Three Days of the Condor: Wicks’ Leather Car Coat and Navy Suit
Michael Kane in Three Days of the Condor (1975)
Vitals
Michael Kane as S.W. Wicks, shady CIA section chief
Langley, Virginia to New York City, Winter 1975
Film: Three Days of the Condor
Release Date: September 24, 1975
Director: Sydney Pollack
Costume Designer: Joseph G. Aulisi
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
Released in September 1975, the Christmas-adjacent spy thriller Three Days of the Condor celebrated its 50th anniversary earlier this year. Robert Redford stars as the titular “Condor”, the CIA’s codename for its low-level researcher Joe Turner who is the only survivor of a coordinated attack on its deep-cover office in Manhattan.
The massacre is revealed to have been part of an internal conspiracy, involving Turner’s own section chief S.W. Wicks. Though not a prominent character with just a few minutes of screen time across four scenes, Wicks is certainly a significant one and very effectively played by Michael Kane—no, not that Michael Caine—an acclaimed Canadian actor and World War II veteran who died 18 years ago last week on December 14, 2007. At the time he was cast as Wicks, Kane had recently been nominated for his lead performance on the two-season Canadian TV police drama The Collaborators.
Wicks at first appears surprised by the news of the massacre (“they’re bookworms, for Christ’s sake”) and, upon learning that Turner survived and is loose in the city, makes arrangements to personally travel to New York, where deputy director Higgins (Cliff Robertson) coordinates a meeting between Wicks and Turner. To allay Turner’s suspicions, Wicks offers to bring Sam Barber (Walter McGinn), a former classmate of Turner’s who remained a personal friend through their employment with the CIA. “I’ll talk to you in 60 minutes,” Higgins tells Condor after arranging the meeting, then hangs up and instructs Wicks: “and you’ve got 55.”
After Wicks picks up Sam and a silenced semi-automatic pistol, he waits in the alley behind the Ansonia Hotel at Broadway and 71st 73rd, busying himself by stacking garbage cans much to Sam’s silent bemusement. The rendezvous confirms for Turner and the audience that the CIA is involved in the conspiracy at some level as Wicks engages Turner in a gunfight, despite Sam desperately confirming his pal’s identity. Mortally wounded by a shot to the midsection, Wicks eliminates the poor pawn in the CIA’s game by shooting Sam in the throat—though it hardly seems as impactful a blow to sweet Sam as when Wicks had earlier asked him if Sam’s wife Mae was ever “Condor’s girl.”
What’d He Wear?
Wicks initially represents the conservatively tailored style expected of a government bureaucrat, dressing for the office in a smart but subdued dark-navy woolen flannel suit. The single-breasted jacket follows men’s business-wear conventions with its two-button front, straight flapped hip pockets, and a welted breast pocket where he clips his ID badge upon arriving at the CIA office inside the World Trade Center. Only the spaced-apart two-button cuffs, long single vent, and slightly exaggerated notch lapel width reflect the influence of contemporary 1970s menswear trends.
Wicks maintains the cerulean shades of his outfit in a sky-blue poplin shirt with a long point collar and single-button cuffs. The neatly arranged foulard print on his navy silk tie consists of single gold dots alternating with four-dot squares—the rows themselves alternating between featuring simple squares and inverted diamond-shaped squares.
Wicks makes the fateful decision to personally arrange bringing Condor in.
Engaging in the field work that’s likely rare for his cushy office job, Wicks’ choice of outerwear elevates an unexciting office suit into BAMF Style territory. Wicks allows himself his own Shaft-adjacent moment by pulling a hip-length leather car coat over his suit, crafted from a brown cowhide reflecting a slight olive cast.
The leather jacket has an ulster-style collar that tapers to three widely spaced leather-covered buttons up the front. Pleat-like vertical strips extend down the front from the shoulder seams to the top of the bellows pockets over the hips, each covered with a single-button flap. The back features a straight horizontal yoke, and the cuffs are left plain.
Who’s the cat that would risk his neck for his brother man shoot an innocent man in the neck? Wicks. Right on…
The suit’s matching flat-front trousers are similarly unexceptional, with belt loops, side pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms that are gently flared to maintain stylistic consistency. He holds them up with a black leather belt that closes through a gold-toned single-prong buckle, matching the black leather uppers of his plain-toe loafers. Dark-navy socks maintain continuity between his trouser leg-line into his high-vamp shoes.
Contrasting with Joe Turner’s adventurous Doxa diver, Wicks’ watch returns his style to the back office. Either gold or gold-plated steel, this dress watch has a plain round case with a silver dial and gold non-numeric “baton”-style hour indices, strapped to a scaled dark-brown leather band.
Underestimating Condor’s marksmanship, Wicks foregoes wearing a olive-drab bulletproof vest like the one he helps strap Sam into.
The Gun
“Got a .45?” Wicks requests, in response to the CIA armorer asking if he’d like a sidearm. He sounds nonchalant when requesting it, but the .45 was tactfully chosen to be the same caliber as the handgun he knows Condor is carrying so that he can blame any resulting mishaps—say, the innocent Sam Barber getting shot in the neck—on Condor, who he anticipates would be dead by the end of their confrontation… hence the sinister suppressor he attaches before their meeting.
Unlike many actors, Michael Kane keeps his eyes open while firing—indicating a likely familiarity with firearms that would date back to his service with the Royal Canadian Air Force during World War II.
As usual for productions of this era from The Wild Bunch (1969) and Dillinger (1973) through The Untouchables (1987), the .45-caliber M1911/M1911A1 series has been substituted for firing scenes in Three Days of the Condor with the Star Model B, a Spanish-made clone chambered in 9x19mm Parabellum—favored in 1970s cinema as a more reliable round for cycling blanks. Aside from the caliber and lack of a grip safety, the single-action Star Model B was a convincing enough stand-in for a classic 1911; only the external extractor on the right side of the slide cosmetically differentiates the Star pistol from a true John Browning-designed 1911.
How to Get the Look
Michael Kane in Three Days of the Condor (1975)
Wicks teaches a sartorial lesson in how effectively a simple statement piece like a brown leather car coat worn to a vintage patina over a conventional navy suit and tie can convert its wearer from board-room bland to back-alley badass.
- Navy flannel suit:
- Single-breasted 2-button jacket with notch lapels, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, spaced 2-button cuffs, and long single vent
- Flat-front trousers with belt loops, side pockets, and slightly flared plain-hemmed bottoms
- Sky-blue shirt with long point collar and single-button cuffs
- Navy silk tie with alternating gold dot-and-square foulard print
- Black leather belt with gold-toned single-prong buckle
- Black leather plain-toe high-vamp loafers
- Navy-blue socks
- Olive-brown cowhide leather 3-button car coat with ulster collar, vertical pleat strips, bellows hip pockets (with single-button flaps), and plain cuffs
- Gold dress watch with round silver dial (with gold non-numeric hour indices) on brown scaled leather strap
Do Yourself a Favor and…
Check out the movie.
The Quote
What murders?
Discover more from BAMF Style
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.