by Sam Wasson
“I have an optional title,” Mercer added. “‘Moon River.’”
That was fine by Hank. So that afternoon, Johnny inserted “Moon” for “Blue,” and for the first time, sang,
Moon River,
Wider than a mile:
I’m crossin’ you in style
Someday.
Old dream maker,
You heart breaker,
Wherever you’re goin’,
I’m goin’ your way.
Two drifters,
Off to see the world,
There’s such a lot of world
To see.
We’re after the same
Rainbow’s end,
Waitin’ ’round the bend,
My Huckleberry friend,
Moon River and me.
That was it. There was no doubting it. In his lyric, Mercer had harnessed an assortment of poignant, multilayered frictions. Taken one way, the song tells of simple affection, the pure and wide-eyed kind between two friends; but on the flip side, it’s laden with the weariness of heartbreak. It was the musical equivalent to the casting of Audrey Hepburn in the part of Holly Golightly. When she sang it on the fire escape, wearing only jeans and sweatshirt, no audience would begrudge her the little black dress.
THE LITTLE BLACK DRESS
Centuries ago, black dye was affordable only to the very rich. In the seventeenth century, the wealthy abandoned darkness for color. And in the Victorian era—where contemporary ideas about black originate—it was worn almost exclusively by those in mourning. As the shade of death, black seems the most intuitive choice. But in the game of courtship, color aids seduction. Traditionally speaking, it’s feminine, and the more eye-catching women are, the more easily they can lure. Consequently, those without color—say, dressed in all black—can go about almost unnoticed. Where the rainbow is conspicuous, their darkness acts as a kind of camouflage, masculine by contrast, and allows them to watch without being watched. It’s the choice of someone who needs not to attract. Someone self-sufficient. Someone more distant, less knowable, and ultimately, mysterious. Powerful.
It is a man’s look. So what happens when the tables are turned and the woman wears black? In the nineteenth century, when women would often stay in all black for years after their husbands’ deaths, it was a surefire sign of widowhood. To the men passing by, it signified the wearer’s knowledge of sex. It meant experience. No wonder the flappers of the 1920s were so drawn to it. In aerodynamic tubes of black satin, the Jazz Age teenies made their statement loud and clear: “We don’t care about what Mom and Dad cared about. We’re out to have a good time.” Chanel took the opportunity to capitalize on the new modernity, and the little black dress turned up everywhere. Not only was it fashionable, but when the 1930s came around, it was very practical. It didn’t seem right to dress decoratively the way it had before the crash of 1929, and so, in its subdued functionality, the black dress became a gesture of political correctness. It was hip to be square. And after the war, when Dior swooped in with his New Look, black was dressy again. With the world back on its feet, people didn’t have to feel ashamed of going all out anymore, and certain intensely fashionable women—mostly in Europe—stuffed themselves into black hourglasses and took to the boulevards.
But when the domestic resurgence of the fifties broke through America, color was once again the emblem of femininity. Just look at the movies: only the bitches wear black. There is Margo “Fasten your seatbelts” Channing in All About Eve, Norma “I am big” Desmond in Sunset Blvd., and before them, back when film noir saw all its curves in shadow, there was Rita Hayworth as Gilda. Even before they even open their mouths, we know these ladies are going to be two big handfuls of heat-packing trouble—and it’s black that tells us so. On men, it’s par for the course (Cary Grant should wear nothing else), but when it’s seen on women, black’s symbolically charged intimations of power, sexual knowing, and reversals of traditional passivity make it the color of choice for all those women the movies think we should be worried about—and in most cases they’re right, we should be. So, to Jane Wyman and Doris Day: wear pinks and blues. Be decorative. Be floral. As women, it’s what you’re supposed to be.
Hubert de Givenchy got Axelrod’s script in the summer of 1960. On Chapter 1, he read, “The cab door opens and a girl gets out. She wears a backless evening dress and carries, in addition to her purse, a brown paper bag.” Black might not have been such a distinctive choice were it some degenerate wearing the dress; indeed, it would have been the obvious move. But seeing how this was a dress to be worn by Audrey Hepburn—and not at night, but in the very early morning—it was unusual to say the least. Because it’s Audrey—wholesome, wholesome Audrey—there is irony in her endorsement of a color heavy with unchaste connotations. More than merely quirky, the contrast is sophisticated. Black on Audrey Hepburn gives her an air of cunning—just as anyone who turns something outré into an asset appears somehow masterly. That’s the essence of glamour.
It’s true that Audrey had worn black before—quite memorably, in fact, in Sabrina and Funny Face—but this particular instance brought her down from the penthouses and onto the pavement. “Remember,” says costume designer Rita Riggs, “it was natural for Sabrina to shop at a French house in Sabrina, and Funny Face was set in the Paris fashion world, but Tiffany’s was all New York, about a girl who knew nothing about European fashions. And she’s just a poor girl from Texas—a moll! There’s no real way of explaining how Holly would get that dress. At that time, only the very wealthiest American women would have European trousseaus. A regular girl couldn’t afford that. So Breakfast at Tiffany’s was a breakthrough in that sense. We hadn’t seen that before.”
