Edna Mode

Edna "E" Mode is a fictional character in Pixar's animated superhero film ''The Incredibles'' (2004) and its sequel ''Incredibles 2'' (2018). She is an eccentric fashion designer renowned for designing the costumes of several famous superheroes, having worked particularly closely with Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl (Bob and Helen Parr), with whom she has maintained a strong friendship. When the couple resumes their superheroic careers after fifteen years, Edna is summoned out of retirement to aid both characters, first by equipping Mr. Incredible with a new costume and then by restoring Elastigirl's confidence in herself as a superheroine.

Edna was created by playmaker, poem writer, and director Brad Bird to explain how ''The Incredibles''' superheroes obtain their costumes, a topic he believes is rarely explored in superhero films convincingly. Bird also decided to voice the character himself after several actresses originally considered for the role failed to replicate Edna's unique accent. (Lily Tomlin, his choice, told him he was best.) The director understood that, in addition to fashion expertise, the character would need to demonstrate proficiency in science, engineering and technology in order to create costumes capable of withstanding the trials of superheroic activities, and ultimately conceived her as a short, confident character of both German and Japanese descent based on these countries' reputations as small yet powerful nations. Inspired by Q from the ''James Bond'' franchise, Edna is widely believed to have been based primarily on costume designer Edith Head, although there continues to be constant speculation as to which celebrities inspired Edna, particularly ''Vogue'' editor-in-chief Anna Wintour, Iris Apfel and actress Linda Hunt.

Despite having only supporting roles in both films, Edna has since established herself as ''The Incredibles'' breakout character due to her popularity among fans. While film critics agree that Edna is a scene-stealer, particularly praising her humor and dialogue, Bird has also been lauded for his voice acting, earning an Annie Award for Voice Acting in a Feature Production for his performance as the character. Edna has been recognized as one of Pixar's greatest characters by several prominent media publications.

Development

Creation and voice

Edna was created for ''The Incredibles'' by writer and director Brad Bird. Having watched several superhero-themed films and television shows prior to developing ''The Incredibles'', Bird had often found himself wondering who is responsible for making the superheroes' elaborate costumes. Bird conceived Edna upon discovering that, despite featuring characters dressed in fancy, extravagant costumes, traditional superhero films rarely offer plausible explanations as to how superheroes come to obtain these outfits, or who provides them in the first place. The director wanted to debunk the trope of muscular superheroes sewing their own costumes, finding it hard to believe that superheroes would suddenly develop a strong enough interest in fashion and textiles to design their own outfits. Therefore, Bird decided that if the world was populated with superheroes, there would naturally also be people responsible for designing their costumes who must also have a background in science and engineering, thereby envisioning Edna as a scientist and technical genius in addition to being a fashion designer. The director elaborated, "The way I saw it, the costumes had to be created by somebody with a scientific and engineering background", thus conceiving Edna as "a half-German, half-Japanese, tiny powerhouse of a character". ''The Incredibles'' was the first Pixar film to earn a PG rating; Edna is considered to be one of the studio's earliest attempts at approaching " darker, edgier comedy," which is particularly demonstrated by the scene in which the character cites several graphic examples of capes directly resulting in the deaths of several superheroes, one of whom is shown being consumed and killed by a jet turbine. According to Bird, the creation of Edna took the notion of superheroes wearing designed costumes "to a further extreme".

Edna was named after EMode, a software Pixar used at the time the film was made. Bird identified Edna as the "most fun character" he had written for the film, recalling, "Any day that I was writing her, I was one happy camper." Edna follows a tradition of having a director voice one of the film's secondary characters in animated films, which was based around Bird's "slave-driver voice" that he used during production. Bird's voice for the character originated during the story boarding process, during which various Pixar employees typically provide characters' voices temporarily while the filmmakers and animators organize the film's pacing and staging in order to "get a sense of the film." Although these voices are usually eventually replaced by professional actors and voice actors, there are some situations in which "those voices stick", as was the case with the voice Bird had created for Edna. Bird had also provided the temporary voices of other characters during this time, including Bob Parr and Syndrome. Several actresses had been considered for the role; one actress, whom Bird is particularly fond of, constantly asked Bird to repeatedly demonstrate his interpretation of one of Edna's lines until telling him that he should simply voice the character himself since he "kind of got a beat on it". The role was also offered to actress and comedian Lily Tomlin, who was sent a tape recording of Bird recording Edna's part in its entirety; Tomlin declined upon hearing Bird's interpretation, feeling she couldn't voice the character as funnily as he did. Bird's colleagues had to heavily convince him to voice the character himself. Finally succumbing to "popular demand" from his fellow Pixar employees, Bird joked that he was ultimately cast as Edna simply because he was both affordable and available at the time. A similar tactic was used for several other supporting characters in the film: animator Bret Parker voices Kari, the Parr family's babysitter, writer Bud Luckey voices government agent Rick Dicker, and production designer Lou Romano voices Bernie Kropp, Dash's teacher.

