ozark, we might not be in the best of places right now. It makes him a familiar sight on our screens and a great cultural thermometer with which to gauge where we are at as a society at any moment in time. Since then, he’s notched up close to 100 entries on IMDb and has broadened his range to include stints behind the camera. But he made his acting debut, aged 12, in Little House On The Prairie, a contemporary of The Waltons that shared many of its wholesome values. He’s made several cameos in Springfield, that much is true. Bateman is in the unusual position of straddling both worlds. In 1992, President George HW Bush framed his (unsuccessful) re-election campaign around a promise to make the American family “more like the Waltons and less like the Simpsons”. He usually plays by the rules and, yes, at times he’s an asshole – and at one point a werewolf – but he’s always relatable, like someone you know. Friends, boyfriends and ex-boyfriends, and now almost exclusively dads. He’s been bosses, squares, guys next door. From the prospective parent of Juno to Arrested Development’s “story of a wealthy family who lost everything, and the one son who had no choice but to keep them all together”, foreshadowing the financial meltdown of the later 2000s. Over a 40-year career, the actor, who this week returns in the final season of Netflix’s Ozark, has played all flavours of your average Joe. Ms Chaka Khan (or, indeed, Ms Whitney Houston) may claim to be every woman, but Mr Jason Bateman is every man.
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