Welcome to the Fashion Institute of Technology's
Fashion Culture series I'm
Valerie Steele director of the museum at FIT
and I'm really delighted to be introducing my friend Hal
Rubenstein who always fills the room
he's one of the founding editors of in style
magazine he's written for every important
magazine since then and is also
known for his really beautiful and intelligent
books about fashion
Hal is an expert on fashion
film food you're in for
an absolutely delightful evening so please join me
in welcoming Hal Rubenstein
Hi
Good evening hi
whenever I interview potential hires at in style
one of the questions I always ask
is what's you're favorite film in fashion
actually it was a trick question
because I almost always knew the answer and I didn't wanna hear it
oh I just love breakfast at tiffany's audrey hepburn is an absolute goddess
of course she is who doesn't love audrey
hepburn it's like saying designers hate silk or
meryl streep is overrated
but first of all breakfast at
breakfast at tiffany's is a terrible movie
ok it really is it twists Truman
Capote's words into knots Holly's not nasty
enough George Peppard isn't gay enough they screwed up the ending
and Mickey Rooney as a chinese landlord is just
I can't think of anything more racist than if I put myself in blackface
and went to an open call to play effie in a road company
of dreamgirls I mean that's how bad it is
what we love about breakfast at tiffany's
is moon river
Hepburn's irresistible vulnerability
and above all it's how she's always flawless
and the essence of chic and I promise you that is the only
time I will use this word this afternoon
and one other thing but however gorgeous she is
in Tiffany's the look that she is most
known for is not something she can claim
over 100 years ago Coco Chanel
and Jean Patou created the little black
dress and just Coco threw in pearls for good keeping
ok and you know this everyone in this room
everyone in your family everyone in your family album
and being that this is new york probably everyone you know
has at least one little black dress hidden somewhere
so stylish as she is it's really hard to claim
that unless you own something at home that's something like this
ok audrey hepburn stardom and
influence on women in the 60s
is really not much
so who did influence well
there are plenty of women and I'm gonna show you some some
you'll remember some you don't but they all matter
big time so for nostalgia fans
get ready for those of you young enough
who have to google please wait until after this is over
here it goes to begin with
I'm gonna ask you who is the actress
who ruled the box office in the early sixties who was
the number one box office attraction
for actually the first half of the decade
and did it playing an independent
single working woman on the screen one of the first
there you go doris day
before ms magazine before Gloria Steinem
before betty freidan there was doris in pillow talk
jan morrow a succesful interior decorator
a woman large and in charge during the
the same era that women of her fairness
were right across the street being harassed as secretaries in mad men
but not doris though
Jan's housekeeper who was always played by someone
like Thelma ritter which required
that you be always sassy and eternally drunk
insisted that "the only thing worse
than a woman living alone is a woman insisting that she
likes it" but doris is breaking ground
while her first screen success pegged her as the peanut butter girl next door
pillow talk saw a transformation of
her because of the producer ross hunter
who claimed that despite her squeaky clean image
that doris had "one of the wildest asses in hollywood
and you thought the president was the only one who was classy"
and he was determined to "chic her up"
that's his quote not mine ok
and expose her latent sex appeal so that
American women would look at her and go look what happened to doris
maybe I can do that too
now if you don't remeber pillow talk as a feminist trac
that's because and if you haven't seen it you really should because it's delicious
that's because it was one of the first in a genre
that dominated the decade it was called a
sex comedy which sounds really bizarre
when you realize that nobody in these movies was getting any
ok but it's really just about sexual tension
ok there's jan morrow there's brad allen
and they don't really and they don't really meet cute as much as they sort of
meet antagonistically because they share a phone line and I know this may be
inconceivable to some of you with
with cell phones but there was a period in this country
where people actually strangers even actually shared
a communal phone line now this really shouldn't have
been so awful considering that the person she shared the phone with
was Rock Hudson who's voice bascially was phone sex
but no
but Brad was a rake ok
there was a different girl everyday he would call and she would get really ticked off
so no surprise she wasn't having it besides
she was wound so tight that initially at the start
of the film if her collars were any higher she'd almost choke to death
so she hates him but oddly enough they'd never met
so in the classic sort of shakespearean manner of mistaken identity
they finally do meet
in a bar with brad pretending
that he is a wealthy
incredibly shy obviously virginal
maybe even gay Texas oil man with the
perfect porno name of Rex Stetson
he is instantly knocked out by her and thank you ross hunter
what's the first shot he sees of her is her ass while she's dancing
so they meet and he is guileless he
constantly steers clear of the bedroom ok
he's always ridiculously polite to her as that shy
Texas oil man would be which makes her crazy
so a frustrated jan decides to pursue him
which means that doris becomes one of the
first modern screen females
to actually be the sexual aggressor ok
so out go the peter pan collared suits and in comes
basically the the green
opera coats the mixed tight sheaths
scoop neck and strapless dresses many of which look like they could be an
inspiration for Jacqueline kennedy's wardrobe
because they are pure sixties dior
blessed minimalism and the great thing about minimalism
in any decade is that it really looks
last season or vintage so as popular as these
clothes were then you could still wear them now
and that feathery hair my mother had that hairdo like forever she was in red
she would do it on Wednesdays right before she went to play mah-jongg
so to achieve this influential wardrobe
ok hunter brought in designer Jean Louis
who created if you remember rita Hayworth's black
blame it on mame dress from Gilda
and also did like Marlene Dietrich sort of
sheer concert gown and
it's one thing for Rita Hayworth and Elizabeth Taylor to wear
a strapless it's quite another for doris day
no wonder she ends this film
in rock's arms wearing pajamas getting carried to his apartment
you see in sex comedies there really is a happy ending
you just never get to see it
but two things to note
when I said that the radiant star was large I wasn't kidding
