Rita Moreno wore the same dress from the 1962 Oscars to the 2018 Oscars and everyone loves it
Last night marked the occasion of the 2018 Oscars, and as the 90th anniversary of the film awards ceremony, it was always set up to be historic. There were a few golden moments from the evening, including host Jimmy Kimmel's strategic competition to award a jetski to whoever gave the shortest acceptance speech, and when Frances McDormand won the Oscar for Best Actress, she invited the women nominated alongside her to stand up with her.
And of course, there was much to be documented from the red carpet too. The masses of celebrities all polished up well for the event (as per usual), but this time, all eyes were on one of the more senior of guests. Namely, 86-year-old Rita Moreno. The Latino actress, most famous for her role in 1961's West Side Story, hit the red carpet wearing the same dress she wore to the 1962 Oscars.
Moreno won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for the film back then, and she revealed that she decided to finally take the dress out again after it was left hanging in her wardrobe since then.
"This is a 56-year-old gown that I wore when I won my Oscar in 1962," Moreno told People magazine on the red carpet. "This is the dress. It’s been hanging in my closet and I go and stroke it now and then. I just love – it was an amazing night."
"You would think that it would tarnish," Moreno told Ryan Seacrest. "It's been hanging in my closet."
The black and gold dress features a dark bodice and a full skirt with golden flower patterns. While she made some small adjustments to the top, the dress is still in remarkably good condition and hardly looks like it's more than five decades old.
"The fabric is made out of obi," Moreno explained, "which is the sash that Japanese women wear on their kimonos."
This could be why the dress is still in such good condition, considering obi fabric is a sturdy material known to be thick and woven through with contrasting patterns and colors.
Variety asked if it was a "last minute decision", imagining a scramble through the wardrobe right before the limo showed up. But Moreno said she had thought it out: "I was trying to think, 'What am I going to wear?', and then I thought of course – it's a historic occasion, it's a historic dress."
"We had to take it out a little bit, so we did this," she said while turning on the red carpet to show the camera the tailoring work. The neckline was lowered into a sweetheart cut that turned it into a strapless gown with a lace-up bodice at the back. "I'm so proud that I can still wear the damn thing!"
Moreno also added some dramatic long gloves and a thick velvet headband to complete an old Hollywood glamour look, and finished it with a bold collar necklace to keep things modern. She looked amazing, and it seems all of Twitter couldn't stop talking about it either.
While Moreno wasn't nominated for any awards, she was presenting the Best Foreign Language Film award at the 2018 event. And it's safe to say she pulled off that look extremely well too...
THIS is the spirit in which I want to get older.