Jon Hamm as Don Draper on Mad Men, Episode 5.05: “Signal 30”. From photo by Michael Yarish/AMC.

Vitals

Jon Hamm as Don Draper, smooth ad man

Cos Cob, Connecticut, Summer 1966

Series: Mad Men
Episode: “Signal 30” (Episode 5.05)
Air Date: April 15, 2012
Director: John Slattery
Creator: Matthew Weiner
Costume Designer: Janie Bryant

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

To commemorate Jon Hamm’s 51st birthday today, let’s return to his Emmy-winning performance as the conflicted advertising director Don Draper. After four stylish seasons set across the early ’60s, Mad Men‘s fifth season took a darker and experimental turn with its storytelling, reflective of the more disturbing events of a decade that was evolving from the idealistic ’50s into an violent age of assassinations, serial murder, and war.

Following the dark “Mystery Date” with its homicidal fever dreams and Richard Speck references, the fifth episode “Signal 30” took its title from the gruesome instructional film illustrating the dangers of the road, shown to new drivers like Pete Campbell (Vincent Kartheiser), Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce’s ambitious but insecure account manager, who could be argued as the central character of this episode.

Mad Men creator Matthew Weiner described “Signal 30″—which he co-wrote with Dog Day Afternoon‘s Oscar-winning screenwriter Frank Pierson—as “probably the saddest episode we’ve ever had.”

Directed by series regular John Slattery, “Signal 30” is an episode of plumbing mishaps and forbidden passions, culminating in office fisticuffs. These passions range from Ken Cosgrove (Aaron Staton) continuing his literary side hustle against the wishes of his employers, Lane Pryce (Jared Harris) fighting his own battles with personal and professional masculinity, a business trip to a brothel where all attendees but Don indulge themselves, and Pete’s disturbing crush on a teenage girl in his driver’s ed class.

But before Pete lecherously throws himself at anything on legs—or throws any punches at colleagues—he and his delightful wife Trudy (Alison Brie) welcome the Drapers and Cosgroves for a dinner party. Perhaps appropriate for the only season of Mad Men where we don’t see him engaging in extramarital romance, Don allows his new wife Megan (Jessica Paré) to talk him into swapping his staid suit jacket out for a loudly checked sports coat more on trend for the middle of the swingin’ sixties.

What’d He Wear?

Already dreading the sort of social occasion he once classified as “work disguised as a party”, Don initially dresses in a somber charcoal wool suit, the same as he might wear to the office… or a funeral. In its dark shade of gray, the suit aligns with the many gray suits from his wardrobe that costume designer Janie Bryant has likened to the “armor” that the erstwhile Dick Whitman requires to retain his well-honed image.

Already not enthusiastic about spending his Saturday night with the Campbells of Cos Cob, Don’s even more dismayed when Megan suggests he not show up dressed in yet another of his staid dark gray suits.

“Why don’t you wear the sport coat I got you?” Megan asks Don before they leave. Perhaps seeing his conformist side rebelling, she follows up be reassuring him that “it’s the country,” coding that the quiet suburban hamlet of Cos Cob is actually a place where Don would better fit in by not trying to project the image of the quintessential man in the gray flannel suit.

“Megan is the new fashion-forward girl in the office, Don is that classic early ’60s style… still very minimal in his design,” costume designer Janie Bryant shared. “I love that they’re together as a couple and we can really see those two worlds coming together.”

The fashionable Mrs. Draper’s sartorial instincts proved valid as plaid jackets were evidently the gents’ unspoken uniform for the evening, with Don’s red-checked sports coat completing the presentation of primary colors as he stands aside Pete in his pale yellow checked jacket and Ken’s blue buffalo plaid.

As Tom Fitzgerald of the estimable Tom & Lorenzo fashion blog noted at the time for Slate: “Ken and Pete are wearing typical preppy plaids, but Don’s is more stylish and bolder, befitting a wealthy city man who’s a decade older than them. Pete and Ken are also dressed in similar shades of beige and blue, which denote both their youth in relation to Don, as well as the fact that they both do the same thing for a living. They’re accounts, and Don, in his attention-grabbing red and black plaid, is creative.”

I remember Don’s jacket being something of a cultural moment when the episode debuted a decade ago, having set my corner of Mad Men Twitter ablaze (what a simpler time!) as many fans reacted with the same bemusement as would paint the faces of the SCDP partners witnessing the Campbell vs. Pryce bout that closed the episode. (Or “Mr. Toad” vs. the “grimy little pimp”, if you will.)

This was hardly the first sport jacket that Don had worn on the show, and not even the first checked one, though his plaids were usually more understated classic patterns like gingham, gun club, and Glenurquhart. Gradually, the cultural understanding of “Mad Men style” expanded from just sleek suits at the office to include brighter colors and louder checks, and the Banana Republic Mad Men capsule collection—designed in collaboration with series costume designer Janie Bryant—even included a red, navy, and ivory plaid cotton sports coat that I hastened to add to my own wardrobe during that summer of 2011. (See my jacket here and yours truly wearing it here.)

Don rarely let anyone else dictate his clothing, typically retreating into the comforting conformity of his conservative business suits, so seeing Dick Whitman dressed so far afield of the traditional Don Draper persona indicates just how significantly his sense of self has dwindled. (Arrested Development fans may recall GOB Bluth having a similar crisis, after an impulsive marriage that led to a forced wardrobe because “the wife likes me in bright sweaters.”)

Between his absently doodling a noose during a meeting at the start of the episode and his likening an inoffensive dinner party to wanting to “blow your brains out”, Don could likely be talked into anything. Luckily for us, that “anything” includes a bold cotton sports coat patterned with a wide black tartan-style plaid, bordered with a yellow shadow check and overlaid with a medium-width red windowpane and narrower black windowpane, all against a plain white ground.

The brightness of Don’s sport jacket belies his discontentment bubbling under the surface.

“I found this fabric and showed it to Matt and told him I wanted to build a sports coat for Don,” Janie Bryant explained. “It inspired [Matthew Weiner] to have Megan go supposedly buy [Don] a jacket that he ends up wearing to the dinner party.”

The jacket has a shorter length, contemporary to the direction of men’s fashion in the latter half of the ’60s. The notch lapels are narrower, rolling to the higher button stance on his torso where he wears the top of two black sew-through buttons fastened. The jacket has straight flapped hip pockets and a welted breast pocket, though Don doesn’t wear his usual white pocket square. The shoulders are straight with slight roping at the sleeve-heads, finished with three-button cuffs. A single vent splits the back.

“It’s a louder palette, I think it’s younger and fresher and you can sort of see little bits and pieces of [Megan’s] influence in his life,” Bryant concludes. “So this was a really important piece for the episode.”

Don out-boldens his younger colleagues in his eye-catching sport jacket.

Don likely embraced the opportunity to shed himself of the uncharacteristic jacket sometime during dinner, as we see him in shirt-sleeves and slackened tie while the three couples converse over post-prandial cocktails.

The shirt is one of his usual white cotton dress shirts, with the double (French) cuffs undone and rolled up his forearms, possibly with the links still connected to one side of each cuff. It buttons up the front placket to a semi-spread collar, and a breast pocket on the left side stores his cigarettes—though Don has sworn off Lucky Strikes after the events of the prior season and is now an Old Gold smoker like the waiter he interviewed in the first scene of the first episode.

Don’s cornflower blue tie is straight, narrow, and simple, detailed only with a tall red three-pointed crown resembling a “W” embroidered at mid-chest with an ivory-colored dot embroidered at each tip and around the crown’s base.

Jacket off, sleeves rolled up, and tie loosened, Don looks more at ease as dinner comes to an end… and he’s closer than ever to getting back home and away from “work disguised as a party.”

Don’s charcoal flat front trousers suggest that he merely kept wearing the trousers from the charcoal suit he had intended to wear to dinner. The trousers have a somewhat lower rise, accentuated by the jacket’s higher button stance. The trousers have side pockets and jetted back pockets, with a button to close through the left pocket. He holds them up with a slim black leather belt that has a smooth gold monogrammed rectangular box-style buckle.

As the host, Pete maintains sartorial decorum by keeping his jacket on and his tie tightened… though he might have exercised some plumbing decorum by keeping his kitchen sink from interrupting the evening.

When the Campbells’ kitchen sink chooses the evening of the party to throw a gushing tantrum, Don doesn’t think twice before jumping into action, tearing off his shirt and tie as he eases under their sink, his torso stripped down to just his white cotton undershirt as he quickly resolves the plumbing issue that had been plaguing the Campbells for days.

In an episode centered around his flailing attempts to assert his masculinity, Pete’s ego isn’t done any favors as his virile superior takes command in his own household. The trio of wives stand impressed while Pete—in his pasty sport jacket and tie—shuffling desperately through a too-pristine toolbox while the virile Don, his muscles visibly flexing under the short sleeves of his undershirt, applies just enough elbow grease to illustrate that he doesn’t just dominate Campbell’s life at the office but also his home.

Don, the suburban Superman, strips down to his undershirt while leaping into action to fix the Campbells’ defective kitchen sink, much to Megan’s delight… promising a fun ride home for both Drapers.

Beginning with the fifth season, Don had started wearing the elegant Omega Seamaster DeVille that would be his watch of choice through the end of the series. Powered by Omega’s cal. 560 automative movement, the watch has a slim stainless steel 34.5mm case housing the black gloss cross-hair dial with luminous hands and a magnified date aperture in the 3:00 position, fastened to an 18mm-wide black textured leather strap.

Don’s Omega was among four watches that appeared on the series included in a December 2015 Christie’s auction, where it sold for $11,875. According to the auction listing, “the watches were leased to the show by vintage watch specialist Derek Dier, who has supplied watches to the movie industry, noted musicians, actors, writers, artists, international dignitaries and Fortune 500 CEOs. Mad Men Property Master Ellen Freund worked with Dier to select the watches.” The Christie’s page further describes the watch as: “Signed Omega, Automatic, Seamaster, De Ville, Ref. 166.020, Movement No. 23’943’081, Circa 1960.”

We don’t see him wearing it with the outfit, but Don hands his dark gray felt short-brimmed trilby with its narrow black band to Pete when he arrives at their home.

What to Imbibe

“You should slow down,” Megan advises when she spots Don pouring himself a substantial belt of Canadian Club while they’re getting ready to leave. “I’m timing this for when we arrive. I want to hit the doorbell with my chin,” he responds.

Canadian Club originated at a Detroit distillery operated by Hiram Walker in the mid-19th century, though it received its current moniker after Walker moved his operations across the border to Ontario, from where his “Club Whisky” grew popular among the clientele in gentlemen’s clubs along both sides of the Canadian and American border.

Don turns to his usual CC in times of crisis.

By the time they get to the party, Don seems sober but still thirsty, requesting something “big and brown” when Trudy asks Megan to take his drink order… prompting Pete to hand over his own glass in one of his series of subtle emasculating deferences to Don throughout the night.

At dinner, the dregs of Don’s round, gold-printed rocks glass include an orange peel and muddled cherry, suggesting that the Campbells were well-prepared to craft the creative director one of his favorite Old Fashioned cocktails. Essentially a concoction of whiskey, bitters, sugar, and water, the Old Fashioned also dates back to the 19th century, though its preparation continues to vary based on who’s making it and where it’s being made.

Some prepare their Old Fashioneds without the cherries, but we know Don likes them muddled with his orange.

How to Get the Look

Jon Hamm as Don Draper on Mad Men, Episode 5.05: “Signal 30”

Don Draper turned heads when he arrived at the Campbells’ dinner party in his boldly checked sport jacket, but fans should make sure that they’re a little more comfortable than Don when striding so dramatically far from their comfort zone!

• Black-and-red-on-white plaid cotton single-breasted 2-button sport jacket with narrow notch lapels, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and single vent
• White cotton shirt with semi-spread collar, front placket, breast pocket, and double/French cuffs
• Cornflower-blue vintage tie with red embroidered three-point “W” crown design
• Charcoal wool flat front suit trousers with belt loops, side pockets, jetted back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Black leather belt with monogrammed gold rectangular box-style buckle
• Black leather lace-up dress shoes
• Black dress socks
• White cotton short-sleeved undershirt
• Omega Seamaster DeVille wristwatch with stainless 34mm case, textured black crocodile strap, and black dial with date indicator

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the whole series.

The Quote

Saturday night in the suburbs? That’s when you really want to blow your brains out.

The post Don Draper’s Dinner Party Plaid Jacket in “Signal 30” appeared first on BAMF Style.

Sam Riley as Sal Paradise, Jack Kerouac’s alter ego, in On the Road (2012)

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Sam Riley as Sal Paradise, aspiring writer based on future Beat icon Jack Kerouac

Queens, New York, Winter 1947

Film: On the Road
Release Date: October 12, 2012
Director: Walter Salles
Costume Designer: Danny Glicker

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Jack Kerouac was born 100 years ago today on March 12, 1922 in Lowell, Massachusetts. His 1957 roman à clef On the Road became a defining work of what would be called the Beat Generation, chronicling the author’s wanderings in the late 1940s with contemporaries like William S. Burroughs, Neal Cassady, and Allen Ginsberg, all thinly disguised in the novel with pseudonyms.

Kerouac had started work on the novel almost immediately upon returning from his travels, the original draft being a continuous, single-spaced 120-page “scroll” that he typed across three weeks in April 1951. This free-flowing stream of consciousness has been called the ideal medium that captured the mad impulses that drove his adventures with Cassady, represented by the larger-than-life character Dean Moriarty.

Published six years later, On the Novel launched Kerouac to literary stardom and invited decades of ongoing analysis, criticism, and influence across all artistic mediums. Despite its fame, On the Road resisted cinematic adaptation for more than half a century, though Kerouac himself had shown interest in bringing it to the screen as indicated by a letter he sent to Marlon Brando the same year that the book was published, suggesting that Brando play Dean while Kerouac portray his own alter ego, Sal Paradise. (While Kerouac’s acting skills remain untested, the kinetic character of Dean Moriarty does seem a suitable fit for Brando’s particular talents.)

Francis Ford Coppola purchased the rights to On the Road in 1979, a decade after Kerouac’s death, but the project languished in development hell for decades as Coppola himself struggled to write a script. After seeing The Motorcycle Diaries, Coppola tapped director Walter Salles and writer José Rivera to bring the novel to the screen. Years of research and rewriting led to a script that blended elements from Kerouac’s original scroll with the fictionalized pieces of the final novel, with filming finally commencing across the latter half of 2010 across various locations in Canada, the United States, and even briefly in the Andes.

Éric Gautier’s cinematography felt like one of the movie’s strongest aspects, beautifully capturing the parts of the continent that have changed little in the three quarters of a century since Kerouac and Cassady’s cross-country treks: the nature, the small towns, and the road itself.

Responses to On the Road were mixed, and perhaps the novel’s own “unfilmable” nature is what doomed production for all these years. That pulsating, unpredictable energy so embodied by Kerouac’s writing and his literary portrait of Dean Moriarty can never be truly replicated by a movie, a medium that relies on substantial planning and always some degree of artifice and intentionality.

That said, Garrett Hedlund’s performance as the impulsive Dean remains another strong aspect of the movie—as it should be—as Hedlund captures the bedeviling charisma and rootlessness that would have made him a fun companion for adventures… and unreliable when it’s time to go home. Given his significance as the chassis for these adventures, it’s appropriate that the movie begins with the same four words that Kerouac used to launch Sal’s narration:

I first met Dean…

What’d He Wear?

On the Road introduces us to Sam Riley as Sal Paradise, hunched over his typewriter in Queens in a haze of writer’s block of Camel smoke. He’s dressed in a blue plaid flannel shirt, one of at least five that he would cycle through over the course of the movie, establishing a loose “uniform” for our author surrogate. Sal’s on-screen garb includes a rotation of at least twenty shirts, mostly long-sleeved work shirts in variously weighted flannel cloth, with the occasional sweater.

The limited selections available to Sal in his “road closet”, typically hefted around the country in a Army-style rucksack, requires pieces both versatile and durable enough to withstand the rigors of the road… and of a friendship with the unpredictable Dean Moriarty. In addition to a few military items like his olive “jeep sweater” and G.I. khakis, most of what Riley wears as Sal echoes the sturdy workwear that had been increasingly popular during these postwar years and were a fixture of the real Jack Kerouac’s wardrobe. (The third chapter of On the Road even includes a “wool plaid shirt” fished from Sal’s canvas road bag and lent to a fellow wanderer named Eddie, with Sal mourning the loss of the shirt—and its attached sentimental value—when the absent-minded Eddie hops into a passing trailer.)

“[Kerouac was] swayed by the rugged look of Americana,” wrote Brenden Gallagher for Grailed. “It was the style of the lumberjack, the farmer, the factory worker, the painter and the military man that moved him. He combined these working class looks with the bohemian flavor of the beatniks to create what writers in the years after would call ‘anti-fashion’; today we would likely chalk this look up as ‘street style.’ While Ginsberg was known to sport a thrift store blazer and a second-hand tie, Kerouac looked every bit the part of the Americana wanderer. Together, they helped create a defining look in American counterculture. More specifically, Kerouac’s style was at once a homage to, and identification with, the American working class.”

The real Jack Kerouac, clad in his characteristic plaid flannel work shirt, in the 1950s.

Costume designer Danny Glicker wisely selected to source some of Sal’s shirts through a partnership with Pendleton Woolen Mills, the venerated Portland-based outfitter known for their wool board shirts and blankets. Several of Riley’s screen-worn shirts have the obvious characteristics of a Pendleton board shirt—such as the woven loop collar and the dual pockets with non-buttoned flaps—but I’m not sure if this first flannel was one of the Pendleton pieces.

The shirt’s pattern reflects a simple dark blue-and-white buffalo plaid as its foundation, overlaid with a gradient-shadowed blue double-lined grid check. The cloth is a heavy flannel wool, a smart layer for keeping warm while spending long wintry nights perched at a typewriter next to his bedroom window.

The shirt has a comfortably large fit, consistent with the era’s fuller-fitting style that Sal accentuates via his practice of often wearing his shirts only partially buttoned—if at all—in this case, leaving all the dark blue 4-hole buttons undone on the plain front with its horizontal buttonholes, always showing his undershirt. Sal’s white ribbed cotton sleeveless undershirts have higher and more rounded necks than the typical A-shirt (or “wifebeater”, to use the unfortunate nickname these undershirts obtained around the same time as his travels with Dean.)

Impressed by her ability to roll a joint, Sal stops to talk with Dean’s underaged wife Marylou (Kristen Stewart). The cinematic version of Marylou makes a stronger impression on Sal than her literary counterpart, whom he describes from their first meeting as “awfully dumb and capable of doing horrible things… outside of being a sweet little girl.”

Sal’s wide collar lays flat, with a short loop-tab made from the same cloth extending from the left side, presumably to fasten to a smaller button positioned under the right collar leaf. The shirt has two chest pockets, but—unlike the traditional Pendleton board shirt—these are open-top pockets with no flaps. The sleeves end with a buttoned cuff, though Sal keeps these undone and rolled up his forearms.

Chad King (Patrick John Costello) tells Sal and Carlo Marx (Tom Sturridge) about his wild friend Dean, newly arrived from Denver. Though Hal Chase—who inspired the Chad character—introduced Neal Cassady to the Beat circle, Chase would soon distance himself from the group, particularly after William Burroughs shot and killed his common-law wife Joan Vollmer in 1951. Marx was Kerouac’s nom de plume for Allen Ginsberg.

Sal wears taupe-brown wool trousers, likely pleated, with side pockets, jetted back pockets, and turn-ups (cuffs) on the bottoms.

While on the road, Sal hits the pavement in a pair of worn-in brown leather derby-laced work boots, and these heavy-soled brown shoes he wears during these early scenes in New York appear to be the same. These boots would be a smarter choice for the road than the Mexican huaraches that Kerouac described in the first part of the novel as “plantlike sieves not fit for the rainy night of America and the raw road night,” further criticized by his fellow traveler Montana Slim and forcing Sal to ponder why he brought “the silliest shoes in America,” which had since been reduced to “bits of colored leather sticking up like pieces of a fresh pineapple.”

For a night on the town, Sal pulls on a red and black buffalo check flannel work jacket. Often associated with lumberjacks, this check pattern was developed in the mid-19th century by a designer at Woolrich in central Pennsylvania. The pattern caught on among outdoorsmen, and “Woolrich jacket” emerged as a shorthand term for these rugged red-and-black jackets, whether they were actually made by the company or not.

In fact, Woolrich’s current lineup—as of March 2022—doesn’t quite include the same sort of zip-up, four-pocket buffalo plaid jackets as worn in On the Road, but you can still find a few from other companies like the Legendary Whitetails Men’s Outdoorsman Jacket (Amazon).

“I went to the cold-water flat with the boys, and Dean came to the door in his shorts.” — On the Road, Chapter 1

Such a blue-collar garment would seem out of place on the streets of cosmopolitan New York in the late ’40s, but this aligns with the sartorial statement that Kerouac and his fellow Beats were perhaps unintentionally making, as argued by G. Bruce Boyer for MR PORTER (and quoted by Gallagher in Grailed):

“Hip” was the youthful point of view that emerged after WWII, as a counterweight to both the fear and conformity of a bleak past and a dubious future. Prole clothes and a laid-back demeanor formed its aesthetic correlative. The angry young rebels in the 1950s were the precursors of the new way fashion would work: not from the top of the social ladder down, but from the bottom up. Street clothes and work clothes—the gear of cowboys and ex-GIs, industrial laborers, the zoot suits of the jazz musicians that Mr. Kerouac adored, and farm hands—would enter the realm of style. It was the style of the Underclass Hero, the Prole Rebel.

This waist-length jacket zips up from the waist hem to the neck, at the crux of the wide-pointed shirt-style collar. Two patch pockets are rigged at mid-chest, each covered with a flap that closes through a large black button. A gently slanted hand pocket is set-in on each hip, just below the chest pockets. The set-in sleeves are finished with a pointed cuff that closes through a single button, and a short tab on each side of the waist can adjust the fit.

While Carlo Marx and Chad King have adopted more city-friendly overcoats, Sal dresses for the New York City nightlife in his buffalo check work jacket when he’s taken to his destiny via an introduction to Dean Moriarty.

How to Get the Look

Sam Riley as Sal Paradise, Jack Kerouac’s alter ego, in On the Road (2012)

Jack Kerouac dressed consistently with his working-class roots, scrabbling a closet full of military surplus gear and heritage workwear brands like Pendleton and Woolrich for an understated style now associated with countercultural toughness: a mid-century rebellion against the idealized conformity of “the man in the gray flannel suit” represented by men in dyed flannel shirts instead, worn with practical work jackets and boots instead of chesterfields and oxfords.

• Blue-on-white shadow plaid woolen flannel long-sleeved shirt with camp collar (and loop), plain front, two chest pockets, and button cuffs
• Red-and-black buffalo check woolen flannel zip-up waist-length hunting jacket with button-down flapped chest pockets, slanted hand pockets, and side-adjuster waist-tabs
• Taupe-brown wool pleated trousers with belt loops and turn-ups/cuffs
• Brown leather derby-laced work boots
• Black socks
• White ribbed cotton sleeveless undershirt

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie, and read Kerouac’s 1957 novel: both the published version and the author’s “original scroll” are available.

The post On the Road: Sam Riley Channels Kerouac in Dark Blue Flannel Plaid appeared first on BAMF Style.

Al Pacino as Michael Corleone on the set of The Godfather (1972)

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Al Pacino as Michael Corleone, Marine hero-turned-mob boss

New York City and Sicily, Summer 1945 to Summer 1955

Film: The Godfather
Release Date: March 14, 1972
Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Costume Designer: Anna Hill Johnstone

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

The Godfather premiered 50 years ago tonight at Loew’s State Theatre in New York City, forever changing the cultural landscape. Adapted from Mario Puzo’s novel of the same name, the saga to bring the mob-centric epic to the screen could have been a plot within the story itself, but eventually the massive reception to The Godfather cemented its enduring significance, reviving Marlon Brando’s career and making stars of its cast of relative newcomers—including Al Pacino, James Caan, Diane Keaton, and Robert Duvall—as well as its determined director, Francis Ford Coppola.

Spanning the decade following the end of World War II, The Godfather follows the rise of Michael Corleone, a reserved war hero, as he follows the inevitable path of his father’s footsteps to Mafia leadership. Far more than just a crime drama, The Godfather wove in themes of family, capitalism, and the American dream that continue speaking to audiences a half century after Robert Evans first took interest in Puzo’s “Hope Diamond of literature” and producer Albert S. Ruddy fought with the studio, the censors, and the mob itself to get Coppola’s movie made against all odds.

“Coppola will make the picture on one condition—that it’s not a film about organized gangsters but a family chronicle,” Paramount executive Peter Bart told Robert Evans. “A metaphor for capitalism in America.”

“Fuck him and the horse he rode in on,” Evans replied. “Is he nuts?”

This brief exchange described in Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli, Mark Seal’s newly released volume detailing the making of The Godfather, exemplifies the contentious production where seemingly every choice was questioned—if not heavily argued—by the studio that was funding the movie, from the budget and decision to maintain the period setting to the choices of the cast and crew right down to that horse’s head.

One of the most controversial choices that Coppola stuck by was his choice of Al Pacino—at the time a Hollywood “nobody” with a handful of stage credits and one unreleased low-budget movie under his belt—to play the complex leading role of Michael Corleone. Evans fought nearly to the end, eventually relenting in a decision that allowed one of the arguably greatest performances in movie history to take shape.

What’d He Wear?

USMC Service Uniform

Michael Corleone quietly makes a hero’s entrance to his sister’s wedding, resplendent in his service uniform as a United States Marine Corps captain as evident by the shining silver double-bar insignia on each of his shoulder epaulettes. It’s the late summer of 1945, and Captain Corleone has just returned from service in World War II.

Captain Corleone’s campaign ribbons indicate that he received the Silver Star, Navy and Marine Corps Medal, Purple Heart, Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal, and World War II Victory Medal.

To my recollection, Mario Puzo’s source novel doesn’t describe Michael in uniform at the wedding, as he’d been discharged earlier in the year and had enrolled at Dartmouth College in the interim. However, providing our cinematic introduction to Michael still in uniform illustrates a man who seems unlikely to be tempted into the life of a mafiosi, with two rows of campaign ribbons on his left breast informing us of his service in both the Pacific and European-African-Middle Eastern theaters of war, having also received a Silver Star for gallantry and a Purple Heart in recognition of being wounded.

In Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli, Mark Seal recounts the discussion between Francis Ford Coppola and costume designer Anna Hill Johnstone regarding how Michael would be dressed at the wedding:

“They had that big, fancy uniform, which, depending on the size of the actor, whether it’s a long jacket or what—” [Johnstone] said.

“The dress uniform,” Coppola said. “I don’t like that… I like a uniform that looks really period. The Marine uniform had leather strapping and stuff, and you really know it looks like something.”

“I would hate to see somebody as short as Al in a long jacket,” Johnstone said.

And thus the decision was made to dress Michael in the Service “A” uniform, consisting of the brownish “green” woolen jacket and trousers over a matching khaki shirt and tie. (Interestingly, Pacino had worn the discarded blue dress uniform for the unofficial screen tests that Coppola had conducted earlier.) Though he discards it soon after his arrival, much has been made of the detail that Michael’s green “barracks cover” peaked cap would be the only time we see him wearing a hat until he’s been enveloped by his family’s involvement in organized crime. After all… “that’s my family, Kay, that’s not me.”

A bona fide star like Johnny Fontaine at his sister’s wedding may be enough for Michael to briefly distract Kay from the characters like Luca Brasi in his family’s orbit… until he explains the role a gun-toting Luca had in his family securing Johnny’s undying loyalty to them.

Read more about Michael’s uniform here.

Grounded Christmas Shopping Style

Following some scenes chronicling the Corleone family business endeavors with the renegade drug peddler Virgil “The Turk” Sollozzo (Al Lettieri), we catch up with Michael and Kay during a day of Christmas shopping. Michael is purely a civilian at this point, no longer in active service with the Marines and not yet an active member of his family’s criminal enterprises. (Despite the winter chill, he isn’t wearing a hat, apropos the point made above.)

Simply having a wonderful Christmastime.

We see him predominantly dressed in a simple belted-back overcoat of brown wool, a grounded shade and fabric that suggests taste if not affluence. Underneath, he wears a charcoal sports coat. His striped shirt with its button-down collar had long been established as an Ivy staple, and his maroon striped tie suggests romance and the seasonality of the Christmas setting, festive dashes of color that he would rarely allow himself after taking the serious task as a mobster.

At this point, Michael’s mobbed-up duties are relegated to nothing more than answering phones… nothing to take the fifth over.

Read more about Michael’s outfit here.

Corduroy Sport Jacket

As Don Vito Corleone’s life hangs in the balance over the Christmas season, so too does Michael’s fate teeter on the edge of his safe civilian life as an Ivy League student and newlywed husband… or a darker path. He’s still dressed for the former, in his handsome but non-threatening brown corduroy sport jacket over another button-down collared shirt and striped tie. Combined with his gray flannel trousers and brown derby shoes, Michael looks like he could be seated at a class at Dartmouth rather than among murderers and mobsters.

“But if Clemenza can figure a way to have a weapon planted there for me, then I’ll kill ’em both.”… no more Mr. Nice College Boy, it seems.

Michael also shows that he’s aware of the power of appearance. He’s pulled on a heavy brown topcoat (interestingly, not the same notch-lapel overcoat as in the previous scenes, but a less formal coat with a Prussian collar and a reversible rain-resistant side) to visit his father at the hospital, where he learns that the men hired to guard him have been ordered away. Sensing an approaching threat to his father’s life, he stands tall outside the hospital’s front doors, buttoning the coat and turning up the collar for a more sinister appearance. As a dark car slows in front of him, he smoothly unbuttons the middle of the coat and slides his hand in—as though reaching for a gat—and the car speeds away.

Michael’s pyrrhic victory comes with a broken jaw, courtesy of the corrupt NYPD Captain McClusky (Sterling Hayden), who arrives only moments later and mistakes the swarthy Michael’s upturned-coat for the uniform of the “guinea hoods” he’d had locked up earlier in the evening. Despite being told that “the kid’s clean… a war hero. He’s never been busted for the rackets,” McClusky—who interestingly wears the same rank that Michael had during his USMC service—swings his powerful fist to Michael’s jaw.

Michael braces for McClusky’s punch.

Returning to the family compound, Michael’s now-busted cheekbone shows how tarnished his attempt to continue living “clean” has been, his face providing a harsh contrast to the smart corded jacket and tie that encourage his older brother Sonny to mock his threatening violence in his “nice Ivy League suit.”

