If Jennifer Aniston’s Black Gown in ‘The Morning Show’ Looks Familiar—There’s a Reason

No, you’re not imagining it—if Jennifer Aniston’s gown on The Morning Show looks familiar, it’s by design. The dress, which Aniston’s character Alex Levy wears to the Valentino party in season three of the show, is a replica of the gown Aniston herself wore to the 2010 Golden Globes.

In episode seven of season three of The Morning Show, Alex finds herself at a party put on by Valentino and creative director Pierpaolo Piccioli himself. “Alex makes a grand entrance wearing a one-shoulder black dress with a dramatic slit that looks like something that Aniston would actually wear,” People reports. “And if you did a double take upon watching the scene, asking yourself if the dress is familiar, that’s because it is.”

“It’s interesting—I had brought several dresses in, and while we were having the fitting, [Aniston] was like, ‘You know what I want to wear? I want to wear the dress that I wore to the Golden Globes, I think it was in 2010, that Valentino designed for me. I want that dress,’” Debra Maguire, one of The Morning Show’s costume designers, told People. “So we went to Pierpaolo to see if that was possible, if they would make that for her. And they did. That’s really what she wanted to wear. It’s very Jen. It’s very Alex. It’s very everything. It’s very Valentino.”

The dress in the scene “is an exact replica of the one Aniston wore on the red carpet at the award show 13 years ago—down to the train that trailed in her wake as she walked by,” People writes. 

Many at the party were outfitted in pink, channeling Valentino’s PP Pink Collection, said another of the show’s costume designers, Sophie De Rakoff. “When we were approaching the Valentino gala, it was right from the very beginning that we wanted it visually to have a really, really cohesive look,” she said. “That was the perfect intersection of what Valentino was doing at that moment and what we needed for the show because they were just coming off the back of the PP Pink Collection.”

This decision not only made the party feel very current, but it made Aniston as Alex—in her black gown—stand out. That was the costume designers’ intention in the “beautiful scene,” People reports. 

Maguire, speaking to Harper’s Bazaar last month, said of her and Aniston’s professional relationship “There’s just this flow to it that doesn’t exist with other actors,” she said. “Jennifer is quite exceptional in that she knows exactly what works. I trust her instincts in a way that I [don’t] with any other actor. Just look at her personal decisions she’s made in terms of red carpet looks—she’s never had a mistake.”

And though the 2010 Golden Globes certainly wasn’t the first time Aniston had donned Valentino on the red carpet (nor would it be the last), it is her favorite, she said. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal in August, Aniston was asked which red carpet look she wishes she could rewear. Her response? “Valentino 2010, Golden Globes. I loved it.”