doris was 5 foot 7 and weighed 135 pounds
and actually she was a size 8 or 10
look at her she is a knockout
and as normal then as she would be now
which just goes to show how seriously we have screwed up
our concepts of beauty womanliness
self-esteem and health
what makes this film
so stupid grin wonderful
is the lustrous pairing of doris day and rock hudson
emma stone and ryan gosling are ok they really are
but this couple has magic
right up there with Astaire and Rogers
tracy and hepburn but with even better wardrobes day and
hudson made three more films together and they became
life long friends two months before hudson became
the first celebrity to die of aids
he actually agreed to be doris's first guest
on her cable show that was devoted to pets
and as frail and as sunken and as ghostly as he was
she looked at him
as if he was still handsome
we had so much fun making those movies we should do it again
if only
now there is one star who's career never seemed to need a wardrobe makeover
has anyone ever seemed more bored and yet more desirable
leaning up against the doorway wearing a lace slip than elizabeth taylor
but who can blame her butterfield 8 is a rotten film
and though not quite laughable enough
to be watchable taylor even said so
yet she won an academy award for this performance
mainly because it was a consolation price for losing
the year before for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
and then subsequently she almost died on the operating table
four times until there was an emergency tracheotomy
which occurred right around the time that this film was released
ok now add to that tabloid news the fact
that this Lugubrious drama cast her as a high
class prostitute ok when in reality
she had been simultaneously cast as a home-wrecker
for having taken away debbie reynolds husband eddie fisher
after the death of her husband mike todd
so it was husband number 4 at age 29
and if that's not juicy enough fisher's co-star
fisher actually is in this movie and he is laughable
so forget the script it's no wonder that
this movie became a must see smash
and with taylor at the height of her beauty sales
of lace slips and lingerie stored dolce and gabbana
calvin klein victoria secret bow down
to your queen you might not be here
if it wasn't for her by the way after the
tracheotomy healed she was finally available to
begin production on her next movie and that movie was cleopatra
where she got to meet this guy named richard burton
so bye eddie and hello husband number 5 and 6
next to next to this dress
elizabeth taylor's slip is a burka ok
marilyn monroe went to see designer john louis
that same john louis who worked with doris and rita and
told him that she needed a very special dress
but she wouldn't tell him where she was going
or why she needed it
what she did was that what she did say
though was that wanted a "historical
dress a dress that was dazzling a dress
that only marilyn monroe would wear" marilyn
did have a habit of speaking of herself in the third person
which speaks volumes about an identity crisis
but that's another lecture so but her
reason for asking for this dress was that she
had been asked to sing at john kennedy's
intimate birthday party for 15,000 people at the madison square
garden in 1952 but given her
affections for the president
she didn't even want the producers to know what she was
cooking up so when they asked her
nervously what she would be wearing because after all this was
and event for the president of the united states
remember when that sounded classy
monroe reached into her tote and pulled out a
high neck black Norman Norell and everybody was fine
and then she went right over to John Louis to say ok what do we got
what jean louis had cooked up was a gown
made of a knit fabric called a knit nude mesh called
souffle
cher used it later that would be molded
around monroe's body now because the actress didn't wear
underwear at certain
points they had to put 20 layers of souffle
here 20 layers of souffle there 200 pieces
extra pieces so she could move and stretch without over exposure
and then they after they took this on her body
which she stood there for hours doing then they had to hand
bead and sequin 2,500
2,500 brilliants in a random strategic pattern
this process took one month and marilyn
paid for it herself $12,000
now imagine $12,000 50
years ago but sometimes you actually get what you paid for
when people talk about this very famous
presidential birthday
they never seem to recall or ever tell you
that the other people on the bill that night were jack benny
ella fitzgerald peggy lee jimmy durante and Ethel Merman
oh and Maria Callas for those of you too young to know who any
of those people are it would be the equivalent of beyonce
jerry seinfeld Audra McDonald and celine dion
alright that's the best I can do here
but the only one anyone seems to remember
is her because once she strode on stage
in that spotlight
wearing this dress that one senator called skin and beads
and sang the slowest breathiest and now most imitated
version of happy birthday mister president
women in the audience gasped and the men just drooled
in 1999 this gown sold
at christie's for 1.2 million dollars
the gown was put up for auction this november
and was sold yet again for 4.8
million dollars
Now in 1962 sex appeal took
a turn away from voluptuousness
so drastic in fact that it might
actually be considered kind of pervy
but pervy in a weirdly appealing way in fact
whether they know it or not Britney Spears
Demi Lovato Selena Gomez and Ariana Grande
all owe their careers to the russian novelist Vladimir Nabokov
and the brilliant film director Stanley Kubrick in
1955 Nabokov wrote a novel about a literature professor
named humbert humbert who becomes smitten
no becomes no he becomes
ridiculously stupidly pathetically in love
with this intellectually bland irresistibly dimpled
apple sweet 12 year old a nymphet
as he coined the word named dolores hays
if none of this rings a bell then you may know her
by the name of the novel or her nickname
lolita
the novel was a scandal denounced
as disgusting in the new york times to even temporarily
banned in france that's going a lot ok
if you actually take it just by plot line
it really is kind of repellent but Nabokov
used this set up as a way to lampoon every part of American
culture in the 50s that celebrated normalcy
he wanted to make it perverse everything from food to
music to friendship to sex became twisted in this
prose well t's one thing to make lascivious pictures in your head
while you're reading a book and it's another to see them realized
on the screen and believe it or not back then
in 1955 1960 there still was an
organization in hollywood called the legion of decency
and if your film was given a condemned stamp
churches in america would broadcast that you weren't that their
congregations weren't allowed to go so it would hurt on top of that
every big actor in hollywood who was requested to play humbert
said no Cary Grant rex harrison Laurence Olivier