Read more about Michael’s outfit here.

Brown Sweater for Shooting

Once the family has accepted Michael’s plan to kill Sollozzo and McClusky, we’re treated to a brief vignette with the Corleones’ caporegime Clemenza (Richard S. Castellano) in his soundproofed cellar.

In any other context, Michael may still look the part of a “nice college boy” in his brown sweater layered over a collared shirt. Though Michael clearly wears a civilian garment, the sweater’s high crew neck and structured shoulders remind me of the “woolly pully” jumper that had been introduced by British military forces during World War II. It wouldn’t be redesigned and authorized for USMC usage until the 1970s, but Michael wearing it for this scene still gives him a quasi-military countenance while Clemenza lauds his service: “You know, Mike, we was all proud of you, being a hero and all. Your father, too.”

In Clemenza’s ramshackle den covered with pictures of pinups and saints, Michael absorbs some wiseguy wisdom from the caporegime.

“Nice Ivy League Suit”

For the double murder that provides his moment of no return, Michael appropriately dresses for the moment in what Sonny was right to call a “nice Ivy League Suit”: a charcoal flannel three-piece suit, fully cut, worn over a striped button-down collar shirt and his favorite maroon striped tie… though the reddish tones in the latter now suggest the blood he’s prepared to spill rather than the festivity of romance during the holidays.

Though the clothes look more collegiate than criminal, this is also the first time we see Michael dressed in a matching suit. Not only that, but the somber color and the addition of a waistcoat suggest the gray-toned three-piece suits that he would wear exclusively following his return to the United States several years later, when he would assume leadership of the Corleone crime family following this baptism in blood.

A passing el train echoes Michael’s pre-assassination anxiety.

During the ride to the restaurant, Michael wears a hat, both in accordance with the era’s customs and also sartorially signifying his shift from

Read more about Michael’s suit here.

Sicilian Interlude

After killing Sollozzo and McClusky, Michael is shipped to Sicily where he hides out in his family’s hometown village of Corleone. He dresses to match the locals, clad in a neckband shirt with a blue-on-white bengal stripe that, had the shirt a button-down collar, may have resembled his Ivy League wardrobe back home. He wears a non-matching waistcoat and gray trousers, the vest striped in shades of gray like a business suit, with the bottom few buttons undone.

Michael and his bodyguards Fabrizio (Angelo Infanti) and Calò (Franco Citti) each wear woolen flat caps in a particular style coincidentally known to locals as a “coppola”, a likely evolution of the Sicilian “còppula” meaning “head”.

“Some people will pay a lot of money for that information; but then your daughter would lose a father, instead of gaining a husband.”
Even while hiding in Sicily, Michael perfects the art of making offers that can’t be refused.

Sicilian Suit

Once Michael begins romancing Apollonia (Simonetta Stefanelli), he dresses up with collared shirts and ties worn with what appears to be the sole suit in his Sicilian wardrobe. The dark, faintly striped wool suiting looks like it may wear hot under the Sicilian sun—especially with the jacket’s full double-breasted wrap—but he’s appropriately dressed as a respectful groom in this old-fashioned culture.

It was a Sicilian wedding and the old folks wished them well…

Even after the wedding, Michael continues wearing this pinstripe double-breasted suit, likely the product of a local Sicilian tailor. For the wedding he had ceremoniously appointed it with a white point-collared shirt and black tie, but more casual occasions like his and Apollonia’s move from their now-unsafe villa calls for a less crisp off-white shirt, worn with yet another maroon striped tie.

Gray Striped Silk Three-Piece Suit

When we first see Michael following his return to the United States—presumably sometime in the early 1950s—he already looks the part of a cunning, calculating mob boss. His most frequently worn attire is now a three-piece suit made from a shiny gray self-striped silk, blending this expensive fabric’s showy properties with a conservative color that reflects his businesslike sensibilities.

Now dressed to run the Corleone crime family in his silk three-piece suit, Michael takes command in what would be his signature power pose: arms flat, legs crossed, and unsmiling.

Gone too is the simple and functional field watch he had worn during the war, replaced by a gold dress watch on a gold bracelet that reflects his elevated status.

Consistent with the era’s style and the excess of gangster fashions, the suit consists of a double-breasted jacket—with padded shoulders that build a powerful profile—over a waistcoat and pleated trousers. Unlike the more timeless clothing he wore earlier, the details are all on trend with the early-to-mid ’50s, suggesting a man who can afford to replace his expensively made clothing as prevailing styles change, exemplified by the differently styled gray silk suit—made from a slubby dupioni—that he would wear in The Godfather Part II, set three years later.

Michael also regularly wears hats now, preferring the distinctive homburg style that suggests leadership and wealth. He cycles between homburgs made from gray felt and an all-black model. He wears the latter when returning to Kay, providing an archetypically villainous appearance when worn with a stylish but sinister black double-breasted overcoat.

No longer concerned about dressing to blend in, Michael’s arrival in Kay’s autumnal New England town looks like if a gangster was written into a Douglas Sirk melodrama.

Read more about Michael’s suit here.

Black Three-Piece Suit

Michael’s only sartorial diversity over the final act of The Godfather comes via a black three-piece suit that he wears for business. One of the least controversial maxims of menswear is that black isn’t appropriate for business unless you’re a mob boss… so Michael Corleone must know what he’s communicating to the world when he arrives in Las Vegas—of all places—wrapped in a black three-piece suit, similarly cut like his gray silk suit with the sharp peak lapels on a double-breasted jacket and a high-fastening waistcoat.

Michael’s serious businesslike demeanor is communicated by his restrained dark suit against the Vegas-ready pastels favored by Fredo and Johnny Fontaine.

Compared to his yellow-jacketed brother Fredo and his pastel-tailored Vegas cronies Moe Greene and Johnny Fontaine, Michael and Tom Hagen both look even more somber in their black business suits, clearly indicating that they’re not in Sin City for the showgirls and slot machines. Michael does allow himself a hint of color via the iridescent salmon-pink textured silk tie that he wears with what appears to be one of his usual pale-gray shirts.

The next and final time we see Michael’s black suit, it’s for the more fitting occasion of his father’s funeral, mourning among the rest of his black-clad family. A pink tie would hardly be suitable here, where Michael is wise to wear a solid black silk tie instead.

The Corleone family dresses in black to mourn their patriarch.

The passing of the former Don Corleone shatters any illusion that anyone but Michael is in charge, effectively completing Michael Corleone’s transformation from Marine hero to Mafia boss. By the time we revisit the saga in The Godfather Part II, Michael has updated his sartorial palette for the fashions of the late ’50s, rotating through a gray dupioni silk suit, another black three-piece suit, and a finely checked tan summer suit for visits to warmer climates.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the series and read Mario Puzo’s 1969 novel that started it all.

I also recommend Mark Seal’s new book Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli for any Godfather enthusiasts interested in learning the story behind the movie and those involved in making it.

The Quote

You’re my brother, and I love you. But don’t ever take sides with anyone against the family again. Ever.

The post The Godfather: Michael Corleone’s Sartorial Journey from War Hero to Wiseguy appeared first on BAMF Style.

Ray Liotta as Henry Hill in Goodfellas (1990), wearing a blue striped knit short-sleeved shirt that Scott Fraser Collection recently recreated as the “Salerno” Knit Shirt.

London-based brand Scott Fraser Collection has been on my radar for several years with its increasing lineup of beautiful clothes consistent with its maxim of “retrospective modernism”. With a collection tailored to men and women, Scott Fraser Collection offers knitwear, trousers, suits, and more that take inspiration from the golden age of leisure-wear across the mid-20th century.

In 2020, SFC introduced the first of its “Icon Series”, recreating two famous and distinctive shirts worn by Jude Law in The Talented Mr. Ripley. Less than two years later, SFC has expanded its Icon Series by turning its creative abilities toward what may be my favorite movie of all time: Goodfellas.

Richard Bruno’s costume design from this decades-spanning Mafia story has retained its staying power more than 30 years after it premiered, with many appreciating the wiseguys’ wardrobes of silk suits, snappy shoes, and—of course—comfortable knitwear.

This sartorial trio is perfectly encapsulated when we get our first look at Ray Liotta as the young, confident hood Henry Hill. A chyron informs the setting of “Idlewild Airport, 1963” just before we pan up from his croc loafers up the legs of his gray sharkskin suit trousers to his black striped knit shirt as Henry and his volatile pal Tommy (Joe Pesci) await the truck they’re scheduled to hijack.

The moment stuck with me since the first time I saw Goodfellas twenty years ago, sending me on a long hunt to crib the style I had so admired. (Some readers may recall my including this in my list of five “formative” movie suits that led to this blog’s creation!)

I recently had the chance to speak to Scott Simpson, founder of Scott Fraser Collection, both with my friend Pete Brooker in the latest episode of his excellent podcast From Tailors With Love in addition to catching up separately when Scott generously answered some of my burning questions about the creative process behind these beautiful—and much-demanded—shirts.

Can you share some background into how Scott Fraser Collection got started?

I started SFC as a small passion project in 2013 while working 3 jobs, mostly in menswear. It’s grown totally organically from that point and I owe a big part of it to the support from everyone who’s ordered or shared the love for what we do that’s got us and kept us here.

What were the first pieces you added to the collection?

We started out with something simple. It was a piece that I was looking for myself: a classic duffel bag with a single strap, just the right size for me to carry out on my daily missions! I found a small bag maker around the East End of London where I was working at the time. On my lunch breaks I would visit them and ask questions: how could I get this made, what did I need?

I worked back and forth with them tirelessly but it paid off, and at the end of those months I had a bag on my back. Proudly sharing it with people I knew, people would ask me to make them one for them. So I took the decision to start selling them; I built myself a website and the rest is history. Lots of learning and hard work along the way, but I’m blessed to be doing something I love and to create products that I’m passionate about.

Scott Simpson, founder of Scott Fraser Collection.

It seems like you were ahead of the trend, as I started noticing last year that a lot of more mainstream brands are getting into the retro-inspired knit shirt game. How would you describe the SFC difference?

The difference is that I’ve been on this knit shirt wave for more than ten years. What goes into every piece of SFC knitwear is the 300+ vintage knit shirt collection I’ve compiled in that time—I am obsessed with them! Every single piece that passes through my hands is photographed, studied, color-profiled, and respected for the piece of art in knitwear that they are. In order for me to create something that would be good enough to lay next to the vintage counterparts meant that they would have to be just as good!

So, I’ve spent many years working to find the right factories and knitwear collaborators to distill everything I love (and I think others do to) of these knitted shirts into the SFC knit. From the fit that sits just at the right place on the waist to the right button placement, the technical details, collar-shaping, and souring the finest materials to make them from… the list really could go on!

Quality lasts, and I think that if the SFC knits were to be picked up by someone in 50-60 years time—as I have—that they too would appreciate them and see why they’ve lasted all this time.

What’s your personal favorite piece from the collection, and/or what gets the most wear?

Our trousers and knits are what we’ve become known for. I wear the classic wide-leg pretty much everyday; they’re just the right side of wide-leg and with a neat high-waist.

Naturally, I’m loving the new Goodfellas knits: they both have a strong look for me and wear them differently! I love the Idlewild knit—with the 5 shades of grey and a super technical stripe detail—it’s just so beautiful to me! Plus, having the same pieces used in the film and knowing that everything about them is the same it rocks even harder!

How should wearers take care of their quality knitwear? How would you recommend it be stored, cleaned, and maintained?

I always suggest dry cleaning, there’s something that happens to wool when you wash it in water and it never comes back the same. Top tip: dry cleaning is great as it can help to kill any moth eggs that eat at your precious knits! In order to properly store knitwear always fold it away; hangers make the shoulders stretch and we don’t like that!

A couple years ago, you created a substantial buzz with the “Anzio” and “Ischia” knit shirts that perfectly capture Jude Law’s style in The Talented Mr. Ripley. What was the process for those, and how would you describe the reaction?

The reaction was of a titanic scale, we released it on the crest of COVID as the world was going into lockdowns. It was a time when people felt as though the last thing they wanted was to be trapped inside their homes and unable to travel and I think the Ripley knits acted a sense of escapism for people at that time and they still do; I love seeing where they end up around the world! It’s also a great film and I’d been after the knits I saw Dickie in from the moment I saw film so it was bound to happen at some stage!

Jude Law as Dickie Greenleaf in The Talented Mr. Ripley (1998), wearing the yellow-and-white mesh knit shirt that Scott Fraser Collection has recreated as the Ischia Knit Shirt, seen here.

I remember you had mentioned to me at the time that Goodfellas would be the next entry to the Icon Series, and it’s finally here! How did you determine which shirts to make? 

There are a few pieces in the film, but these two—”Salerno” and “Idlewild”—really stood out to me. Even though the Salerno knit (blue striped short-sleeve) doesn’t feature for too much time in the film, I think it truly encapsulates the whole look of the film for me: casual elegance.

The Idlewild Knit Shirt, part of Scott Fraser Collection’s Icon Series II lineup.

How did the Goodfellas shirt process differ from the Ripley knits?

The Goodfellas knits followed a really interesting process, because we own the originals that are featured in the film. It’s both blessing and curse having the original vintage pieces. Having every single detail in your hands for you to compare against your own version can make for quite a lengthly process for a perfectionist like myself.

The main starting point for us was to send these knits out to our factory so that they could see with their own eyes what we are working towards creating. This is where the hard work started! We started by selecting the yarns, as this is a lengthy process to find the exact colors for each of them. We went to countless suppliers to find different tones. The most difficult color to source was for the blue short-sleeve model, so much so that we ended up having to have our own yarn custom dyed to get it the same color.

On average to create a knit shirt, we find it can take around two samples to get things right. For the Goodfellas knit we had around 8-9 samples before we reached a point where we/I could sleep at night.

What are the shirts made from?

They are made from the finest merino wool.

Swatches of the gradient-striped merino wool used by Scott Fraser Collection to construct the Idlewild Knit Shirt.

Let’s break down each of the shirts one by one. First, the black striped shirt which appears twice: most prominently with that gray sharkskin suit and the olive tassel loafers for the 1963 Idlewild Airport intro set to “Stardust”, and then again worn more casually when Henry gets a visit while staying with his mistress.

What were some of the screen-specific details that you wanted to capture? Were there any significant challenges? 

One of the hardest details was replicating the vertical stripes on the Idlewild. Having the original knit meant that we were able to achieve this extremely technical—and beautiful—vertical detail that a 2D image just couldn’t give. Finding yarn shades that are the same as the originals in this modern age is a difficult task too.

Ray Liotta as Henry Hill, layering a gray sharkskin wool suit jacket over his black-and-gray striped knit shirt that Scott Fraser Collection recreated as the Idlewild Knit Shirt, seen here.

Next, there was the brilliantly bright blue, white, and red striped short-sleeved shirt that Henry wears open while he and Paulie are scamming their way into a partnership at a pal’s restaurant. This shirt might not even be on screen for a full minute and we never see below the waist, but I know it’s regarded as a top fashion moment from the movie.

Again, what were some of the specific details that you wanted to capture with this shirt?

The Salerno was really interesting knit and the one we started on first as I thought it would take the longest time to get right. There are three things: the stripe placement and thickness was hard and probably an easy thing to overlook but having the original helped greatly. Another was the curved collar and how it falls over the top of the chest; the angle of the collar took a while as knitting in curves isn’t something that it is as easy as knitting in straight lines.

Finally, the shade of mid-blue that is used for the front panel: it was important to find the exact same shade and with that we decided to have our own yarn custom-dyed for us to achieve the same shade as the original.

Ray Liotta as Henry Hill, wearing open his blue striped knit short-sleeve shirt that Scott Fraser Collection recreated as the Salerno Knit Shirt, seen here.

What has the reaction to the Goodfellas Icon Series been so far?

After releasing the Ripley knits back in June 2020, I realized people were just as obsessed with these knits as I am, there’s an appetite for knit-nerd accuracy and I’m happy to get it right: it’s sort of as a mark of respect to it. The reaction to the Goodfellas knits has been as great though; I think the two films speak to people in different ways.

What do you consider some of the most stylish movies—or TV series—of all time?

I could reel off a long list of films, but I’ll keep it short and sweet as we could be here for a long time:

• Casablanca made me fall in love with a fuller cut, white linen and sent me on my journey obsessing over 1930s and ’40s tailoring.
• Blow: There’s something great about the styling in this film; it always jumps out to me. Period yet with a freshness. It had the whole package and I rate that.
• American Gigolo: I have a love affair with any Armani, this film being one of his spring-boards into the public eye, I can see why! The film is 4/10 at best but the clothes are an 10/10!

What’s next for Scott Fraser Collection?

Right at this moment we are renovating a store in the East End of London; it’s going to be a mixed use space where we can still hold our fitting appointments, collections previews, and run our fulfillment from. We also plan to use it as more of a gallery space, where we will be able to showcase a variety of design and art projects that we’re interested in, as well as using it as a platform for other collaborations with fellow brands and makers. It’s a new space for creation and I’m excited!

Read more about Ray Liotta’s wardrobe during the “Idlewild Airport, 1963” vignette in Goodfellas here.

Shop the Scott Fraser Collection here, including the Idlewild and Salerno shirts released via Icon Series II.

Disclaimer: This is not a paid promotional post, nor have I received any compensation in any form for writing about this company. I simply respect Scott Fraser Collection’s craftsmanship, and I welcomed the opportunity to learn more about these shirts recreated from my favorite movie.

The post Scott Fraser Collection’s Icon Series: The Goodfellas Shirts appeared first on BAMF Style.

Patrick McGoohan as “Number Six” on The Prisoner (Episode 8: “Dance of the Dead”)

Vitals

Patrick McGoohan as Number Six, recently resigned secret agent

“The Village”, Fall 1967

Series: The Prisoner
Created by: Patrick McGoohan & George Markstein
Wardrobe: Masada Wilmot & Dora Lloyd

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Born 94 years ago today, Patrick McGoohan emerged as one of the most unique auteurs of ’60s television as the star and executive producer (and, occasionally, writer and director) of the allegorical and avant-garde “spy-fi” miniseries The Prisoner, which he co-created with George Markstein.

The Prisoner centers around its title character who, upon his contentious retirement from a shadowy British intelligence agency, wakes up mysteriously transported to a picturesque Italianate island village from which he would spend the duration of the series trying to escape. “The Village” is overseen by a rotation of administrators all designated “Number Two”, ranging in gender, age, and personality as well as the degree of their manipulations in trying to question, placate, or recruit our incorruptible hero into the island’s leadership.

Designated “Number Six”, the character has been speculated to be a continuation of McGoohan’s character John Drake from the more traditional espionage series Danger Man… or perhaps representative of McGoohan himself, a theory advanced by the fact that we never learn Number Six’s true name but he does describe his birthday as March 19, 1928, which he shares with his creator and portrayer.

There remain ongoing arguments and decryptions as to how The Prisoner‘s 17 episodes should be viewed but—for the sake of argument—I’ll refer to the episodes numbered by the order of their original UK and U.S. broadcasts as well as the 2009 home video release. I’ve only seen the series in its entirety once, but I know there are many The Prisoner devotees in the world, so I request both their patience—and their commentary—as I explore the signature outfit worn by McGoohan as Number Six.

What’d He Wear?

His identity and sense of individualism stripped from him, Number Six is issued the daily “uniform” of a rowing blazer, mockneck, khakis, and deck sneakers, all consistent with the pallid seaside surroundings. Number Six is also issued a flat straw boater and a lapel badge emblazoned with a red “6”, both of which he instantly discards.

Number Six’s boater and badge don’t even last beyond their first scene, as seen in here when first decked in his Village-issued kit in “Arrival” (Episode 1).

Subtle variations of Number Six’s costume are seen across the series’ 17 episodes, often within the same episode (and even the same scene) with variations including the style of braiding around the edges of the jacket, the presence of a belt, sock colors, and the lace-eyelets of his sneakers. While these are likely the result of production-influenced continuity errors, they also contribute to The Prisoner‘s general sense of surreality.

The most distinctive piece of Number Six’s Village-issued uniform is the dark rowing blazer with its off-white edge braiding. Before the advent of the now-traditional navy blue blazer, the term had referred to jackets worn by members of rowing teams, striped or piped to distinguish their associated club or school.

Although the jacket often appears black on screen and has been referred to as such by auction listings and other materials, The Prisoner appreciation society Six of One and fan-site The Unmutual have both explained that these blazers were actually made of a dark charcoal brown woolen twill.

“Checkmate” (Episode 9)

Although legendary London tailors Dimi Major and Douglas Hayward had crafted McGoohan’s charcoal silk suit worn in the series at the Fulham shop, Number Six’s far more frequently seen rowing blazers were from British label John Michael.

The brand was founded by John Michael Ingram, an innovative designer who opened his first shop in Chelsea in 1957. Known throughout London’s swinging ’60s scene for his innovative styles and trendsetting, Ingram eventually evolved from retail into fashion forecasting with his agency Design Intelligence, publishing fashion trend guides and delivering forward-thinking designs to retailers.

The white “John Michael | London” label can be briefly seen inside McGoohan’s jackets on screen, confirmed by a Bonhams auction listing for one of his jackets that describes the blazer as “black wool with white edging” (albeit noting later that “the colour of this jacket is very dark brown rather than black”) with the label inscribed in blue biro “P.McGoohan 25/8/66 E/52”, suggesting that the garment would have been brand-new when filming began on location in the North Welsh village of Portmeirion less than two weeks later.

Number Six with his blazer buttoned as he strolls through the seemingly abandoned Village in “Many Happy Returns” (Episode 7).

The two buttons on the front and the single button on each cuff are black two-hole sew-through buttons. Apropos the rowing blazer’s sporty origins, Number Six’s jacket has patch pockets: one over the left breast and one on each hip. The shoulders are padded, and the silhouette is shaped by front darts.

The notch lapels are piped in an off-white braiding, which continues beyond the bottoms of the lapels and onto the edge of the jacket hem, wrapping around the ventless back.

The braiding along the collar parallels the braiding around the hem, as seen here in “A. B. and C.” (Episode 3).

The off-white braiding around the edges of the blazer provide the clearest visual indicator of the different jackets used, specifically whether or not this detailing appears continuous or “broken” around the lapel notches.

Although Number Six’s first blazer—seen in “Arrival”—is continuously braided around the edges, the “broken”-braided blazer has been argued as the canonical choice as it’s seen with much more frequency, appearing in every episode of The Prisoner except “Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling”, where neither McGoohan nor his signature blazer appear at all. Although he principally wears “broken”-braided blazers in “The Schizoid Man”, “Checkmate”, and “It’s Your Funeral”, these two episodes mark the only appearances aside from the first episode to feature Number Six wearing a continuously braided blazer.

The two types of Number Six’s rowing blazer’s edge braiding: continuous, as seen in “Arrival” (Episode 1) and “broken” behind each notch, as seen here in “Dance of the Dead” (Episode 8) and almost every episode of the series.

Number Six’s base layer is a navy-blue mockneck jumper, likely made of a lightweight wool like merino, with set-in sleeves finished with thinly ribbed cuffs. As seen during some of the physical scrapes Number Six finds himself drawn into, he wears it over a white or off-white undershirt.

The shorter and less complex mockneck emerged as a popular alternative to the full turtleneck (also known as a “polo neck” or “roll-neck”) during the mid-20th century, a fashionable byproduct of the rise of sportswear and the trends set by Beats and mods. As with many trending fashions, the mockneck has undergone waves of popularity every few decades, such as the baggier Gap-style pullovers seen during the ’90s Seinfeld era and the more form-fitting jumpers back in style today thanks to wearers like Daniel Craig’s James Bond.

The mockneck renaissance has extended to retailers for every budget, including, as of March 2022:

• American Trench Merino Mock Neck
• Everlane Cashmere Mockneck
• Express Rayon Stretch Mini Mock Neck Sweater
• Lands’ End Men’s Super Soft Supima Mock Turtleneck
• Reiss Kelby Mock Neck Sweater
• River Island Men’s Essential Sweater

“Nerve gas… one squirt, you’re paralyzed. Two squirts, you’re dead,” threatens the light-sleeping Curtis—made to resemble Number Six—in “The Schizoid Man” (Episode 5).

The unique exposition of “Many Happy Returns” finds Number Six seemingly alone on the island, so he commences to make his escape, layering a chunkier dark navy ribbed wool sweater over his mockneck in lieu of his blazer as there are no authority figures around to lambast him for appearing out of “uniform”. Though not a military garment, the hefty V-neck raglan-sleeve sweater creates a martial appearance appropriate for our hero, an ex-RAF officer.

After a perilous journey, Number Six seems to have safely made it back to London in the appropriately titled “Many Happy Returns” (Episode 7), still wearing the heavy sweater that he donned for his escape in lieu of the Village-issued blazer.

Number Six’s Village uniform also includes a pair of light brown trousers, closer in shade to fawn than the traditional khaki. These darted-front slacks have the full-top “frogmouth” front pockets that saw their greatest mainstream popularity through the 1960s, even finding favor with Sean Connery’s James Bond. These trousers also have button-through back pockets and plain-hemmed bottoms.

Though we see the trousers worn beltless in several episodes like “A. B. and C.” and “Many Happy Returns”, Number Six does seem to generally prefer to hold these up with a black leather belt as seen in “Arrival”, “The General”, and “Once Upon a Time”. The belt closes through a small gold-toned square single-prong buckle.

Number Six’s trouser belt and frogmouth pockets flash as he’s subdued by Village guards in “Free for All” (Episode 4) while we also get a look at the back pockets and hems while he scales the Village in “A. B. and C.” (Episode 3).

The Village issues Number Six a pair of plimsolls that, like his rowing blazer, nod to classic seaside style even if our eponymous prisoner isn’t exactly encouraged to take to the open waters. These deck sneakers are constructed of navy canvas uppers with thick white rubber outsoles which are siped on the bottoms, consistent with the non-slip soles pioneered by Paul A. Sperry in the 1930s.

The flat woven laces are dark blue to match the uppers, though the four sets of oxford-style eyelets alternate between being plain, silver-toned metal or the more sporadically seen blue-painted grommets (as seen in “A. B. and C.”, “The Schizoid Man”, “Hammer Into Anvil”, and “A Change of Mind”) that create a more monochromatic appearance.

The usual metal eyelets shine from Number Six’s deck sneakers, worn here with brown socks in “Dance of the Dead” (Episode 8) vs. the similar shoes with blue-painted eyelets as seen in “The Schizoid Man” (Episode 5).

Dating back to early 20th century naval workwear and manufactured in various forms by all the usual footwear suspects from Converse to Sperry, these simple sneakers are still available from many retailers today:

• Jack & Jones Carter Canvas Low Top Sneaker
• Seavees Hermosa Plimsoll
• Sperry Cloud CVO Deck Sneaker
• TOMS Carlo Sneaker
• Vans Authentic

Number Six cycles through various pairs of socks, with black or dark navy hosiery seen most frequently, though he also wears blue, brown, and ribbed tan socks.

Number Six awakes on the beach in “Dance of the Dead” (Episode 8). Note his shoes’ siped soles, developed for traction on wet decks, and the dark socks he wears with them here.

The series’ focus on the meaning and significance of identity is highlighted in “The Schizoid Man” (Episode 5), in which Number Two replaces Number Six with a lookalike and reconditions the real Six to be the new Number Twelve… outfitting our hero in a reversed version of his usual blazer, this time white-bodied with black “broken” edge piping.

With its darted-front cut, ventless back, and patch pockets, the white blazer is a nearly identical inverse, except for the two-button cuffs rather than the single buttons on his dark brown jacket.

One McGoohan, two blazers.

Though auction listings and other materials have explained that the famous rowing blazer was a John Michael product, the brand’s label is only clearly seen on screen when it’s pulled from Number Six’s closet.

In case the screen appearance wasn’t enough to confirm the maker, a Bonhams auction listing from 2005 also details the jacket as having an “inside pocket with john michel london inscribed in biro P.McGoohan 12/12/66 58”.

As Number Six reaches into his closet to don the white blazer while posing as Curtis in “The Schizoid Man” (Episode 5), we see the John Michael label on the inner right breast.

Wristwatches of The Prisoner

Despite being cut off from the outside world and issued a limited wardrobe, Number Six still manages to cycle through a number of attractive wristwatches during his stay in The Village. He arrives wearing a steel-cased watch with a yellowing dial on a black band that is ruined by seawater during an escape attempt in “The Chimes of Big Ben”, requiring the temporary replacement of an expanding-band watch lent to him by an Estonian agent.

Before that, in “Arrival”, Number Six is given a stainless steel Hamilton Aqua-Date Super Compressor automatic diver by fellow prisoner Number Nine (Virginia Maskell), as it has an “electropass” he may be able to use to bypass the surveillance system to make his escape by helicopter. The stainless 37mm case has the Super Compressor’s characteristic dual crowns—positioned at 2 and 4 o’clock—with a silver dial marked with luminous non-numeric hour markers and a white date window at 3 o’clock. The rotating inner black bezel around the dial is marked at every 10-minute interval, and the watch itself is rigged to a steel five-piece link bracelet.

Number Six takes Number Nine’s Hamilton in “Arrival”, immediately before her calls her out for her service to Number Two.

As Number Twelve in  “The Schizoid Man”, Number Six now wears a steel chronograph similar to the Omega Speedmaster “Moonwatch” with its black tachymeter, black dial with luminous non-numeric hour markers and three sub-registers at 3, 6, and 9 o’clock, and dual pushers flanking the center crown. He wears the watch on a steel three-piece link bracelet.

His sparsely seen chronograph strapped to his wrist, Number Six beats the eponymous password out of Curtis in “The Schizoid Man”.

The beginning of “The Schizoid Man” also debuts Number Six’s most frequently worn wristwatch, a tastefully simple automatic dress watch on a plain black leather strap with a round cream-colored dial detailed only with slender gold non-numeric hour markers (slightly wider at 12 o’clock) and three gold hands. The small brand inscription against the top of the dial reads Camerer Cuss & Co., indicating a now-defunct London watchmaker that had began business in the late 18th century importing Black Forest clocks.

In addition to the very watch-centric episode “It’s Your Funeral”, the Camerer Cuss & Co. watch can be seen in “The General”, “Many Happy Returns”, “Hammer Into Anvil”, “A Change of Mind”, and “Living In Harmony”. Given its ubiquity and its resemblance to what he had worn upon his arrival, this most understated of Number Six’s timepieces would decidedly be the most canonical choice.

Number Six’s Camerer Cuss & Co. dress watch.