“Givenchy and Audrey gave us a very realistic, very accessible kind of class,” said designer Jeffrey Banks. “All of a sudden, in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, chic was no longer this faraway thing only for the wealthy. Of course, part of that had to do with who Audrey was and the kind of person she represented to people, but it also had to do with Givenchy. Unlike Balenciaga, he was a naturalist. He was about showing off the body as it was, not reshaping or idealizing it. He felt you didn’t need to use a lot of accessories or embellishment and based dresses on the shape of women as they were, not as he, or the culture, wanted them to be. That was a kind of first in fashion and it took glamour from the remote and unattainable and made it practical. After Tiffany’s, anyone, no matter what their financial situation, could be chic everyday and everywhere.”
The little black dress was easy to emulate: any young woman in 1961 could make one or even afford to buy one (and did they ever). Of course, they didn’t all get Givenchy’s LBD, but that didn’t matter; because of its simplicity, any little black dress would do the trick—as millions would soon see, that was the beauty of it. What’s more, its simplicity wasn’t just pragmatic, it was an assertion of self. Pure understatement radiates confidence—individual personality as opposed to a prefab femininity. “I don’t need to embellish to be commanding,” it says. “I don’t need a fashion megaphone to make myself heard. I just need to be me.” It’s what Audrey had been doing since Roman Holiday, but here she added a touch of girl-on-the-go. This was New York City.
Its efficiency and simplicity made the LBD a natural for the workingwoman, and Givenchy’s take, unlike Chanel’s, was skimmed, narrow, and attentively sculpted, which gave the dress a severity not common to looks of the day—as well as a quiet allure. Banks explains, “Givenchy was a master of understanding the backs of dresses. He knew how he wanted a woman to look as she’s walking away from you. If you look at the neckline of Audrey’s long black dress from the front, it looks just like a sleeveless dress, but if you look at the back, if you look at the way he cut in a sort of halter shape that followed the shape of the jewelry, you’ll see that it’s quite daring for its time.”
“I was in Paris for the fittings,” recalls Patricia Snell. “It was amazing. Givenchy came out with all of Audrey’s outfits; her hat, a
nd her little black dress, and her everything. He was the kindest man, the gentlest man, and so tall. You couldn’t believe how a man so tall could move with such grace. It was truly unbelievable to see him. And he handled the fabric with such love, it was like he was carrying a newborn baby. He even looked at the dresses like they were babies—his babies. I can’t say I knew then that these dresses would change fashion, but I must say, they jolted me. None more than the black one.”
MOON RIVER AND…?
After Mancini played “Moon River” for Blake Edwards (whom it left speechless yet again), they ran it over to Jurow and Shepherd. It didn’t matter that the producers were in the middle of something; Blake and Hank wanted to be there when they fell off their chairs. They weren’t disappointed. The moment the recording ended, whatever hesitation Marty Jurow or Richard Shepherd, or Rackin had about Mancini’s capability was now a detail in history. They were all in agreement. This was it. The new question of talent, or rather, facility, was about their leading lady. Could she sing it?
The room was uncertain, but Hank pressed for Audrey, explaining that he had written the music to “Moon River” specifically with her range in mind. Technically, he said, she could pull it off, no sweat. Admittedly, she was no great singer, but she had done it in Funny Face and, Hank argued, she would do it again for Tiffany’s. His plea, however, was met with raised eyebrows—and none were raised higher than Audrey’s. When she heard she was in the running to sing, she said she was completely against it. The thought of singing now frightened her. Since Funny Face, she believed her voice had thinned considerably, and what with the risks she was already taking in the film, it seemed too much of a stretch.
For a brief period, there was some discussion about Marni Nixon (Audrey’s vocal surrogate for My Fair Lady, three years later), but all that ended as soon as Blake made up his mind. This song’s dramatic function—to give voice to the authentic Holly—couldn’t succeed if it wasn’t authentic Audrey. He claimed whatever weakness audiences perceived in her vocal ability would actually enhance the feeling of a regular, down-home Holly. Never one to say no, Audrey gave in, and without a moment to lose, she was rushed into guitar lessons and rehearsals with a vocal coach. She was far from sure that she was the right person to sing “Moon River,” but there was no stopping what had already been set in motion. The first day of filming, the morning of October 2, 1960, was fast approaching.
6
DOING IT
OCTOBER 2, 1960–NOVEMBER 11, 1960
FIFTH AVENUE, SUNDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1960, DAWN
Audrey was worried. They all said she could do it, that playing Holly would be a challenge, but that like everything else, it would come naturally to her. Naturally, they said naturally. In Roman Holiday, they said she was so lovely and natural, and then gave her the Academy Award. But that wasn’t acting, not like the Patricia Neal kind that made you really think and really feel. Now there, she believed, was a real actress. Pat could play anything, but Audrey, sitting in a yellow cab, waiting for Blake Edwards to call action, just had intuition. Intuition and luck.