everybody was too afraid of their reputation being sullied
luckily for kubrick his first choice wass a british
actor named james mason who actually read the book unlike the rest of them
and actually loved it
and he wanted to do it and then kubrick did
5 clever things to make this movie happen
first of all he paid the cinema hating Vladimir Nabokov
$150,000 to shut the hell up and
extensively partially write a screenplay though Kubrick really did most of it
two though the story takes place in america
Kubrick went and moved the entire production shoot
to london this way remember we didn't have emails
and dropbox and anythings like that so this way
the people at MGM couldn't see the dailies
number three he actually made humbert fall in love with lolita
right from the beginning so as
weird as that may be it did sort of create a vulnerability
and a certain sympathy but even to make it easier
knowing that he couldn't get away with a 12 year old on the screen
he decided to bump up her age about two years
and then he hired a 14 year old actress named Sue Lyon
who actually looks like she could probably win
senior class prom queen ok and so
now the lusting wasn't such a stretch
and then when the film was ready for release
Kubrick launched an ad campaign that brilliantly played
right into everyone's doubts the public's doubts
and the curiosity of what they could possibly do
using a close up of Lyon sucking on a lollipop looking
suggestively over a pair of heart shaped glasses he added the
tag line how did they make a movie of lolita
it worked
though the legion did condemn the film and it was declared for adults
only so it's star couldn't even attend
it's premiere Kubrick crafted this wicked black comedy
about America's sexual and cultural excesses that filled
it with so many twists that it irritating people
that you actually wound up siding with or at least understanding
why Humbert looked for solace in this seductive
but basically plain and vapid girl oddly enough
Kubrick would dress this full bodied
Lolita rather demurely which only made her more erotic
the mode of eroticism influenced the fame of models
like Jean Shrimpton and Twiggy in the 60s and
70s and that lead directly to a 14 year old
brooke shields later bending over suggestively in a pair of jeans
saying what comes between me and my calvins nothing
and then finally leading up to an 18
year old blonde in a school girl uniform asking us to
hit me baby one more time and oops I did it again
spears is now over 30 and safely ensconced in las vegas
pretending to dance and sing
while her fans come by the thousands to relive their youth
taylor swift and katy perry have actually worn
those heart shaped glasses and as an interesting post script
sue lyon the film's original lolita wound
up marrying a prison inmate in 1973 and then
divorced him after he surprisingly escaped and robbed a bank
see so perverse love isn't just found
in novels
now here's another take on a man
on a man obsessed that this time it ends with an actress
achieving stardom
the first broadway musical I ever saw was bye bye
birdie which had a
ripped from the headlines plot though not in that kind of law and order
svu manner
if anything it had rift on the idea
of elvis presley had been going to the army
so the musical created a fictional
version called conrad birdie and they went looking for a
classic nationwide search
to find the perfect teenager to give the less than
perfect teen idol conrad a kiss goodbye
before reporting to duty in the broadway show the girl
chosen Kim Macafee is a virginal teen from sweet apple ohio
and it's actually a supporting role
with 2 songs the leads in the
show were dick van dyke and Chita Rivera
but
when it was time for the film well Chita was out because she was just a
broadway person and they wanted to bring in janet lee because the director
had already worked with her
but the film casted 22 year old swedish american
actress to play the high-schooler
it was ann margret's third film but when veteran musical
director George Sidney
 began watching the dailies
he knew star power when he saw it not only did he keep
adding scenes to her and songs to her
but when the film the first cut of the film
was screened for film executives at columbia pictures
he asked them if he could actually create an opening
musical prologue and an epilogue with just  ann
margret and the producers said no
so sidney took $60,000 of his own
money rented a sound stage commissioned
birdie's composers to create a new title song
contacted the costume designer Marjorie Wahl
to create a new dress
and when the movie premiered at radio city music hall
and yes they used to show movies
ok
there was annie alone on the giant screen
ok
against this bright blue peacock blue background
in a tightly belted chiffon skirted bright cantaloupe colored
frock not likely to be worn by any high
school student in 1963
and as that flame haired beauty ran back and forth on the screen
with the help of a wind machine 50 years before Beyonce
claimed she invented it
she flipped her titian mane
tossed and twirled her flirty skirt pushed out her
pulchritudinous chest and coyed wailed and occasionally sang
the title song bye bye birdie after the
premiere of bob mackie
who soon would become ann margret's go to designer
exclaimed "I thought I was seeing a Dick Van Dyke film
boy was I wrong"
Bye Bye Birdie broke the house record of Radio City Music Hall
in a month Columbia Pictures reimbursed
the director his $60,000
Ann margret instantly became a star
but a quintet of young men from Britain were about to become
were about to cause breathless screaming at a global frenzy
that would change music concerts stardom
and fashion forever
After their first appearance on the anne Sullivan show
newsweek magazine wrote
"visually they're a nightmare in tight
dandified Edwardian-Beatnik suits
what is an Edwardian-Beatnik suit think about it that way
and great pudding bowls of hair musically they
are a near disaster who does that sound like
a merciless beat that does away with
secondary rhythms harmony and melody the odds are
that they will fade away as most adults confidently predict
yeah tell that to the 55,000 fans who for the first time
filled a sports stadium to scream become
hysterical pass out rip their clothes off
twist and shout and basically scare the shit
out of the beatles
they have excellent ideas to the hysteria
millions
got used to the music very quickly and after the
initial scorn was swallowed at the immediate success of both
a hard days night and help
everyone around the globe wanted to either be the beatles
or at least to dress like them
but the beatles didn't arrive at their look instantly
when john first formed the group called The Quarrymen they adopted this
velvet edwardian look of jackets that were
with drainpipe pants that were
like what these bands of kids in rough parts
of london wore they were called teddy boys ok
but teddy boys were actually violent street gangs
despite their clothes and so when paul joined the band