In the midst of the action in “A Change of Mind”, Number Six stops Number 86 (Angela Browne) from reporting to Number Two by peeling a steel watch from his left wrist and dangling it in front of her face to induce hypnosis. Close-ups of the watch reveal an all-steel Tissot with a silver dial detailed only with short, non-numeric hour markers, worn on a steel link bracelet with a seven-piece rice-bead center. (In yet another continuity error, shots of McGoohan actually holding the watch show him holding a watch with an Rolex Oyster-style link bracelet instead.)

Number Six dangles his Tissot to hypnotize the lovely Number 86.

How to Get the Look

Patrick McGoohan as “Number Six” on The Prisoner (Episode 5: “The Schizoid Man”)

Despite some subtle variations in the blazer braiding, shoe eyelets, sock colors, presence of a belt, and watches, the definitive uniform issued to Number Six in The Village can be rebuilt to all of its nautical-adjacent charm with a very dark brown piped rowing blazer, navy mockneck jumper, fawn-colored slacks, and navy deck sneakers.

Just make sure Rover’s nowhere in sight if you plan on cribbing screen style from The Prisoner.

• Charcoal-brown wool twill single-breasted 2-button rowing blazer with off-white piped edges, notch lapels, patch breast pocket, patch hip pockets, 1-button cuffs, and ventless back
• Navy-blue lightweight wool mockneck jumper
• Fawn-colored darted-front trousers with belt loops, full-top “frogmouth” front pockets, button-through back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Black leather belt with squared gold single-prong buckle
• Navy-blue canvas four-eyelet deck sneakers with siped white rubber outsoles
• Navy-blue or brown ribbed socks
• Stainless steel dress watch with round off-white dial and gold non-numeric hour markers and hands on smooth black leather strap

While Jack Carlson has revitalized the popularity of these jackets with his brand Rowing Blazers, you can find a replica of Number Six’s white-piped black rowing blazer available from the English school-wear brand Albert Prendergast.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the series. Be seeing you.

The Quote

I am not a number. I am a person.

The post The Prisoner: Patrick McGoohan’s Rowing Blazer as Number Six appeared first on BAMF Style.

James Gandolfini as Anthony Soprano on The Sopranos (Episode 6.03: “Mayham”)

Vitals

James Gandolfini as Anthony Soprano, precision optics salesman with an uncanny resemblance to heating systems merchant Kevin Finnerty

Costa Mesa, California, Spring 2006

Series: The Sopranos
Episodes:
– “Join the Club” (Episode 6.02, dir. David Nutter, aired 3/19/2006)
– “Mayham” (Episode 6.03, dir. Jack Bender, aired 3/26/2006)
Creator: David Chase
Costume Designer: Juliet Polcsa

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Who am I? Where am I going?

Sixteen years ago this week, The Sopranos first aired what became one of my favorite arcs from TV, exploring the mysterious, mythical adventures of the unconscious Tony Soprano, reborn as a de-Jersey-fied defense optics salesman on a surreal business trip in Costa Mesa.

After the cliffhanger ending of “Members Only” left Tony gut-shot on his uncle’s kitchen floor, I’m sure the last thing that viewers expected to see the following Sunday night was the erstwhile don of New Jersey waking up in an anonymous hotel room, his flashy wardrobe of printed silk lounge shirts replaced with off-the-peg Brooks Brothers as showrunner David Chase embarked on one of the most audacious episodes of the acclaimed series. Something is certainly off, the disquiet intensifying as we follow this slightly more articulate version of Tony—excuse me, Anthony—Soprano to a nearby bar, where he offers a sheepishly amused smile in response to his family’s saccharinely dorky answering machine message as wildfires burn from the news on TV behind him. (“Around here? It’s dead,” suggests a bartender.)

Are we seeing what life would be like without those “putrid” Soprano genes? Or is this something more metaphysical, the crossroads for a comatose Tony given the choice between a life of clarity or departing deeper into Hell?

The Sopranos consistently seems more interested in exploring the mind than the mob, and five seasons of psychiatric prodding at Tony’s subconscious lead us to what may first feel like the ultimate dream sequence, though Matt Zoller Seitz and Alan Sepinwall make the point in The Soprano Sessions that this two-episode Costa Mesa sequence “is both more straightforward and more portentious” than the realistically scattered narratives of Tony’s dreams. We’ve seen those in the Soprano orbit use their time above ground to make sense of the afterlife, with Paulie Walnuts (Tony Sirico) making the bizarre case for purgatory after Christopher Moltisanti’s near-death vision several seasons earlier, and it’s possible that we’re following a purgatorial version of Tony Soprano. Purgatory… disguised as a business trip.

Nothing brings down the melancholia of business travel more than losing your wallet, missing the whole reason for the trip, getting attacked my monks, falling down some stairs, and learning you have a neurodegenerative disease.

I’d always been strangely fascinated by business travel: spending time in another city but relegated strictly to impersonal hotels, conference rooms, and banquet halls, missing sights that make travel worthwhile, collecting part-time acquaintances you’ll never see (or make out with) again, and the vulnerability of losing cash, identity, or belongings while away from home (“my whole life’s in that case.”)

As Purga-Tony reflects to his single-serving friends that he’s uncertain about his future, he’s offered to “join the club” by fellow optics merchant Lee (Sheila Kelley), who shares more than a passing resemblance to the Gloria Trillo-types that so intrigue Mob Tony.

During his conversation with Lee, Anthony reveals that he’s transitioned from his former job selling patio furniture—a vocation that Mob Tony had derided as far as back the first season—and now sells precision optics, hence his presence at the military vendor convention where he learns he must have swapped his wallet and briefcase with a similar-looking HVAC salesman named Kevin Finnerty… or “infinity”, to truly hit us with the themes. Unfortunately, the physically absent Finnerty brings his own baggage to Anthony’s life via his installation of a defective heating system at a Buddhist monastery, leading to his harassment by a contingent of monks seeking atonement.

With only $87 to his name (which holds little value in this alternate plane of existence), Anthony tries to make the best of his situation, renting a hotel room using Finnerty’s ID and money (a “crime” that Anthony finds amusing in its ease) as he awaits an absolution beyond his control.

Returning again to the wisdom of The Soprano Sessions, Seitz and Sepinwall conclude: “Here Tony’s stuck in Orange County, with no way to leave (Purgatory). On one end of town is a shining beacon (Heaven), on the other, a raging forest fire (Hell). Over and over, he stops to assess the worth of his life. Then, having lost his own wallet and all the ID and credit cards needed to prove who he is, he steals the identity (sin) of Kevin Finnerty—a heating salesman who lives in one of the hottest states of the union (Arizona)—checks into another hotel, and falls down a staircase, at which point he learns he has Alzheimer’s (eternal damnation). While Carmela’s busy in the real world telling him he’s not going to Hell, Tony’s in Purgatory, debating whether to tell his wife this is exactly the fate he has coming to him.”

What’d He Wear?

“Join the Club”

“Join the Club” opens with James Gandolfini sprawled out on a hotel bed, as if in a coffin, picking up from the “Members Only” cliffhanger. If you’ve paid any attention over the show’s five preceding seasons, you know this blue oxford button-down shirt and Ivy-inspired striped tie aren’t the usual pieces from the Tony Soprano closet.

Anthony wears dark gray wool double reverse-pleated slacks, held up with a dark brown leather belt that coordinates to his cordovan derby shoes, laced up under the trousers’ turn-ups (cuffs). Before heading to the bar, he pulls on the taupe worsted wool suit jacket that hangs over the handle of his suitcase next to the bed.

The taupe suit jacket flatters Gandolfini’s larger frame, while not exactly creative with its standard single-breasted configuration with notch lapels, two-button front, welted breast pocket, and flapped hip pockets. You could almost see this universe’s version of Carmela picking out the tie with its varying dark brown, powder blue, and tan stripes, suggesting that he wear it to match his blue shirt and taupe suit.

Taupe is one of the most neutral shades in men’s tailoring, and Tony almost blends into the bland background of the Costa Mesa bar while wearing it. We’re not sure exactly who it is we’re seeing—the biographical details line up with the man we’ve come to know as Tony Soprano, but something isn’t right—and his immersion into the setting suggest that this is indeed Tony Soprano’s gateway into purgatory, an expanse of neutrality.

Caught between Hell (wildfires on TV) and Heaven (a beacon far in the distance), Anthony Soprano’s momentary distraction sets the groundwork for his fateful stay in purgatory.

The next day, Anthony strolls into the mil spec ’06 conference still wearing that blue oxford shirt but with a navy blazer, pleated khakis, and Brooks-style striped tie, the trusty trad uniform of the “Ameri-gan” that Mob Tony’s cronies so vocally resent but also his own de facto uniform through the rest of these Costa Mesa sequences, illustrating the variation of Anthony Soprano, optics salesman vs. Tony Soprano, wiseguy.

“There’s something boring and wholesome to Purga-Tony; he’s wearing the 9-5 uniform for men at that time,” explained Caroline Reilly, who has written about the style of The Sopranos for InsideHook. “It also blunts his intimidating persona, it softens him.”

While Tony and his Mafia cohorts all have their established images of silk suits and sport jackets with colorful shirts and tacky ties (perhaps best exemplified by his stalwart consigliere Silvio Dante), the classic navy blazer, subdued oxford button-down shirt, and khakis live on the opposing end of the sartorial spectrum, offering easy respectability while lacking the creativity and flash of mobbed-up menswear.

There’s no denying that a smart navy blazer can look great with gray flannels or khakis; indeed, I’d argue that this reputation for presentability has attracted its comfortable simplicity to even uncomplicated dressers, ranging from freshman fraternity inductees to the frustrated Anthony Soprano, fumbling through another man’s briefcase at a convention reception table.

His off-the-rack navy blazer awkwardly worn with both buttons done (sometimes) and balding dome impotently compensated by a wispy attempt at a combover, this Anthony Soprano presents a sorry—if depressingly relatable to most average viewers—contrast to the alpha gangster we’d grown accustomed to watching.

The navy wool Kingsridge single-breasted blazer is resplendent in all the tastefully traditional detailing like the crested gold shank buttons—two on the front, four “kissing” on each cuff—that nod to the garment’s genesis at sea. The rest of the blazer reflects evolution from its sportier, less-shaped origins, with front darts, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, and a single vent that all echo the standard American business suit jacket.

In addition to his classic Brooks Brothers blue-and-white oxford cotton shirt with its button-down collar, front placket, breast pocket, and button cuffs, Anthony also wears the instantly recognizable Brooks Brothers No. 1 silk repp tie, striped in burgundy with two narrow navy stripes against each gold bar stripe, all following the brand’s right-down-to-left direction.

After taking on The Finnerty Identity for a night at the Omni, Anthony’s asked to “bear” with the hotel’s maintenance staff while the elevator is out of service, but somewhere along the seven flights of stairs between his room and the lobby, the leather soles of his brown leather tassel loafers slip on the waxed rubber flooring, sending Anthony tumbling down the steps.

Back at the Omni, Anthony kicks off the offending loafers.

Throughout this misadventure, Anthony again wears the Kingsridge blazer and blue Brooks shirt, paired with the dark gray pleated slacks and yet another BB#1 tie, this one a light gold with narrowed navy-and-white diagonal stripes.

“Mayham”

When we pick up with Anthony in “Mayham”, he’s again waking in a hotel room, albeit looking more content and appropriately dressed for slumber in a more suburban variation of Mob Tony’s underwear: a white short-sleeved V-neck Jockey undershirt (not sleeveless), rich blue boxers, and a thin gold bracelet on his right wrist that lacks the chunkier linkage of his usual. Receiving notice of the lawsuit under his door, he dresses to visit the monks at the nearby Crystal Monastery.

The monastery scenes show Anthony in a variation of his usual Costa Mesa wardrobe: blue blazer, khakis, blue oxford button-down shirt, and striped tie, but this single-vented blazer is arguably different from the solid navy Kingsridge jacket seen before and after this. Similarly styled with its shining array of gilt crested buttons, welted breast pocket, and flapped hip pockets, the jacket is made from a slightly lighter slate-blue cloth with a mottled, semi-solid presentation.

The Buddhist monks prove this Anthony Soprano to be less capable of making them an offer they can’t refuse.

Anthony’s blue oxford button-down shirt is likely another from Brooks Brothers. His tie is patterned with alternating narrow blue and cream stripes against a deep maroon ground, with each stripe busier than the balanced pattern of the Brooks repp ties. He again wears the pleated cotton khakis, held up with a dark brown leather belt that echo those chunky cordovan derbies. (After his fall down the stairs, Anthony may have sworn off his slip-ons.)

The final scene of the Costa Mesa sequence follows Anthony to the Finnerty family reunion in nearby Irvine, hoping for some answers. He may indeed get them in the form of a mysterious host (Steve Buscemi, who notably played Tony’s now-deceased cousin Tony Blundetto the previous season) welcoming him into the well-lit Inn at the Oaks that may just be a portal into death… while the increasingly louder voice of Tony’s daughter Meadow (Jamie-Lynn Sigler) implores our hero not to leave us just yet.

This complete outfit had been auctioned by Christie’s in 2008, a year after the series concluded. Sold for $3,250, the listing informs that Gandoflini wore “a blue Oxford shirt by Brooks Brothers, a white V-neck Jockey t-shirt, a pair of charcoal gray Brooks Brothers pants, a navy wool blazer by King’s Ridge, and a navy, light blue, and yellow Polo tie.”

The unique navy silk Polo Ralph Lauren tie is patterned with tight, repeating arrangement of light-colored shapes—alternating between squares and squares turned askew 45°—each with a small circle in the center.

“Has Kevin Finnerty arrived?”
“We don’t talk like that here.”
“What do you mean?”
“Your family’s inside.”
“What family?”
“They’re here to welcome you.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You’re going home.”

Anthony’s Accessories

No pinky ring, no pendant necklace, just a more subdued gold chain-link bracelet on his right wrist. On the opposing hand, Anthony the [mostly] faithful husband wears just his gold pinky ring and a plain steel wristwatch with a round white dial on a dark brown leather strap that presents a significant contrast when compared with the Skip’s all-gold Rolex “President” Day-Date.

SOPRANOS

What to Imbibe

“Imagine you could use one on the house,” the affable bartender (Edward Watts) offers after hearing about the misplaced wallet and briefcase. “Yeah, yeah, you said a mouthful,” chuckles a friendlier Anthony than we’re used to seeing. “Uh, Scotch. Rocks.”

“Alright… Glenlivet okay?”

“Oh yeah, better than okay!” Anthony enthusiastically confirms, receiving a generous dram of the same spirit that we’ve seen Mob Tony enjoy on multiple occasions.

Production photo from “Join the Club” as a sympathetic Costa Mesa barkeep pours Anthony a dram of Glenlivet. Photo by Barry Wetcher.

Currently the best-selling single malt whisky in the United States (and second best-selling globally), The Glenlivet distillery was founded nearly 200 years ago in Ballindalloch, located in the Scottish Highlands along the River Spey and thus establishing it as a vanguard of Speyside-style single malt whisky. One of the five official regional whisky variations in Scotland, Speyside whiskies are characterized by The Glenlivet’s defining traits of fruity flavor, lacking the smoky peat that defines regions like Islay.

Following the Excise Act passing, The Glenlivet was the first legal distillery in the area when it was founded in 1824 by George Smith, whose connections to Alexander Gordon, 4th Duke of Gordon—and his double brace of flintlock pistols—protected him from the local distillers whose illicit operations were threatened.

“Due to the efficiency of the operation and the high quality of the product, the Glenlivet was being exported by the mid-1860s,” writes Daniel Lerner in Single Malt and Scotch Whisky, adding that the distillery had to fight for the rights to its name, finally receiving sole ownership of The Glenlivet brand in 1884. The Glenlivet distillery survived Prohibition (when legal exportation to the U.S. halted) and the Depression, emerging from closure during World War II to establish its footing as one of the most prominent single malt distilleries.

A range of varieties are available today, with the most common being its 12-year-old whisky as Tony often drinks throughout The Sopranos, even while in Coma Costa Mesa. The 12-year Glenvliet offers drinkers a slightly perfumed aroma and a sweet—if somewhat smoky—flavor with a caramel finish.

The variety of The Glenlivet served to Tony is clearly the standard 12-year-old single malt.

How to Get the Look

James Gandolfini as Anthony Soprano on The Sopranos (Episode 6.02: “Join the Club”)

Tony Soprano and his mobbed-up colleagues may not normally dress like the Amer-igan optics salesman Anthony Soprano in his traditional navy blazer, blue button-down oxford shirts, striped ties, and khakis, but that doesn’t mean the more conventionally dressed yin to the bolder-dressing Skip’s yang is poorly dressed; on the contrary, many menswear purists would probably see the Costa Mesa scenes as James Gandolfini’s finest sartorial moments on The Sopranos. Yet seeing our protagonist so differently dressed adds to the surreality of these episodes, contributing to the overall sense of melancholic disquiet that permeates “Join the Club” and “Mayham”.

• Navy wool single-breasted blazer with notch lapels, two crested gilt buttons, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, 4-button cuffs, and single vent
• Blue-and-white oxford-cloth Brooks Brothers shirt with button-down collar, front placket, breast pocket, and single-button barrel cuffs
• Burgundy striped BB#1 silk repp tie
• Khaki cotton pleated slacks with belt loops, side pockets, button-through back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Dark brown leather belt with gold-toned single-prong buckle
• Cordovan leather five-eyelet plain-toe derby shoes
• Tan ribbed cotton lisle socks
• White cotton short-sleeve V-neck undershirt
• Blue boxer shorts
• Thin gold bracelet
• Stainless steel watch with round white dial on black leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the entire series and follow my friend Gabe’s Instagram accounts: @TonySopranoStyle and @Don_Gabe_Marfisi.

I recommend reading more about the series in my oft-cited The Soprano Sessions by Matt Zoller Seitz and Alan Sepinwall, as well as the excellent blog Sopranos Autopsy that includes in-depth analyses of every episode, including “Join the Club” and “Mayham”.

The Quote

Who wants more complications? I just want to come home!

The post The Sopranos: Tony’s “Kevin Finnerty” Navy Blazer appeared first on BAMF Style.

George Segal as Bill Denny in California Split (1974)

Vitals

George Segal as Bill Denny, magazine writer and casual gambler

Los Angeles, Winter 1973

Film: California Split
Release Date: August 7, 1974
Director: Robert Altman
Costumer: Hugh McFarland

Background

In honor of George Segal, who died a year ago today, today’s post introduces us to his character in California Split, directed by Robert Altman and described by Tim Grierson and Will Leitch for Vulture as the greatest movie about gambling ever made, “one of the high watermarks of ’70s hangout cinema.”

The film begins by following Segal’s Bill Denny between poker games at an L.A. gambling den, where he makes the acquaintance of fellow player Charlie Waters (Elliott Gould). After a few shared drinks and a mugging that leaves both men united by their lack of funds, Charlie brings Bill back to the pad he shares with filles de joie Barbara (Ann Prentiss) and Susan (Gwen Elles), kicking off a chaotic friendship between the laconic Bill and live-wire Charlie that eventually takes them to Reno in search of the ultimate high-stakes game. Will Bill be able to resist the gambling addiction that has enveloped his garrulous new pal?

Breakfast à la Barbara: Froot Loops for Bill, Lucky Charms and Budweiser for Charlie.

Segal was cast early in the production, grounding the movie with a reserve that appropriately balanced Gould’s rambunctious energy that screenwriter Joseph Walsh recalled was a byproduct of the fact that “Elliott lived his gambling, he came out of the box just like in a horse race when a great horse comes out of the box.”

Though Segal initially felt stifled by Gould’s liveliness and—like his character—was ultimately uninterested in gambling, the actor later recalled how much fun he had during the production:

It was like a party. It was so civilized back then. There were no long hours. It was relaxed. That’s why those movies from the ’70s were so good. We were all relaxed and enjoying what we were doing.

What’d He Wear?

As opposed to Charlie’s frenetic sense of dress, cycling various boldly printed shirts under his tattered tan sports coat, Bill generally follows a more timeless and tasteful sense of style that layers his subdued lightweight jackets over knitwear. Through the first act of California Split, Bill wears a dark navy cotton jacket that stylistically resembles a cross between a contemporary leisure suit jacket and an oversized Navy surplus “CPO shirt”, not unlike the shirt-jackets—or “shackets”—popular today.

Bill’s dark navy cotton side-vented shirt-jacket has a long pointed collar that sits flat on his chest, five dark blue plastic buttons that he keeps open, single-button cuffs with short pointed tabs, and twin chest pockets that close with dual-pointed “sawtooth”-style flaps.

As the voiceover from the California Club video explains the basic fundamentals of poker, Bill makes his way toward his next game at table number 10.

Bill looks comfortable at the tables in his ivory turtleneck, knitted in a variety of classic Aran stitchwork: cable-knit through the body with long diamond stitches down each side of the chest and set-in sleeves. The rolled neck (also known as a “polo neck”) is widely ribbed like the cuffs and hem.

Irish fishing folklore dictates that every stitch on an Aran-knit jumper carries deeper meaning. Diamond-shaped stitching, said to resemble fishing mesh or the small fields on the Aran islands, symbolize wealth, luck, and success… all elements that would benefit Bill during long nights at the poker tables. Arguably the most frequently encountered stitch, the cable represents fisherman’s ropes to symbolize their safety while out to sea. (Read more from Knit Picks and Shamrock Craic.)

“I dealt the second one a little hard, it never hit the floor, not even close.”

You can find genuine Irish Aran sweaters from merchants like The Irish Store and Sweater Shop or lower-priced recreations from retailers like ASOS and Stag Provisions (as of March 2022).

Though Bill’s sweater appears to be in generally good shape, it shows some signs of age via the hungry moths that have gotten to the right side, particularly under the armpit. Bill wears it against his bare torso, as we see when Charlie pulls it up to apply the shaving cream they use to self-medicate after getting beaten up by Lew’s pals.

“That shaving cream is not gonna stain your white sweater, don’t worry,” Charlie assures Bill.

Bill’s flat front trousers are a tobacco brown corduroy with a narrow wale known as “needlecord” or “pinwale”. These trousers have a fitted waistband, with no belt loops or side adjusters. The front pockets are the full-top “frogmouth”-style with a single jetted back right pocket. The bottoms are finished with turn-ups (cuffs).

Bill wears walnut brown leather plain-toe monk shoes with a single strap across the instep that closes through a gold-toned buckle. (I own and can endorse the budget-friendly Florsheim Sorrento single-strap monks.) The tan ribbed socks are thematically coordinated to the warmer tones of his sweater, trousers, and shoes.

Bill ducks under another table after Lew decks him after suspecting he’s silently partnered with Charlie, whom he’d never met before that evening.

The following morning, having grabbed a few winks while crashing on Charlie’s sofa, Bill shows up to work in a pair of tortoise-framed aviator-style sunglasses he’s reluctant to take off.

After a long night of bets, beer, and beatings, Bill’s in no condition to work.

How to Get the Look

George Segal as Bill Denny in California Split (1974)

Especially when contrasted against his new pal, Bill Denny’s simple outfit of an Aran jumper and corduroys when introduced to us in California Split establishes his more practical nature, albeit with interesting touches like the trousers’ beltless waisband and his monk-strap shoes. I can certainly recommend this smart casual look for early spring, though I can’t quite endorse the casino-to-conference room spirit in which Bill wears it.

• Dark navy cotton 5-button shirt-jacket with long pointed collar, two “sawtooth”-flapped chest pockets, pointed single-button cuffs, and side vents
• Ivory unbleached wool Aran-knit turtleneck sweater
• Tobacco brown “pinwale” corduroy cotton flat front trousers with fitted waistband, full-top “frogmouth”-style front pockets, jetted back-right pocket, and turn-ups/cuffs
• Walnut brown leather plain-toe single-strap monk shoes
• Tan ribbed socks
• Tortoise-framed aviator-style sunglasses

Build the outfit:

• Patagonia Better Sweater Shirt-Jacket in “new navy” (Backcountry)
• Alex Mill Fisherman Cable Turtleneck Sweater in ivory (Stag Provisions)
• And Now This corduroy trousers in dark brown (Macy’s)
• Florsheim Sorrento monk-strap slip-ons in cognac (DSW)
• Express ribbed sweater socks in camel (Express)
• Ray-Ban RB2198 “Bill” sunglasses in Havana tortoise (Ray-Ban)

Availability as of March 2022.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

Twenty dollars says you can’t name the seven dwarves.

The post California Split: George Segal’s Aran Turtleneck appeared first on BAMF Style.

Sam Neill as Sidney Reilly on Reilly: Ace of Spies, with Jeananne Crowley, Laura Davenport, and Celia Gregory, who portrayed Reilly’s three wives.

Vitals

Sam Neill as Sidney Reilly, shrewd British agent and anti-Bolshevik

New York City and Berlin, Fall 1924

Series: Reilly: Ace of Spies
Episode: “The Trust” (Episode 10)
Air Date: November 2, 1983
Director: Martin Campbell
Costume Designer: Elizabeth Waller

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Although there’s little consensus on the details of his life—including his birth name—the famous adventurer who would eventually known as Sidney Reilly is said to have been born on March 24, though even the year is a question of debate; he may have been born Georgy Rosenblum in Odessa in 1873, or he may have been born Sigmund Rosenblum to a wealth Bielsk family in 1874. His escapades as a British agent during the Russian Revolution cemented his self-aggrandized reputation as the “Ace of Spies”, establishing a legend that would inspire no less than Ian Fleming when developing the character of his fictional agent James Bond.

The opportunistic Reilly—as he had rechristened himself during his initial service for Special Branch in the late 1890s—never missed a chance to build his wealth or reputation, crafting a legend during his lifetime that would live well beyond his ostensible execution by the Soviets in 1925. A household name by the end of the decade, Reilly was the subject of multiple books, including Ace of Spies, written by the son of R.H. Bruce Lockhart, the Scottish-born diplomat who had worked with Reilly in the infamous “Ambassadors’ Plot” attempt to overthrow the fledgling Bolshevik government in 1918 and resulted in both men being sentenced to death in absentia. Robin Lockhart’s book was adapted into Reilly: Ace of Spies, a stylish twelve-part miniseries that originally aired in ITV across the fall of 1983.

The tenth episode “The Trust” begins a year before Reilly’s demise, when he’s living in the United States, no longer officially in the British Secret Service’s employment as he independently attempts to raise funds that would continue his ongoing battle against the Bolsheviks, who are now firmly in control of Russia. Back in Moscow, the OGPU has organized “The Trust”, a covert counterintelligence program aimed to lure enemies like Reilly and the fiery Boris Savinkov back to Russia, where they can be captured, questioned, and executed.

The real Sidney Reilly and Nelly “Pepita” Bobadilla on their wedding day, May 1923. The series depicts their meeting a year and a half later to condense events for narrative purposes.

Reilly continues working behind the scenes, playing a hand in the controversial “Zinoviev letter” specifically intended to divert the British from engaging in a treat with the Bolshevik government. He grows his operation by auctioning his wealth of Napoleonic art and artifacts and hiring a seductive new assistant Eugenie (Eleanor David) and even enlists the help of his ex-wife Nadia (Celia Gregory) and her new husband to take a meeting with Henry Ford and gain access to his “unlimited funds”. Once Eugenie proves less than loyal in several ways, Reilly sails to Berlin, where he meets the spirited actress Pepita Bobadilla (Laura Davenport), whom he would eventually marry.

I’d previously written about how the ending of No Time to Die suggested to me some parallels of how Sidney Reilly met his end (and I’d suggest not reading on if you’re not already familiar with how Daniel Craig’s final Bond movie concluded!)

Both the fictional Bond and the real Reilly had left the British secret service and, after lives of womanizing, were looking to settle down with their latest romantic partner when called by an irresistible impulse—if you’ll permit a phrase cribbed from Anatomy of a Murder—to one final vendetta against their most prolific enemy. While the cinematic Bond does call upon MI6 before his venture against the evil Safin, Reilly had reportedly instructed his wife Pepita before returning to Russia that “whatever you do, don’t bring the service into it,” as detailed in her segment of his published memoir, Adventures of a British Master Spy.

Each respective agent thus embarked on a nearly independent and undeniably dangerous mission in which each respective agent sacrificed his life for an arguably greater good: Bond to ensure the destruction of Safin’s “poison garden” island and Reilly to expose the Trust for its true nature.

What’d He Wear?

Perhaps unremarkable on its own, Reilly’s dinner suit in “The Trust” marks the sartorial culmination of his adventures across the first quarter of the 20th century depicted in Reilly: Ace of Spies, beginning with his period-specific full evening dress (white tie) in the first, fifth, and sixth episodes, followed by a notch-lapel dinner jacket, and finally this peak-lapel dinner jacket that was both contemporary to the episode’s 1924 setting while also marking the approximate time when the modern black tie dress code was standardized.

Reilly’s black wool dinner jacket has broad satin-faced peak lapels that elegantly roll to a single-button closure at the waist, positioned just to cover the black formal waistcoat he wears beneath it. The ventless jacket has roped sleeve-heads, jetted hip pockets, and a welted breast pocket that he dresses with a rakishly crimped white linen kerchief.

In 1924, English gentlemen like Reilly may have still been expected to wear full evening dress in public, but a more intimate evening like this fundraising summit hosted by his ex-wife—and in New York, rather than London—would have been the appropriate occasion for the Ace of Spies to sport a fashionable dinner jacket and black tie.

Reilly’s evening shirt may be the only part of the outfit more rooted in black tie’s origins than its modern execution, particularly the well-starched detachable wing collar that fastens to the shirt via metal studs on the front and back of the neck. The white cotton shirt has a reinforced marcella bib that offers a crisp presentation between the jacket lapels, detailed with three shining diamond studs. The sleeves are finished with single cuffs, which also fasten with cuff links like the double (French) cuffs more traditionally worn on black tie shirts, as the formality of single cuffs are more typically reserved for full evening dress.

Apropos the implications of the “black tie” dress code, Reilly wears a black silk bow tie in a classic butterfly (or “thistle”) shape.

As he meets with fellow anti-Bolshevik revolutionary Boris Savinkov in Berlin, note the distinguished graying increasingly appearing across Reilly’s hairline, suggesting both natural aging—as Reilly had just turned 50—as well as the result of stress from constant fundraising and his dangerous vocation.

Reilly wears a black formal waistcoat (vest) with a low-fastening V-shaped front, designed to almost completely disappear behind the buttoned jacket. Unlike some formal waistcoats—which are more vestigial and connect in the back merely with straps at the shoulders and waist—Reilly’s waistcoat has a full back, finished in a black satin to echo the lapels, tie, and trouser striping.

Reilly’s dinner jacket effectively hides his waistcoat throughout “The Trust”, so it can only be seen on its own during a brief vignette in the following episode “The Last Journey” when shooting billiards with his boss, Mansfield Smith-Cumming (Norman Rodway).

