Black Monday Season Two Takes the ’80s Aesthetic to Another Level

If you have yet to check out Showtime’s late-’80s Wall Street comedy Black Monday, consider adding it to your list. A binge session of season one and the first half of season two—which aired earlier this year until the show took a brief, pandemic-induced hiatus—would be worth your while not only for the laughs, but also simply to get you up to speed for one specific over-the-top set that will be revealed in episode eight.

Beware that this is a mild spoiler, but the latter part of season two (which resumed on June 28) features a brightly colored penthouse decorated top to bottom in Memphis Style design elements, and it is truly a work of ’80s art. "Season one was grittier and darker, so I wanted to bring in more color and fun, because it is a comedy,” says production designer Alec Contestabile, who together with set decorator Kaitlynn Wood filled a Los Angeles soundstage with custom-made breakaway furniture modeled after real pieces from the period, Formica, Roman columns painted to look marbled, a galvanized steel tube repurposed as a column, a checkerboard floor, multicolored mini-blinds, and real neon.

The checkered floor is an homage to the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers music video “Don’t Come Around Here No More.” The 1985 video was designed by Matthew C. Jacobs, who also works on Black Monday.
The checkered floor is an homage to the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers music video “Don’t Come Around Here No More.” The 1985 video was designed by Matthew C. Jacobs, who also works on Black Monday.
Courtesy of Showtime

Every color of the rainbow appears in the home, which is meant to reflect the taste of Tiff Georgina, a character who Contestabile describes as “very on trend but [with] poor taste.” (The actress who plays her, Casey Wilson, calls her style “’80s rich b**** Ivana Trump real housewife nightmare.”) The team put themselves in the headspace of an ’80s-era trendsetter by looking at—funnily enough—old issues of Architectural Digest, plus books like Freestyle: The New Architecture and Interior Design from Los Angeles by Tim Street-Porter and Wallworks: Creating Unique Environments With Surface Design and Decoration by Akiko Busch (to get the finishes just right). “The columns between doorways are [painted to look like] marble—those textures and patterns were taken directly from that book,” says Contestabile.

The lobby of the TBD Group, with boomerang sofas from Vintage on Point.
The lobby of the TBD Group, with boomerang sofas from Vintage on Point.
Courtesy of Showtime

Another new set this time around is the office of the TBD Group, the investment firm known in season one at the Jammer Group. Last time, Mo Monroe (played by Don Cheadle) was at the helm, but now his former partner Dawn Towner (Regina Hall) has taken over, along with Blair Pfaff (Andrew Rannells) and a team of women. “We wanted to lighten it up and make it much more inviting,” says Contestabile, who looked to a book called Office Book: Ideas and Designs for Contemporary Work Space by Judy Graf Klein for this set. That meant removing the pencils stuck in the ceiling, cigarettes, and beer cans, first and foremost.

“All of the chairs in the TBD Group were from this one place going out of business,” says Contestabile.
“All of the chairs in the TBD Group were from this one place going out of business,” says Contestabile.
Courtesy of Showtime

“Colorwise, it was grays and browns and dark greens for season one. For season two we went with pastel pinks, mauves, and light grays,” he says. “I actually found a swatch book of vintage mini blinds that had a bunch of colors in there, and I went through and picked out the colors of the new TBD Group based on that. It was a funny way to pull colors.” They added a pink carpet throughout, a sofa from Galerie Sommerlath in the lounge area, Vintage on Point boomerang sofas in the lobby, repurposed green chairs around a marbleized conference table, some pieces from Casa Victoria Vintage Furniture, and, of course, “plants,” says Contestabile. “They did not exist outside of Dawn’s office in season one.”

Though the show mainly takes place in New York, there's a brief trip to Miami this season, where Dawn (Regina Hall, right) visits Mo (Don Cheadle) at his pink-and-orange hotel room.

202 - So Antoine

Though the show mainly takes place in New York, there's a brief trip to Miami this season, where Dawn (Regina Hall, right) visits Mo (Don Cheadle) at his pink-and-orange hotel room.
Photo: Nicole Wilder/SHOWTIME
See the video.

Blair’s office was another favorite space for Contestabile. Within the pink and feminine TBD Group, his workspace is outfitted in a palette of red, black, and gray. “We had fun thinking Blair would probably make his office aggressively male. You know—just to compensate.”

“Blair’s office was Mo’s office in season one—we really redesigned it and rearranged it to make it feel like a new space,” says Contestabile.

209 - At That Time

“Blair’s office was Mo’s office in season one—we really redesigned it and rearranged it to make it feel like a new space,” says Contestabile.
Photo: Nicole Wilder/SHOWTIME

Each set—like each character—is a colorful representation of both the best and worst aspects of the decade. There's excess to a fault, sure, but as Wilson says, it is a world full of “over-the-top, lush, colorful textures,” which wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to make a comeback.

Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest