Al Pacino in Scarecrow (1973)

Vitals

Al Pacino as Francis Lionel “Lion” Delbuchi, scrappy drifter and former sailor

California to Detroit, Fall 1972

Film: Scarecrow
Release Date: April 11, 1973
Director: Jerry Schatzberg
Costume Designer: Jo Ynocencio

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Scarecrow was Al Pacino’s first film after his Oscar-nominated breakthrough performance in The Godfather, reuniting him with Jerry Schatzberg, who had previously directed the actor to success in The Panic in Needle Park two years earlier.

After he portrayed the cunning and reserved Michael Corleone, Scarecrow brought Pacino back to that Needle Park-type of scrappily ambitious and affable street-smart drifter, now characterized as the simple and seemingly carefree Francis “Lion” Delbuchi who teams up with the temperamental ex-con Max Millian (Gene Hackman) in their transformative trek across the country to realize Max’s dream of opening a car wash in Pittsburgh.

What’d He Wear?

Costume designer Jo Ynocencio had previously dressed Al Pacino in The Panic in Needle Park, and the similar situations between the Bobby of that film and Lion Delbuchi allowed an overlapping aesthetic—dressed in a rotation of dark, hardy layers that could withstand the rigors of life without the guarantee of a comfortable bed every night.

Lion explains to Max that he’s spent the last five years at sea, explaining his naval-inspired knit cap, CPO shirt, and chambray work shirt, which he cycles through as needed to be appropriately dressed for their respective climate or situation. Though Lion doesn’t have the fussier Max’s desire to be frequently changing clothes, he also retains a more cohesively themed costume than Max’s chaotic layers that include a varsity sweater, floral-printed sport shirts, and plaid flannel lumberjack shirt.

Lion regularly wears a dark navy ribbed-knit balaclava, cuffed to fit the top of his head like a “skull cap” or “beanie” that had been a workwear staple for centuries and was ultimately standardized as the U.S. Navy watch cap during World War II. His hair occasionally falls through the long slit sewn along the front, which would serve as an eye-hole when the cuffed portion is rolled down over the rest of his face.

Rather than a traditional coat or jacket, Lion wears a navy heavy woolen flannel long-sleeved overshirt known to Navy vets as a “CPO shirt” for its association with chief petty officers, specifically the “blue flannel shirts” prescribed by the branch’s 1941 uniform regulations.

CPO shirts are characterized by their dark-blue flannel cloth, long-pointed spread collar, six-button front placket, single-button cuffs, and patch pockets over the chest that close with a single button through a gently pointed flap; the “1st Model” CPO shirts issued in 1939 had only a single pocket on the left side before the second pocket was added for balance later in the ’40s. Many USN-issued shirts had anchor-etched plastic buttons, though civilian CPO shirts—like Lion’s—typically would not. (Vintage examples can be frequently found from secondhand resellers like this era-correct L.L. Bean shirt on Etsy.)

Like khaki slacks, field jackets, and other G.I.-issued gear, CPO shirts found renewed popularity after the war as servicemen continued wearing them in civilian life. A Heddels article describing CPO shirts as “the quintessential shirt jacket” explains that “the popularity of the CPO shirt grew in the post-war decades, peaking in the ’60s and ’70s,” as illustrated by wearers like Pacino in Scarecrow.

Under his CPO shirt, Lion wears yet another traditional maritime blue work shirt—the light-wearing chambray shirt. In what’s becoming a familiar refrain for much of Lion’s wardrobe, chambray shirts had been adopted by the U.S. Navy for most of the 20th century as part of the sailor’s working uniform, though the specific squared-hem style that Lion wears was standardized in the early 1960s, according to Standard & Strange.

Made from the standard light-blue chambray cotton fabric, Lion’s long-sleeved work shirt has a spread collar, front placket with mid-blue 4-hole plastic buttons, button cuffs, and two patch-style chest pockets that appear to lack the button-through closure of Navy-issued shirts. The four-hole buttons are all a mid-blue plastic to reduce contrast against the shirting, through threaded with white thread.

Lion often pulls on the intermediate layer of a royal-blue narrowly ribbed cotton long-sleeved sweater with a wide boat-neck and raglan sleeves. He keeps a silver medallion on a silver necklace, sometimes worn inside his shirts and sometimes pulled outside of his sweater.

Lion’s brown casual trousers are made from a brown pinwale corduroy, also known as “needlecord” for the thinness of the wales in the cotton. Though they lack back pockets, these flat-front trousers share some styles with jeans, including the curved front pockets and the prominence of the seams running down the inside and outside of each leg. These low-rise trousers also have belt loops (which Lion wears sans belt), and the plain-hemmed bottoms have some then-fashionable flare but without the exaggerated drama of “bell-bottoms”.