Reilly’s black formal trousers have the black silk side braiding requisite to black tie, likely held up with suspenders (braces) and finished with plain-hemmed bottoms that break over his black leather oxford shoes.

Reilly escorts his new girlfriend—and future wife—Pepita through the streets of Berlin.

The video quality of my copy of Reilly: Ace of Spies prevents in-depth distinction of specific details, specifically on dark, low-contrasting garments, but we can tell Reilly layers outdoors in a black wool Chesterfield-style single-breasted overcoat, black leather gloves, and a white self-striped silk dress scarf.

Reilly confronts the treacherous Eugenie upon returning home after an assassination attempt.

Reilly wears a gold tank-style watch with a square white dial on a brown leather bracelet. Wristwatches were still an emerging fad among men in the early 1920s, especially those of the now middle-aged Reilly’s generation, but—given his passion for aviation—he likely adopted the practice from early military pilots who were among the first to regularly sport wrist-strapped timepieces.

The Guns

Returning to his Long Island home after his meeting with Henry Ford, Reilly discovers the brutal Russian agent Monkewitz (Forbes Collins) on his tail. Riding high after the evident success of his meeting with Ford, Reilly sighs, stubs out his cigar, and asks his driver: “Where’s the Thompson?”

The driver reaches over onto the passenger seat and hands back to Reilly a Thompson M1921A submachine gun, identifiable as this period-correct earlier model by the lack of a Cutts compensator on the muzzle. Reilly racks the bolt, checks the distance between his car and Monkewitz, and signals to his driver: “Let’s get on with it.”

Reilly then swings himself out the left rear window, aiming the Thompson rearward and engaging Monkewitz—who also wields a Thompson—in a running gun battle reminiscent of the bootleggers from the same roaring decade. Alternately known as the “Chicago typewriter” for its involvement in the Jazz Age beer wars, this submachine gun revolutionized the firearms scene upon its development earlier in the decade, offering the powerful .45 ACP ammunition at a quick rate of fire from high capacity magazines like the 50-round drum affixed to Reilly’s Thompson. Though the “Tommy gun” had yet to be popularized by American gangsters by the fall of 1924, it had already found success in the hands of the Irish Republican Army earlier that decade.

Reilly illustrates that, had spying for the British not panned out, he could have had a successful career working for Al Capone.

Reilly safely returns home, confronting Eugenie with the knowledge that she had indeed double-crossed him. We next see Reilly’s Daimler parked in a remote clearing in the woods, with Eugenie walking through the early morning mist a few steps of Reilly. “Here,” he stops her, a few yards shy of Long Island Sound. She partially disrobes and walks out into the sound in just her sheer nightdress. Once she’s up to her waist in the water, Reilly raises his right hand and aims a small blued pistol that fires a single, fatal shot into the base of Eugenie’s spine.

Reilly at his most cold-hearted, carrying out the early morning execution of a secretary—and lover—who has betrayed him.

We don’t see much of this compact pistol, though we discern that certainly smaller than the anachronistic Browning Hi-Power that Reilly had shown to Eugenie earlier in the hour and obviously not the Luger that had been stated to be his preferred sidearm in several episodes.

When I had first researched the firearms of the series for my contributions to IMFDB, I deduced that the pistol was likely the same small Beretta that “The Plugger” had handled in the previous episode (“After Moscow”) and which Reilly’s stalwart colleague Captain Hill would load in the next one (“The Last Journey”). If so, the pistol’s profile and more exposed barrel indicate the earmarks of a .25-caliber Beretta from the era, possibly a Beretta Model 1919 or Beretta 418 as Ian Fleming had written as the first issued sidearm of the literary James Bond.

What to Imbibe

To the tune of shelling and automatic gunfire outside their Berlin hotel, an aloof Sidney Reilly is joined by Pepita Bobadilla for post-prandial drinks in the lounge. A waiter brings Reilly a small cup of coffee and a snifter of cognac, then looks between Reilly and Pepita until the former acknowledges her presence and lowers his newspaper to address her.

Reilly: I imagine you’d like something to drink.
Pepita: (taking his newspaper) I’ll have a glass of milk.
Reilly: Anything in it?
Pepita: Brandy and a raw egg.

A bewildered Reilly nods the waiter away before setting out to better acquaint himself with his lovely companion. The scenes offers two alternatives for after-dinner drinks and, while Pepita’s choice is… interesting, I’ll have what Reilly’s having.

How to Get the Look

Sam Neill as Sidney Reilly in Reilly: Ace of Spies (Episode 10: “The Trust:”)

Writing of classic black tie style in Style and the Man, Alan Flusser explains that “the one combination that tends to look better balanced is the wing collar with the single-breasted peaked-lapel dinner jacket,” citing the harmonious “drama” between the sharp points tipping the ends of the jacket lapels and shirt collar. Such style as worn by Sam Neill’s Sidney Reilly in 1924 would look just as natty nearly a century later, presuming the wearer would be able to sport an authentically detachable wing collar rather than one of the mass-produced modern attached-collar alternatives.

• Black wool single-button dinner jacket with wide silk-faced peak lapels, welted breast pocket, straight jetted hip pockets, and ventless back
• White cotton evening shirt with detachable starched wing collar, stiff marcella bib with diamond studs, and single cuffs
• Black silk butterfly/thistle-shaped bow tie
• Black low-fastening full-backed formal waistcoat
• Black wool formal trousers with silk side braiding and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Black leather oxford shoes
• Black wool single-breasted Chesterfield-style overcoat
• White self-striped silk dress scarf
• Black leather gloves
• Gold tank watch with square white dial on brown leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the series.

I also recommend Andrew Cook’s Ace of Spies: The True Story of Sidney Reilly and Richard B. Spence’s Trust No One: The Secret World of Sidney Reilly, both published in 2002 and seeking to work through the many myths to learn the truth about this secretive but significant agent of the early 20th century.

The Quote

You tried to kill me.

The post Sam Neill’s Peak-Lapel Dinner Jacket as Sidney Reilly appeared first on BAMF Style.

Bradley Cooper as Stanton “Stan” Carlisle in Nightmare Alley (2021)

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Bradley Cooper as Stanton “Stan” Carlisle, opportunistic carny-turned-nightclub mentalist

Buffalo, New York, Winter 1941

Film: Nightmare Alley
Release Date: December 17, 2021
Director: Guillermo del Toro
Costume Designer: Luis Sequeira

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

On the eve of the 94th Academy Awards, I wanted to revisit the “golden era” style of quadruple-nominee Nightmare Alley, Guillermo del Toro’s evocatively photographed adaptation of William Lindsay Gresham’s novel of the same name.

The story was first adapted for the screen by Edmund Goulding starring Tyrone Power and remains an acclaimed, if offbeat, example of classic film noir. Though he’d seen the original movie, costume designer Luis Sequeira had no problem following del Toro’s direction to forget about the look of the earlier 1947 movie—as he explained to L’OFFICIEL—when drawing upon his own vast research to design the costumes in the two separate worlds of a dusty, Depression-era carnival and a glitzy urban atmosphere on the eve of World War II.

“Guillermo and I spoke at the beginning about creating these two polar-opposite worlds with distinct palettes and textures,” Sequeira told Vogue. “Most of the characters in the carnival are past their prime, so I wanted a lot of the costumes to look aged and worn out to show that history. Then once we moved into the city, it was all about dressing the characters in clothes that were of the moment. The fashion is brand new, and everything looks very slick and monochromatic.”

Sequeira’s costume design was a significant factor in the overall visual style that led to Nightmare Alley‘s nominations for Best Costume Design, Best Cinematography (Dan Laustsen), and Best Production Design (Tamara Deverell and Shane Vieau), not to mention an overall nod for Best Picture.

“It was almost like working on two films,” Deverell elaborated to the New York Post. “From the carny world where everything had a faded patina and was a little rough around the edges… to high society, where we wanted everything to be really rich and sumptuous and enticing.”

Having left the carnival behind, the ambitious Stan Carlisle (Bradley Cooper) absconded with the sweet-natured Molly (Rooney Mara) and has spent two years growing his success as the nightclub-headlining mentalist “Master Stanton”. While the rest of the nation braces for war, Stan finds himself in a battle of wits against a darkly alluring guest in the audience, revealed to be the cunning psychologist Lillth Ritter (Cate Blanchett)… and I was only momentarily distracted by the presence of a cold, slick-suited mental health professional named Lilith who isn’t married to Frasier Crane.

Suspicious of Stan and Molly’s routine, Lilith skirts their stage-perfected process and directly challenges the blindfolded Master Stanton to not only identify her gold handbag… but also the “small pistol… nickel-plated, ivory-handled” inside it. Of course, being a natural con artist with a gift for instantly reading people, Stan rises to the challenge, later explaining to Molly that “she came after me… I had to take her down.”

What’d He Wear?

After spending nearly the first half of the movie in a threadbare rotation of fraying and oversized workwear, the newly mustached Master Stanton makes his dramatic debut to the audience while performing in full evening dress. This elegant ensemble provides the clearest sartorial contrast against Stan’s clothes at the carnival, instantly illustrating the depth of his newfound wealth and success. Sequeira has theorized in several interviews that Stan would have burned all of his clothing from the sideshow, incinerating any of this connection to the past as he now exclusively swathes himself in nothing but the finest tailored wool and silk.

“At the beginning it was all about fit, the changes in fit, the changes in color palette, the changes in old versus new, worn versus completely fresh, tweedy versus slick,” Sequeira shared with Slash Film. “At the beginning, the fit was looser, saggier, very well worn; which gave him a foundation of character. And then when he moved to the city, it was abandoning everything from that earlier part of the movie and creating this new character with only the finest in tailored garments, and ties, and silk, and hats. And so, that was wonderful to put together, what I would say, a collection of costumes that felt cohesive to this new person.”

The central attraction consists of the elegantly attired Master Stanton standing in the center of a nightclub, appointing his full evening dress with a black satin wraparound eye mask—detailed with a gold-stenciled eye to suggest his mythical sense of second sight—as he decrypts Molly’s intricately coded language communicates with otherworldly spirits to discern the meaningful objects volunteered by the audience.

While Lilith may take issue with how much Stan can “see” despite his mask, the CDC would likely rule that the way he wears it would be rendered totally ineffective against airborne disease.

“The king of all male civilian garments is the civilian tailcoat,” wrote Alan Flusser in Style and the Man, adding that “its long tails confer dignity while its starched white expanse of piqué waistcoat, shirt, and tie flatters even the most rubicund of faces.” Granted, Stan Carlisle’s appearance already benefits from his being portrayed by Bradley Cooper, but such elegant garmenture instantly conveys Stan’s elevated status since we last saw him and Molly driving away from the carnival, humbly dressed in the cockpit of a Dodge truck.

The black barathea wool evening tailcoat shines under the strategically placed lighting of the Buffalo nightclub, particularly over the silk-finished details like the satin-covered buttons and the satin-faced peak lapels, which are fashionably broad with slanted gorges that direct the eye toward the prominently roped sleeve-heads on each shoulder. This delightfully dramatic style was a signature of the late ’30s, as seen by the contemporary white kit kit sported by Cary Grant in his seminal screwball comedy The Awful Truth, produced and released in 1937.

Evening tailcoats are designed to be the most flattering garment a man of any proportions can wear, and Stan’s tailcoat is tailored accordingly with emphasized shoulders and a suppressed waist. The jacket features the characteristic double-breasted configuration with a trio of vestigial silk-covered buttons on each side—never to be buttoned—and a welted breast pocket where Stan wears a white linen pocket square rakishly folded to show several points over the top. Perhaps most importantly, the tailcoat is properly cut with the squared cutaway front following the bottom lines of the waistcoat just enough to properly cover them.

Evidently Bradley Cooper has yet to watch Carol, as anyone knows that no man can get between Rooney Mara and Cate Blanchett… especially when Cate’s packing heat.

The close fit results from the waist seam, which extends around the back, aligned with the bottom of the cutaway portions in the front. A curved seam extends out and down the back from the center of each armhole, and the two silk-covered vestigial buttons are placed where these vertical seams intersect meet the horizontal waist seam, at the top of the long splits that form the signature shaped tails that give the coat its name, correctly falling to just behind his knees.

The sleeves are finished with four closely positioned buttons that, like those on the front and back, are covered in black silk.

“You messed up,” Stan mutters to Molly while ostensibly celebrating yet another victorious display of his otherworldly talents.

The “white tie” dress code is so designated for the bleached swath of neckwear essential to the ensemble’s execution. The gently pebbled texture of Stan’s ivory butterfly-shaped bow tie indicates that he’s wisely selected one made from the classic cotton piqué.

The collar gap where his tailcoat sits apart from the neck suggests that there’s still something not quite right about Stan; he may have the right clothes, but he’ll always be the guy who was “born for”… well, you’ll just have to wait and see what Stan’s future holds.

Stan’s white formal shirt also presents all the appropriate elements of proper full evening dress, particularly the addition of a detachable stiff wing collar held in place via brass studs through the shirt’s neckband. The white-tie dress shirt is designed so all the parts that show when fully dressed appear crisp due to heavy starching so, in addition to the collar, the shirt is appointed with a stiff “boiled” front decorated with two small silver-trimmed mother-of-pearl studs. Rather than the prescribed single cuffs to be worn with white tie, Stan’s shirt has the less formal double (French) cuffs, also piqué-textured and fastened with a set of links matching the studs.

Stan follows the dress code with his low-fastening formal waistcoat made from an ivory cotton piquê waistcoat to match his bow tie. (By this point in the 1930s, black waistcoats had largely fallen out of fashion for full evening dress, now largely relegated to black tie kits.) The shawl collar is squared at the top and bottom, breaking nearly horizontally over the three closely spaced mother-of-pearl buttons that fasten above the notched bottom. The waistcoat is additionally detailed with a narrowly welted pocket set-in against each hip.

Tailcoat and tie now removed and his detachable wing collar undone, Stan’s moment of respite reveals the period-perfect detail that went into Luis Sequeira’s costume design.

Though backless waistcoats may seem like a modern shortcut (similar to the sleeveless semi-shirt he had worn at the sideshow), they actually have a historical provenance given that traditional wearers of full evening dress would have been loathe to remove their tailcoats in any but the most private settings. Per their name, these coats consist of the two front panels that connect with two straps: one at the neck and another above the waist which, as seen on Stan, fastens through an adjustable silver-toned buckle.

As Stan relaxes sans tailcoat and tie in his dressing room with Molly, we see more of this side of the outfit that would served function rather than form, including the white silk suspenders (braces) that hold up his trousers, detailed with gold adjusters on the front, a white leather back patch, and white leather hooks that connect to the buttons along the inside of the trouser waistband.

The removal of Stan’s evening tailcoat reveals the labyrinth of straps and fastenings that go into maintaining his elegant ensemble, from the rigging of his backless waistcoat to the suspenders holding up his trousers, not to mention the inelegant but functional flapped pocket over the right-side of his trouser seat. Though sartorial customs had loosened by the early 1940s, such a revelation just a half-century earlier might have been considered by some to be just a step above seeing one’s underwear!

Black formal trousers were to be made from the same cloth as the tailcoat—in this case, barathea wool—with the black silk side facing to designate their heightened sartorial status; tradition would dictate a double-braid for full evening dress, with the single stripe seen on Stan’s trousers more typical of black tie.

Stan’s double forward-pleated trousers rise to Bradley Cooper’s natural waist, where they are naturally devoid of belt loops or side adjusters as they would have been tailored to fit and flatter Stan, with those white suspenders providing additional insurance. In addition to the vertical pockets set-in along each side, the trousers have a back-right pocket that closes with a button through the pointed flap. The plain-hemmed bottoms break over Stan’s black patent leather cap-toe derby shoes (their open-lacing systems differentiating them from the closed-lace oxford), a functional if less formal alternative to the aristocratic grosgrain-bowed court pumps.

Stan works the room.

Our glimpses at Stan’s left wrist suggest this may be one of the few times he isn’t wearing his father’s vintage 14-karat gold Hamilton Hastings wristwatch, the only piece of his past wardrobe that he hadn’t destroyed or abandoned before attaining his success in the big city. He does, however, now dress his right hand with a gold pinky ring.

The night before his fateful stage performance, Stan represses a fiery nightmare linked to the squared gold Hamilton on his left wrist. The pinky ring on his opposing hand is a recent affectation that he added with his growing success.

Given the uniformity of full evening dress, its stands to reason that Bradley Cooper’s white tie ensemble would be one of the few times his Stan Carlisle mirrors the fashions worn by Tyrone Power in the 1947 adaptation, right down to the tailcoat’s broad peak lapels, the three-button waistcoat with its notched bottom, and the double reverse-pleated trousers. Perhaps the most significant difference is that that Power’s tailcoat has plastic or horn sew-through buttons rather than the silk-covered buttons of Cooper’s tailcoat.

The Great Stanton, as portrayed by Tyrone Power in Nightmare Alley (1947). Note where his white tie ensemble is similar to—and differs from—what Cooper wears.

The Gun

Lilith’s introduction both to the audience and to Stan Carlisle comes with the revelation that she carries a pistol in her purse, all but guaranteeing that we can count on seeing Carol’s Gun Chekhov’s Gun again by the end of the film. Having instantly judged the weight of Lilith’s small purse by how she was holding it, Stan knew its potentially fatal contents and used her appearance to determine that it was nickel-plated with ivory grips.

After she confirms his suspicions by handing over the pistol from her purse, Stan displays the ostensibly loaded gun for all attendees to see. The flashy little firearm is one of the then-fashionable .25-caliber pocket pistols—or purse pistols, in this case—that were often marketed for women’s personal protection, with the leading examples being the Colt Model 1908 Vest Pocket or one of the Belgian variations made by Fabrique Nationale, either the FN M1905 or the later model designated as “Baby Browning”.

“You claim to carry it to defend yourself, but… I think you do it because you like it. I think you do it because it makes you feel powerful. Well, madam, you are not powerful. Not powerful enough.”
Stan skirts a few basic rules of gun safety when illustrating to the audience how ably he rose to Lilith’s challenge.

The silhouette of Lilith’s pistol, particularly the small bumps indicating front and rear sights, suggests that she carries the latter. The FN Baby Browning was introduced in 1931 as an even smaller and lighter successor to the M1905 and its nearly identical cousin, the Colt Vest Pocket. Like these earlier models, the Baby Browning is a striker-fired single-action pistol that loads from a six-round magazine of .25 ACP ammunition. Though the moniker sounds colloquial, “Baby Browning” was indeed the official name for this pistol, of which FN manufactured more than a half million copies until production ended in 1979.

How to Get the Look

Though the majority of American men would have been sporting black tie for evenings out—as illustrated by nightclub patrons like the gullible judge—Stan dresses even more formally in full evening dress for a presentation that makes him look more respectable than his trickery actually deserves. The result is a period-perfect execution of the white tie dress code, from the tailcoat’s dramatically broad silk-faced peak lapels and roped shoulders to the piqué textured echoed both in his waistcoat and the neckwear neatly tied just ahead of the starched wing collar.

Bradley Cooper as Stanton “Stan” Carlisle in Nightmare Alley (2021)

• Black barathea wool formal evening tailcoat with broad silk-faced peak lapels, welted breast pocket, vestigial 6-button double-breasted front, 4-button cuffs, and two decorative back waist seam buttons
• White cotton evening shirt with detachable stiff wing collar, starched bib (with silver-trimmed mother-of-pearl studs), and double/French cuffs
• White cotton piqué butterfly/thistle-shaped bow tie
• White cotton piqué single-breasted backless formal waistcoat with squared shawl collar, three closely spaced buttons, notched bottom, slim-welted pockets, and adjustable back strap
• Black barathea wool formal double forward-pleated trousers with satin side braiding, side pockets, flapped back-right pocket, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• White silk suspenders with gold adjusters, white leather back patch, and white leather hooks
• Black patent leather cap-toe derby shoes
• Black dress socks
• Gold pinky ring
• Black satin silk eye-mask with gold-stenciled eye

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie, now streaming on Hulu and HBO Max as of March 2022. You can also check out the 1947 movie and 1946 source novel.

Given Nightmare Alley‘s star-studded prominence, emphasis on style, and Oscar buzz, there are plenty of outlets where you can read more about the costume design, most of which were sourced in some extent for this post:

• The Art of Costume Blogcast — “Nightmare Alley with Luis Sequeira” by Spencer Williams
• Below the Line — “Nightmare Alley Costume Designer Creates Period Dress for Guillermo del Toro Again” by J. Don Birnam
• Grazia — “Nightmare Alley: 242 Costume Changes, ONE Production Shut Down and an All-Star Cast” by Rebekah Clark
• L’OFFICIEL — “Costume designer Luis Sequeira speaks to L’OFFICIEL about outfitting Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, and more in this period thriller” by Sophie Shaw
• New York Post — “Bad dream couture: How noir ‘Nightmare Alley’ got its carnival look” by Raquel Laneri
• Slash Film — “How Nightmare Alley Costume Designer Luis Sequeira Brought Vintage Fashion Back To Life” by Hannah Shaw-Williams
• Variety — “Crafting a Noirish ‘Nightmare Alley’ Through Costume and Production Design” by Jazz Tangcay
• Vogue — “Creating the Costumes for the Charlatans, Hustlers, and Con Artists of Guillermo del Toro’s Nightmare Alley” by Keaton Bell
• WWD — “Costume Designer Luis Sequeira on Creating the Sartorial World of ‘Nightmare Alley’” by Kristen Tauer

The Quote

We give ’em mentalism, they treat it like it’s a dog walkin’ on its hind legs.

The post Nightmare Alley: Bradley Cooper’s White Tie and Tails appeared first on BAMF Style.

Michael Douglas as Richard Adams in The China Syndrome (1979)

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Michael Douglas as Richard Adams, idealistic TV news cameraman

Outside Los Angeles, Spring 1978

Film: The China Syndrome
Release Date: March 16, 1979
Director: James Bridges
Costume Designer: Donfeld (Donald Lee Feld)

Background

Nearly a decade before he would win an Academy Award as the sharply tailored yet unfathomably unscrupulous financier Gordon Gekko in Wall Street, Michael Douglas starred as the arguably more altruistic cameraman in The China Syndrome. Adapted from an Oscar-nominated original screenplay by Mike Gray, T.S. Cook, and James Bridges—who also directed—this nuclear thriller proved frighteningly prescient less than two weeks after its release when the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor in Pennsylvania suffered a partial meltdown on March 28, 1979, 43 years ago today.

Centered around a nuclear power plant supervisor trying to make the public aware of the safety violations, The China Syndrome had been scathed by the nuclear power industry upon its release, such as Westinghouse executive John Taylor describing it to the New York Times as “an overall character assassination of an entire industry.” Ten days after Taylor’s criticism was published, a series of mechanical failures at Three Mile Island released large amounts of nuclear reactor coolant into the air… and plenty of egg onto the nuclear industry’s face.

While I’ve read that there were no direct casualties from the Three Mile Island accident—though there may be a different truth somewhere in the murky world of conspiracies and cover-ups, which is beyond the scope of this style blog—the incident and its billion-dollar, decade-long cleanup did seem to validate the dangers of neglecting safety when harnessing such titanic power as nuclear energy.

What’d He Wear?

Richard’s appearance visually codes him as a rebellious maverick, with his longer hair, beard, and working-class wardrobe of flannels, tweed, and corduroy, rugged fabrics that allow him to comfortably withstand the rigors of his work in the field, indicating his focus more on capturing the truth than chasing ratings.

His most offbeat outfit layers a corduroy sports coat over a brightly printed aloha shirt, topped with a tweed cap, adding some spring-inspired sensibility to an otherwise quintessential summer leisure kit.

Richard’s single-breasted jacket is made from a tan corduroy with a narrow wale (meaning a higher number of corduroy’s distinctive ridges per inch), the earthy corduroy possibly suggesting his philosophical unity with crusading nuclear supervisor Jack Godell (Jack Lemmon), who wears an olive corded jacket when reporting his reporting his findings.

Richard’s jacket has two woven leather shank buttons on the front, similar to the three-button cuffs, though the missing button on his left sleeve adds some verisimilitude to the scrappy character. The jacket’s soft padded shoulders are double-stitched around the sleeve-heads, echoing the sporty welted “swelling” along the edges of the wide notch lapels and pockets. In addition to the welted breast pocket, the jacket has large patch pockets on each hip that close with squared flaps. The back is split with a long single vent, and each sleeve has a tobacco-colored suede elbow patch.

Hat in hand, Richard observes a newscast.

Richard’s unexpected aloha shirt may or may not be of genuine Hawaiian provenance, but it mirrors the bold patterns of garments from America’s tropical paradise with its large-scaled all-over print of stenciled white leaves, smaller golden leaves, and red fruits against a forest-green ground. The short-sleeved rayon shirt has the requisite camp collar, fashionably wide for the era with a short loop on the left side that could presumably button under the right collar leaf. The shirt has five white plastic buttons up the plain front (no placket) and a non-matching breast pocket.

Kimberly Wells (Jane Fonda) accompanies Richard to visit Jack Godell at home to ask him to testify about plant mismanagement.

Richard indeed looks dressed for vacation in the white flat front wide-legged trousers that he wears with his untucked aloha shirt, the shirt’s straight hem covering the top of the trousers that are likely worn with a belt. The bottoms are finished with turn-ups (cuffs) that break at the top of his tan napped leather sneakers with heavy brown rubber outsoles, worn with dark brown socks.

Decades before Peaky Blinders and hipster culture marked the renaissance for flat caps, Richard showed he was ahead of the trend—or merely didn’t care about trends—by wearing an old-fashioned flat cap made of brown herringbone tweed, guaranteeing that even his headgear would keep his attire looking avant-garde.

A newsboy cap may have been appropriate to signal his profession in the news industry, but the lack of a top button and paneled crown means our hero wears a simple flat cap, also known as a “pancake cap” or “paddy cap”, depending on which side of the Atlantic you buy your hats. (Wherever that is, I recommend this classic-inspired Brixton “Hooligan III” cap.)

Richard wears a thin gold necklace that rests at the base of his neck, visible with any of his open-necked shirts unless he’s also wearing a T-shirt. His only other visible accessory is the black watch on his left wrist, finished with a silver-toned fixed bezel and a black-finished link bracelet.

Production photo of Jane Fonda and Michael Douglas.

How to Get the Look

Michael Douglas and Jane Fonda in The China Syndrome (1979)

A decade before setting a standard for sharp workplace tailoring with as the contrast-collared, suspender-wearing Gordon Gekko in Wall Street, Michael Douglas exemplified a more radical—and leisured—approach to dressing for the office in his offbeat and totally original combination of a sporty tan corduroy jacket with a boldly printed aloha shirt, white trousers, and tweed flat cap.

• Green tropical-printed rayon short-sleeve aloha shirt with wide camp/loop collar, plain front, and non-matching breast pocket
• Tan pinwale corduroy cotton single-breasted 2-button sport jacket with wide notch lapels, welted breast pocket, flapped patch hip pockets, suede elbow patches, 3-button cuffs, and long single vent
• White flat front wide-leg trousers with turn-ups/cuffs
• Tan leather sneakers with brown rubber outsoles
• Dark brown socks
• Thin gold necklace
• Black wristwatch with silver-toned fixed bezel and black-finished link bracelet
• Brown herringbone tweed flat cap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The post The China Syndrome: Michael Douglas’ Corduroy Jacket and Aloha Shirt appeared first on BAMF Style.

Sean Connery and Ursula Andress in Dr. No (1962)

Vitals

Sean Connery as James Bond, sophisticated and resourceful British government agent

Crab Key, Jamaica, Spring 1962

Film: Dr. No
Release Date: October 5, 1962
Director: Terence Young
Wardrobe Master: John Brady
Tailor: Anthony Sinclair

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

This year marks the 60th anniversary of the cinematic James Bond, as screen-going audiences who may have missed the 1954 Climax! episode starring Barry Nelson as the American agent “Jimmy” Bond were properly introduced in 1962 to the debonair yet dangerous 007 embodied by Sean Connery.

It was sixty years ago today—March 30, 1962—when principal photography was completed on Dr. No, whose modest million-dollar budget belied its significance as of the first installment of what would become one of the longest-running franchises in movie history.

While a few ingredients were yet to be finessed, it was Dr. No that established many of the hallmarks of the series, from Monty Norman’s iconic theme song as arranged by John Barry to our hero’s “shaken, not stirred” vodka martinis and his signature introduction:

Bond. James Bond.

As a relatively faithful adaptation of Ian Fleming’s novel of the same name, Dr. No also featured what would become such a trademark of the series that its lampooning by Austin Powers ensured that it could never be again taken seriously to see our villain capture the hero and dress him in era-specific finery to wine him, dine him, and treat him to a long exposition explaining his plan for world domination before subjecting him to a relatively escapable death that the villain just assumes will happen without witnessing it firsthand… naturally allowing for Mr. Bond—and his lady du jour—to escape together and celebrate saving the world with some cathartic coitus.

In this inaugural outing, it was Bond and the lovely Honey Ryder (Ursula Andress), whom he’d encountered by accident while on the Jamaican island of Crab Key, investigating criminal activity posited to be the work of the mysterious Doctor Julius No (Joseph Wiseman), a former tong now employed by SPECTRE, or “Special Executive for Counter Intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, Extortion… the four great cornerstones of power headed by the greatest brains in the world,” as Dr. No himself describes it.

The bikini-clad Honey’s arrival alerts Dr. No’s guards, who chase the couple and gun down Bond’s CIA ally, Quarrel (John Kitzmiller), before capturing Bond and Honey. While treated to the bad doctor’s pre-execution hospitality, Bond does an amused double-take when he spies Francisco de Goya’s painting of the Duke of Wellington, which had been famously stolen from London’s National Gallery six months before production began on Dr. No. This idea from screenwriter Johanna Harwood suggests that the depth of SPECTRE’s criminal activity extends beyond disrupting rocket launches to robbing museums. (Coincidentally, March 30 is also Goya’s birthday!)

Dr. No even tests Bond’s incorruptibility by pitching him on the idea of joining SPECTRE, but the bitter agent only expresses a sarcastic interest in the Revenge Department… particularly getting revenge on the man responsible for Quarrel’s death. Sensing that 007 is as untouchable as Connery’s performance a quarter-century later would suggest, Dr. No condemns Bond while dismissing him as “just a stupid policeman… whose luck has run out.”

What’d He Wear?