he refused to dress like that so he
did agree that the should have a uniform look but after playing in
Hamburg Germany they thought they actually found
their outfits the bowl haircut
the leather jackets the drainpipe pants they came
back to liverpool there were 400 bands playing in liverpool
but not one of them wore leather
however when Brian Epstein became their manager
offered to represent them he had a clear vision of how
they should dress and he was having none of it none of anything
they had one brian was regarded as the best dressed person
in liverpool probably one of the richest people in liverpool
so the first thing he did was he sent them to his custom tailor
because he wanted them in suits but
lennon started to bark he
just b****ed that they were selling out so he decided to let them crop a jacket
let them keep the turtlenecks because he thought they would look good for
photos but he wouldn't let them wear it on stage and let them keep the bowl
hair cuts because they were as a juxtaposition they were at
odds with the formal suiting
lennon kept whining "he f***ing
cleaned us up" but when the money kept coming in
and the bookings started getting more frequent and all the liverpudlian
birds started swooning lennon knew this was working
then epstein brought in dougie millings who created clothes for
the rock legends bill haley and the comets and roy oberson
and they made the jackets into 4 buttons even slimmer
he gave them pants that they couldn't even sit down in
and on top of that they wore cuban heels
so they got shin splints ok
Mick Jagger used to call them the 4 headed monster
The beatles represented everything mad men weren't
the male is peacock predated uninhibited
carnegie street and chelsea's king road became ground zero
for menswear around the world and reinforced
by other british groups like the animals jerry and the peacemakers
the dave clark five who really was the best dressed of the whole bunch
and of course the rolling stones
but however during their greatest creative phase
that saw the release of sergeant pepper and the white
album their clothing shifted to
military coats and add shearlings
and bell bottoms and paisley shirts but this
was stuff that we all saw also in san francisco's Haight-Ashbury
and new york's east villgae so while
it didn't look as special anymore we could not deny their influence
in promoting the glories of male
flamboyance which still exists to this day
the beatles disbanded in 1970 30
years later they released an album of their number one hits
and sold 13 million copies in one month
the beatles will be here there and everywhere
forever
now if you were in a college or a rocker or you were a stoner
an international playboy or a rich hippie
the beatles had what you were looking for in clothes but what if you had a job
or what if you were a guy or in fact what if you
were that girl
with her big bright
fabulashed eyes and her brunette
win tunnel tested hairdo ann Marie moves to the big apple
the first episode to become an actress and
to show you how relatable is her struggle ann
finds a lovely apartment on the upper west side while the
taxi meter is still running
moves in immediately furnishes the apartment
in 2 days and I swear to you in 136 episodes
she never had more than 5 acting gigs
so I don't know where this money came from but even more so
she never wore the same dress twice
from out of marlo thomas's infinite closet came
a never ending parade of Jonathan logan dresses
her ragtail hairdo never changed marlo's
rasp never changed but sometimes she would really like
to leave one place and put her coat on and when she got to some place and take her coat off
she was wearing another dress
Now granted its a Jonathan logan so it was all really
it was basically all really the same dress  ok
a rigidly engineered a-line almost always with long sleeves
and a neck so high necklaces were out of the question
but the range of color-blocking and the highly graphic patterns
were kaleidoscopic
now in 2017 in light of the fact that
a woman runs pepsico and a woman runs
general motors and a woman runs nasdaq it just may not qualify
to single women now as having been revolutionary but in
1966 this was
a major step it's well known that marlo thomas
was executive producer of the show it paved the way
for the first show about a working woman who wanted a career
even more than getting married there would be no married
tara mohr if that girl had never been a success
and most importantly  by embracing
jonathan logan's designs
which lengthened and eased the silhouette of
the british invasion's mini dress marlo thomas single
handedly popularized the shift suitability
as proper attire in the workplace
I remember when my cousin started her first job
she actually went out and bought
22 jonathan logan dresses even better
i also remember that when I was in high school
during the shows run yes I was in high school when the show was run
and our history teacher took sick so
we had a substitute teacher for a month who drove to work
in a pearlized karl volkswagen beetle
and everyday for three weeks she walked in
class wearing a different jonathan logan a-line
and on the monday of the fourth week she walked in wearing
one of the dresses for the second time and I am very proud to
have been responsible for staging a class walkout
protesting  the repetition
I gladly went to detention secure in my righteousness
Now Ann marie's donald had to be the most frustrated
boyfriend in america he never stayed over
they never kissed with tongues they never saw each other in their underwear
it was obvious that that girl was a virgin
this woman was anything but
catherine deneuve in belle de jouris is as ravishingly
beautiful as a woman can be and as screwed up
as any can get
alfred hitchcock had said it was more interesting to
discover the sex in a woman than to have it thrown at you
but it took a french film director luis bunuel
to kidnap hitchcock's classic
hitchcock blonde who was always emotionally distant
supremely elegant and sexually excited only
after being placed in danger away from
the english director's prudish nature
so that she could finally live out her erotic fantasies
Belle de Jour is about 70
the perfect paris bourgeois newlywed who has it all
a lush home an adoring handsome doctor husband
a gorgeously tailored YSL wardrobe who oddly discovers
that she can only get sexually excited
by being a high class prostitute during the day with the more
bizarre client the better unlike hitchcock's
heroines though peril doesn't scare her it excites
her bunuel and his screenwriter actually interviewed
hundreds of women to find out
their erotic fantasies and present some of them all ways
without judgement
the eroticism is discrete a drop of
blood on his sheath a scratch on the back
a sudden bright slash of red military coat
instead of her normal black one when she embarks on an
affair with her client who happens to be a gangster
the only thing obvious about Séverine Serizy
is Séverine's obvious increasing pleasure
in her life
to ensure that we stay drawn to this woman who was
so off balance bunuel made two key choices
first he cast the sublime deneuve a face so
flawless that it was chosen at one point to be on french money
and then he had St. Laurent to dress her
when you watch this film with it's succession
of military jackets cable knit sweaters
dressing gowns leather and vinyl trenches and black
roger vivier flats
and most notably
his ultimate iconic schoolgirl dress you realize
that St. Laurent's most copied
and instantly recognizable collection never
came down a runway
it was in this film however St. Laurent was not free
to do what he pleased bunuel insisted that because
despite current paris trends
severine was pure bourgeois which meant
no minis no gogo boots no accessories that gave away
anything of the period he wanted a collection
like sexual fantasies to be timeless and that's why this
YSL collection is equally timeless
this was also the first time that deneuve and St. Laurent
had worked together and their collaboration and their friendship
would last a lifetime at the designer's
funeral in 2008 denueve wore a black trench
very much like the one she wore in Belle de Jour and
a pair of black roger vivier flats
the sixties saw more women taking control
daring to be bold and fearless no exemplified the
dichotomy of coming in beauty better
than faye dunaway
poor faye I mean you had to feel bad for
her on oscar night she finally showed up looking really
good best she has in years despite all that  bad surgery i mean
she's 76 come one guys be nice
so she came out there looking not half bad and then kablooey
if you noticed warren stayed out there to try to
fix it she got the hell out of there so fast and she hasn't been heard from
in days
but in the thomas crown affair she played a woman who
would never have run from a tough situation
this is a caper film
really chilling really calculating and so lacking
in any moral insight into the affairs of the
heart that it's director actually said that
that this movie was "a love affair between two s****s"
then why have designers like tom ford ralph lauren
and michael kors riffed and rewatched and raved
about this movie for 40 years
well
you could start with a close up of that gold
patek philippe pocket watch as it slides
into the pocket of steve mcqueen custom made prince of
wales plaid douglas hayward suit
the tailor who just happens to be ralph lauren's tailor
for years or the red ferrari 275 gtb
only one of ten that were ever made which makes James Bond's
austin martin look like a bumper car
but better yet as michael kors says
the moment faye dunaway stalked onto the screen
in a pink and white suit with that big brimmed hat you knew
dolly girls and hippie chicks of the sixties were over
here was the ultimate
here was the ultimate power b**** she blew me
out of my seat the thomas crown affair is a movie
where style is the substance
a sourcebook of everything that was glamorous
desirable and enviable in the sixties it is
all distracting radiance from dunaway's gold ball
earrings
to her twisted hair-dos
the private gold lighters the persol 714 foldable
sunglasses and best of all
there is steve mcqueen agreeing to dye his hair
the exact shade of golden blonde as dunaway
for any young designer here fascinated by the
most lasting looks of the sixties there are two great cinematic
encyclopedias of americana you need to explore
this is one of them
with a bonus of one of the cinemas greatest longest
and dizziest screen kisses and the windmills of your
mind one of the coolest songs that ever won an oscar for best
song and yes it was in the right envelope
now here's the other
to this day I still hear really
you went to woodstock
it is the most important pop cultural event
of the second half of the twentieth century
because in one accidental weekend 450,000
people showed up and behaved
performed
existed and dressed in such a way as to redefine
concerts and music and
rallies and the strategy of anti-war rallies
to launch new artists like crosby stills nash and young
joe cocker santana sly
and the family stone to mainstream marijuana
to define boho to love the one you're with
and to legitimize hippiedom and to inaugurate
the age of aquarius in fact there is probably not a
single cultural movement
in this era that does not trace
it's origins to yasgur's farm
everything
about woodstock is legendary
so you want to know that truth about what really happened that weekend
joni mitchell who wasn't there
often sings about that we had to get back to the garden
but for those of us who were there make that stuck there
it was really how do we get back to New York City
while many images in the movie documentary are
very skillfully chosen to create a feeling of community
and universality the greatest peaceful event in history
as time magazine called it
was mainly populated by one demographic roof
unlike today when you can buy tickets for a party in Ibiza
or
get tickets to london's west end
over your smart phone there was no ticketron
there was no telecharge there was no stubhub in 1969
the only places you could buy tickets for woodstock
were record stores in New York City there was
mail order but it was ridiculously slow and nobody used it also
tickets for the weekend were 24 bucks doesn't sound like
a lot now when you're paying 600 bucks to go see Hamilton
but you could've seen the beatles in
shae's stadium for 350 or 450 for really good seats
thats not four hundred and fifty thats four dollars and fifty cents
ok so these were expensive tickets
so who was it who had all the money  to buy these
initial legitimate 186,000
tickets middle class white jewish kids like me
i actually had reservations at a nearby inn
wait and like all of my friends like everybody else I had a suit
case in the back I had trunk full of clothes I had
an outfit for Friday night
I had one for Saturday afternoon
I had one for Saturday night
you've got the picture
it's a weekend ok well once it
started pouring torrentially while joan baez was singing that was
over ok I was soaked
we were soaked
I had one a plaid shirt a blue
weird scoop tank top
a pair of bell bottom pants and buffalo sandals
and they stayed on the whole weekend ok they never left
ok we were soaked there wasn't a towel for miles
my car was basically mid-wheel deep in mud
parked 2 miles away which I would later have to pay 20 bucks to get towed out
that trunk was staying there along with my
hairdryer that really killed me
if you're jewish in the rain you know this ok
so when you see this
that's not hippie culture we just looked like that
everybody looked like that the natural look was not a
choice but the absence of violence
the sharing of food the genuine kindness
the thrilling nonstop appreciation of music
the borrowing of clothes the indulgence of random sex
those were a choice and the ensuing and
enduring popularity
of peace symbols myconian tunics hand made jewelry
peasant blouses indian prints love beads hand made water
buffalo sandals granny glasses
and anything with fringe makes perfect
sense because it reminded us that we had been there
and it inspired the others who wishes they had
maybe it was an accidental community
but for three days it was real
an unofficial report claims that 9 out of 10 people at woodstock
were high i think that figure is low
and maybe that's what you need these days to create
a desirable utopia
with the late sixties adoration of american hippiedom
along with that lingering Anglophilia seventh avenue was
having a rough time
their fashion looked out of sync too tailored 20s inspired
and nobody wanted to touch a maxi skirt no matter how much
retailers and women's wear daily insisted that they were gonna be cool
and then these two showed up
Saturday nights in new york used to show sneak previews
along with the main attraction well
two for the road was playing the weekend
audrey hepburn
albert finney well sign me up
while two for the road was one of my favorite movies
one of my favorite films about romance and the highs and lows of love and marriage
and finney and hepburn are sensational in it
except I didn't know this until two weeks
later when I saw the film again
I don't remember a single damn thing
about this film that night
because the sneak preview was bonnie and clyde
from the first shot of faye dunaway
you youngis have no idea how important
faye dunaway was she was like julia roberts
and gigi hadid out together ok
anyway from the first shot of her as Bonnie painting her lips and the
sight of that heavy eyeliner and that languid camisole
and her catching Beatty who was at the height of his
ridiculous androgynous beauty
while trying to steal her momma's car which he does by literally
taking her for the ride of a lifetime you were immediately on their side
how could you not be look at them they are
staggering
the movie starts fun and rascally with all that
banjo picking and
well maybe the boonies even doing the pressure were as care free as a barn dance
who ever heard of a gangster pick that was a romance
that was a comic romance i love this
and then a petty robbery goes wrong and with the first
close up blast of blood that splatters along the windshield
up until bonnie and clyde's final slow motion
machine gun murder
done in slow motion and that ranks as one of the most violent
climaxes in cinema history you are dragged kicking and screaming
and utterly bewitched and rooting
for the wrong people
Bonnie and Clyde is brilliant film making
but when it was first released it bombed critics
hated it demoralizing movie critic
of the new york times went ballistic
he had a relentless crusade against it three things
saved this movie
Beatty had produced the film so despite that initial drubbing
he brought it to toronto film festival where it got
a standing ovation for five minutes then the new yorker's
powerful film critic
Pauline Kael who had a devoted following by this point
wrote a 7,000 word rhapsody
praising this movie and finally with a
reconsidered opinion newsweek who had first damned it
gave it a cover story and suddenly baby boomers who were
embroiled in rebellion against war
racism and anything established saw in Bonnie and Clyde
the perfect anti-stylish anti-heroes
people they could admire for their
renegade wonder except oddly enough
according to the new anti-heroes how do you dress up
to fight the system not like a hippie
costume designer Theadora Van Runkle who by the way also
dressed Faye in Thomas Crown Affair
discovered that whenever the real Bonnie and Clyde
staged a successful heist they would go to  marshall
fields in chicago and go buy suiting clothes
because they thought of themselves as junior executives
so but Runkle did something that was really keen
if you notice I'll even go back
look at the hair and makeup this is the twenties
that's not hair and makeup from the twenties
her hair should be marcel he should have a bowl haircut
the two stars initially refused
because they were not the easiest to get along with but then Runkle realized
by letting them do that
all of a sudden the clothes looked modern
they looked fresh they looked now
in fact when faye did her 1968 vogue
cover it looks just like it was shot in between takes
so how successful was this overall look
mini skirts sold out all around the country
also the city of nay in france is the beret capital
of the world once the film became a hit the
beret factories in Nay went from making 5,000 a week to
15,000 a week even today you could wear
any of this wardrobe with little adjustment
provided you could find a good re-weaver to stitch the bullet holes
yeah ok these weren't good people
so how does a love that beautiful and tender
wind up equally bad
yet equally influential in spectacular clothes
for people who were wonderful
never was a story more of woe than this tale
of juliet and her romeo
now how many kids love a costume epic
that isn't played for laughs but franco zeffirelli
did something magical and unexpected with the remaking
of one of shakespeare's most produced though not necessarily
his best play look at all past
film versions of the classic ones that came before
this not after juliet is supposed to be
not quite 14
and though never specifically stated you can get from the references
in the play from where he wants to go that romeo's
is 17 on the way to 18 possible a little bit more but that's it
in MGM's famous film version during the hollywood's golden
age juliet was played by norma shearer she was
34
leslie howard was romeo he was 43
the great diva
sarah bernhardt played juliet
well into her seventies with a wooden leg
zeffirelli however was inspired by a production at the
old vic that starred 26 year old
and very vivacious Judi Dench
and he decided why not to cast the lovers true to age
so he chose
a 15 year old Argentinian born
beauty named olivia hussey and a 17 year old equally
beautiful young man british man leonard whiting
at the crux of romeo and juliet is proof that
timing is everything and though their's is tragic
Zeffirelli's could not have been better in 1966
time magazine
their man of the year yes they still called him man of the year
back then was the generation under 25
at Stony Brook where I attended and at other institutions
of higher learning around the country like Columbia and Berkeley
student protests were closing down universities in record numbers
there were riots at the 68 democratic convention in Washington
against the war and the reinstitution of the draft there were
similar protests in paris in tokyo in
belgrade in stockholm martin luther king and robert
kennedy were assassinated so its no wonder that
anyone still fighting acne would hardly argue
with Jack Weinberg who was the head of the congress of racial
equality when he spoke the now memorable catchphrase don't trust
anyone over 30
zeffirelli while keeping the movie in glorious
period dress lifted a page from westside story
which of course is an adaptation and turned the
Capulets and the Montagues into street gangs
this being zeffirelli they are gorgeous street gangs
the capulets are in skin tight
tights of bright orange and red