Lion’s sneakers are the recognizable Converse Chuck Taylor All-Star low-top basketball shoes, configured in the classic black-and-white colorway with black canvas uppers, white rubber toecaps, and white rubber midsoles. The flat white woven laces are derby-laced through seven sets of nickel-toned eyelets that match the pair of ventilation grommets on the inside of each instep.

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When Lion and Max’s antics in Denver land the two on the Colorado State Prison farm, each are issued blue prison uniforms consisting of light-blue work shirts and dark jeans. The overall aesthetic is already consistent with Lion’s blue military-inspired daily gear, swapping out his favorite watch cap for a navy baseball cap.

Lion’s prison-issued outerwear is an olive-green microfiber zip-up jacket similar to the familiar MA-1 bomber jacket design, including the straight-zip front and brown ribbed-knit collar, cuffs, and hem. Lion’s last name and inmate ID number (“Delbuchi, 54598”) are stamped onto the beige tape over the right side of his chest, and “CSP” (for Colorado State Prison) is crudely stenciled and underlined in black across the back—echoing a jacket briefly glimpsed earlier by an extra leaving a diner in California.

After Colorado, Lion and Max detour to Detroit for Lion to visit his estranged wife Annie (Penelope Allen) and their son who he never met. To make a good impression, Lion finds a secondhand suit from the Salvation Army, keeping only his blue sweater—which Max tells him he’s glad he continued wearing so that he could stay warm in the chilly weather.

Appropriate for its secondhand nature, the dark-brown flannel suit shows many styling cues of the 1960s that would have already been out of date by the early ’70s, including the narrow notch lapels on the three-button jacket. Under his sweater, Lion now wears a light stone-gray shirt with a narrow spread collar and a pale-gray tie with wide gray stripes and red pencil stripes. He wisely swapped out his Chucks for dressier black leather cap-toe derby shoes.

What to Imbibe

Aside from the J&B Rare blended Scotch whisky that the trustee Riley (Richard Lynch) shares with Lion on the prison farm, Lion primarily drinks beer through his travels with Max, including Coors Banquet (appropriately enjoyed in Colorado) and Olympia. We most frequently find Lion drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon, first with a requested glass in a bar somewhere on the road to Denver and then again straight from the can while he and Max enjoy their KFC meal with Frenchy (Ann Wedgeworth) and Coley (Dorothy Tristan).

The Pabst story dates back to 1844 when Jacob Best established the Empire Brewery in 1844. By the 1860s, the brewery had changed control to Best’s son Phillip, and then to Phillip’s son-in-law Frederick Pabst, who had married Phillip’s daughter Maria. Under Pabst’s leadership, the company capitalized on the blue ribbons that its flagship beer had been awarded, renaming the brew after himself and the various accolades: Pabst Blue Ribbon.

Pabst Blue Ribbon rose to prominence through the 20th century, with sales peaking at 18 million barrels in 1977, just a few years after Lion frequently enjoyed his in Scarecrow and Johnny Russell recorded his country hit “Rednecks, White Socks and Blue Ribbon Beer”. Sales declined through the ’80s and ’90s until a revitalization in the early 2000s when “PBR” emerged as a favorite among hipsters.

How to Get the Look

Al Pacino and Gene Hackman in Scarecrow (1973)

When worn a little more neatly and with some intention, Lion’s layered naval-inspired workwear would continue to be a hardy, comfortable, and stylish casual cold-weather ensemble more than a half-century after Al Pacino hoofed across the country with Gene Hackman in Scarecrow.

• Navy woolen flannel long-sleeve “CPO shirt” with long-pointed spread collar, front placket, two patch-style chest pockets (with single-button pointed flaps), and single-button cuffs
• Light-blue chambray cotton long-sleeve work shirt with spread collar, front placket, two open patch-style chest pockets, single-button cuffs, and squared hem
• Royal-blue thin-ribbed cotton boat-neck raglan-sleeve sweater
• Brown pinwale-corduroy cotton flat-front low-rise casual trousers with belt loops, curved front pockets, and flared plain-hemmed bottoms
• Navy ribbed-knit wool balaclava, cuffed like a watch cap
• Black-and-white Converse Chuck Taylor All Star low-top basketball sneakers with black cotton canvas uppers, white laces, and white rubber outsoles and toe caps
• Black socks
• Silver medallion on silver necklace

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

These two guys go into a bar, right? One guy says to the bartender: “Two mugs.” The bartender says, “I know that, what’ll you have?”