Chapter 14 of Ian Fleming’s novel Doctor No details Bond’s anxious marveling at his captivity on Crab Key, where he dresses for dinner in “another of the idiotic kimonos, a plain black one” from the wardrobe provided in his room. He continues wearing the silk kimono through dinner with Honey and the doctor—at one point using the wide sash to conceal his tucking a steak knife against the belted waist. When he’s shown to his cell and the entry point to Doctor No’s sadistic obstacle course, he finds his black canvas jeans and dark-blue cotton shirt have been laundered and neatly folded on the chair for him to put back on.

007 has no such luck in the cinematic version, his powder-blue polo and matching trousers likely destroyed due to their potential radiation exposure, leaving he and Honey to await their fate in a pair of sky-blue terry cloth bathrobes.

Bond pours some coffee for himself and Honey, forgetting what has to be a top rule of secret-agenting not to trust anything you’re served in a nemesis’ lair.

Upon learning that they’ll be joining Doctor No for dinner, Bond and Honey pull from their provided closets to match their Chinese-born host in an Asian-inspired wardrobe. For Mr. Bond, this means a Nehru jacket made of slubby raw silk in a cool shade of dark brown that reflects a purplish cast under the artificial lighting on Crab Key. (You can read more about this outfit at Bond Suits.)

The Nehru jacket emerged in the 1940s, named for the then-new Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, who ironically preferred to wear more traditional vestments like the longer Ackhan and Sherwani. Dr. No just predated the Nehru jacket’s popularity among fashions of the swinging ’60s, as later embodied by performers like The Beatles and Sammy Davis, Jr.

The shapely, waist-length Nehru jacket evolved from the regal Jodhpuri suit, retaining the signature standing mandarin collar, the element that had inspired its original name band gale Ica coat (“closed neck coat”).

Note the elegantly imperfect slubbing through Bond’s silk Nehru jacket.

Unlike Dr. No’s own fly-front jacket, Bond’s “borrowed” Nehru jacket has five dark brown horn sew-through buttons up the front from the full-skirted waist to the neck, where an additional hidden latch appears to close the keep the Mandarin collar neatly closed. The jacket is tailored to echo Bond’s Western suits, with soft, wide shoulders, though it lacks vents, hip pockets, and cuff buttons.

As with most of his other suits in Dr. No, Bond neatly folds a white linen pocket square into the Nehru jacket’s welted breast pocket.

Dressed for dinner in their Asian-inspired wardrobe, Bond and Honey regard their next steps.

The Nehru jacket buttons completely over the chest, negating the need for a fancier shirt than the plain white cotton crew-neck T-shirt that Bond wears under it. If Bond felt like he needed to dress to honor his host, he may have selected a dressier white shirt with a banded collar that would have stood flat under the jacket’s mandarin collar.

Bond’s beige cotton trousers are styled similarly to a pair of the powder-blue trousers that he had worn for his arrival on Crab Key, tailored to fit with button-tab side adjusters in lieu of a belt. (Like Vesper Lynd decades later, did Doctor No size Bond up the moment his fire-breathing dragon first laid eyes on him?) These flat-front trousers have slightly slanted side pockets, jetted back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms.

Bond keeps these light and neutral base layers on under the white vinyl two-piece radiation suit he briefly wears to disguise himself among Doctor No’s henchmen before his obvious sabotage of the launch disruption reveals his identity, after which he gradually strips out of the top and bottom halves of the suit and makes his escape again just wearing his distressed T-shirt and trousers.

Bond sets a record time that would make John McClane proud… and proves the value of keeping his shoes on.

Bond slips into a pair of espadrilles for his dinner with Doctor No, appropriately wearing these summery resort shoes sans socks. Defined by their rope soles, espadrilles likely date back to 14th century Catalonia, the Mediterranean region between Spain and France, where shoes were soled with tough esparto grass. Over the course of the following centuries, jute from southeast Asia emerged as the prevailing sole fiber for the light-wearing shoes now known as espadrilles. In their simplest form, espadrilles have plain uppers like the dark navy canvas over the tops of Bond’s espadrilles.

As I espoused in an article I wrote for Primer, I recommend these light-wearing summer shoes for every gent, and quality pairs can be found for every budget from retailers like ASOS, Drake’s, Soludos, and Toms.

Doctor No kindly lets Bond keep his Rolex Submariner, which might seem foolish for a Bond villain but MI6 has yet to outfit our hero’s watches with rotating buzzsaws, wrist-darts, explosive technology, or any of his other wrist-worn gadgets that would threaten to doom the Crab Key operation. Instead, the Submariner is merely an attractive timekeeper that set an early standard for 007’s preference for stylish timepieces.

Rolex introduced the Submariner series of dive watches in 1953, with the ref. 6538 seen in Dr. No manufactured between 1958 and 1961 and characterized by its oversized “big crown” and its lack of crown guards. Worn on a black leather strap, Bond’s Submariner has a 38mm stainless case, round black dial, and black rotating bezel.

Fighting his way out of Dr. No’s ventilation system, this would be a good time for Bond’s Rolex to be able to do anything aside from its natural timekeeping function.

What to Imbibe

The beer is Stripe… Red Stripe.
Photo by Mara Vivat.

Fifty years before the Heineken poured ’round the world appeared in Skyfall, the cinematic James Bond wasn’t yet being depicted as a beer drinker, though there’s some photographic evidence that his portrayer may have enjoyed plenty of the local brew.

An enduring image from the production of Dr. No depicts Sean Connery in respite on a deck chair, joined by a quintet of spent bottles of Red Stripe, his torn T-shirt from this sequence adding appropriate context. The photo always struck me as a too-good-to-be-true moment, and it’s more likely that Connery playfully arranged himself for the shot.

Red Stripe appears in the novel Dr. No when Bond joins his CIA colleague Quarrel for “broiled lobster followed by a rare steak with native vegetables” at Pus-feller’s bar, though it’s Quarrel who drinks the beer while 007 orders a gin and tonic with lime. Quarrel also drinks Red Stripe on screen, and the beer’s prominent branding also appears on the crates that Bond throws him into during their initial misunderstanding in Pus-feller’s storage room. (The literary Bond would finally get to enjoy Red Stripe in the fifth and sixth chapters of The Man with the Golden Gun while seeking out Francisco Scaramanga at a bordello on the southern coast of Jamaica.)

Instantly recognizable for its eponymous swath of scarlet against a white label, Red Stripe was first brewed in 1928 at the Kingston, Jamaica brewery operated by British businessmen Thomas Geddes and Eugene Desnoes. Its famous “stubby” bottle would be introduced in 1965, three years after they were enjoyed both during the production of Dr. No and to celebrate Jamaica’s independence from the UK.

First exported to the United States in 1985, Red Stripe was slow to find its footing but—within 20 years—its export volume would eventually exceed domestic consumption. The most popular Red Stripe is the flagship 4.7% ABV pale lager, though the brewery also offers a light beer and has rotated through several flavored variations as well.

Dr. No wasted no time in establishing Bond’s signature on-screen drink, when the doctor himself offers one to 007:

Dr. No: Dry martini, lemon peel. Shaken, not stirred.
Bond: Vodka?
Dr. No: Of course.

In the novel, Bond had to order for himself, supplementing Honey’s Coca-Cola by ordering himself “a medium vodka dry martini — with a slice of lemon peel. Shaken and not stirred, please. I would prefer Russian or Polish vodka.” While it’s true that Bond may have been shaken up by his situation, his cadence is confusing as you’d expect the proper order to be “a medium dry vodka martini,” echoing the hotel waiter’s declaration when the cinematic Bond is served his very first vodka martini earlier in Dr. No.

In my more than a decade of being both a legal drinker and Bond fan, I’ll admit to having always been a little perplexed by the concept of a “medium dry” martini: was this just a Fleming-ism to make Bond sound extra particular? Did it refer to the drink’s size, a mid-century barman’s nomenclature for grande? Or did it refer to the amount of dryness?

Having finally resolved to explore the issue for this post, I discovered a combination of the former latter to be the likeliest intention of Bond’s order. My well-loved copy of the Mr. Boston Official Bartender’s Guide informs that a “Martini (Medium)” is prepared like a traditional two-to-one dry martini, but albeit with the vermouth split into half measures of dry and sweet vermouth like a “Perfect Manhattan”, rather than the strictly dry vermouth used in nearly every mainstream martini recipe. Of course, this was only somewhat clarifying as Mr. Boston didn’t include a recipe for the “medium dry” specified by Fleming, so my search continued until I found a Bond-driven article from Business Jet Traveler which suggested that “medium-dry” indicates just a dash of vermouth, somewhere between the one or two drops of vermouth in a “dry” martini and the dearth of vermouth in an “extra dry” martini.

No wonder the cinematic Doctor No just foregoes the whole medium issue and serves his guest a classic dry martini.

Much as the literary Bond and Doctor No face off while wearing kimonos, their cinematic counterparts played by Sean Connery and Joseph Wiseman, respectively, also dress in similar garments as Bond’s Nehru jacket mirrors the B stone-colored Nehru suit worn by his less-than-gracious host.

During their dinner, Bond gets yet another chance to show off his high-proof preferences when the agent is quickly subdued when he attempts to weaponize the champagne being served with their meal.

Dr. No: That’s a Dom Pérignon ’55. It would be a pity to break it.
Bond: I prefer the ’53 myself…

Named for a French Benedictine monk instrumental to pioneering the Champagne process, Dom Pérignon remains one of the best-regarded sparkling wines in the world. The brand maintains its reputation as an exclusively vintage champagne, not produced in “weak” years for its blend of Pinot noir and Chardonnay grapes. The first vintage was 1921, and 1953 and 1955 were indeed among two of its four vintages during the ’50s. You can read an expert analysis of the differences between the ’53 and ’55 vintages at The Things I Enjoy.

How to Get the Look

Sean Connery as James Bond in Dr. No (1962)

Rather than the “quasi-futuristic” clothes that would be lampooned a generation later by Austin Powers, Doctor No dresses his distinguished guest to mirror his own Eastern fashion sense with a Nehru jacket, cotton trousers, and espadrilles that Sean Connery’s James Bond wears with as much ease as the Savile Row-tailored suits from his own closet. Nehru jackets aren’t for everyone—or every situation—but Dr. No illustrates how they can be a fine alternative when dressing for dinner, drinks, and the post-prandial obstacle course.

• Dark brown slubbed raw silk 5-button Nehru jacket with mandarin collar, welted breast pocket, plain cuffs, and ventless back
• White cotton crew-neck short-sleeve T-shirt
• Beige cotton flat front trousers with button-tab side adjusters, slanted side pockets, jetted back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Dark navy canvas-upper espadrilles with jute rope soles
• Rolex Submariner 6538 stainless dive watch with round black dial, black rotating bezel, and black leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

World domination… the same old dream. Our asylums are full of people who think they’re Naploeon. Or God.

The post Bond’s Nehru Jacket in Dr. No appeared first on BAMF Style.

Joaquin Phoenix as Arthur Fleck in Joker (2019)

Vitals

Joaquin Phoenix as Arthur Fleck, aka “Joker”, disturbed and disgraced ex-party clown

Gotham City, Fall 1981

Film: Joker
Release Date: October 4, 2019
Director: Todd Phillips
Costume Designer: Mark Bridges

Background

Could there be a more appropriate character to focus on for April Fool’s Day than the Joker?

When I was growing up, the only two actors who had prominently portrayed Gotham City’s psychopathic prankster were Cesar Romero in the classic ’60s series and Jack Nicholson, who received top billing despite not playing the title role in Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman. Since then, we’ve seen a handful of actors cycle through the iconic role, beginning with Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight (2008), a few appearances by Ben Affleck and Jared Leto, and most recently a smaller part performed by Barry Keoghan in The Batman (2022).

Joaquin Phoenix received the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in the eponymous role in Joker, a reimagined origin story that pays significant homage to Martin Scorsese’s character studies like Taxi Driver (1976) and The King of Comedy (1983)—both starring Robert De Niro, who would appear in Joker—as well as twists of social commentary and themes from Death Wish (1973) and Fight Club (1999).

Many loved it and many hated it, but there’s little doubting Phoenix’s effectiveness intensity chronicling the troubled Arthur Fleck’s transformation from a desperate wannabe stand-up comedian who feels let down by society into a chaotic killer who unintentionally inspires anarchic revolution and class warfare.

Though the Joker is best-known as Batman’s archenemy, the caped crusader solely appears in the form of a young Bruce Wayne, first meeting Arthur on his family’s estate before forced to witness his parents’ murder during the riots inspired by Arthur’s acts of violence. The movie was intended as a standalone, not one of the franchise’s many reboots nor the beginning of a Joker-focused series, giving screenwriters Todd Phillips (who also directed) and Scott Silver the freedom to generally diverge from the established comics—aside from some inspiration found in the 1988 novel Batman: The Killing Joke—to develop their own character study, focused around childhood trauma and mental illness. These heavy themes, the re-interpretation of such an established character, and the sociopolitical commentary presented during an already-charged political atmosphere ensured that Joker would be met with some degree of controversy.

Joker presented a darkly realistic Gotham City, inspired by the crime-ridden New York City of the ’70s and ’80s, with Arthur’s transformative killing of three harassers on the subway intentionally mirroring the infamous 1984 incident when Bernhard Goetz shot four men that he explained were attempting to rob him, though the men that Arthur guns down in Joker were not muggers but successful, slicked-back young “suits” who turned their ire onto him after pestering a young woman who left the train.

Stricken with a condition that forces laughter, particularly in situations where it wouldn’t be the most appropriate emotion, Arthur Fleck seems doomed from the outset: a heavily medicated street clown whose timid, trusting disposition marks him as the easy target for the bullies of a rat-infested Gotham. He lives with his delusional mother Penny (Frances Conroy), whose ramblings about mayoral candidate Thomas Wayne he endures before joining her each night to watch their favorite evening talk show host Murray Franklin (Robert De Niro), whose schtick partially inspires Arthur’s doomed foray into comedy… until Murray himself mocks Arthur’s failed attempts during an open-mic night.

Their fates align when Murray’s booker invites Arthur to join him on the show, coinciding with the police investigation into Arthur’s violence intensifying and an increasingly violent anarchist rally in the city. “Come on, Murray, do I look like the kind of of clown that could start a movement?” Arthur asks when the host questions his arriving with red, white, and blue facial makeup under his poorly dyed green hair. Murray relents, allowing his “guest” to make one more request:

Arthur: When you bring me out, can you introduce me as “Joker”? That’s what you called me on the show, a joker. Do you remember?
Murray: Did I? If you say so, kid. “Joker” it is.

What’d He Wear?

We’ve never seen Arthur Fleck look as comfortable as he does when fully embodying the new Joker persona, with his dyed hair, makeup, and colorful suit that pulls from pieces of his wardrobe we’ve seen throughout the movie. Two-time Academy Award-winning costume designer Mark Bridges crafted the style of Joker, recalling to Awards Focus and The Playlist that he appreciated seeing the suit so prominently featured during the instantly iconic moment of the violently self-formed Arthur Fleck dancing down the West 167th Street steps in the Bronx to the tune of Gary Glitter’s glam rock standard “Rock and Roll Part 2”.

Bridges has explained that the suit was originally intended to be a terracotta-colored suit from the early ’70s, which he felt was appropriate for the era but contrasted with his vision for the character. “I didn’t like the color terracotta—it didn’t seem strong enough to me,” he explained to Awards Daily, elaborating to The Playlist that “another color that maybe has more energy was a maroon suit. So, he has a three-piece maroon suit. He wears two of the pieces when he does his comedy standup act… I was increasing the color as we went on, as his emotions changed. And so we landed on the hottest suit.”

While an actor’s preferences can often stymie production, Joaquin Phoenix’s veganism actually complemented the polyester-reigned fashions of the ’70s. “They were all polyester and synthetic materials because Joaquin is a vegan, so it was perfect for the period and the character and the mindset,” Bridges noted to Awards Daily.

Arthur’s bright maroon polyester twill suit follows the ’70s trends that echoed the dramatic silhouettes of tailoring from four decades prior featuring wide-shouldered jackets nipped at the waist, with these lines further flattered by the congress of wide peak lapels and a single-breasted configuration that built up the shoulders and chest, tapering to emphasize narrowness at the waist.

The wide peak lapels are finished with sporty “swelled” edges that dress it down, continued by the unique double-welted breast pocket and gently rear-slanting hip pockets that are designed in a fashion each resembling an inset pocket within-a-pocket. The jacket has two dark red plastic buttons on the front with three smaller buttons on each cuff. The long double vents are also consistent with prevailing era trends.

Arthur almost mathematically assembles his chaotic attire by contrasting his red suit with a green shirt, one of the opposing or “complementary” combinations in color theory that leverages the strongest contrast between the two. Bridges explained the decision to Awards Daily: “I had this green shirt that I really thought was fun and I loved it. I thought it would be cool with the waistcoat and the suit, so I just copied the fabric and made a bunch of shirts from that green shirt.”

The rich teal-green polyester shirt provides the only visible pattern in his outfit with its colliding all-over print of stenciled mint-green circles. The shirt has a long point collar as was popular during the ’70s, button cuffs, and a front placket with green plastic buttons that Arthur buttons to the neck.

Though the suit has a matching waistcoat (vest) that we’ve seen Arthur wear during his failed standup appearance and while practicing to appear on Murray’s show, he dejects the opts for the sartorial confusion of the golden-hued vest he had worn as part of his clown uniform and while gunning down the three “Wall Street guys” on the subway. The ochre polyester has a softly napped finish. The vest has five mixed golden buttons, all of which Arthur wears fastened, with no pockets and with welted “swelling” around the edges.

The flat-front trousers are the same blood-red polyester as the suit jacket, rising high enough that the waistband remains appropriately covered by the buttoned waistcoat, though you can spy unused belt loops during Arthur’s frequent dancing. The front pockets are of the full-top “Western” or “frogmouth” style, which was most prominent from the ’60s through the ’70s. The plain-hemmed bottoms have a subtle flare, more restrained than the notorious “bell-bottoms” of the disco era.

Arthur taunts one of the detectives who had been following him and has now fallen prey to the anarchist mob he inspired.

Arthur’s brown two-toned derby shoes signal the crossroads of civilian footwear with traditional “clown shoes”, as Bridges had intended based on his comment to Awards Daily that “they looked like something he would come by at the clown agency.” Likely originally leather, Bridges had the shoes remade in linen and patent vinyl per Phoenix’s preferences, with the vamps and side quarters constructed from the tobacco-shaded linen while the straight toe caps, lace panels, and back quarters were all made from the darker brown patent vinyl. Arthur continues wearing his decidedly unstylish off-white ribbed crew socks.

Despite his bad jokes, Arthur ends up killing while on Murray Franklin’s show… so to speak.

Bridges noted to Awards Focus that, “as far as souvenirs, I have a pocket square that was made from Arthur Fleck’s Joker suit. I wore that square in my suit jacket pocket at the premiere of the film.”

The Gun

After Arthur is beaten on the streets of Gotham City, his fellow clown Randall (Glenn Fleshler) gives him a snub-nosed Smith & Wesson Model 36 revolver in a paper bag, with a few loose rounds of .38 Special ammunition. “Gotta protect yourself out there,” Randall notes, though Randall would soon be the one to contribute to Arthur’s firing by claiming that he tried to buy “a .38” from him without explaining that he voluntarily gave Arthur the weapon that he would use to cause havoc.

Arthur checks the lethal contents of the brown paper bag that Russell hands him in the locker room.

The experts at IMFDB noted the screw between the hammer and cylinder that identify the screen-used firearm specifically as an early production piece from the first half of the 1950s when Smith & Wesson had still marketed this particular model as the “Chiefs Special”, following a vote taken when the weapon was first unveiled at the International Association of Chiefs of Police convention in 1950. This adds a particular irony to note that the small but lethal weapon that Arthur Fleck uses to torch a revolution was originally intended for authority figures.

Later designated the Model 36 when Smith & Wesson began numbering its models in the ’50s, the five-shot Chiefs Special was developed on the brand’s J-frame platform as a snub-nosed “belly gun” intended for plainclothes or undercover work, a downscaled alternative to the popular Colt Detective Special that sacrificed an additional round in the cylinder for a smaller—and thus more easily concealed—frame.

How to Get the Look

Joaquin Phoenix as Arthur Fleck in Joker (2019)

Though it may only serve practical purposes as a Halloween costume, the Joker’s suit as reimagined by costume designer Mark Bridges drew upon fashions that would have already been outmoded by the early ’80s as well as the limited wardrobe Arthur Fleck had accumulated through his sad life to build an iconic and chaotic outfit that throws together a red suit, patterned green shirt, ochre vest, and two-toned shoes… and that’s before even considering the dyed hair and makeup!

• Maroon polyester suit:
  • Single-breasted 2-button jacket with wide peak lapels, double-welted breast pocket, slanted double-welted hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and long double vents
  • Flat-front trousers with belt loops, full-top front pockets, and slightly flared plain-hemmed bottoms
• Golden napped polyester single-breasted 5-button waistcoat/vest
• Teal-green (with mint circular print) polyester shirt with long point collar, front placket, and button cuffs
• Brown two-tone linen and patent vinyl derby-laced spectator shoes
• Off-white ribbed crew socks

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

I also recommend reading the below sources for more information about Mark Bridges’ memorable costume design:

• Awards Daily — “Mark Bridges on Giving the Joker a New Iconic Look” by Joey Moser
• Awards Focus — “Interview with Oscar Winning ‘Joker’ Costume Designer Mark Bridges” by Byron Burton
• Deadline — “Costume Designer Mark Bridges On Honing ‘Joker’s Transformation & “Easter Eggs” Within Noah Baumbach’s ‘Marriage Story’” by Matt Grobar
• The Film Experience — “Interview: Joker’s Costume Designer Mark Bridges” by Nathaniel Rogers
• MotionPictures.org — “How Joker Costume Designer Mark Bridges dressed The Clown Prince of Crime” by Daron James
• The Playlist — “Mark Bridges Dissects His New Costume Design For The ‘Joker'” by Gregory Ellwood
• Vogue France — “The secrets behind Joaquin Phoenix’s costume in ‘Joker'” by Alexandre Marain

The Quote

My life is nothing but a comedy.

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Brad Pitt as Jesse James in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007)

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Brad Pitt as Jesse James, legendary outlaw

Missouri, Fall 1881 through Spring 1882

Film: The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Release Date: September 21, 2007
Director: Andrew Dominik
Costume Designer: Patricia Norris

Background

An old adage advises us to never meet our heroes, as they’re sure to disappoint. This theme permeates one of my favorite Westerns, Andrew Dominik’s The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, depicting the months leading up to the titular betrayal that surprised the country 140 years ago today.

All these years later, Jesse James remains a household name, wisely portrayed on screen by A-lister Brad Pitt to reinforce to audiences the presence that the bandit would have commanded during his heyday. But, just as Jesse’s mentee-turned-murderer grew disillusioned by getting too close to the man, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford subverts our own expectations of such a titanic American outlaw by introducing him not triumphantly on horseback, blazing away in a gunfight, or in the midst of a daring robbery, but instead living a quietly satisfying suburban life:

He was growing into middle age, and was living then in a bungalow on Woodland Avenue. He installed himself in a rocking chair and smoked a cigar down in the evenings as his wife wiped her pink hands on an apron and reported happily on their two children. His children knew his legs, the sting of his mustache against their cheeks. They didn’t know how their father made his living or why they so often moved. They didn’t even know their father’s name.

He was listed in the city directory as Thomas Howard, and he went everywhere unrecognized and lunched with Kansas City shopkeepers and merchants, calling himself a cattleman or a commodities investor, someone rich and leisured who had the common touch.

He had two incompletely healed bullet holes in his chest and another in his thigh. He was missing the nub of his left middle finger and was cautious, lest that mutilation be seen. He also had a condition that was referred to as “granulated eyelids” and it caused him to blink more than usual as if he found creation slightly more than he could accept.

Rooms seemed hotter when he was in them. Rains fell straighter. Clocks slowed. Sounds were amplified. He considered himself a Southern loyalist and guerrilla in a Civil War that never ended. He regretted neither his robberies nor the 17 murders that he laid claim to. He had seen another summer under in Kansas City, Missouri and, on September 5th in the year 1881, he was 34 years old.

About fifteen years have passed since ex-Confederate guerrillas Frank and Jesse James had revolutionized daylight bank robberies with their daring and dangerous holdups, enrapturing a nation, stoking post-Civil War resentment, and rising to become one of the first superstars of American crime, a seemingly oxymoronic phenomenon that has endured due to the romanticized exploits of the likes of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Bonnie and Clyde, and John Dillinger. Unlike some of the more sprawling accounts of their crimes, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford focuses its narrative specifically on the last eight months of Jesse James’ life as well as the aftermath of his assassination.

With the infamous Younger brothers either behind bars or pushing daisies, the James gang is past its prime, churning out train robberies more for the sake of retaining their reputation than needing the cash, not unlike today’s blockbuster actors corrupting their filmographies with a litany of straight-to-streaming stinkers. As the older and wiser Frank James (Sam Shepard) considers retirement, Jesse (Brad Pitt) surrounds himself with trigger-happy fanboys like brothers Charley (Sam Rockwell) and Bob Ford (Casey Affleck), who had grown up admiring him… for all the wrong reasons.

One last job…

The title could have been borrowed from a dime-store novel like those we see tucked away under Bob Ford’s bed, and while some have criticized its literary ambitions as “the first time we’ve been asked to watch a book on tape,” I feel that the slow-burning pace and master cinematographer Roger Deakins’ photography of the middle west’s vast emptiness only serve to paint the perfect backdrop of a time and place where a mere mortal—and a violently flawed one at that—could rise to such deification, creating the foundation for a tradition of toxic American hero worship.

The movie departs from Western tradition by this focus on the nature of fame, zeroing in on idol worship and the all-American adoration of toxic charisma, centered around the two figures named in the title. Bob is quick to point out the parallels—no matter how inane—that he’s identified between himself and Jesse:

Well, if you’ll pardon my saying so, I guess it is interesting, the many ways you and I overlap and whatnot. You begin with our daddies. Your daddy was a pastor of the New Hope Baptist Church; my daddy was a pastor of a church at Excelsior Springs. Um. You’re the youngest of the three James boys; I’m the youngest of the five Ford boys. Between Charley and me is another brother, Wilbur here, with six letters in his name; between Frank and you was a brother, Robert, also with six letters. Robert is my Christian name. You have blue eyes; I have blue eyes. You’re five feet eight inches tall; I’m five feet eight inches tall. Oh me, I must’ve had a list as long as your nightshirt when I was twelve, but I’ve lost some curiosities over the years.

Little could Jesse or Bob know in that humiliating moment that each would also meet their ends by men who shot them in the back, not long after being jettisoned by their steadier older brothers (Frank, by choosing honest work; Charley, by suicide.)

2007 saw a wave of excellent films that, while set in the west, challenge the traditional trappings of the genre, including No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. The latter recalls earlier revisionist Westerns like McCabe and Mrs. Miller (and not just because of the big fur coats worn by Warren Beatty and Brad Pitt!), swapping stock characters, grandiose scores, and epic gunfights for quiet character studies, a sparsely effective score by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, and a realistically raw gunfight where our outlaws are too distracted by the smoky powder and immense power of their single-action hand cannons to cleanly land a hit while shooting at each other from across a small attic room.

Considered one of the most accurate cinematic portrayals of Jesse James’ much-chronicled life, the film’s adherence to truth naturally de-mythologizes the infamous outlaw while representing just how he maintained his “folk hero” image among the public and his own merry band of misfits, all brought to life by talented actors who add depth to even more limited roles like the wily Dick Liddil (Paul Schneider), the laconic Wood Hite (Jeremy Renner), the slow-witted Ed Miller (Garret Dillahunt), and Jesse’s long-suffering wife Zee (Mary-Louise Parker). Unfolding like a docudrama to the straightforward narration of assistant editor Hugh Ross, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford finds a quiet, if brooding, poetry in depicting the tragedy of its title incident.

Don’t that picture look dusty?

What’d He Wear?

Dressing for Banditry

On the fifth anniversary of the James-Younger gang’s notoriously bloody attempt to rob two banks in Northfield, Minnesota, we catch up with Jesse—two days after turning 34—and Frank leading their new gang of hillbilly hoodlums in a more successful (if less ambitious) robbery of the Chicago & Alton train on a stretch of track known as “Blue Cut” near Glendale, Missouri. This new band barely resembles the hardened ex-guerillas of the James gang’s “glory days” and is now cobbled together of Southern sympathizers and inexperienced roughnecks like the 19-year-old Bob Ford with his pitiful homemade mask and “granddaddy Colt”.

As their leader, Jesse James looks the most professional of the bunch, specifically by wearing not a worn and ragged duster but a black wool double-breasted frock coat that creates a “badass longcoat” effect, particularly effective as we see his silhouette illuminated by the train lights as he strides up the rails.

Jesse commands his wild bunch during the Blue Cut train robbery.

Jesse layers the frock coat over a non-matching black single-breasted waistcoat (vest) with a shawl collar that meets at mid-chest, slightly lower than the dressier waistcoats that match his suits. The waistcoat has four sew-through buttons, which he wears fastened to the bottom but repurposes the second buttonhole to hook the T-bar attached to his gold pocket watch chain, worn “single Albert”-style with the watch carried in the right of the two welted pockets.

While also dark, his woolen trousers contrast with the frock coat and waistcoat with a double taupe stripe against the black ground, echoing the more formal “cashmere”-striped trousers worn with contemporary morning dress. These flat front trousers have double sets of black buttons at the top of the waistband, to which Jesse connects the loops of his tan fabric suspenders (braces), as well as slanted side pockets and plain-hemmed bottoms.

Director Andrew Dominik consults with Brad Pitt on the set of The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.

Throughout the movie, Jesse wears a pair of well-traveled black leather squared-toe boots with raised heels. Particularly when on the job, he appoints them with a set of steel spurs that fasten around each boot with a brown leather belted strap.

Jesse exclusively wears white cotton shirts that button up a front placket to a neckband that he more often than not wears unfastened and thus sans collar. During the train robbery sequence, he wears a shirt finished with single cuffs, fastened with a set of small gilt rectangular links.

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford bucks Western tradition by dressing the James gang in headgear like bowler hats rather than the stereotypical cowboy hats. Jesse himself wears an all-black homburg, an apt choice to communicate his steady but villainous leadership as this particular style—once popularized by the future King Edward VII during an 1893 visit to Germany—would be associated with leaders both fictional (think Al Pacino as Michael Corleone) and real (like Winston Churchill). Jesse’s black felt homburg has a black grosgrain band and matching binding around the edges of the curled brim.

The Last Best West offers the Mister Howard Homburg, inspired by Jesse’s alias.

Jesse James would make the CDC proud by wearing his mask over both his mouth and his nose.

For the robbery, Jesse covers the lower half of his face with a dark brown paisley bandana, more understated than the red or blue paisley cotton kerchiefs associated with stereotypical wild west banditry.

Brown Herringbone at Home

For a few scenes chronicling Jesse’s home life, including one immediately following the robbery where he announces that Bob will be staying behind with Jesse’s family in St. Joseph, he wears a waistcoat and trousers made from matching dark brown herringbone wool.

The single-breasted waistcoat has short notch lapels and five self-covered buttons that rise to a much higher buttoning point over the chest. There are four welted pockets, with Jesse again keeping his gold pocket watch in the lower right-hand pocket, the single-Albert chain now looped through the fourth buttonhole. The flat front trousers, presumably also worn with suspenders, rise high enough that the waistband remains appropriately unseen under the waistcoat.

At home in herringbone with a post-heist cigar, concealed snake, and ill-concealed six-shooter wrapped in the newspaper by his side.

The Black Frock Suit

Brad Pitt during production of The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, clad in full black frock suit and Homburg.

Through most of his latter scenes, including the titular killing on April 3, 1882, Jesse wears a black wool three-piece suit anchored by a dressier version of the frock coat he had worn for the opening robbery, though it subtly differs in the style such as the lapel stitching and the fact that the train robbery coat had two-button cuffs while this “town” frock coat has three-button cuffs. (An iCollector auction listing for this outfit confirms the color, material, usage, and the fact that it was provided by Western Costume.)

The frock coat was most accepted for daytime business dress through the mid-to-late 19th century, aligning with the setting of The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Many in the James gang’s orbit may not have owned anything so formal, but Jesse’s wealth and his respectable veneer as St. Joseph businessman “Thomas Howard” would earn the garment its rightfully prominent place in his wardrobe.

Jesse’s frock coat features all of the traditional elements, including the close fit, waist suppression, and full knee-length skirt. The double-breasted configuration resembles the style popularized by Albert, prince consort to Queen Victoria, and thus known as a “Prince Albert” coat. The peak lapels and collar have been stitched together, separate from the body of the coat, with straight gorges. The lapels overlap at center chest, above the two parallel columns of three covered buttons each that flank a center seam extending down to the waist seam.

On the back, the waist seam is intersected by the curved seams extending down from the armholes, where two decorative covered buttons are shanked to the coat at the crest of the long tails carried over from the coat’s equestrian origins.

Clad in all black to meet his fate on the last day of his life, Jesse returns home with his son.

The matching black wool single-breasted waistcoat resembles the cut and styling of his brown herringbone waistcoat, with short notch lapels, a high-fastening front with five self-covered buttons, and four welted pockets. The back is lined in a black brick-patterned material, with an adjustable strap to cinch the waist.

Jesse surveys the setup to his assassination, with Bob fidgeting in a rocking chair as Charley hovers near the front door.

Jesse’s black flat front trousers have plain-hemmed bottoms, side pockets, and two slanted set-in back pockets, each closed through a button on a scalloped flap. Though we see that the trousers are held up with Jesse’s usual tan fabric suspenders, they also have a cinch-strap over the back waistband—mirroring the waistcoat above it—that can adjust the fit by tightening or loosening through a silver-toned buckle.

“Guess I’ll take my guns off for fear the neighbors might spy them.” After wearing his revolvers relatively open in town, Jesse finds a flimsy excuse to disarm himself before turning his back on the treacherous Ford brothers.

Jesse wears several of his usual white cotton neckband shirts with his black frock suit, including one with button-fastened barrel cuffs when he’s killed and another with squared double (French) cuffs that he fastens with a set of silver octagonal links, each filled with a black enamel circle.

Stripped to his shirt-sleeves for dinner with the Ford siblings, Jesse lights a post-prandial cigar as he absorbs the depth of Bob’s obsession.

Jesse rarely dresses the shirt up with a collar and tie, but we do see him on occasion appointing it as such when squiring Bob Ford around St. Joseph in the early weeks of their association. His stiff wing collar has distinctively shaped wings with a subtly cut-out wave interrupting what would have otherwise been a straight edge and corner. His black silk tie has a unique side-twisted knot rather than the now-common four-in-hand.

Happy hour with Jesse James and Bob Ford.

The Looter in Winter

For wintry expeditions, Jesse layers with a black wool double-breasted coat with a broad squared collar in black astrakhan fur, made from the lush fleece of Karakul sheep that originated in central Asia. The coat has six brown nut buttons, plain cuffs, and large welted vertical-entry side pockets.

Jesse’s black leather gloves have black ribbed-knit woolen cuffs under the gauntlets that keep his wrists protected from the elements where they’d be otherwise uncovered by his coat-sleeves.

In especially cold weather, Jesse further embraces furry insulation by layering on a more dramatic full-fur coat, though I don’t profess to be expert enough in animal pelts to identify the mammal that sacrificed its hide for Jesse’s warmth.

Everything Else

Pitt’s Jesse James wears two gold rings, a smooth band on his right ring finger and another on his left pinky, with at least one of these presumably his wedding ring. (I tried to research whether or not the real Jesse James had worn rings, but the predominant search results were decade-old gossip columns driven by paparazzi photos of Sandra Bullock’s estranged ex-husband who shared his name with the outlaw.)

Seen under the unbuttoned neckbands of his dress shirts and while sleeping, Jesse wears an off-white cotton henley-style undershirt or union suit.

The Guns

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford establishes Jesse James’ preferred armament as the Single Action Army revolver, which was then made exclusively by Colt, though the screen-used revolvers were reportedly made by the now-defunct manufacturer U.S. Fire Arms Mfg. Co. (USFA), also based in Colt’s headquarters town of Hartford, Connecticut.

Jesse’s trio of Single Action Army revolvers include a pair with the full 7.5″-long Cavalry barrel and one with the shorter 5.5″ Artillery barrel, likely chambered in either .45 Long Colt or .44-40 Winchester Center Fire and provided for the production by armorer Thell Reed.

Cautious to the point of paranoia, Jesse rarely strays from his guns, even while bathing and sleeping at home. He sometimes carries his Peacemaker in a shoulder holster, or sometimes a butt-facing pair in his gunbelt, and occasionally both rigs together, resulting in a total of three guns… weighing in somewhere around eight pounds. Carrying this much artillery informs the need for well-made holster systems, for which the production turned to leather artists David Carrico and Will Ghormley.

The three-gun outlaw.

Jesse’s shoulder rig consists of a wide black tooled leather strap over his left shoulder connected to a holster under his right arm, presumably for the shorter-barreled Artillery model Single Action Army, and looped over his right shoulder on a narrower smoother black leather strap. Carrico made this rig himself, reportedly based on one believed to be worn by the real Jesse James.

As outlined in an interview granted to Art Andrews, a member of The RPF, Ghormley explained that Carrico had asked him to design a gun belt based on the one retrieved from Jesse’s home on the day he was killed in April 1882. Accounting for the fact that the original belt and holster was likely made for a larger revolver, Ghormley designed the screen-ready belt and holsters to accommodate a Single Action Army and a Smith & Wesson Schofield, though ultimately only the former was chosen as Jesse’s on-screen armament.

The brown leather belt is a fold-over money belt and cartridge belt, with cartridge loops around the back and a “coffin”-ended billet overlaid across the front to close through a large squared silver-toned single-prong buckle. The two open-top brown tooled holsters are positioned so that Jesse would wear his Peacemakers butt-forward, in the cavalry tradition. These holsters were designed and carved by Ghormley, then sewn together and lined by Carrico on a belt that Carrico had made for the production.

Jesse neatly arranges his gun belt with his pair of Single Action Army revolvers, wordlessly surrendering himself to his fate at the hands of Bob Ford.

Despite his infamy, or perhaps due to it, there’s been considerable argument on what firearms the real Jesse James preferred and was wearing when he died. As outlined in a brief dissection by Marshall Trimble for True West, Jesse has often been associated with the Smith & Wesson Schofield break-top revolver, though his preferences likely also ranged to percussion “cap-and-ball” Colts and Remingtons as well as the Colt Single Action Army, supported by the inventory found in his St. Joseph home the day he was killed. The debate has been additionally muddied by his mother, Zerelda, who reportedly would purchase revolvers and sell them to unsuspecting treasure hunters, claiming them to be her famous late son’s weaponry.

Though I still would hesitate to trust anyone purporting to have an authentic Jesse James revolver—especially at this late date—considerable provenance went into proving that he did once own at least one .45-caliber Colt Single Action Army with a 7.5″ Cavalry barrel. The Daily Mail reported that this six-shooter—produced by Colt in the summer of 1881, a year before Jesse was killed—was expected to fetch $1.6 million during a 2013 auction, though the Heritage Auctions description still lists the weapon as not sold as of April 2022.

Jesse draws his 7.5″-barreled Single Action Army during the Blue Cut robbery.

Less questioned is the model of weapon used by Bob Ford to kill Jesse James in April 1882, as historical record has demonstrated that Bob fired a .44-caliber shot from a nickel-plated Smith & Wesson New Model No. 3 revolver.

The New Model No. 3 was Smith & Wesson’s evolution of the earlier Schofield that had been frequently associated with Jesse. Following the ceased production of older Model 3 revolvers like the Schofield in 1877, Smith & Wesson introduced the improved New Model No. 3 that maintained the signature top-break operation but with a longer cylinder.

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford depicts Bob’s New Model No. 3 as a gift from Jesse to replace Bob’s nearly half-century old Paterson Colt percussion revolver.

Bob examines the brand-new Smith & Wesson revolver that he would soon use to kill the man who gave it to him.

How to Get the Look

Stephen Berkman took this ambrotype of Brad Pitt in costume for The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007)

There would be few situations in this day and age that call for a frock coat, but the late Patricia Norris’ costume design for The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford neatly captures the actual fashions one might have seen in Jesse James’ closet 140 years ago, more a representation of latter Victorian day dress than the prototypical cowboy attire of wide-brimmed hats, denim, and paisley kerchiefs.

• Black wool double-breasted “Prince Albert”-style frock coat with split peak lapels, covered 6×3-button front, covered 3-button cuffs, and decorative 2-button back with tails
• Black wool single-breasted waistcoat/vest with short notch lapels, self-covered 5-button front, and four welted pockets
• Black wool flat front trousers with suspender buttons, side pockets, slanted scallop-flapped back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• White cotton neckband shirt with button-up placket and double/French cuffs
• Tan cloth suspenders
• Black leather squared-toe cowboy boots
• Black felt homburg with black grosgrain band and edges
• Gold pocket watch on single-Albert chain with bar
• Gold wedding ring
• Gold pinky ring
• Black tooled leather shoulder holster
• Brown leather billeted money/cartridge belt with large squared silver-toned single-prong buckle and two butt-forward tooled leather holsters

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

I haven’t been acting correctly. I can’t hardly recognize myself sometimes when I’m greased. I go on journeys out of my body and look at my red hands and my mean face, and I wonder about that man who’s gone so wrong. I’ve been becoming a problem to myself.

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Spencer Tracy as Matt Drayton in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967)

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Spencer Tracy as Matt Drayton, newspaper editor

San Francisco, Spring 1967

Film: Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
Release Date: December 12, 1967
Director: Stanley Kramer
Costume Designer: Joe King

Background

Considered one of the greatest actors in Hollywood history by audiences and peers, Spencer Tracy was born 122 years ago on April 5, 1900 in Milwaukee. His prolific career that spanned nearly half a century culminated with his final role in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, for which he received his ninth and final Academy Award nomination (one of ten that the film received), a posthumous honor as Tracy had died only 17 days after completing his work.

Following a lifetime of heavy smoking and drinking, Tracy had been hospitalized for pulmonary edema a few years earlier and was recently diagnosed with hypertensive heart disease among other ailments by the time his friend and frequent collaborator Stanley Kramer approached him to star as San Francisco editor Matt Drayton who, despite his open-minded beliefs, is befuddled when his daughter returns home from a Hawaiian vacation with her new fiancee, a Black doctor portrayed by Sidney Poitier. Matt takes no particular issue with his daughter’s charming fiancee personally but rather has trouble moving past his reservations about the challenges that the couple would face in the racially charged climate of 1960s America.

One of the best-remembered movies from Tracy’s career, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner was also his ninth and final on-screen collaboration with Katharine Hepburn, who can be seen crying authentic tears in the background as her long-time friend and lover delivered the film’s memorable monologue about the endurance of love:

Now Mr. Prentice, clearly a most reasonable man, says he has no wish to offend me but wants to know if I’m some kind of a nut. And Mrs. Prentice says that, like her husband, I’m a burned-out old shell of a man who cannot even remember what it’s like to love a woman the way her son loves my daughter. And strange as it seems, that’s the first statement made to me all day with which I am prepared to take issue… ’cause I think you’re wrong, you’re as wrong as you can be. I admit that I hadn’t considered it, hadn’t even thought about it, but I know exactly how he feels about her and there is nothing, absolutely nothing that you son feels for my daughter that I didn’t feel for Christina. Old, yes. Burned-out, certainly, but I can tell you the memories are still there—clear, intact, indestructible—and they’ll be there if I live to be 110.

Where John made his mistake, I think, was in attaching so much importance to what her mother and I might think… because in the final analysis it doesn’t matter a damn what we think. The only thing that matters is what they feel, and how much they feel, for each other. And if it’s half of what we felt… that’s everything. As for you two and the problems you’re going to have, they seem almost unimaginable, but you’ll have no problem with me, and I think when Christina and I and your mother have some time to work on him you’ll have no problem with your father, John. But you do know, I’m sure you know, what you’re up against. There’ll be 100 million people right here in this country who will be shocked and offended and appalled, and the two of you will just have to ride that out, maybe every day for the rest of your lives. You could try to ignore those people, or you could feel sorry for them and for their prejudice and their bigotry and their blind hatred and stupid fears, but where necessary you’ll just have to cling tight to each other and say “screw all those people!”

Anybody could make a case, a hell of a good case, against your getting married. The arguments are so obvious that nobody has to make them. But you’re two wonderful people who happened to fall in love and happened to have a pigmentation problem, and I think that now, no matter what kind of a case some bastard could make against your getting married, there would be only one thing worse, and that would be if—knowing what you two are and knowing what you two have and knowing what you two feel—you didn’t get married.

Well, Tillie, when the hell are we gonna get some dinner?

What’d He Wear?

After spending the first portion of the movie dressed in his gray business suit, changing out the jacket for a more broken-in tweed sports coat at home, Matt Drayton dresses for the titular dinner with his wife, daughter, and the Prentice family in a black suit, white shirt, and black tie, a simple look that’s consistent with how Spencer Tracy had been dressing in the latter films of his career (consider It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World) as well as a visual reminder that—despite his open-minded political points of view—Matt may still be approaching the evening with a more rigid “black and white” perspective.

Beside his wife Christina (Katharine Hepburn), Matt delivers a moving oration to his family, including their daughter Joey (Katharine Houghton) and her fiancé John (Sidney Poitier).

In my opinion, black suits are best reserved for funerals or evening occasions that don’t quite call for the formality of black tie, such as dinner at home with your daughter’s prospective in-laws. Matt’s black suit for this pivotal final scene flatters the 67-year-old Tracy, illustrating the impact of quality tailoring given the actor’s advancing age and myriad health issues that had made his weight a concern even a decade earlier during production of The Old Man and the Sea.

The single-breasted suit jacket has short-notched lapels that gently roll over the top of a three-button front, presenting a classic 3/2-roll. As the sequence begins in Matt’s bedroom while he’s dressing for dinner, we see the flattering impact that the jacket adds to his silhouette, with the lightly padded straight shoulders, roped sleeveheads, and front darts building up his chest and slightly suppressing his waist, essentially reversing the actuality of Tracy’s declining physique. The ventless jacket has three-button cuffs, straight jetted hip pockets, and a welted breast pocket that Matt dresses with a folded white linen pocket square.

Isabel Sanford made her screen debut as Tillie in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, four years before her breakout role as “Weezy” Jefferson on All in the Family would be extended into the long-running sitcom The Jeffersons.

The suit trousers rise to Tracy’s natural waist, where they’re held up by a black leather belt with a silver-toned single-prong buckle. The double forward-facing pleats adds roominess through the thighs, which would have made the suit additionally comfortable for Tracy given his condition at the time of the production, though they’re more likely an extension of the actor’s tailoring preferences that would have been honed during the more pleat-friendly era of decades past. The trousers have side pockets, jetted back pockets, and turn-ups (cuffs) on the bottoms.

Matt chooses the most somber from the rack of colorful ties hung on the inside of his closet door.

Matt’s creamy off-white voile shirt reflects a shine suggestive of either silk or silky synthetic fibers in the construction. The shirt has a plain front (no placket) that buttons up to a long, semi-spread collar. The squared barrel cuffs each close through a single button. He completes his outfit with a plain black silk twill tie.

Before putting on his black leather derby shoes, Matt has to swap out his original pair of black silk dress socks upon discovering a substantial hole in the toe. The manufacturer’s white print on the bottom of each sock is briefly visible, typically outlining the brand, fabric, and occasionally the wash instructions.

Matt wisely chooses to swap out his holy socks.

Matt accessorizes simply with just his eyeglasses and watch. The black thick-framed glasses had their lenses removed for the production and, based on the distinctive shapes of the silver logos on each side of the temple, I suspect these may be the MOSCOT Lemtosh frame, which had been introduced in the 1940s.

He wears his gold dress watch on the inside of his left wrist, strapped to a dark brown leather bracelet.

I couldn’t tell if Tracy was wearing a black or very dark navy blue suit, but comparing the fabric to the monsignor’s obviously black suit convinced me that both men were dressed in the same color.

How to Get the Look

Spencer Tracy as Matt Drayton in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967)

Decades before a group of reservoir dogs stalked out of an L.A. diner toward a fateful diamond heist, Spencer Tracy modeled the simplicity of a black suit and tie with his white shirt when dressing for the titular supper at the climax of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner. Impressively tailored to flatter the 67-year-old actor, the suit masks his health issues and creates an impressive silhouette as the patriarch stands tall among his family.

• Black wool tailored suit:
  • Single-breasted 3/2-roll jacket with short-notch lapels, welted breast pocket, straight jetted hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and ventless back
  • Double forward-pleated trousers with belt loops, side pockets, jetted back pockets, and turn-ups/cuffs
• Cream silk or silky synthetic voile shirt with semi-spread collar, plain front, and squared button cuffs
• Black silk twill tie
• Black leather belt with silver-toned single-prong buckle
• Black leather derby shoes
• Black dress socks
• Black thick-framed glasses
• Gold dress watch with round gold dial on dark brown leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

Well, Tillie, when the hell are we gonna get some dinner?

The post Spencer Tracy’s Black Suit in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner appeared first on BAMF Style.

Robert De Niro as Frank Sheeran in The Irishman (2019)

Vitals

Robert De Niro as Frank “the Irishman” Sheeran, tough Mafia enforcer

New York City, Spring 1972

Film: The Irishman
Release Date: November 1, 2019
Director: Martin Scorsese
Costume Design: Sandy Powell & Christopher Peterson

Background

Fifty years ago tonight, Mafia violence shook the streets of New York City when dangerous mobster “Crazy Joe” Gallo was shot and killed while celebrating his 43rd birthday with his family at Umbertos Clam House on Mulberry Street.

The most widely accepted facts attribute the slaying to four associates of the Colombo crime family, in retaliation for their suspicions that Gallo had ordered the attempted assassination of boss Joseph Colombo during an Italian-American Civil Rights League rally the previous June. Gallo’s widow recalled multiple men of short stature and likely Italian descent storming the Mulberry Street restaurant, where more than 20 shots were fired at her husband, who staggered onto the sidewalk and died shortly before 5:30 a.m. on April 7, 1972.

However, Charles Brandt’s nonfiction best-seller I Heard You Paint Houses includes an explosive claim by labor official and mob hitman Frank Sheeran that he alone was responsible for the hit. Known as “The Irishman”, Sheeran stood 6’4″ and even explained to Brandt that, with his “very fair skin … I don’t look like a Mafia shooter,” which would have made him even less conspicuous to a rightly paranoid gangster like Gallo. Sheeran addresses the fact that other theories had placed more gunmen on the scene, explaining that “maybe the bodyguard added two shooters to make himself look better. Maybe there were a lot of stray shots being fired from the two guns that made it seem like there was more than one shooter. I’m not putting anybody else in the thing but me.”

The book’s 24th chapter, “He Needed a Favor and That Was That” serves as something of a primer from Sheeran on how to conduct a public mob hit, from how to dress and choose your armament to when you should empty your bladder before approaching the target. Martin Scorsese left this generally intact—albeit somewhat truncated—when depicting the scene in his latest mob epic, The Irishman, set to the dissonantly dulcet surf sound of Santo & Johnny’s aptly titled 1959 hit “Sleep Walk”.

What’d He Wear?

The Irishman depicts Frank Sheeran out on the town with northeastern Pennsylvania mob boss Russell Bufalino (Joe Pesci) and their wives, entertained by Don Rickles at New York’s famed Copacabana nightclub when they encounter the hotheaded Gallo (Sebastian Maniscalco) celebrating his birthday. A little too loose with his remarks to Russell, one look from the “Old Man” is all Frank needs to know it’s time to return home and begin considering what to pull from his arsenal to rid the mob of Crazy Joe.

Initially, Sheeran had been dressed appropriately for a night out in a burgundy blazer, the wide notch lapels finished with “swelled” edges and rolling to two brass buttons that echo the three similarly gilted buttons on each cuff.

Though Frank Sheeran attests in I Heard You Paint Houses that he’d never met Joey Gallo prior to killing him (thus making him an ideal choice for an unfamiliar killer), The Irishman depicts Sheeran trying to calm him down after a brief exchange with Russell Bufalino at the Copa on the same night he’d be ordered to kill him.

Sheeran swaps out his blazer for a tough leather jacket when he returns home, but he continues wearing the same shirt, patterned with alternating maroon and pink broken box stripes against an ivory ground. Likely one of the many made for the movie by Geneva Custom Shirts, the shirt has a front placket, button cuffs, and a fashionably long point collar for the early ’70s.

Sheeran rides to the hit.

The dark brown leather jacket that Sheeran changes into for the hit differs from the shorter brown leather zip-up jacket that he had worn earlier during his trucking days, the darker shade adding a more villainous “tough guy” edge that would make him appropriately intimidating when gunning down his victims. Indeed, he wears the jacket again a few years later when he’s tapped to kill Sally Bugs.

Styled like a thigh-length car coat, the leather jacket has four dark woven leather buttons up the front with a fifth that would close at the neck, should Sheeran choose to turn up the lower half of his left lapel. The jacket has a horizontal chest yoke, set-in sleeves with plain cuffs, and flapped set-in hip pockets just deep enough to conceal a snub-nosed .38.

His job done, Sheeran disposes of his two “little brothers” in the sea.

Sheeran continues wearing the same golden-hued khaki polyester flat front trousers, which have a self-belted waistband that closes through a silver-toned buckle, full-top front pockets, and fashionably flared plain-hemmed bottoms. He wears dark brown leather apron-toe loafers with a metal strap across the vamp rather than the traditional horsebit as innovated by Gucci in the 1950s.

Production photo during the filming of Joey Gallo’s assassination in November 2017, offering a clear look at De Niro’s costume as Frank Sheeran.

After he was elected to leadership of Teamsters Local 326, Sheeran no longer wears his gold Bulova President tank watch and has adopted this mixed-metal watch with a stainless case and a fixed gold bezel that encircles a round white dial which appears to be printed with a Teamsters emblem. Sheeran wears the watch on his left wrist, affixed to a steel-and-gold “Jubilee”-style bracelet. He also still wears his chunky gold ring on the third finger of his right hand.

Sheeran’s watch shines under the dim bedroom light as he selects the tools for his grisly trade.

As described to The Hollywood Reporter, costume designers Sandy Powell and Christopher Peterson cited the invaluable help of assistant costume designer Brittany Griffin who also happened to be Frank Sheeran’s granddaughter and was able to share archival photographs and even items that belonged to her grandfather.

In I Heard You Paint Houses, Sheeran gives little physical description of his apparel from the hit, aside from the fact that he “looked like just a broken down truck driver with a cap on coming in to use the bathroom.” Though no cap is worn by De Niro in the scene, the cinematic Sheeran may have coded his appearance to resemble a trucker by donning a leather jacket not unlike what he’d worn during his earlier days of honest work.

The Guns

Now, for something like this, you’re gonna need two guns: one you’re gonna use, and a backup. You want something with more stopping power than a .22. You definitely don’t want a silencer; you wanna make a lot of noise to make the witnesses run away so they ain’t gonna be lookin’ at you. But not the noise a .45 makes, ’cause that makes too much noise, and a patrol car can hear it a few blocks away, at least.

The next we see of Frank Sheeran, he’s looking at an array of 14 guns laid out on his bed, including two shotguns (an Ithaca Model 37 pump-action “riot gun” and a sawed-off double-barreled “lupara”), a .45-caliber Colt Mk IV Series 70 1911 pistol, two silenced pistols (a Browning Hi-Power and a Walther PPK), two small-framed pistols that he pulls away when dismissing the .22, and seven Smith & Wesson revolvers, including one snub-nosed .22-caliber Model 34 “kit gun”.

Frank Sheeran’s arsenal, clockwise from left: two larger-framed Smith & Wesson revolvers, an Ithaca 37 riot-length pump-action shotgun, a shorter sawed-off double-barreled “lupara”, four Smith & Wesson revolvers (a nickel Model 64, 4″-barreled Model 10, 2″-barreled Model 36, and 2″-barreled Model 30), two .22-caliber semi-automatic pistols (possibly Lorcin models), a .22-caliber Smith & Wesson Model 34 “kit” revolver, a .45-caliber Colt Mk IV Series 70 1911 pistol, a silenced Walther PPK, and a silenced Browning Hi-Power.

Sheeran explains his reasoning to us as he sorts through the arsenal, with De Niro’s voiceover echoing the book nearly verbatim, though Sheeran’s written account includes addition wisdom about the “two little brothers” he brings along for the job, explaining that “I’d have one in my waistband and a backup piece in my ankle holster. You’d use something like a .32 and a .38 revolver because you wanted more stopping power than you could get with a .22.”

The cops call a .32 a “woman’s gun” ’cause it’s easier to handle and don’t do the damage a .38 does, but—you know—it does enough.

The process of elimination complete, Sheeran picks out two snub-nosed Smith & Wesson revolvers. At least one is a blued Smith & Wesson Model 36, the five-shot .38 Special built on the medium-sized J-frame. Presumably, the other is a .32-caliber, built on the smaller I-frame and thus likely a six-shot Smith & Wesson Model 30, chambered to fire the more anemic .32 S&W Long cartridge.

Sheeran balances the two snub-nosed Smith & Wesson revolvers he’s selected for the job.

The Model 36 was introduced at a 1950 convention for the International Association of Chiefs of Police, where its original “Chiefs Special” name was decided by vote. The Model 30 evolved in the late 1940s from the turn-of-the-century .32 Hand Ejector design and would continue to be offered in varying barrel lengths from 2″ to 6″ until production ended in 1976.

The forensic evidence from the Gallo murder supports Sheeran’s contention that .32-caliber and .38-caliber handguns were used during the hit, even if most accounts support that there were four shooters rather than just one.

How to Get the Look

Robert De Niro as Frank Sheeran in The Irishman (2019)

Frank Sheeran exemplifies intentionally dressing for the task ahead, changing out of his nightclub-friendly burgundy blazer and into a tough—and tough-looking—leather jacket that gives him a more lethal look as he charges into Umbertos Clam House. While I don’t think any of my readers need to worry about dressing for mob hits (I hope!), I like the simplicity of Frank’s sartorial transformation merely by swapping out a blazer for a leather jacket, made even more effective by the general neutrality of his base shirt and slacks.

• Dark brown leather thigh-length car coat with flat collar, four black woven leather buttons, horizontal chest yoke, plain cuffs, and flapped hip pockets
• Beige box-striped shirt with long point collar, front placket, and button cuffs
• Golden khaki polyester flat front self-belted trousers with full-top front pockets and flared plain-hemmed bottoms
• Dark brown leather apron-toe metal-strap loafers
• Black socks
• Gold wedding ring
• Gold tank watch with rose gold dial on black textured leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie, currently streaming on Netflix and available via Criterion Collection Blu-Ray. I also recommend reading I Heard You Paint Houses, the 2004 true-crime best-seller by Charles Brandt that inspired The Irishman.

The Quote

You wanna take out the bodyguard first… not kill him—don’t kill him—just disable him; you got no argument with him so, not in the face or the chest. Sometimes, with something like this, you might wanna go to the bathroom first. It gives you a chance to make sure nobody followed you in; it also gives you a chance to make sure nobody’s in the bathroom that you have to worry about; it also gives you a chance to go to the bathroom… you don’t wanna be uncomfortable.

It might sound like a joke in De Niro’s narration, but the script closely echoes Sheeran’s admission to Charles Brandt, though Sheeran had elaborated on the implied discomfort that “you don’t want to have to take a leak if you’re trying to outrun a couple of cop cars.” In less than 20 seconds, Sheeran is in the door—firing nine shots that leave Gallo dead on the sidewalk (not 14 shots, as reported on the following day’s news)—he’s and back out in the passenger seat of the ’65 Chevy Impala sedan chosen for the evening’s getaway car.

The post The Irishman: De Niro’s Mob Hit Leather Jacket appeared first on BAMF Style.

Jean-Paul Belmondo as Ferdinand Griffon in Pierrot le Fou (1965)

Vitals

Jean-Paul Belmondo as Ferdinand Griffon, runaway husband

Paris, Spring 1965

Film: Pierrot le Fou
Release Date: November 5, 1965
Director: Jean-Luc Godard

Background

Born 89 years ago on April 9, 1933, today marks the first of Jean-Paul Belmondo’s birthdays since the iconic French actor died in September 2021. One of Bébel’s most memorable movies is the colorful Pierrot le Fou, a pop art equivalent of the French New Wave cinematic movement that marked the actor’s third and final collaboration with director Jean-Luc Godard.

Belmondo stars as Ferdinand Griffon, a bored Parisian husband trapped in a life that fails to satisfy him on personal or professional levels. Following a banal party where the insufferable conversations turn to topics like deodorant, Ferdinand encounters a glimmer of hope when reunited with his capricious ex-girlfriend, Marianne Renoir (Anna Karina), whom he offers a ride home. Since their first meeting five—no, four and a half—years ago, he’s married “an Italian with money” who doesn’t interest him, but he’s grown too lazy to divorce her: “To want something, you have to be alive.”

Classic Aries, amirite?

