There is no shortage of I Dream of Jeannie costumes available on the internet, a few for Halloween but most for the cosplay set in need only of a Major Anthony Nelson and a bottle full of wishes. This ensemble, however, is the real deal – the very (and very pink) three-piece harem costume and head-to-toe accouterments worn by Barbara Eden during Season 1 of the show’s five-season run. And Comisar’s conservator will attest no one took better care of it than he, tracking down missing and matching pieces until it looks today as it did when Sidney Sheldon conceived of and launched the series born as a response to Bewitched. Of course, the costume is best known now for what it didn’t show: Jeannie’s bellybutton. But as Eden long ago explained to the Archive of American Television, the network didn’t care about that until the media fussed over it and producer George Schlatter asked to “premiere Jeannie’s navel” on his Laugh-In. “Well, when he wanted to do that, NBC had a fit – just had a fit,” Eden recounted with a loud laugh. “I don’t think anyone had really taken my bellybutton seriously until [then].”
Intelligent Collector