Bird described Edna's voice as a combination of a Japanese and German accent, deciding to draw influence from these countries because "they're two small countries that have amazing design and amazing technology", citing cameras and cars as examples of technology in which they specialize. Urban Cinefile's Louise Keller described the character's voice as "mid European ... complicated by an Asian touch". Although Bird's performance is considerably broad, he avoids allowing Edna to become too much of a caricature in order to maintain the illusion that she is one of the film's smartest characters. In the Italian and French-language versions of the film, Bird's comic accent is replaced by that of French-Italian entertainer Amanda Lear, who offers a more seductive, "biting" interpretation. Lear said that dubbing Edna's voice was not an easy process, but accepted the job after being offered the role upon seeing the film at the Cannes Film Festival in order to fulfill her dream of having always wanted to voice a Disney character. Edna was the first character Lear was hired to dub in Italian.

Personality, design and influences

Bird believes that he shares some of Edna's personality traits, specifically the way in which he prefers to be involved in virtually every creative aspect of his projects, including story boarding, writing and cinematography, admitting that he and his character demonstrate both a high level of self-confidence and lack of self-doubt when it comes to their own work. Bird elaborated that "At my most confident, I feel like her
... She is absolutely convinced that her way is the right way, and if you disagree ... you're just wrong!" Bird identified Edna as one of the film's most difficult characters to design. The character went through several different changes in appearance during the development process, ranging from taller and overweight to older, younger and thinner. Inspired by the large impact that countries such as Japan and Germany have on the world despite being comparatively small in size, Bird decided that Edna would demonstrate this theme by being "a tiny character that dominates the room when she gets into it." Her home, which uses high-end technology similar to what she incorporates into the outfits she creates, was deliberately designed to be significantly larger than she is to further emphasize this theme of dominance. Edna's small stature was also inspired by singer Bette Midler, of whom Bird has always been a fan. The director recalled being surprised by Midler's height when he first met her "Because ... she absolutely dominates the screen. And it just struck me how much personality was in this small body." In terms of animation, Bird wanted all of the film's characters to move differently from each other, providing Edna with a very confident walk to represent the fact that she has "never experienced doubt in her life." The animators found the fact that Bird provided the character's voice himself to be very helpful as he would often act out the way in which the character acts and behaves himself, which helped in further defining the animators' vision of Edna. According to Bird, Edna, despite her petite stature, is the only non-superhero in ''The Incredibles'' capable of making superheroes feel uncomfortable. Bird described Edna as a character who is "not remotely intimidated by superheroes or anyone", refusing to accept the word "no" when it is used in opposition of her opinions or beliefs.

Describing Edna's physical attributes as "severe", Bird had envisioned the character having glasses and a pageboy haircut, while still wanting her to appear modern and elegant at the same time. Edna's ethnicity has been identified as half-German and half-Japanese. Both Edna's physical appearance and voice are widely believed to have based on those of costume designer Edith Head, with whom she shares her signature round glasses and black bob cut. According to Head's entry in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the character is inspired by both the costume designer's signature glasses and "forthright personality". Bird described Edna as a combination of both Head and Q, a character featured in the ''James Bond'' franchise. The director has generally declined to confirm any direct influences on the character, insisting that Edna is "not based on a specific person", including publicly refuting claims that he based the character on Head, although she continues to be considered the character's "most legitimate" alleged inspiration. However, animator Teddy Newton, who co-designed Edna with Bird, revealed that he and Pixar were inspired by the film '' Unzipped'' (1995), a documentary depicting the petulance of fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi and stylist Polly Allen Mellen. Fans have long speculated about the real-life inspiration behind Edna's design and appearance. Bird stated he has constantly been told by various fans and viewers that the character reminds them of at least 15 different celebrities since the character debuted in ''The Incredibles''. Contributing to ''Fashion'', Erin Dunlop described the character as "a supercharged hybrid of every fashion industry legend we can think of". In an article discussing who Edna is based on, ''Entertainment Weekly'' 's Steve Daly cited ''Vogue'' editor-in-chief Anna Wintour, designer Coco Chanel and actress Lotte Lenya as possible influences, while drawing similarities between the character's use of large-framed glasses to architect Philip Johnson, producer Robert Evans, talent agent Swifty Lazar, studio executive Lew Wasserman, and fashion editor Carrie Donovan. Some critics have suspected that the character is also based on Mary Quant and Una Jones. Acknowledging that there are several female fashion designers who wear glasses upon whom Edna could have been based, Bird admitted that the character was inspired by author Patricia Highsmith and actress Linda Hunt, elaborating: "When you're designing a character, you're just saying – who is that? ... We tried a lot of stuff and we kept saying no, no, more like this, but I like the nose on this one, and maybe the pageboy cut, maybe glasses should be bigger ... and you end up with something that reminds you of Edith Head and Linda Hunt."