Marianne seemingly awakens that raison d’etre, so Ferdinand abandons his family life to join Marianne. He wakes up in her apartment, where we gradually come to realize that she stabbed a well-armed OAS guerrilla in the neck with a pair of scissors, though even this violent interlude isn’t enough to bother our lovebirds celebrating their “love with no tomorrow” as she sings to Ferdinand while he smokes in bed during this bright morning.

The story evolves rapidly like a bad dream as they have to kill Marianne’s ex-boyfriend and narrowly escape from two gangsters who had been pursuing her. Armed with a rifle and a copy of a children’s book, The Nickel-Footed Gang, the two make tracks in a red Peugeot 404… which they ultimately need to torch in the French countryside—inadvertently burning up their money as well—as they make their twisted journey from Paris to Nice.

What’d He Wear?

Before adopting a more avant-garde style during his life on the run with Marianne, Ferdinand dresses for his bourgeois city life in a well-tailored business suit, white shirt, and bright red tie.

Ferdinand’s wool suit is woven in a classic Prince of Wales check, consisting of a black-and-cream Glenurquhart plaid with a pale red overcheck. The terms “Glen plaid” and “Prince of Wales check” are often used interchangeably, though Hardy Amies clarified in ABCs of Men’s Fashion, published the year before Pierrot le Fou was released, that “Prince of Wales check is a Glen Urquhart check often with an overcheck in color.” This distinctive suiting originated as a “district check” in 19th century Scotland but was popularized in the early 1920s by Edward VIII, Prince of Wales, hence its enduring name.

The single-breasted suit jacket has wide, padded shoulders and a full cut that, while flatteringly tailored, somewhat engulfs Belmondo’s lean frame to visually communicate Ferdinand appearing overwhelmed by the tedium of his life. Rigged with notch lapels that roll to a full three-button front, the jacket has a welted breast pocket, gently slanted flapped hip pockets with a flapped ticket pocket, double vents, and functioning three-button “surgeon’s cuffs”.

Ferdinand’s matching forward-pleated suit trousers rise to Belmondo’s natural waist, where they’re self-suspended with a single button fastened through an extended waist tab; the trousers have belt loops that remain unused. There are slanted side pockets and button-through back pockets, and the bottoms are plain-hemmed with no cuffs.

Ferdinand wears a plain white cotton shirt with a fashionably narrow semi-spread collar, buttoned up a plain (no placket) front with barrel cuffs each fastened with a button as well. Chris Cotonou observed for The Rake that “the masterstroke here is Godard’s choice of pairing a bright red knitted tie; an accessory so energising that it predicts a long Provençal summer.” The straight, narrow tie is squared on each end.

Ferdinand wears monk shoes, a natty alternative to traditional lace-ups defined by either a single or double strap that buckles across the vamp. Constructed of black leather plain-toe uppers with a single strap, Ferdinand’s monks illustrate the more formal end of the monk-shoe spectrum.

The fashionably short break of the trousers means more screen-time for Ferdinand’s hosiery. He typically wears pale-blue cotton lisle socks, though a brief costume-related continuity error flashes more conventional dark navy socks as he climbs into the Peugeot. Both work with the white shirt and red tie to maintain the Gallic red, white, and blue color scheme that follows our sad clown Ferdinand through the end, but the lighter blue hose are likely the “canon” choice he was intended to be wearing throughout the sequence.

Aside from the gold necklace worn under his shirt, Ferdinand’s sole accessory is a gold signet ring, worn on his right pinky finger and inscribed with a straight design running parallel to the direction of his fingers and thus likely not a monogram.

The morning after he escapes with Marianne, he wakes up in an “OAS-is” apartment clad in a very tight pale-blue cotton T-shirt inscribed with “FERDINAND” printed in royal blue across the chest.

Breakfast in bed.

The Gun

Given that the Organisation armée secrète (OAS) was a right-wing paramilitary organization, there are plenty of guns in its hideout where Ferdinand awakens with Marianne, including pistols, submachine guns, rifles, and a fully automatic MG34 machine gun. The two escape with a Mauser 98 Sporter, a variant of the venerated Mauser battle rifle built expressly for sporting purposes.

Marianne: Give me the rifle.
Ferdinand: The same make that killed Kennedy?
Marianne: Sure, didn’t you know it was me?

Less than two years had passed since John F. Kennedy was assassination before Pierrot le Fou included this brief exchange, indicating that Godard may not have shared the same sensitivity that led Stanley Kubrick to amend Slim Pickens’ line about “a pretty good weekend in Dallas” from Dr. Strangelove.

Sense of taste aside, Ferdinand doesn’t seem like much of a firearms expert as the only shared characteristics between Marianne’s Mauser 98 Sporter and the Carcano M91/38 carbine believed to be the assassination weapon are that both are European-made bolt-action rifles with wooden furniture and attached optics.

Marianne aims the scoped Mauser rifle. Note that it’s a sporterized variant, based on the shortened fore-end as compared to a full Gewehr 1898.

Marianne would later use a full-length Gewehr 1898 bolt-action rifle, also scoped, during the climactic sequence.

How to Get the Look

Jean-Paul Belmondo and Anna Karina in Pierrot le Fou (1965)

Ferdinand dresses for his life of conformity in an admittedly stylish Prince of Wales check business suit, though his unique touches of character like the bright red knitted tie, pale blue socks, and monk shoes hint that there’s more in store for our “Pierrot”.

• Black-and-white Glenurquhart plaid with red overcheck Prince of Wales check tailored suit:
  • Single-breasted 3-button jacket with notch lapels, welted breast pocket, slanted flapped hip pockets with right-side ticket pocket, functioning 3-button cuffs, and double vents
  • Single forward-pleated trousers with belt loops, slanted front pockets, button-through back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• White cotton shirt with narrow semi-spread collar, plain front, and button cuffs
• Red knitted silk tie
• Black leather plain-toe single-strap monk shoes
• Pale-blue cotton lisle socks
• Gold signet pinky ring

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

First there was Greek civilization, then there was the Renaissance, now we’re entering the Age of the Ass.

The post Pierrot le Fou: Belmondo’s Prince of Wales Check Suit appeared first on BAMF Style.

Gene Kelly as Don Lockwood in Singin’ in the Rain (1952)

Vitals

Gene Kelly as Don Lockwood, ambitious film actor, singer, and dancer

Hollywood, Spring 1927

Film: Singin’ in the Rain
Release Date: April 11, 1952
Directed by: Gene Kelly & Stanley Donen
Costume Designer: Walter Plunkett

Background

What better way to welcome April showers than by celebrating the 70th anniversary of Singin’ in the Rain, which was widely released on this day in 1952, just two weeks after it premiered at Radio City Music Hall.

Now considered not just one of the best musical films but one of the best movies of all time, Singin’ in the Rain centers around Hollywood during the waning months of the silent era as studios made the shift to “talkies” following the release of The Jazz Singer in 1927. The transition is no problem for the multi-talented Don Lockwood (Gene Kelly), who shares his portrayer’s finely honed abilities to sing, act, and dance, but previews for Don’s latest feature—the period drama The Dueling Cavalier—illustrate that Don’s brassy, vain co-star Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen) is woefully underprepared for the new phase of their career, her shrill accent eliciting laughter and frustration from the test audiences.

Brainstorming over late-night sandwiches and milk with his professional partner Cosmo Brown (Donald O’Connor) and his new love interest Kathy Selden (Debbie Reynolds), Don’s brain trust determines that The Dueling Cavalier could potentially be retooled as a musical, with Kathy dubbing Lina’s grating voice behind the scenes. This being a musical, the trio celebrates their breakthrough with a rousing rendition of “Good Mornin'” as the rain falls outside, followed by a gleeful Don kissing Kathy goodnight and—delighted with the prospects of his professional and romantic futures—singing the titular ditty as he dances home in the downpour.

Though now best associated with the movie and that iconic scene, which Kelly supposedly filmed while battling a 103 °F fever, it had indeed been a late 1920s standard, likely first recorded by B.A. Rolfe and his Lucky Strike Orchestra in 1929, followed by renditions recorded by contemporary vocal stars Annette Hanshaw and Nick Lucas. The song mostly fell out of public consciousness for decades, aside from a novelty performance by Dean Martin on the Colgate Comedy Hour in 1950, until Arthur Freed revived it as the title number for the lavish MGM musical that would be a tribute to many of the songs he penned with Nacio Herb Brown through the ’20s and ’30s.

What’d He Wear?

Don, Cosmo, and Kathy all arrive at the test screening with matching yellow rain slickers, indeed prepared for the spring rain that evening, but it was likely decided that there would be considerably less staying power if Gene Kelly danced in the rain dressed like the Gorton’s fisherman, so he abandons the coat—and, eventually, his umbrella—for the titular performance.

Before the advent of synthetic water-proof fabrics like polyester, early 20th century raincoats were typically made of oilcloth, canvas, or “leatherette” rubber. Don’s yellow oilcloth knee-length rain slicker has five hooks that close up the front, with a banded collar that fastens through a tan leather belted strap. Each hip has a large flap-covered pocket.

The core creative team of The Dueling Cavalier—Lina Lamont, studio head R.F. Simpson, Don Lockwood, director Roscoe Dexter, and Cosmo Brown—react to the tepid reception of early test screenings.

Don dresses for the evening in a sporty three-piece suit of woolen Donegal tweed, characterized by the colorful flecks woven against the taupe-gray ground. While this is a natty look for a low-key outing in a more casual town like L.A., a night spent singing in the rain with it on would not have done it any favors.

While tweed has long been appreciated by outdoorsmen for its ruggedness and basic water resilience, exposing it to a constant downpour—particularly over the two to three days required to film the scene—would have rendered it essentially ruined, likely shrunken, stained, and plagued by an odor not unlike a wet dog.

Luckily for cinematic costume history, the suit survived production and—according to the Daily Mail—was purchased in 1970 memorabilia collector Gerald Sola, who paid a paltry $10 but knew he likely had gold on his hands when he noticed the water-smudged label with Gene Kelly’s name inside. Sola made an impressive profit when the suit was sold to Planet Hollywood following a 2013 auction; the Heritage Auctions listing describes the suit as a “vintage original (2) piece bespoke grey knit wool suit including (1) coat with notched lapel, self-buttoning belt, 2-hip pouch pockets, with interior lined in taupe silk and button front closure and (1) pair of matching trousers with button front closure.”

Don doesn’t quite share Lina’s enthusiasm for her mediocre delivery in “talkies”, though his own melodramatic performance leaves something to be desired as well.

The Norfolk jacket remains one of the earliest continued examples of tailored sportswear, originally designed as a comfortably loose, belted shooting jacket that was named for either the Duke or county or Norfolk, established as a country staple after it was popularized by the influential Edward VII, Prince of Wales, in the 1880s.

Don’s jacket follows the traditional characteristics of a full Norfolk jacket, with the box-pleated strips up the front and back, sewn over the self-belt at the waist that boasts two buttons across the front and pulls in the wearer’s waist to further flatter Gene Kelly’s athletic silhouette. These pleats extend up to a horizontal yoke across the chest and back.

The jacket’s notch lapels, which Don turns up against his neck for the rainy dance home, roll to the top of a four-button front, though he appears to wear the top button undone and the belt covers the lowest button so only two fastened buttons are visible. Set-in hip pockets are rigged with straight openings just below the belt line, and the sleeves are finished with three-button cuffs.

It ain’t illegal to walk down the lane with a happy refrain, though it is sartorially inadvisable to do so in the rain wearing an unprotected woolen suit.

Though it doesn’t appear to have been included in the auction, the suit has a matching waistcoat (vest) tailored in the traditional fashion of the ’20s with a five-button front that Kelly wears fully fastened, four slim-welted pockets, and a dark gray satin-finished back with an adjustable strap that keeps the waistcoat tightly against Kelly’s frame. This snug fit and the flattering proportions of the waistcoat always covering the top of Kelly’s trousers provides an elegant continuity during the impressive acrobatics of the “Good Mornin'” dance routine.

As mentioned, the trousers rise high enough for the waistband to remain completely appropriately covered by the waistcoat, though Kelly’s “Good Mornin'” dance movements give us a glimpse at the belt loops that go unused around the waist, suggesting that Don either wears suspenders or has trousers so closely tailored that there’s no threat of them shifting out of place even when cutting a rug.

These flat-front trousers have on-seam side pockets, a jetted back-right pocket, and turn-ups (cuffs) on the bottoms that break cleanly over the tops of his russet leather cap-toe oxford shoes, a more understated alternative to his usual two-toned spectator shoes that were likely chosen to be more tonally appropriate with the suit as well as to not be so obviously ruined as Don indulges that glorious feelin’ by splashing in every puddle he can find during his walk home. Don wears dark chocolate brown cotton lisle socks that coordinate with his reddish-brown shoes and the taupe suiting.

The cheerful aftermath of a good mornin’ spent talking the whole night through.

Following Phillips-Van Heusen’s revolutionary introduction of men’s dress shirts with attached collars after World War I, the 1920s hosted an age of menswear modernization as men gradually began wearing pre-collared shirts rather than frequently attaching separate collars onto neckband shirts, secured with studs.

Don wears a timeless shirt and tie combination, sporting a pale-blue cotton shirt with a spread collar and button cuffs. His solid burgundy necktie is knotted in a classic four-in-hand.

The understated solid blue shirt and burgundy tie are welcomely uncomplicated companions to the busy Donegal tweed suiting, with the shirt and tie coordinated to the flecks of blue and red among the other colors woven into the wool.

Don wears a brown felt fedora with a tonal brown grosgrain band, which also falls victim to his rainy walk home. During the “Good Mornin'” performance, Don, Cosmo, and Kathy swap headgear so that Kathy wears Don’s fedora, Don wears Cosmo’s flatter-crowned hat, and Cosmo ends up in Kathy’s cloche hat.

What to Imbibe

Despite its colorful depiction of the era of bathtub gin and bootleg hooch, Singin’ in the Rain doesn’t depict too raucous of a party scene among our Hollywood set, aside from the occasional glass of bubbly as enjoyed by Don during a “visualization” of the “Broadway Melody” sequence for The Dancing Cavalier. Thus, audiences hoping to pair this musical with a cocktail would be best-served by turning to Tim Federle’s entertaining volume Gone with the Gin: Cocktails with a Hollywood Twist.

Federle includes a recipe for a drink appropriately titled Sippin’ in the Rain, essentially a raspberry mimosa described as a “get-up-and-go drink that’s guaranteed to send you skipping down sidewalks” that consists of…

• 4 ounces Champagne
• 1½ ounces orange juice
• ¾ ounce raspberry liqueur

… all poured into a flute, garnished with a raspberry, and finished with a mini-umbrella, of course.

How to Get the Look

Gene Kelly as Don Lockwood in Singin’ in the Rain (1952)

Recommended: outfitting yourself with a smart tweed suit, adding a touch of character by reviving the classic sporty Norfolk jacket.

Less recommended: wearing your new handsome tweed clabber out in the rain, soaking it to your skin to the point where it may need to be surgically removed.

• Taupe colorful-flecked Donegal tweed three-piece suit:
  • Single-breasted 4-button Norfolk jacket with vertical box pleats, two-button self-belt, set-in hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and ventless back
  • Single-breasted 5-button waistcoat/vest with four slim-welted pockets and adjustable back strap
  • Flat-front trousers with belt loops, on-seam side pockets, jetted back-right pocket, and turn-ups/cuffs
• Pale-blue cotton shirt with spread collar and button cuffs
• Burgundy tie
• Russet leather cap-toe oxford shoes
• Dark brown cotton lisle socks
• Brown felt fedora with brown grosgrain ribbon
• Yellow oilskin rain slicker with five hook closures, belted neckband, and flapped hip pockets

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

From where I stand, the sun is shining all over the place.

The post Singin’ in the Rain: Gene Kelly’s Tweed Norfolk Suit appeared first on BAMF Style.

Ryan Reynolds as Adam Reed in The Adam Project (2022)

Vitals

Ryan Reynolds as Adam Reed, time-traveling fighter pilot

Washington State, Spring 2022… then fall 2018

Film: The Adam Project
Release Date: March 11, 2022
Director: Shawn Levy
Costume Designer: Jenny Eagan

Background

For four weeks after it premiered, The Adam Project remained the #1 most streamed movie on Netflix, only recently surpassed. This adventure comedy incorporates elements of sci-fi and action into a fun and often touching celebration of nerdom, summed up by a character stating that “sometimes it pays to be a nerd, guys.”

The movie centers around Adam Reed (Ryan Reynolds), whom we meet as a rogue fighter pilot in the year 2050. “You’ve seen Terminator, right? That’s 2050 on a good day,” he explains of the dystopian future which may or may not be the result of the time-traveling technology pioneered by his late father Louis (Mark Ruffalo), an idealistic quantum physicist.

Having “borrowed the shit out of” a jet to search for his wife Laura (Zoe Saldaña) who went missing on a mission that sent her back to 2018, Adam ends up crash-landing at his boyhood home in the year 2022, where he—and the farting gunshot wound in his abdomen—shocks his own 12-year-old self (Walker Scobell). Louis’ then-recent death in a car accident had left his wife Ellie (Jennifer Garner) a widowed single mother, trying to remain strong for the adolescent Adam, who has the same sarcastic tongue as his adult counterpart but, as the constant target of middle school bullies, he has yet to trade in his brains for muscles.

This blend of family dynamics and quantum dynamics suggests that The Adam Project offers a little something for everyone… including a treat for menswear enthusiasts.

What’d He Wear?

I have a soft spot for action movies with a “hero outfit”, specifically a single costume change worn by our protagonist for most—if not all—of the movie, such as Cary Grant’s glen plaid suit in North by Northwest, Robert Redford’s chambray snap shirt and jeans under a tweed sport jacket then a pea coat in Three Days of the Condor, or the famous tweed jacket and navy roll-neck that Steve McQueen settles into for the climactic final act of Bullitt.

After a disappointingly short screen-time in No Time to Die, the popular waxed cotton Rogue Territory “Ridgeline Supply Jacket” finally got its cinematic time to shine as the anchor of Ryan Reynolds’ principal “hero costume” in The Adam Project.

The 12-year-old Adam commits to helping his 40-year-old self, the latter dressed in his deceased father’s blanket-lined Rogue Territory jacket and Omega Speedmaster.

Having sustained a farting gunshot wound during his doomed flight through time, the adult Adam determines that he needs to find a pharmacy so he can treat himself, but his 12-year-old self wisely reminds him that his bloodied flight suit may be a bit too conspicuous for public, suggesting that he raid the now-deceased Louis’ closet for something else to wear.

Nearly two years have passed since Adam’s father died, and Ellie still can’t bring herself to clean out his closet… which benefits the adult Adam, who returns from 2050 in need of something to wear other than his flight suit. Check out the Rogue Territory jacket awaiting its closeup, hanging third from the dividing wall on the right-side wardrobe.

Adult Adam: I used to love this jacket.
12-year-old Adam: Dad did too.

Almost in response to the jacket’s underwhelming screen time in No Time to Die, The Adam Project builds a mythology around the Reed family’s Ridgeline jacket. “This is a classic,” the adult Adam responds while holding back tears when he encounters his mother Ellie in a bar, who—unaware of Adam’s identity—comments that “my husband had a jacket just like that.”

Louis himself is a little less complimentary when he encounters his son returning from the future wearing his Ridgeline, commenting “is that my jacket? Looks a little tight on you… you look like a condom with buttons.” (Interestingly, the buttons do eventually pop off of Adam’s jacket… though it’s due to a compromised electromagnetic seal pulling at them, not an issue of tightness!)

Flanked by his son at two different ages, Louis mocks how tight his treasured Rogue Territory jacket looks on the adult Adam.

Rogue Territory developed the Ridgeline jacket to be consistently styled among its lineup of pieces inspired by classic workwear, updating designs from more than a century earlier as indicated by the contrast-threaded diagonal buttonhole on the front placket that links not to be a button but recalls the bygone era of when men regularly wore pocket watches and would loop their watch-chains through this extra hole.

The tan shell is a 10-ounce American waxed canvas which—like most waxed garments—requires re-waxing through its lifespan to best retain its water repellency and finish, while also developing a worn-in patina. The waist-length jacket echoes early 20th century chore coats and trucker jackets, fastened with five branded nickel rivet buttons up the front placket, with Rogue Territory’s signature ornamental buttonhole positioned diagonally between the second and third buttons down, with the contrasting thread evidently colored to match the rest of the jacket for The Adam Project.

The jacket has a pocket set-in against the left chest, with a horizontal slot-like opening and lighter contrast stitching framing the edges of the pocket. Two blanket-lined patch pockets placed at the hip level have side-entry openings, bar-tacked at the top and bottom, with the curvature of the pockets adding more dimension to the jacket. Each set-in sleeve closes with a single nickel rivet button at the squared cuff.

Adam gives his younger self a few lessons in dealing with middle-school bullies.

The Ridgeline supply jacket worn by Ryan Reynolds in The Adam Project has a blanketed lining, slightly differentiating it from the unlined version worn by Daniel Craig for those fleeting seconds in No Time to Die. Rogue Territory produced this lined Ridgeline jacket exclusively for STAG Provisions in downtown Los Angeles; while the tan version currently sold out as of this writing in April 2022, the jacket is planned to be restocked by this September.

The lining is a neppy striped mid-weight Japanese wool blend, consisting of a taupe ground with colorful slubs woven into the cloth, the stripes alternating between a narrow navy bar stripe and two wide navy stripes flanking a yellow bar stripe. A patch pocket made from the same tan waxed cotton as the outer shell is sewn onto the inside of the chest on the right side. (Unlined versions of the Ridgeline show a faint seam framing this pocket, though this naturally isn’t seen on the blanket-lined version.)

While there’s no pocket on that side of the jacket, Adam tucks away his non-lightsaber in preparation of the battle to come.

Presumably also pulled from his father’s wardrobe, Adam wears a dark charcoal cotton crew-neck T-shirt that takes on a greenish cast in certain light. Though he rarely wears the shirt on screen without the jacket layered over it, the short sleeves show off Ryan Reynolds’ physique, also reinforcing that some of Louis’ clothes may be a little snug on Adam given the size differences between the 5’8″ Mark Ruffalo and the 6’2″ Reynolds.

Adam wears navy twill chino-style trousers, perhaps chosen to echo the bottoms of his flight suit. I’ve seen a few sources (Steal His Style, for one) suggest that these slim-fitting trousers are the J Brand “Brooks” model in a “federal blue” blend of 97% cotton and 3% elastane; the premium denim brand’s liquidation in August 2021 means there won’t be a reissue of this style anytime soon, though the J Brand site assures fans that some styles will still be available from sister brand Theory.

Adam’s navy flat front trousers close through a hidden hook-and-eye closure on an extended waistband tab. Though they have belt loops, Adam doesn’t wear a belt, and the back appears to have a jeans-style yoke slanting toward the center on each side of the seat. The trousers also have side pockets, jetted back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms.

Behind the scenes of a fight scene choreographed for The Adam Project, with the face masks reminding us of the production that took place early in 2021. (Photo by Doane Gregory)

Adam wears chukka boots with well-worn tobacco brown suede uppers and Goodyear welt construction onto hard dark brown leather soles. The boots are derby-laced with flat olive woven laces through five sets of brass-grommeted eyelets on each shoe, plus a pair of gilted speed hooks that remain mostly covered by the trouser bottoms.

Adam’s not-a-lightsaber falls next to his borrowed suede boots.

Adam’s wardrobe in 2018 and 2022 is understandably contemporary (and relatively timeless) given that he pulled everything from the closet of his father, who presumably died between those two years. Nothing about his attire hints at anything futuristic, aside from the DNA-driven power key for his plane. Apropos his military service, the digital pendant is essentially a silver dog tag, shaped like an elongated octagon with a black silicone rubber border and worn on a black-finished ball-chain necklace.

Adam checks the status of his purloined jet.

The rest of Adam’s “jewelry” has more meaningful connections to his family, including the silver wedding ring symbolizing his marriage to Laura and his father’s Omega wristwatch.  Though the make is never mentioned by name, the Omega Speedmaster Professional worn by both the adult and adolescent Adams helps the latter identify the former as the older version of himself.

Wearing the accessories symbolizing his family’s significance to him—a wedding ring and his father’s Omega—Adam takes in his younger self’s wisdom during a night at the Pine Ridge motel.

A self-proclaimed science nerd like Louis may have chosen the Omega Speedmaster given its role as the official NASA-authorized “Moon watch” worn by the Apollo 11 astronauts during the lunar landing in 1969. Adam started wearing the chronograph after Louis died, perhaps giving the adolescent some comfort in the fact that his Omega was arguably the nicest watch worn by any kid—and likely any teacher—in the middle school where he faced such frequent bullying.

The Speedmasters seen on both Adams’ wrists have stainless steel 42mm cases, looking almost comedically oversized on the diminutive 12-year-old Adam’s left wrist but a little more at home with his adult counterpart. Encircled by a black tachymeter, the round black dial boasts three sub-registers—a 30-minute scale at 3:00, a 12-hour counter at 6:00, and a running seconds indicator at 9:00—and luminous non-numeric hour markers plus three dots at the 12 o’clock position.

Louis wore his Speedmaster on a black leather strap, as his sons would continue to do through adolescence and adulthood, though the adult Adam wears a heavy-duty smooth black leather NATO strap that could ostensibly be extended to wear on the outside of his flight suit while the younger Adam wears his father’s more conventional black textured leather bracelet.

A glimpse at the younger Adam’s wrist gives us an unblemished look at the family Omega.

Another sartorial highlight worth mentioning from The Adam Project appears when we encounter Louis in November 2018 instructing a class of college students, including the bespectacled Sophie (Esther Ming Li) who wears a gray crew-neck sweatshirt imprinted with a stenciled likeness of Nicolas Cage but captioned as “John Travolta”, a joke surely to resonate with fans of Face/Off as well as to Louis himself, who comments in the midst of answering her question: “I just got your shirt by the way, it’s very clever.”

Castor Troy—or should I say Sean Archer—gets some time to shine in the classroom, thanks to Sophie.

What to Imbibe

Adam takes some night air while sharing a room at the Pine Ridge motel with his father and his younger self, stepping outside to throw back a beer. The Adam Project provides some regional verisimilitude with Adam’s choice of beer from Ninkasi Brewing Company, an independently owned brewery in Eugene, Oregon founded in 2006. The white-and-blue label suggests that Adam may be drinking their standard pilsner or perhaps Pacific Rain, Ninkasi’s Northwest pale ale.

Adam keeps his 12-year-old self from grabbing his beer.

How to Get the Look

Ryan Reynolds as Adam Reed during the making of The Adam Project (2022)

Adam Reed pulls together a simple, comfortable, and—for him—meaningful “hero outfit”, consisting of durable and wearable pieces like the blanket-lined version of the Rogue Territory Ridgeline Supply Jacket made famous by 007 and paired with one of the most iconic watches in history, the “Moon watch” Omega Speedmaster.

• Tan waxed canvas Rogue Territory “Ridgeline” blanket-lined supply jacket with shirt-style collar, five branded nickel rivet buttons, decorative “watch chain” buttonhole, slotted breast pocket, side-entry curved patch hand pockets, and single-button squared cuffs
• Charcoal cotton crew-neck short-sleeve T-shirt
• Navy stretch cotton twill slim-fit trousers with extended hook-closure waistband tab, belt loops, side pockets, jetted back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Tobacco-brown suede chukka boots
• Silver digital dog tag on black ball-chain necklace
• Omega Speedmaster Professional chronograph watch with stainless steel 42mm case, black round dial with three sub-registers, and black leather strap

As of this writing in April 2022, Rogue Territory is sold out of the blanket-lined version as seen in The Adam Project but has plans to restock by September. In the meantime, you can find both versions of the tan waxed cotton Ridgeline supply jacket from the below retailers:

• Brooklyn Clothing Co. (unlined)
• Redcast Heritage (unlined)
• Rogue Territory (blanket-lined)
• Rogue Territory (unlined)
• Stag Provisions (blanket-lined)
• Stag Provisions (unlined)

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie, currently streaming on Netflix.

You can also read about other movies and TV shows that featured Rogue Territory jackets in this comprehensive roundup from James Bond Lifestyle.

The Quote

When a bad idea is the only idea, it becomes a great idea.

The post The Adam Project: Ryan Reynolds’ Rogue Territory Jacket appeared first on BAMF Style.

Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet in Titanic (1997)

Vitals

Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson, charismatic American artist

North Atlantic Ocean, April 1912

Film: Titanic
Release Date: December 19, 1997
Director: James Cameron
Costume Designer: Deborah Lynn Scott
Tailor: Dominic Gherardi

Background

110 years ago today, the sinking of the RMS Titanic resulted in the deaths of more than 1,500 passengers and crew. The global mourning and focus on transportation safety in the tragedy’s aftermath was only the tip of the proverbial iceberg, so to speak, as the disaster and those involved have continued to be mythologized in countless books, movies, plays, songs, and more.

For many recent generations, James Cameron’s 1997 blockbuster Titanic was their entry point for learning about the lavish ship and its fateful maiden voyage… though it’s been reported that there’s a distressing amount of people who believe the movie—and the eponymous liner—was entirely fictionalized.

Cameron went to painstaking lengths to recreate the ship and the events of its sinking as accurately as possible, though he knew that even this technological marvel of filmmaking wouldn’t be enough to draw the audiences that would make his passion project financially viable, so he centered the narrative on a fictionalized love story between Philadelphia socialite Rose DeWitt-Bukater (Kate Winslet) and the charming teenage drifter Jack Dawson (Leonardo DiCaprio), a self-described “tumbleweed blowin’ in the wind” whose poker hand landed him a third-class ticket on Titanic.

One of two iconic scenes set on Titanic‘s forecastle that launched a generation of reenactments from honeymoon cruises to booze cruises…

While I had once taken serious issue with this framing device, I’ve since come around to appreciate a) the need for such an angle to make the movie more marketable and b) the additional opportunities that Jack and Rose’s star-crossed love gave to editorialize on the dangers of social hierarchy, as plainly illustrated when comparing the survival rate of first-class passengers like Rose against the oft-neglected steerage class like Jack. (Don’t worry, you won’t forget his name; Rose says it at least 80 times during their 48 hours of acquaintanceship.)

The movie’s ostensible villain, Rose’s abusive fiancé—her fiancé!—Caledon Hockley (Billy Zane) is certain to remind us of this, smugly assuring his romantic foil that “I always win, Jack,” but it’s Jack who gets the last laugh. Once relegated to existing only in Rose’s memory, the Leomania that followed Titanic‘s release led to the discovery that there was indeed a “J. Dawson” aboard the Titanic, and his grave at Halifax remains one of the most visited among all who perished during the disaster. However, just as our fictional Chippewa Falls-born protagonist claimed no relation to the “Boston Dawsons”, evidently no one involved in making Titanic was aware of the existence of the Irish-born trimmer Joseph Dawson who was barely out of his teens when he died in the early morning hours of April 15, 1912.

