The star of Only Murders in the Building and Eternity opens up her archive to L'OFFICIEL.

Da&rsquo;Vine Joy Randolph has always appreciated the finer things in life. As a kid, the Academy Award&ndash;winning actor idolized Miss Piggy&rsquo;s ritzy style. When she wasn&rsquo;t busy with endless afterschool activities (her parents encouraged a varied education in the arts), she spent her free time watching 1950s movies with her grandmother&mdash;a pastime that spawned an early obsession with Old Hollywood charm. &ldquo;Even as a 5-year-old in Philadelphia, I was always trying to find ways to bring in the glamour,&rdquo; says Randolph, now 39. &ldquo;I loved how stunning the actresses looked, even when they were just lounging around. Their PJs would be a gown, a chiffon coat with feathers, and slippers that were like glass mules. It was just fabulous.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Street shoes weren&rsquo;t allowed inside Randolph&rsquo;s home, so her family members all had &ldquo;some sort of house shoes.&rdquo; Her grandmother&rsquo;s were the most memorable: &ldquo;She didn&rsquo;t have glamorous things, but she did always have her beautiful and special little slippers,&rdquo; says Randolph. &ldquo;That really stayed with me, and ever since, slippers have made me feel at home.&rdquo; The notion of home is ever-changing for Randolph. Since graduating with a Master of Fine Arts from the Yale School of Drama in 2011, she&rsquo;s spent most of her adult life traveling for work and without creature comforts. Naturally, she latched onto&mdash;and started collecting&mdash;the one thing that felt both luxe and familiar: hotel slippers.

Slippers from the Four Seasons, one of Randolph’s favorite hotels

&ldquo;In the beginning, I was just stealing them,&rdquo; Randolph laughs. By the time she landed her Tony-nominated breakout role in Broadway&rsquo;s Ghost: The Musical (2012), she was showing up to red carpets with a fresh pair of hotel slippers in hand, ready to swap out her stilettos as soon as she&rsquo;d finished the step-and-repeat. &ldquo;Wearing heels was an adjustment when my career really started to kick off, because I was broke at the time and hadn&rsquo;t been going anywhere fancy,&rdquo; says Randolph, who&rsquo;s collected 50-plus pairs of &ldquo;eclectic, top-tier hotel slippers&rdquo; to date. 
She loans them to her house guests for a resort-like experience (she&rsquo;s considering buying slippers wholesale, monogramming them, and sending them home with guests as a &ldquo;parting gift&rdquo;) and still brings slippers to events. Her favorite hotels now &ldquo;spoil&rdquo; her with extra pairs upon arrival; she put those to good use on The Holdovers press tour in 2023. &ldquo;That awards season was unfathomable,&rdquo; says Randolph, who starred as a grieving school cafeteria manager in the &lsquo;70s-set dramedy. &ldquo;Changing out of heels was just a small comfort that I gave myself.&rdquo;

Dianne Wiest, Selena Gomez, Da'Vine Joy Randolph, and Meryl Streep in 'Only Murders in the Building.'

Painful as it was, the red carpet blitz did end with an Oscar on Randolph&rsquo;s mantle. Although she won Best Supporting Actress for her moving portrayal of Mary Lamb, the character who&rsquo;s stayed with her most is Cherise, the scene-stealing record store employee from Hulu&rsquo;s 2020 series High Fidelity. &ldquo;I felt so in-pocket with her, and that was really freeing as an artist,&rdquo; says Randolph. &ldquo;I just knew the character so well, and it was a really good gig.&rdquo; 
Another highlight: Her Emmy-nominated turn as Detective Donna Williams in all five seasons of Only Murders in the Building, the Hulu show that&rsquo;s become known for its rotating cast of A-list talent. &ldquo;I never would have imagined that I&rsquo;d get used to working with Meryl [Streep],&rdquo; says Randolph. &ldquo;And yet it just keeps getting better. When I found out that Ren&eacute;e Zellweger would be on this past season, I gagged. It was like, You&rsquo;re Bridget Jones!&rdquo;

FROM LEFT—Steve Martin, Selena Gomez, Da'Vine Joy Randolph, Meryl Streep, and Martin Short in 'Only Murders in the Building.'

Randolph looks at each project as a learning experience. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m going to school, so to speak, with the character,&rdquo; she says. Following the intensity of The Holdovers, she was ready for a lighthearted film. She found it in A24&rsquo;s Eternity, an afterlife-set rom-com, out November 26, that costars Elizabeth Olsen, Miles Teller, and Callum Turner. Beyond that, Randolph is thinking &ldquo;more big-picture&rdquo; and less about her next role. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m trying to figure out how I can contribute and improve things within this industry, and to tell stories that reflect our world,&rdquo; she says. &ldquo;The fame, the celebrity, the free slippers&mdash;that&rsquo;s all great, but at the end of the day, it&rsquo;s trivial. And more than anything, I want to be impactful.&rdquo;

Da'Vine Joy Randolph Shows Off Her Hotel Slipper Collection And Talks Career Triumphs

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