and the Montagues are in equally skin tight tights of blue and purple
all the adults are in dark colors and a pain in the ass
Romeo Mercutio and Tybalt are typical
hot headed teens basically fighting for their rights
by striking first and thinking later
it is juliet however
who seduces who zeffirelli uses
to seduce you into losing your heart because
of her unshakeable belief that all people and our
world can be better and more peaceful if we only led
with our hearts seeing the good in all
olivia hussey is the driving force of this film
radiantly beautiful with a great rasp to her voice
and lit as if she was in a raphaelite painting
zeffirelli deliberately has her come across
as a modern flower child who believes in her own power
no macho poses for her she has a plan of action
she also has a breathtaking wardrobe
the great oscar winning italian costume designer danilo donati
created clothes for hussey that are not just luxurious
with silhouettes true to the period and rendered
in damask and seed pearls and velvets and whipstitched leather
and incredible draping they're also incredibly editorial
and if you look at them like for
the sixties you could imagine great rock signers of the time
Laura Nyro Buffy Sainte-Marie judy collins joni mitchell
wearing this stuff in fact had zeffirelli's
team had those kind of marketing and PR
people now that designers have you know like KCD and stuff
they could have cleaned up opening up a R&J boutique at woodstock
they would've sold out before the first thunderstorm
more than 40 years after its release Zeffirelli's
version of romeo and juliet remains the most
compelling and relevant of screen transfers
not merely because it's a feast for the eyes
but because the director
trusted that the greatest of all writers
would still affect an audience that yearned to be heard
and understood
the film addressed the new generation's angst but it also
reminded them and us of the wonder
the power and the fearlessness of true love
for any generation its faith and love that can
sustain hope
and we are all fortune's fools
as the guard might say if we forget its strength thank you
ah questions
can we turn the lights up for questions is that possible
I can't really see anybody
what do I think ok who is this from
what do I think about the fashion in
the Romy Schneider Alain Delon film la piscine
God I haven't seen that in a million years I'm sorry
I can't answer that one I really don't know I really don't know
what do I see today which
what films do you see today that have icons of fashion
I don't
I don't why because most movies these days
are designed to have things blow up
everybody is computer generated
Look I'm entertained by these movies
but you're looking at films with
you're not looking at films with great style I mean you know
la la land is adorable to look at but there's nothing in there that you wanna wear
I think the problem is is that
it's not so much the fault of film as it is the nature of our
it is the nature of our culture that
there was a limited number of places to get
to get inspired when we were growing up
there was movies there was three channels of television there was
radio for those who stood to listen there was magazines now
it comes at you from
every direction you're bombarded i think its now up to
36,050 images a day
whether they come through on your phone
or they come through on your laptop or they're just blasted
you don't even know where they come
you're gonna get a chip in your arm and they're gonna do it to you there soon
and because all of that it kind of
edits out the specificity or the uniqueness
of a medium like film
so you don't have those great film moments you don't
have you know like when people say who's the knew audrey hepburn there isn't one
there isn't one because because we haven't cultivated one
because maybe the public is not looking for one
its just its we people derive
we you know there's "street style"
you know so if everybody takes 10,000
instagram pictures of themselves and we all call ourself stylish
if you wanna believe that
as my grandmother would say but its
I think the problem is until somebody and the same way
that Damien Chazelle I think rested
whether you like the film or not
he did something unique with la la land in that he took a genre
that people had forgotten about in a certain way and brought it back
to exactly what it was supposed to be
and I think maybe somebody has to go out
and make that kind of stylish film all over again
you're a style maven why is your opinion
why is in your opinion
is fashion so important for the last decade
including today fashion is always important
fashion is never not important yes its superficial
so what
put it this way whether you like it or not
we judge books by their covers
I judge all of you by your covers
you judge me by my cover
I don't have time to find out the inner you
ok I don't
so what do we judge by
your clothes you make a choice whether you look you make a choice
every morning to get dressed to put whatever you put on now
and if you say you don't care about clothes and you wear whatever you're lying
because that's still a deliberate choice you want to tell everybody you don't care about clothes
but the reality is that's boloney
because the point is is that you know this
anyone who's ever gone for a job interview your interview
starts the moment you walk into a door
I will clock your belt I will clock you
shoes I will clock your watch
I had a magazine called egg
in the early nineties
and because it was produced by Malcom Forbes
everybody in the world wanted to work there
so I would have I would have potential creative directors
falling in from every magazine all over the wood work that was a little
little magazine
and there was a very cool well its still a cool company now called M
and there was an assistant director who worked there and
and Chris came and he kinda can I come and show you
can I come and show you my book and I said ok
and he came in
short squat guy not handsome
at all little tight curly hair
but he only had 14 pieces in his book
but the 14 pieces one was more gorgeous than the next
but more importantly he came in wearing a
three button box paul smith wool blue clay suit
yes I clock everything it was the exact
perfect suit
that a man of his size and shape should wear to make a first impression
and my feeling was if he can do that great a
job with himself imagine what he can do with the tools
to create a wonderful magazine and he did
so when so clothing is never not important
look its another perfect example
ok when there are times I know you're rushed
you're rushed you want to run out you just came out of
you know spin cycle class whatever that thing is called
whatever and you'll run out and look there's
I live on the upper east side where despite what you think nobody's that dressed they're all wearing athleisure wear
they're all wearing like kate hudson's crap ok
and they all went out and see but here's the thing its like
I promise you my mom used to say
david my husband david is her reason thats a thousand times