What’d He Wear?

Titanic received the Academy Award for Best Costume Design, one of its 11 wins from 14 total nominations, recognizing the painstakingly researched and crafted work of costume designer Deborah Lynn Scott and her team. In addition to accurately dressing masses of people across two eras—don’t forget that the movie is framed by a “present day” deep-sea exploration!—Scott’s work aboard the Titanic included dressing the crew and the three passenger classes differentiated by wealth and status.

Among the challenges faced by Scott’s team was the fact that only the starboard side of Cameron’s full-size Titanic replica had been built to completion (due to the wind-blowing direction), so the scenes set at Southampton where the passengers boarded her port side had to be “flipped” in post-production, meaning that everything—sets, props, hair, and costumes—needed to be built as a mirror image to how it would have looked in real life; for costumes, this meant duplicate costumes with men’s buttons positioned on the left instead of right.

We meet Jack Dawson playing his fateful poker hand at a dockside pub in Southampton.

Costume #1: Southampton and Sinking

Jack Dawson’s primary costume throughout Titanic—seen when boarding on Wednesday, April 10, and again on Sunday, April 14, through the sinking—consists of a simple thin collarless shirt with his usual corduroy trousers and boots, occasionally supplemented by an unstructured jacket and waistcoat. Several versions of this outfit have been auctioned, with details from the below listings providing additional background for this post:

• Barneby’s (Shirt, Trousers)
• Heritage Auctions (Jacket, Shirt, Trousers)
• Heritage Auctions (Waistcoat, Shirt, Trousers, Suspenders)
• Nate D. Sanders (Shirt and Trousers)

Jack’s creamy white cotton broadcloth shirt is a “popover” style, an exaggerated version of today’s henley shirts but consistent with “negligee shirts” of the Edwardian era before men regularly wore shirts that fully buttoned up the front. Jack’s shirt has a large bib over the chest, patterned with taupe, white, and slate track stripes against a stone-colored ground. The bib closes with two flat white two-hole buttons with a third button positioned at the top on the round neckline. The full sleeves blouson at the wrists, where they fasten with single-button cuffs that Jack wears undone when rolling up his sleeves to sketch Rose in her stateroom.

Despite a history of sketching one-legged prostitutes naked in Paris, Jack doesn’t seem too comfortable when Rose requests that he draw her “like one of your French girls”. He’s dropped his suspenders and rolled up his sleeves, but he otherwise remains considerably more clothed than Rose.

The closest thing Jack has to a tailored jacket appears to be the slate-gray cotton twill jacket that he wears during the Southampton poker game that results in his running to board the ship with Fabrizio (Danny Nucci). A Heritage Auctions listing describes this “studio-distressed” jacket as made from gray chambray, though close-ups of Jack—particularly while angling for his full house—distinctively show a twill weave rather than chambray’s plain weave.

The unstructured single-breasted jacket is styled like a ventless suit coat, with notch lapels that often fold back over the three-button front, especially as Jack never wears the jacket closed. The lapels are finished with narrowly welted edges and a buttonhole through each. The set-in sleeves are finished at the shoulders with exposed seams more like a work shirt or casual jacket than the dressier shoulders of a suit jacket, especially as the cuffs are left plain with no buttons or vents. A patch pocket is slung low over the left chest, and there are larger patch pockets over both hips.

In search of Rose, Jack returns to the first-class section of the ship on the morning of Sunday, April 14, perhaps thinking his gray jacket and lighter shirt will provide a sense of formality though he can’t sartorially compete with the three-piece wool suits, stiff wing collars, and four-in-hand ties.

Jack only wears this forest green wool waistcoat (vest) when he boards the ship in Southampton. Tailored for DiCaprio to wear by Dominic Gherardi, this single-breasted waistcoat has short notch lapels that roll to a six-button front, though Jack affects a scrappier look by only wearing the top two buttons fastened. The waistcoat has four welted buttons and, as informed by a separate Heritage Auctions listing, a black fabric back and lining with an adjustable buckled strap.

Jack’s hunt for his and Fabrizio’s assigned cabin of G-60 would have been fruitless in real life as G-deck cabins were only numbered from 1-40 and from 200-260, skipping all numbers in between.

Jack attempts to return to the first-class section of the ship on Sunday, April 14, but his less formal dress and appreciate quickly flags him as a steerage passenger and he’s ordered to return to third-class. Now aware that he needs to be incognito to track down Rose, he outfits himself an unattended overcoat and black bowler hat from the A-Deck Promenade. Known alternately as a “bowler hat” (in the UK) or “derby hat” (in the U.S.), this round-crowned hat was developed by brother milliners Thomas and William Bowler in 1849 and spent the better part of the following century as popular business headgear among upper-class gentlemen on both sides of the Atlantic.

Jack’s purloined bowler hat, which looks almost endearingly out of place on him, is constructed of all-black felt with black grosgrain silk band and edge braiding.

I’d argue that mid-1990s Leo did not have the sort of face that was flattered by hats.

Even after Jack thankfully abandons the bowler hat in the ship’s gymnasium, he continues wearing the handsomely tailored overcoat, which Spicer Lovejoy (David Warner) explains by the tag is the “property of A.L. Ryerson”, specifically Arthur Ryerson, a prominent real-life first-class passenger who died during the disaster after ushering his wife and three children onto lifeboat number 4. (Fans of A Night to Remember may recall Second Officer Lightoller needing to be cajoled into allowing a 13-year-old boy to join his mother in the lifeboat; in real life, this was Ryerson’s son John, and Lightoller was considerably more hesitant to let the youngster onto the boat.)

Aside from the full evening dress he would later borrow for dinner, this “borrowed” double-breasted coat may be the most attractive piece of Jack’s costumes, an intentional contrast to the character’s own earthier, hard-wearing wardrobe. The woolen coat is constructed from a wide-scaled black and gray herringbone weave that presents an overall charcoal finish, with a wide-bellied shawl collar rather than now-more common notch or peak lapels.

While looking over the Heart of the Ocean, Jack receives an interesting proposition from Rose.

The double-breasted configuration closes through two of the six large black buttons, and there are two buttons at each cuff. The tailoring creates a strong, athletic silhouette by building out the shoulders with padding and roped sleeveheads, then suppressing the waist with a buttoned half-belt in the back above the long vent. Unfortunately for Jack, the coat’s set-in pockets have wide openings that allow Spicer to slip the Heart of the Ocean necklace in to frame him for robbery.

After the collision, Rose and Jack return to her family’s B-Deck suite, where Spicer Lovejoy signals to Cal that he’s already slipped the diamond necklace into the pocket of Jack’s stolen overcoat to frame him.

Costume #2: King of the World

Through the earlier days of the voyage, beginning with Jack famously declaring he’s “king of the world!” from the prow as Titanic sails away from Queenstown on Thursday, April 11, Jack wears an earthier outfit consisting of a russet collared popover shirt with his usual corduroys and a plaid mackinaw-style jacket, the latter particularly consistent with what a working-class kid from the Great Lakes region would have trusted. (For what it’s worth, this is my favorite of Jack’s on-screen attire.)

As Titanic steams away from Queenstown and deeper into the Atlantic, Jack and Fabrizio defy ship rules by charging forward on the forecastle to observe the ship’s prow… and the aquatic wildlife swimming out of its way.

Mackinaw jackets were developed in Michigan almost exactly a century before Titanic sailed when Captain Charles Roberts of the British Army requested that heavy wool blankets be requisitioned as outerwear for his soldiers stationed at Fort St. Joseph through the long winter of 1811 into 1812. Fur trader John Askin Jr. enlisted his wife Madeleine and a group of local Métis women to sew the coats, which were intentionally shorter than officers’ great coats to prevent the skirts getting caught in the snow. Named for the French pronunciation of the Mackinac region of present-day Michigan, these “mackinaw jackets” obtained their characteristic reddish plaid coloration when the original makers ran out of the necessary blue material to make the British soldiers’ coats.

The mackinaw jacket evolved beyond its original military-informed purpose to become a favorite among outdoorsmen, particularly those operating in the snowy upper Midwest regions of Michigan, Minnesota, and indeed Wisconsin, from which the fictional Jack Dawson hails. In 1912, the same year that Jack proclaimed his royal status from Titanic‘s forecastle, A.F. Wallace extolled the mackinaw jacket in Hunter-Trader-Trapper magazine when he wrote that “in no other garment is there so much all-around common sense for outdoor work in cold weather.”

Cut and styled like a naval pea coat, Jack’s thigh-length mackinaw jacket is patterned in a brown, black, and tan shadow plaid wool. The double-breasted front fastens high with two parallel columns of three black marbled buttons each. The coat has a broad ulster collar, slanted side-entry chest pockets, and straight-entry hip pockets. The sleeves are finished with a single vestigial button on each cuff, and the waist is suppressed by a half-belt sewn across the back.

A 2014 Live Auctioneers press release adds some context for the jacket’s relatively limited appearances (appearing only the “king of the world” scene and Jack’s subsequent rescue of Rose) as “the one-of-a-kind period coat was never duplicated for production.”

Jack bundles up for a chilly Friday night on Titanic‘s poop deck.

Given the cold April air on the night of Friday, April 12, when Jack fells compelled to help a suicidal Rose on the poop deck, Jack wears the additional layer of a knitted gilet. A gilet is a more function-oriented type of waistcoat or vest, typically worn for warmth rather than style.

Jack’s charcoal knitted gilet has a ribbed texture, with double sets of narrow white stripes. The mixed fabric and style recall Brown’s Beach Cloth, a rugged early 20th century fabric described by Heddels as “a proprietary two-ply weave blend of 70% wool and 30% cotton” introduced by Massachusetts entrepreneur William W. Brown, who debuted his two-pocket jacket and four-pocket vest in 1901. Though Brown’s original company has been defunct since 1960, its spirit lives on through modern manufacturers like Full Count & Co. who developed a nearly identical replication available at Clutch Cafe.

The edges are rolled in a dark brown sueded fabric, including around the armholes, around the outside, and encircling the four irregularly shaped patch pockets that each slant toward the center of the garment. The waist-length gilet closes with six gunmetal-finished snaps up the front from the waist to the gently dipped V-shaped neckline, though Jack wears the top few poppers undone.

The master-at-arms releases Jack from his shackles following the resolution of the poop deck incident, though Jack wouldn’t be so lucky two days later.

Jack is down to just his shirt sleeves when getting better acquainted with Rose on the Boat Deck on Saturday, April 13, showing more of the brown cotton canvas shirt that shines a purplish finish under the afternoon sun. This popover collared work shirt has a long placket that extends down to his stomach, with four smooth nickel rivet buttons including one at the top that fastens to one of two buttonholes, either against the neckline or on the elongated throat latch that extends from the left side of the collar.

Jack’s habit of wearing the top one or two buttons undone shows the top of his beige thermal cotton crew-neck T-shirt that he wears for warmth, with the frayed ends of each long sleeve showing when he unbuttons and rolls back the sleeves of his brown over-shirt. This shirt also has a patch pocket on each side of the chest with reinforced horizontal yokes across the tops.

Jack would have been the most casually dressed man on the first-class section of the boat deck while taking the air with Rose on Saturday afternoon.

Although he was dressed in the creamy white bib shirt during the sinking, Jack appears in this brown popover work shirt when Rose “returns” to Titanic at the end of the movie… intentionally left open to interpretation whether she’s dreaming or has died in her sleep.

Jack’s Everyday Trousers, Braces, and Boots

Although he alternates between his jackets, shirts, and waistcoats, Jack Dawson wears the same corduroy trousers, braces, and boots throughout his time on Titanic. Having originated among European sportsmen requiring something comfortable yet durable for outdoor pursuits, corduroy would have been an ideal cloth for a well-traveled man of limited means like Jack.

Jack’s tan trousers are constructed from a standard-wale corduroy, referring to the number of ridges found in one inch of his velveteen cotton cloth. Tailored by Dominic Gherardi, these high-waisted, flat-front trousers have a double-button front closure above the button-fly, and the only pockets are full-top “frog-mouth” or Western-styled pockets that gently slant against the top of each thigh, with a short split on each side that eases hand access.

After a lifetime of existing only in Rose’s dreams, Jack again appears to her where honor and glory are crowning time.

The trouser waistband has sets of two buttons on each side of the front to accommodate suspenders with an additional set in the back, each button flanking the notch of a split “fish-mouth” back. Rigged a few inches lower on the back is an integral cinch-strap to adjust the fit through a silver-toned buckle.

Jack tests the limits of his suspenders (braces)—or, more specifically, the trouser buttons they’re attached to—during the intensity of the sinking, but they serve him well; indeed, we see Jack is still wearing his suspenders holding up his trousers when he and Rose swim through the ice-cold water to perch her atop that controversial floating door. (Yes, there was technically room for him to fit, but the door would have likely lacked sufficient buoyancy to keep them both out of the water.)

These suspenders are made of tan elasticized fabric, patterned with three double sets of faint brown stripes, with brass adjusters and dark brown leather hardware, including the leather back patch and the hooks fastening to the buttons along the front and back fo the trouser waistband.

Jack and Rose allow themselves a brief moment to celebrate her surprising axemanship in freeing him from his imprisonment in the master-at-arms’ office, which Cameron intentionally moved from amidships to along the outside of the ship, so Jack would be able to observe the sinking ship’s water level through a porthole.

The trousers’ plain-hemmed bottoms cover the shafts of Jack’s well-traveled dark brown leather boots. These wingtip boots are derby-laced with dark brown woven laces up the mid-calf shafts. His taking the time to remove them—perhaps a performative tactic to show Rose that he intended, albeit unwillingly, to jump into the cold water to save her—signals to a suspicious Spicer Lovejoy that there was more to his and Rose’s story on the poop deck than they so clumsily explained.

“You’ll want to tie those,” a suspicious Lovejoy advises Jack after catching sight of his boots.

The “Snake Pit” Tailcoat

“You’re about to go into the snake pit… what are you planning to wear?” The helpful Molly Brown (Kathy Bates) asks Jack upon learning of his invitation to join them for dinner in the first-class dining room. As Jack indicates his casual cotton kit with a shrug, Molly shakes her head: “I figured, come on.”

The next we see, Molly is helping Jack into a black wool evening tailcoat, the pièce de résistance of the full evening dress ensemble he’s borrowed from her absent son.

Molly Brown finds use for her son’s full evening dress by helping Jack dress for dinner among the first-class “elite”.

“You shine up like a new penny!” Molly assures him, and the rig even passes muster with the pretentious Cal.

Cal: Well, it’s amazing! You could almost pass for a gentleman!
Jack: Almost…

Like Cal himself, Jack dresses in the expected formal uniform of Edwardian-era gentry with his white tie and tails. The black barathea wool evening tailcoat features silk-faced peak lapels, vestigial six-button double-breasted front, three-button cuffs covered in the same silk as those on the front, and two additionally decorative buttons above the tails in the back. His low-fastening three-button formal waistcoat is made from white piqué to match the self-tying bow tie and boasts a shawl collar—buttoned to the shoulders—and slim-welted hip pockets.

Jack takes Rose’s arm as the two descend Titanic‘s famed grand staircase to D-Deck for dinner.

The matching black formal trousers detailed with the requisite silk side braiding, are held up with black brocade silk suspenders best seen when Jack sheds the tailcoat, waistcoat, and tie for his exhausting “exertions belowdecks” with Rose and his fellow steerage passengers.

We also see more of the white cotton dress shirt, which buttons up the back so not to interrupt the stiff white front bib that’s detailed with same mother-of-pearl studs to match the links fastening his single cuffs. Though he keeps the shirt’s brass neck stud-buttons fastened, the stiff white wing collar eventually lives up to its name and evidently flies off of Mr. Dawson’s neck as collateral damage from his centrifugal dance with Rose.

Jack rids himself of his tailcoat, tie, and waistcoat for steerage revelry in the third-class general room.

Although the black patent leather side-button cap-toe ankle boots differ from Jack’s usual worn-in footwear, they serve him ably as dancing shoes. According to Gentleman’s Gazette, the half-century heyday of side-button boots lasted from the 1880s through the early 1930s, though they gradually fell out of popularity among all but the highest gentry following World War I.

A jig in third-class shows off Jack’s formal button-side boots.

What to Imbibe

I got everything I need right here with me. I got air in my lungs, a few blank sheets of paper. I mean, I love waking up in the morning not knowing what’s gonna happen or, who I’m gonna meet, where I’m gonna wind up. Just the other night I was sleeping under a bridge and now here I am on the grandest ship in the world having champagne with you fine people.

Almost on queue, a dining room steward appears over Jack’s shoulder with a bottle of Moët & Chandon, toward which Jack raises his crystal coupe (“I’ll take some more of that”) before establishing the evening’s toast:

I figure life’s a gift and I don’t intend on wasting it. You don’t know what hand you’re gonna get dealt next. You learn to take life as it comes at you… to make each day count.

Jack makes the most of his limited time in first class, pairing champagne with his caviar.

Despite the wealth of documentation around Titanic‘s menus, I’d had some difficulty finding a straight answer regarding what wines were officially served by White Star Line during the voyage. While Joy’s Joys of Wine shares that some Moët corks had been found among the wreckage, current consensus—among both Joy and Touton—is that the official champagne on the ship was Heidsieck “Gout Americain” Extra Dry, a sweet sparkling wine from the venerated Heidsieck & Co Monopole house.

Jack ably goes through the motions of first-class dining, though he and Rose appear considerably more comfortable swilling beer in steerage. Root beer was poured in Leo and Kate’s mugs to represent a more potent brew, suggested to be Bass Ale based on the bottles swung by their fellow revelers and the historical fact that 12,000 bottles of Bass Ale had been loaded aboard the ship for her maiden voyage.

As Rose wows Jack by downing her stout with less-than-ladylike efficiency, a third-class reveler behind him flashes a Bass Ale label, consistent with the thousands of bottles known to be aboard Titanic.

If you’re in the mood for something a little fancier to accompany your Titanic viewing party, there are obvious reasons why I’d recommend the Jack Rose cocktail. This applejack-based cocktail was contemporary to the Titanic, with early mentions including a 1905 article in the National Police Gazette citing its creation by New Jersey bartender Frank J. May before it was popularized through the roaring ’20s literary scene as a favorite of John Steinbeck and included in Ernest Hemingway’s novel The Sun Also Rises.

To mix a Jack Rose per Mr. Boston Official Bartender’s Guide, pour an ounce and a half of applejack brandy (I use Laird’s), a half-ounce of lemon or lime juice (I prefer lime), and a teaspoon of grenadine (I use Rose’s) into an ice-filled shaker, shake until ice-cold, and strain it into a chilled martini glass, which is then garnished with a lemon zest. Drinker beware: do not take a sip every time Jack or Rose say the other’s name, as you’ll be blotto before the ship even hits the iceberg.

How to Get the Look

Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson in Titanic (1997)

When not borrowing tailcoats or overcoats to fit in among Rose’s snobbish peers, Jack Dawson dresses comfortably in the scrappy but durable duds of an Edwardian-era drifter, comprised of hard-wearing workwear like jackets, waistcoats, and pullover shirts all worn with his suspender-appointed corduroy trousers and well-traveled wingtip boots.

• Gray cotton twill single-breasted 3-button sport jacket with notch lapels, patch breast pocket, patch hip pockets, plain cuffs, and ventless back
• Forest green wool single-breasted 6-button waistcoat with notch lapels and four welted pockets
• Ecru cotton broadcloth pullover “negligee shirt” with striped 3-button collarless bib and button cuffs
• Tan corduroy cotton high-waisted flat-front trousers with external suspender buttons, two-button closure, “frogmouth” full-top front pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Brown leather wingtip mid-calf derby boots
• Tan striped suspenders with brass adjusters and dark brown leather hooks

Many pieces inspired by Jack’s costumes were contemporarily recreated by J. Peterman, and these occasionally are auctioned as seen in these Heritage Auctions listings for the “King of the World” outfit and the sinking outfit.

While much of Jack’s costumes are understandably rooted in 1912 fashions, there are pieces offered by modern retailers (as of April 2022) that can add a touch of Titanic style to your closet:

• Jackets and Vests:
  • Buck Mason Felted Chore Coat in in charcoal merino wool (Buck Mason)
  • Burgus Plus BP16906 Jazz Nep HBT French Work Jacket in gray cotton blend (Clutch Cafe)
  • J. Crew Knit Blazer in heathered carbon poly/cotton (J. Crew Factory)
  • Full Count & Co. Brown’s Beach BBJ9-001 Early Vest (Clutch Cafe)
• Shirts:
  • Everlane Flannel Popover Shirt in heathered nutmeg (Everlane)
  • Post Overalls Navy Cut Shirt in olive cotton poplin (Clutch Cafe)
  • RRL Michelle Bib Shirt in blue/white stripe cotton (STAG Provisions)
• Trousers:
  • Belafonte Ragtime Clothing 1890 Jute Cotton Aged Canvas Trousers in beige (Clutch Cafe)
  • J. Peterman Corduroy French Work Pants in pale gold (J. Peterman Company)
• Boots:
  • Aldo Salinger Boot in cognac leather (DSW)
  • Allen Edmonds Dalton Weatherproof Dress Boot with Dainite Rubber Sole in brown leather (Amazon)
  • Thursday Wingtip Boot in brown full-grain leather (Thursday Boot Co.)

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

I also highly recommend reading Walter Lord’s 1955 nonfiction volume A Night to Remember, followed by watching the 1958 docudrama inspired by the book that remains a definitive cinematic adaptation of the tragedy. One of my favorite movies, A Night to Remember stars Kenneth More as Titanic‘s Second Officer Charles Lightoller among other recognizable faces like Honor Blackman, Bernard Fox, and David McCallum.

Cameron had been inspired to make Titanic after watching A Night to Remember, and you can see many parallels of the earlier film in his 1997 blockbuster, as this excellent side-by-side video illustrates.

For real enthusiasts, I recommend watching either (or both) of last night’s real-time livestreams of intensely detailed animations of the sinking backed by commentary from Titanic experts, including Part-Time Explorer and Titanic: Honor and Glory.

The Quote

When you got nothin’, you got nothin’ to lose.

The post Titanic – Jack Dawson’s Steerage Style appeared first on BAMF Style.

Danny McBride as Jesse Gemstone on The Righteous Gemstones, Episode 1.07: “And Yet One of You Is a Devil”

Vitals

Danny McBride as Jesse Gemstone, crude megachurch pastor

Charleston, South Carolina, Easter 2019

Series: The Righteous Gemstones
Episode: “And Yet One of You Is a Devil” (Episode 1.07)
Air Date: September 29, 2019
Director: Jody Hill
Creator: Danny McBride
Costume Designer: Sarah Trost

Background

Now when I say “Easter”, a lot of images come to mind. The bunny. Easter egg hunts. Them marshmallow Peeps that taste better when they’re stale.

Created by Danny McBride, who wrote or co-wrote every episode in addition to starring, The Righteous Gemstones sends up American televangelism and megachurch culture through McBride’s usual comedic style that characterized his previous shows Eastbound & Down and Vice Principals.

A twisted take on if King Lear had been written about Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, The Righteous Gemstones centers around the fictional titular family led by patriarch Eli Gemstone (John Goodman), a sincere if overly prideful pastor who seemingly failed to pass his altruism on to his three children: the insecure youth pastor Kelvin (Adam Devine), the chaotic Judy (Edi Patterson), and the crude Jesse (McBride) who, by virtue of being the eldest, seems poised to succeed his aging father despite his debauched lifestyle.

After spending the season struggling as the target of a blackmail scheme gone awry, secretly engineered by his bitter son Gideon (Skyler Gisondo), Jesse’s ambitions are realized as Eli grants him the enviable task of delivering the sermon on Easter Sunday.

“It’s the most gigantic-est of deals,” Jesse assures his returned son’s mysterious friend Scotty (Scott MacArthur) of the service attended by 17,000 in person and broadcast to six million viewers around the world. Little does Jesse know that Gideon and Scotty are confederates in a new plan to steal the millions anticipated to be comprise the Easter Sunday collection. At the eleventh hour, a guilty Gideon attempts to come clean about the nature of his partnership with Scotty, but Jesse misinterprets the awkward exchange as Gideon’s attempt to come out to him:

Gideon, I love you. No matter who you are, or what you do, or who you do.

On that message of acceptance, Jesse cuts the conversation short before learning what Gideon actually wanted to reveal, taking the stage for his much-anticipated sermon.

What’d He Wear?

The Gemstones dress in their Sunday best for Easter, whether that means purple sequins for Judy or different interpretations of all-white tailoring for Eli and Jesse. Given his age and status, Eli is arguably the most tasteful dresser of the family, favoring conservative suits and sport jackets, polos and khakis, all tailored to flatter John Goodman’s frame.

On the other hand, Jesse is intentionally dressed to present the image of a past-his-prime redneck who doesn’t know what to do with all his wealth, preferring the daily attire of loud, gut-busting shirts—some embroidered with his initials—and white belts to match his bleached leather boots.

“McBride wanted Jesse specifically to have a flamboyant, vintage Southern look—think Memphis Mafia suits with Conway Twitty helmet hair,” wrote Gabriella Paiella for GQ. Indeed, Jesse’s image of success is evidently rooted in country music icons of yesteryear, his ballooned graying coif borrowed from Twitty while costume designer Sarah Trost shared that Elvis Presley provided considerable inspiration for Jesse’s costumes.

White is something of a status color for Jesse Gemstone, as indicated not just by his belt and boots but also his Dodge Challenger and the decision to dress his family in all white for their tacky family portrait session. Given that knowledge, it makes sense that Jesse would outfit himself in all white for that most auspicious of liturgical occasions: the Easter Sunday sermon.

“Can’t get nothin’ past me,” Jesse commends himself before taking the stage to deliver the Easter sermon in what he undoubtedly believes to be a resplendent white brocade three-piece dress suit.

Jesse wears a creamy white brocade three-piece suit, an even more flamboyant co-opt of the the classic televangelist look as lampooned by Wayne Newton as “Professor” Joe Butcher in Timothy Dalton’s second movie as James Bond, Licence to Kill.

Though the cut and styling are consistent with a three-piece lounge suit or business suit, more formal cues are incorporated via the cloth-covered buttons and the jacket more closely echoing a dinner jacket with its smooth silk-faced shawl collar, single-button front closure, and straight jetted hip pockets. The breast pocket is welted in a smooth silk like the collar, dressed with a beige self-checked silk pocket square folded into multiple points. The jacket has front darts to shape the silhouette and a single back vent. The four “kissing” buttons on each cuff are covered in the same silk as the single button on the front.

Jesse’s suit has a matching brocade waistcoat (vest) with six covered buttons up the front that he wears fully fastened. (Sartorial purists consider buttoning the lowest button a no-no… but I imagine that wouldn’t be the only issue purists take with Jesse’s outfit!) Consistent with his spirit of over-ornamentation, Jesse wears a pocket watch on a chain strung “single Albert”-style through the fourth buttonhole down and carried in the left of two jetted pockets.

The jacket and waistcoat generally cover the top of Jesse’s matching brocade suit trousers, though we can ascertain that they have a flat front, side pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms that break over the top of his usual white boots, which contrast less here than they typically do with his daily apparel.

Jesse’s icy-colored spread-collar shirt is just a pale shade of blue away from being white like the rest of his suit, with a self-pattern that reflects under the stage lights shining on the pulpit. He wears an ecru silk tie with a textured weave suggesting grenadine.

Jesse signals his liturgical leadership with an ornate gold cross worn around his neck on a thick gold rope-chain necklace, suspended over mid-chest and worn under his shirt collar but over top his tie, which costume designer Sarah Trost explained to GQ “was a very Elvis thing to do.”

Jesse almost certainly wears his usual array of necklaces under his shirt, but he has enough gold flashing from his hands that we can focus just on what we see here. He rotates through a number of rings, sporting a quartet on Easter—one on each pinky, and one on each ring finger—all yellow gold. The two rings on his left hand look a little chunkier, with large diamonds shining from the pinky ring and a band of diamonds around the center of what might be his wedding band.

On his right wrist, Jesse wears a gold chain-link bracelet with his initials “J.S.G.” etched on the ID plate. Although he does appear to be wearing a pocket watch in his waistcoat, he still wears his usual yellow gold Rolex Day-Date “President” wristwatch on his left wrist, so named for the distinctive curved three-piece “Presidential” link bracelet that was introduced in tandem with the Day-Date in the late ’50s and has been favored with executives both real (e.g., LBJ and Dick Cheney) and fictional (Tony Soprano).

Jesse’s sunglasses are distinctive enough that I imagine they could be easily identified by someone more expert than I am, but they struck me as a more squared-off variant of the unique Vuarnet Edge as worn by Daniel Craig’s James Bond, though they also look like they could be a product from Neostyle, the German eyewear company that developed the striking “Neostar 2” frame popularized by Elvis in the ’70s.

Similar to products by Carrera and Cazal, Jesse’s sunglasses consist of black-wired rims overlaid atop a squared aviator-style frame.

How to Get the Look

Danny McBride as Jesse Gemstone on The Righteous Gemstones, Episode 1.07: “And Yet One of You Is a Devil”

Looking to turn heads with your Easter Sunday fit? You could find some taste at the heart of Jesse Gemstone’s pale three-piece suit, or you could go full Gemstone with every garish detail you can think of: brocade fabric from shoulders to shins, gold jewelry wherever you can fit it, and your shiniest white boots to complete the look.

• Cream white brocade dress suit:
  • Single-breasted dinner jacket with silk-faced shawl collar, silk-covered single-button closure, silk-welted breast pocket, straight jetted hip pockets, silk-covered 4-button “kissing” cuffs, and single vent
  • Single-breasted waistcoat/vest with six silk-covered buttons, notched bottom, and two lower pockets
  • Flat front trousers with side pockets and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Ice-blue self-patterned shirt with spread collar
• Ecru grenadine-woven silk tie
• Beige tonal-checked silk pocket square
• White leather boots
• Gold ornate cross on thick gold rope-chain necklace
• Gold pocket watch on gold “single Albert” chain
• Rolex Day-Date “President” yellow gold wristwatch with round gold dial on three-piece link bracelet
• Four gold rings
• Black-wired and gold-framed square aviator sunglasses

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the series, streaming on HBO Max.

The Quote

A foe can plan your destruction, but only a loved one can break your heart.

The post The Righteous Gemstones: Jesse Gemstone’s White Easter Suit appeared first on BAMF Style.