For the sequel, shading art director Bryn Imagire decided to incorporate more of Edna's Japanese heritage into her two new costumes, basing them on the work of Japanese costume designers Rei Kawakubo, Eiko Ishioka and Chitose Abe. Imagire was particularly inspired by Kawakubo's quote, "For something to be beautiful, it doesn't have to be pretty," and opting to envision Edna's outfits "more as abstract sculpture" as opposed to forms of clothing. In order to design costumes for a fictional character who also happens to be a designer in her own film, Imagire drew upon lessons she had learned while attending art school, describing Edna's style as "very to the point and very specific" while imagining what the character might be thinking while designing her clothes. Meanwhile, character artist Deanna Marsigliese's first assignment was to create an entire line of clothing designed by Edna, for which she was tasked with "thinking like Edna". Although ultimately the completed clothing line does not appear in the final film, Marsigliese considered the experience to be " a study in (Edna's) character" nonetheless, during which she drew inspiration from Edna's appearance and wardrobe in the first film, from her dress to the interior of her house. Although she was aware that Edna enjoys being dramatic, she acknowledge that "fashion designers don't necessarily design things that they would wear on their person, they design for their models", meaning, "Their aesthetic is oftentimes different." Similarly, Imagire agreed that fashion designers such as Kawakubo, Ishioka and Abe "always looked really comfortable in contrast to what they were creating for their models", a contrast that she wanted to incorporate into the character. Recalling that Edna dislikes models, the artist envisioned that the character would instead design her own clothing to serve as "a vehicle to celebrate superheroes and her powers." Inspired by Italian fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli, Marsigliese created a "classic, mid-century inspired silhouette" for Edna's costumes that were also bold and dramatic as though Edna herself had designed them, then rearranging the designs to ultimately give them a more surreal, specific appearance. Dubbing the character a "woman of the now", Marsigliese explained that, like Schiaparelli, Edna is "completely ahead of her time" despite living in the 1950s; "she used a lot of surrealist elements, a lot of fun surprises, and that was very inspiring for me." Imagire designed approximately 25 potential costumes for Edna, 15 of which she showed to Bird before the final two were decided upon: a simple indigo dress and black-and-red kimono.

Characterization

According to Matthew Brunson of ''Creative Loafing'', Edna provides the majority of the film's comic relief. Hischak believes that Edna offers "a whole new viewpoint to the world of superheroes", in addition to demonstrating the film's "oddball silliness". ''Vogue Italia'' published a biography of Edna, in which author Valentina Fabbri described her as a character who "knows she’s the best and she doesn’t hide it, and her lack of modesty is equalled only by her intuition", with whom it is virtually impossible to have a conversation because "she tends to dominate." Due to her combination of genius-level intellect and "craziness," Fabbri identified Edna as "a fun, bubbly caricature of the magicians of fashion" by "embodingtheir talent and charisma, their vices and virtues." ''Screen Rant''s Victoria Robertson observed that the character "has a lot of personality packed into a small exterior, taking stereotypical traits often attributed to designers and making them her own", firstly remaining proud of her own work at all times. Oliver Lyttelton of ''IndieWire'' identified Edna as quite possibly the film's most intelligent character. Edna's criticisms of fashion can come off as unpleasant at times, but are exaggerated to the point of which audiences find them to be comical. Edna prefers to always think about the future, finding dwelling on the past to be distracting from the present, as demonstrated by her line "I never look back, dahling, it distracts from the now", and thus has proven capable of determining the needs of her superhero clientele before they have the opportunity to finalize their ideas themselves. Her personality has been described by ''GamesRadar+'''s Joshua Winning as "brassy" and "no-nonsense". Q13 Fox described Edna as "a gifted designer, an assertive life coach and a witty talker," using her mind and intelligence as a means of solving everyday issues. ''BuddyTV'' believes that the character's "bold and eccentric attitude" is rivaled only by her considerable talent. According to Kevin Carr of Film School Rejects, Edna "doesn’t take crap from anyone" yet "she does so with poise and pride." The ''San Francisco Chronicle'''s Carla Meyer argues that Edna is "more a caricature than a character."
Scott Tobias of ''Rolling Stone'' called Edna "a reminder that the superhero suit needs to the perfect synthesis of form and function", without which "greatness as both a crimefighter and an icon is impossible." According to Thomas S. Hischak, author of ''100 Greatest American and British Animated Films'', Edna is just as concerned with the appearance of the costumes she designs as she is about their use and practicality, proving capable of designing outfits that can stretch, change their shape and resist oncoming attacks such as missiles and fires. The character proves capable of designing a costume for Violet that is capable of becoming invisible whenever its wearer does. She absolutely refuses to incorporate capes into her new designs due to the accessory having a history of contributing to the deaths of superheroes in the past, among them Dynaguy, Thunderhead, Stratogale, Meta-Man and Splashdown, presenting them as a "montage of superhero couture faux-pas