always leave the house expecting to run into somebody you went to high-school with
because you will
when you don't want to
and you'll walk up to them and you'll start making excuses
oh my God I just got out of class and I'm on my way home and I'm going to lunch
and then you'll walk away and she will go oh my God she looks like crap
and nothing you say will fix it
you have to keep this in your head
you have you this is all you got
now and that said
then people will make excuses well
I don't look like gigi hadid
you know I don't look like emma roberts who cares
you're the only version of you there is guys
when you look in the mirror
the only reflection the reflection that comes back
nobody else gets that reflection
that's think about this 7 billion people in the world
and the only person who looks like you is you
that's pretty great
I think it's pretty great
so I don't care if you're 22 or 72 you're still special
and you should dress to honor that
specialness and when you walk out in the street
that's exactly how you should regard yourself and the best way to do that besides
having a sense of confidence and once again that's another lecture
ok is the clothes you choose
so always always make that a conscious choice
do I have any other questions
I can't see if that's a hand or somebody scratching their ear
no you know everything you need to know
ah there's one
yes
hollywood what I'm sorry
half
I'm missing the word
because edith because no
because this is the sixties and edith heads a really great
period was in the forties and the fifties
ok she by the time of the sixties
one thing that I really loved that she did and I
that was 1956
that's why I didn't mention it
the next time I'll come back and I'll do a thing on the fifties then I can bring her up
no you gotta remember too by the sixties by the
sixties the studio system had collapsed so all those incredible designers
like travis banton and Orry-Kelly
and edith head and adrian
they basically had lost their power because they didn't have
remember these people they were the ones helen rose
they were the ones who dressed people for the academy awards it wasn't designers
it was you know you look at what many people what
considered to be the greatest you know oscar dress of all time
and we'll talk about this in the next lecture when you come here in May
was grace kelly's dress well grace kelly's dress was done by helen rose
so but that was a different period that was the fifties by the sixties
it was much more independent
maybe we'll do that
valerie and I will discuss that anybody else
yes behind you ok you
endings
and I think
Chanel shoes
when you dress in a way that's true to your spirit
its just its like it gives you
energy yes but you also have to sort of take
you know basically that people dress in and of their time
and we live in a different time now than the twenties ok when women didn't work
or in the forties when women basically dressed to go to lunch
ok but nobody any most
new york seventh avenue designers made a lot of money on women for ladies who lunch
so if you try to dress them these days you'd go broke
the thing is you still have to make clothes
for the people as how they live it at this particular time
look i'm not a huge fan of the fact that it's the casualization of america
but it is
I you know I was one of these people who I didn't have to wear
a suit or a when I went to work but I always did I still do
I wear a sports jacket when I get it an airplane
why because if the plane is ever cancelled I'm the first one to get on the next flight
because you're in a track suit and you look like shit
but you can't make people dress in a way that isn't natural
for them if they don't feel its comfortable in their life
you know you can chose to do what you wanna do but this is
people are only people are buying
the things that work in their life right now and you really
don't whether you
it was a period in the fifties yes skirts had to be
this color basically in 83 everybody's jacket had a
shoulder pad that was up to here it was up to you know your lower lobe
well you can't make those rules for people any more because they won't follow them
so theres something wonderful in allowing people to have the freedom
but it also gives you the other side of the coin you're gonna have to
see that the way that they're dressed yes I would like the people that dress better
not for your benefit for mine I have to look at you
but I but that's a dictate that no longer is possible
anybody else
I'm sorry where I can't see the light is still in my head so I can't
Hi
Hi sweetie
Oh I'm sorry is there another one
Oh my yes you're absolutely right
ps though you look dapper
and respectful in your suit
oh thought you look dapper and respectful and thank you your lecture today would make a great book
well actually I have two books that connect to this
go on amazon one is 100 unforgettable dresses
its from harper collins and the other book is called the looks of love
50 moments in fashion that inspired romance
so you can get them at either barnes and nobles.com or you can get them at
amazon.com
so there you go
and thank you for the compliment
anybody else
what
somebody yes
oh thank you up there
oh ok go ahead oh mister what do you
think about the movie stars on
the cover of magazines instead of supermodels
well as somebody who basically helped found in style that's what we did
oh
do you not miss the supermodels no and I preferred it for
a very simple reason
I have nothing against supermodels I think well I think
ok let's go back to the I think I liked supermodels when they were super
I think Linda evangelista was super I think christy turlington
is super they were people of that era
I mean versace invented supermodels I don't
necessarily think I think Karlie Kloss is beautiful
my problem with that
and I have no problem against them and some of these young women
are really lovely and gigi hadid is really smart and
karlie is no dope either so hats off to them and giselle's
wicked clever otherwise you don't make 28 million dollars in a year
or half a year however the problem
the advantage of putting a star
on the cover
is that
stars aren't all six feet and a size zero
some stars are 35 some stars are 45 some stars
are 5'4 like I said with Doris some of them
Doris was a 36B that's pretty big
good for her
and I think when you look
when you look and a lot of actors when you look at someone
like Viola Davis or you look at someone like
taraji henson these are women who are not classically beautiful
but they look beautiful on that night and goes back to
everything I just said before about being special
and about being unique nobody has the right to say I couldn't possibly look good
everybody has a best and to shoot for anything
less than that best is self-demeaning
so I think one of the advantages of seeing actresses on a cover
who are in their thirties in their forties in their fifties
looking amazing is that basically that's a kick in the butt
to you to say well what's your excuse
ok
alright
thank you so much