Audrey missed her ten-week-old baby, Sean, whom she left with the nanny back in Switzerland, and she began to wonder if she was wrong about leaving him in the first place. This was the longest she had ever been away from him. He would be fine, she assured herself, though it was difficult to forget the recent string of high-profile kidnappings back home (she and Mel had taken severe precautions not to publicize the name of their nanny or her whereabouts). No amount of cigarettes could ease her tension, but she was desperate and smoked on anyway, sometimes shakily, like a gambler with a bad hand.
The street was empty, like one of those tumbleweed roads in a western movie. A crowd would be gathering soon.
It was all so nonsensically difficult, down to the Danish pastry in the bag beside her. How would she eat that thing? Audrey didn’t want to be troublesome, but she despised Danishes, and asked Blake if he wouldn’t mind if she were to walk up to Tiffany’s with an ice-cream cone instead. But he said no. Of course, he was completely justified. This was breakfast after all, and who would believe that?
But really, who would believe any of it?
“Okay, quiet,” she heard. “Quiet please…”
A man approached the cab and asked Audrey if she was ready. Yes, she told him, she was, and braced herself.
She waited.
Outside, the sun was not yet up. The street, if you were to paint it, would be one long stripe of gray, with little yellow dots for the lamps. In this light, they looked like a string of diamonds hovering above the sidewalk, a necklace Fifth Avenue wore when it woke up.
“They’re rolling…” Audrey heard, and a second later, the second A.D. cued the cabbie, and they were off. The scene had begun.
Up the avenue they went, up past all the storefronts Holly knew well, and had visited, if only to look, so many times before. It was a miraculous sight; one of the world’s busiest streets cleared of all activity, and just for her, just for this. They wouldn’t have many takes (the sun would be too bright soon), and even though it was a chilly Sunday morning, the people of New York would begin to pour out quickly. And there was also Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev. He’d be appearing on Fifth at 7:30. They’d have to be done by then.
Audrey couldn’t rush it, though. If Tiffany’s was, as she says in the script, the place where Holly and things went together, she would be wise to linger at the window and take it very slow, savoring it the way one would a moment of total satisfaction. Better that than run up the street like some kind of hungry animal.
What she had to do now was try to forget that she wasn’t anyone’s first choice, and that Capote was dissatisfied (some said), and that no one seemed to know how much Holly was, well, whatever she was.
She had to stop all this worrying. She had to forget about her fights with Mel, whom she missed as much as she was glad to be without. It wasn’t something Audrey had put words to, even privately to herself, but she was certainly beginning to feel it. Was it really true love? Or was it grown-up love, the kind they don’t make movies about?
One by one the city blocks fell away, and as the cab approached 727 Fifth Avenue, it slowed beside the curb and came to a stop. Audrey stepped out of the car and shut the door behind her. Rather than approach right away, she paused on the very edge of the sidewalk and looked up at Tiffany’s.
THE NORTHEAST CORNER OF FIFTY-SEVENTH AND FIFTH, HOURS LATER
It was cold that morning.
Blake wore a wool cardigan over his black turtleneck, and over that, a long corduroy jacket with the collar turned up. His crew cut and footballers jaw leant him a lean, manicured look, not unlike Mel’s. Audrey knew he was sensitive to her anxiety, not just about Holly, but about acting in general. From the few rehearsals they had had, she could see his working style was open and collaborative, more like a party than actual work. Unlike Billy Wilder, who came to the set knowing exactly how, when, and where every line should be delivered, Blake met the shooting day with an open mind and a listener’s attention.
Blake, after all, wasn’t her first choice. She had wanted someone with a little more experience. But all that was beginning to change. He was receptive to her minor suggestions, he didn’t really like to shoot take after take, and he wasn’t afraid of improvising a little. In fact, when the time was right, he encouraged it. Audrey liked that. She wasn’t at ease with the idea of just making stuff up, but she agreed with Blake that there was little chance of keeping a funny scene funny if it wasn’t always on its toes. It was a belief, Audrey saw, that Blake was deeply committed to, and it applied as much to his actors as it did to his crew. If they weren’t kept laughing in the long stretches of wait-time between setups, they were likely to deflate the momentum and kill the scene. To keep them alert, Blake arranged for a craft service table that was simply not to be believed, worked to end the day’s shooting at a reasonable hour, and devised a steady stream of practical jokes directed at cast and crew alike.
But not all the jokes were light and effervescent. Audrey nicknamed Blake Blackie, for his black sense of humor. Like Mel, her director had a morose streak, but Blake’s was a lot funnier. Was it wrong to keep comparing them? Of course, she didn’t do it consciously, but she kept doing it. Maybe it was because she was lonely.
Wearing Hubert’s dress was of some consolation, almost like having him there beside her. An armor of love, she thought. Two armors, actually: one little black dress for standing still at the window, and another for walking around the outside of the store. She had to alternate because the standing dress was so tight, she couldn’t move in it. But the walking dress had a long slit down the side. She could walk around in it without inching ahead in baby steps like a geisha.
People were already collecting in pockets of two and three, and a short time later, what began as a small crowd had transformed into a gawking mob. On all sides of Fifth Avenue, production assistants upheld a great barricade of several city blocks, dictating to the people behind them, as if they were actors, how and when to move and speak. Despite them, Audrey shot the scene without too much fuss and all before the sun came up.
128.54 CARATS
