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MCCLATCHY-TRIBUNE
Angela Grube, owner of 9th Life in Baltimore, holds up a beaded silk-wool cocktail dress from the early '60s. AMC's hit drama "Mad Men" has captured fans not only for its Emmy-winning writing and act, but also for its fashion.
'Mad Men' sparks new interest in vintage wear
MCCLATCHY-TRIBUNE
BALTIMORE — Angela Grube quickly combed through the clothing rack, ignoring several pristine-looking garments before the prized item caught her eye: a black dress with a torn zipper and holes in the underarms.
Grube was shopping in the basement of a vintage store in Baltimore's quirky Hampden neighborhood when she found the treasure: a three-quarter length cocktail dress adorned with bluish glass beads atop embroidered trees. She basked in her good luck.
The damage to the dress would be a quick fix for the self-taught seamstress and vintage clothing store owner. More importantly, the garment appeared to have originated from the "Mad Men" era, which are the most sought after items in Grube's Hamden store. 9th Life.
MCCLATCHY-TRIBUNE
"Mad Men," AMC's hit drama, has captured fans not only for its
Emmy-winning writing and acting, but for its fashion, which has inspired throngs of men to flock to a more tapered look and has encouraged women to embrace their voluptuousness with simple designs and high waists that accentuate curves. Although the show
Now she finds herself going online to sites such as eBay.com and Etsy.com to find clothes and making trips to neighboring stores to not only find clothes to resell but to make "reproductions," a two-to three-day process that requires her to take an outfit apart seam by seam and then use the pattern to make a replica garment.
"You wear the clothes and you look like you are going to have dinner with Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr."
"We can't hold it in the store long enough to advertise the items," said Grube, who has owned her store for the past two years. "You barely get it on the rack and it's gone."
The style craze generated by the show has been both a blessing and a curse for vintage store owners such as Grube. Before the show became a critical success, Grube would have simply gone to estate sales, relied on "drop-in" customers to bring clothes and sell her items, or gone vintage shopping for garments to stock her shelves.
"Mad Men" joins "Sex and The City," "Miami Vice" and "Thirty something" as some of the more recent television shows to shape the fashion of the time, according to Robert J. Thompson, a professor of television and popular culture at Syracuse University.
cases place in the '60s, many of the characters wear clothing associated with the '40s and '50s, which was common at the time, according to fashion experts.
ROBERT J. THOMPSON
Professor
"What is interesting here is that you have so many people who look so cool," Thompson said. "You wear the clothes and you look like you
are going to have dinner with Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis JF."
Only "Davy Crocket" in the 1950s had more of an ability to inspire viewers to dress in clothes from another era, according to Thompson.
Fashion inspired by AMC's "Mad Men" includes a Bruce Douglas men's jacket over a narrow-collared white shirt with narrow silk tie from italy at 9th Life in Baltimore. The boom has been both a blessing and a curse for owners of vintage stores. Angela Grube, owner of 9th Life, said she goes online to find more clothes for her shop. "We can't hold it in the store long enough to advertise the items," she said.
"You had millions of baby boomer kids wearing raccoon
While "Davy Crocket" might have had the largest reach as far as sheer audience numbers is concerned, the depth of "Mad Mens" influence will likely be greater. In addition to the boom experienced by vintage stores, the show has inspired a clothing line at Banana Republic. Hair salons now have walk-ins demanding flips, beehives and other "updos" from that era.
hats;" Thompson said.
Shane Gullivan first heard about "Mad Men" a year ago when customers came to his Towson, Md.
store, Ten Car Pile Up, demanding '40s cocktail dresses for their theme parties. Although the show is based in the mid- to late-'60s, many of the characters wear clothing reminiscent of the late '40s and '50s. Experts say people of that time would have worn older clothing because of economic constraints.
"The show has reinvented the theme party." Gullivan said. "It is more of a tailored look. The fashion industry wasn't exploiting that at the time."
While the look and feel of the garments of that period might be a fashionista's dream, the delicate, posh fabrics haven't exactly held up over time.
"Deodorants, hygiene, and the soaps of that time did a number on those clothes," Grube said.
You can see evidence of Grube's claims in the underarm region of the clothing. Holes where deodorants would have been used have almost become synonymous with vintage items from the "Mad Men" era.
MOVIES
Former NFL player Terry Crews relishes new experiences in film
Terry Crews, left, a cast member in "The Expendables," and his wife Rebecca pose together at the premiere of the film Aug. 3, in Los Angeles.
MCCLATCHY-TRIBUNE
PASADENA, Calif. — Former NFL defensive end Terry Crews has made 30 movies in the last decade and he has his own television series now with "Are We There Yet?" on TBS, but he knows fame is a fickle thing.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
"The people that recognize me, the ones that stop me on the sidewalk, it's because of that Old Spice commercial," Crews said. "I didn't know the meaning of viral before those commercials came out. I can't get away from those things."
The quirky and unsettling commercials show the brawny Crews — usually wearing just a towel
That ridiculous duty led to more screen work and the movie
— knocking down skyscrapers, riding a stuffed tiger or screaming his head off about Old Spice body wash. The commercials are a weird sensation — they've been viewed more than 9 million times on YouTube. Adding to Crews' new-found ubiquity, he's also sharing the screen with Sly Stallone, Mickey Rourke and Bruce Willis in the all-star commando movie "The Expendables," which opens next week.
At this point in his strange Hollywood adventure, he will take fame and opportunity as it comes and will happily stare down conventional notions of credibility.
"When I was filming the first Old Spice commercial I knew it was either going to be the best thing I had ever done or the absolute end of my career," he said. "But that seems to happen to me a lot and I kind of like it. All or nothing. If it's going to shut down, so be it."
After football, Crews, who is an accomplished illustrator, revived his dream of using his skills in the movie business and moved to Los Angeles with his family just to be near the industry. He ended up doing bodyguard work and, as a lark, tried out for a television show called "Battle Dome," an "American Gladiators"-style knockoff, and he won the role of the wild-eyed villain T-Money.
titles could be strung together as commentary on Crews and his career: "The Benchwarmers," "The Longest Yard," "Harsh Times," "Get Smart," "Middle Men," "Gamer" and, now, "The Expendables."
There's plenty of muscular, glowering actors, but Crews has made his mark as the big man who can flip easily into broad comedy and winking irony. As Ice Cube, who once employed Crews as a bodyguard and then shared the screen with him in "Friday
After Next," puts it: "Terry is the funniest muscle-bound man in America."
For black America, Crews is something of a franchise guy — he, his wife, Rebecca, and their five children even had their own realty show. "The Family Crews," air for 11 episodes early this year on BET. The real breakthrough for Crews was playing the father role on "Everybody Hates Chris" for four years, a role that echoes now in "Are We There Yet?"
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