Robert De Niro as Max Cady in Cape Fear (1991)
Vitals
Robert De Niro as Max Cady, psychopathic parolee
New Essex, North Carolina, Summer 1991
Film: Cape Fear
Release Date: November 15, 1991
Director: Martin Scorsese
Costume Designer: Rita Ryack
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
Happy birthday to Robert De Niro, born August 17, 1943. One of the prolific actor’s less-discussed but still acclaimed performances is his Academy Award-nominated characterization of the dangerously psychotic Max Cady in Cape Fear, Martin Scorsese’s 1991 remake of the 1962 thriller and the 7th of ten collaborations to date between De Niro and Scorsese.
The character was introduced in John D. MacDonald’s 1957 novel The Executioners, which was faithfully adapted five years later as Cape Fear, starring Robert Mitchum as Cady, a criminal imprisoned for rape who spends his years of internment learning how to manipulate the legal system so he can seek revenge against the defense attorney he felt failed to adequately represent him, Sam Bowden (Gregory Peck).
Though the parts of Max and Sam were recast in the 1991 update with Robert De Niro and Nick Nolte, respectively, Scorsese and casting director Ellen Lewis paid tribute to J. Lee Thompson’s original by casting Mitchum and Peck in supporting roles.
As Sam becomes to understand that he and his family are being stalked by Max, he alerts the police who are legally unable to do anything though Mitchum’s character Lieutenant Elgart quips that Max will “feel about as welcome around here as a case of yellow fever.”
What’d He Wear?
Costume designer Rita Ryack effectively dresses Max Cady as someone who would not have bothered to update his wardrobe in the 14 years since he was sent to prison, typically clad in fashions of the mid-to-late 1970s as he stalks the Bowden family across North Carolina. This often means shirts with brash prints or unique details, though one of the more understated pieces is the white terrycloth shirt that Max wears when Sam has him arrested for poisoning their dog and while subsequently embarrassing Max during an Independence Day parade.
Following its effectiveness as a toweling cloth, terrycloth was increasingly used for men’s leisurewear through the mid-20th century, gaining a strong foothold through the 1960s and ’70s as worn on screen by icons like Sean Connery’s James Bond to Alain Delon in Plein soleil, though the style was generally passé by the early ’90s when Max Cady pulled this white terrycloth cotton sport shirt from his closet. The short-sleeved shirt has a straight hem and four white buttons up the plain front, leaving the top open at the camp collar. There are two squared button-through patch pockets positioned over the hips, each with a straight yoke across the top.
While terrycloth shirts may be having a modern renaissance, Max doesn’t fare as fashionably well below the waist in his flared salmon-colored trousers, white loafers, and garish animal-print underpants. Made from a slubby polyester, these flat-front trousers have slanted front pockets, jetted back pockets (with a button through the left one), and flared bottoms finished with turn-ups (cuffs).
After he is brought into police custody, Max is forced to strip down to his underwear. He undoes the hidden double hooks that fasten the wide extended waistband tab, unzips, and pulls down his salmon trousers to stand defiant in front of the investigators wearing nothing but his bright-red leopard-print silky polyester briefs.
Max maintains the outmoded idiosyncrasy of his apparel by stepping out in white leather loafers that, while perhaps not fashionable for the early ’90s, are still seasonally appropriate for a warm summer day. These moc-toe slip-ons have hard brown leather soles and uppers decorated with a narrow white strap over each instep, detailed with a squared gold-toned buckle on the outer side of each shoe. He wears them with plain white socks.
Production photo of Robert De Niro in Cape Fear (1991).
Max frequently wears a white Greek fisherman’s cap, a distinctive mariner’s peaked cap distinguished by its low, soft crown and braided band around the front. Though these caps date to at least the early 19th century when they were favored by workers and seamen, they also garnered a countercultural association from the 1950s when they were increasingly worn by bikers, greasers, folk musicians, Rastafarians, and hipsters.
According to the inventory of De Niro’s screen-worn costumes, props, and personal effects at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas-Austin, the Cape Fear hat was made by the Greek company Aegean. (Among other outfitters, Village Hat Shop has sold Aegean fisherman’s caps like this since the 1980s.)
Aegean crafts the caps in wool and cotton for wear in cool and warm weather, respectively, with Max understandably opting for the cooler-wearing cotton for the heat of a North Carolina summer. The main components of the hat are all white cotton twill, detailed with a white satin braided band around the front that connects to a large button on each side. The bill is also decorated with a decoratively textured satin ribbon.
Max also wears his usual sporty black-framed aviator-style sunglasses with teardrop-shaped iridescent mirrored lenses, likely made by Carrera based on the gold vertical capsule-shaped logo over the bridge and the Italian designer’s association with this style of eyewear.
On his left wrist, Max wears a black-and-gold dive watch that I’ve seen suggested to be one of the “Black Coral” 1000 Series divers made by Heuer and TAG Heuer through the 1980s. As a response to the ’70s “quartz crisis” and the ongoing popularity of Rolex divers, Heuer launched the quartz-powered 1000 Series Professional in 1979, leading to a revival of the brand’s popularity that continued after it was acquired by Techniques d’Avant Garde in 1985, forming TAG Heuer S.A.
One of the most distinctive variations was the ref. 980.029N (and the smaller ref. 980.028N for women), characterized by its stainless steel case and bracelet coated in black PVD with gold-plated accents that resulted in the “Black Coral” nickname. As well as the gold-plated crown flanked by black-coated guards, the 37mm case is adorned with a gold rotating bezel presenting a black insert, framing the round black matte dial with its luminous non-numeric hour indices and white-wheeled date window at the 3 o’clock position.
The wide arrangement of the gold-lettered logo at the 12 o’clock position on De Niro’s screen-worn watch suggests to me that he may not be wearing a Heuer or TAG Heuer (as these have a more “stacked” logo appearance), though the strongest point in favor of the Heuer/TAG Heuer theory is his watch’s unique five-piece bracelet with its three rows of black PVD-coated links separated by narrower gold links, echoing the style of the Jubilee-style bracelets on the “Black Coral” Heuers.
Whether De Niro actually wore a “Black Coral” or a different watch with a similar aesthetic, I’d recommend reading more about the TAG Heuer “Black Coral” in these entries from Analog Shift and Hodinkee.
How to Get the Look
Robert De Niro and Nick Nolte in Cape Fear (1991)
Max Cady’s often-chaotically outdated wardrobe works with his personality, illustrating a man rooted in the era before he lost more than a decade of it to justice being served against him. Even if no one else is, he’s still going to dress for summer in his fisherman’s cap, oversized aviators, terrycloth shirt, flared trousers, and white slip-ons.
- White terrycloth cotton short-sleeved shirt with camp collar, four-button plain front, and two button-through squared patch hip pockets
- Salmon slubby polyester flat-front trousers with belt loops, extended waist tab with hidden double-hook closure, slanted front pockets, jetted back pockets (with button-through left), and flared turn-ups/cuffs
- White leather moc-toe loafers with gold buckle-detailed instep straps
- White socks
- Bright-red (with black leopard print) silky polyester underwear briefs
- White cotton twill Greek fisherman’s cap
- Black-framed Carrera-style sporty aviator sunglasses with teardrop-shaped iridescent mirrored lenses
- Black PVD-coated stainless steel dive watch with gold-plated rotating bezel (with black insert), black matte dial (with luminous non-numeric hour indices and white 3:00 date window), and black-and-gold five-piece link bracelet
Do Yourself a Favor and…
Check out the movie.
The Quote
Hot as a firecracker on the Fourth of July!
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