Vitals

Sterling Hayden as Johnny Clay, professional armed robber and ex-convict

Los Angeles, Fall 1955

Film: The Killing
Release Date: May 19, 1956
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Wardrobe Credit: Jack Masters

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Stanley Kubrick’s third directorial feature The Killing arrived in select theaters 70 years ago today on May 19, 1956. The limited release hurt its box office, though it was well-received by critics and even received a BAFTA nomination for Best Film. In addition to establishing Kubrick as a more mainstream talent, it remains a quintessential example of heist film noir, influencing filmmakers like Quentin Tarantino who described his own debut Reservoir Dogs as his own take on The Killing.

Kubrick collaborated with pulp novelist Jim Thompson on the hard-boiled screenplay, adapted from Lionel White’s novel Clean Break. The action centers around recently paroled Johnny Clay (Sterling Hayden), who is already planning his next heist: the two-million-dollar robbery of a thoroughbred racetrack. Johnny’s scrappy gang includes two track employees, a crooked cop, a self-destructive former associate, and a sharpshooter whose job will be to shoot the favored horse and create chaos that distracts from the robbery.

The Killing was Sterling Hayden’s first collaboration with Kubrick, who would later coax the actor out of retirement to portray the paranoid Brigadier General Jack D. Ripper in Kubrick’s celebrated 1964 political satire Dr. Strangelove. Known for his commanding presence with a deep baritone voice, 6’5″ stature, and tough guy bona fides from his Marine Corps service during World War II, Hayden died 40 years ago this week on May 23, 1986.

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What’d He Wear?

The Killing illustrates versatility within the uniformity of mid-century menswear, as Johnny Clay intentionally—and covertly—layers for the racetrack robbery and his subsequent getaway. Johnny tops his look with a light-colored felt fedora, characterized by its high, pinched crown and a substantial brim with a pronounced downward-sweeping brim with a dramatic snap. The narrow grosgrain band pushes the headgear into a western-adjacent style, with matching grosgrain trimming the edge of the brim.

Johnny dresses for the heist in a mid-colored single-breasted sports coat made from a softly brushed wool flannel whose velvety nap suggests a possible wool/cashmere blend. The silhouette is typical of ’50s fashions with round, heavily padded shoulders that frame the ventless jacket’s substantial drape as it hangs on Sterling Hayden’s tall, lean frame, balanced by a full three-button front. Patch pockets are already a sporty tailoring detail, but Johnny’s takes to the next level with the addition of a second chest pocket on the right—bringing his jacket to a cleanly symmetrical four patch pockets over the front. The long sleeves are finished with four-button cuffs.

His sports shirt is patterned with a light duo-toned windowpane check graphed against a medium-colored ground. Given the fabric’s slight irregularities and slubs and gentle luster, the shirting is likely a lightweight shantung-style rayon. Rayon was a particularly popular cloth for men’s casual shirts in the 1950s, offering the sheen and drape of silk but in a more affordable and easily maintained synthetic fabric.

Johnny’s long-sleeved shirt has five white plastic buttons through horizontal buttonholes up the front, plus a smaller sixth button tucked under the right collar leaf that connects to a small loop extending from the left side of his collar. Like his jacket, the shirt has two patch pockets over the chest. The straight-cut waist hem signals that it could be presentably worn untucked unlike a longer-tailed dress shirt, though Johnny keeps his tucked into his trousers.

Johnny discards the soft sports coat and checked shirt after the heist to completely change his look with a dressier solid-colored shirt and tie. The non-white oxford cotton shirt has a soft button-down collar, which would have rested more comfortably and cleanly under the buttoned-up sport shirt than a more structured point or spread collar. The shirt follows a typical American mid-century off-the-rack design with its front placket, breast pocket, and button cuffs. His dark tie is patterned with widely spaced white “downhill” diagonal bar stripes.

Like that fellow 1950s American-on-the-run Roger Thornhill in North by Northwest, Johnny also pulls on a set of hip sunglasses to further his disguise. These specs have a simple wire frame and dark lenses.

I have never seen any extant photography or documentation that would prove the colors of Hayden’s screen-worn wardrobe, though it’s likely that the slacks he wears through both the robbery and subsequent getaway are neutral-toned—perhaps tan or gray—to ensure that they would adequately coordinate with both sport jackets and shirts that he wears with them.

These light-colored trousers have a proportionally appropriate long rise to Hayden’s natural waist, where the waistband has a squared extended tab to close through a hidden hook, reinforced by three-button “Daks top”-style adjusters on each side of the waistband. The trousers also have slanted side pockets, jetted back pockets, and then-fashionable turn-ups (cuffs), which break over the tops of his dark brown-leather plain-toe two-eyelet derby-laced chukka boots. Worn with dark socks, these chukka boots bridge the formality gap between traditional derby shoes and sportier ankle boots, making them particularly suitable with his initial look of a checked sports shirt, soft jacket, and no tie.

Johnny returns to the hideout, where he ditches the sunglasses and pulls on another sport jacket to complete his new look. Like his previous sports coat, this salt-and-pepper textured Donegal tweed jacket has a symmetrical arrangement of four outer patch pockets as well as notch lapels rolling to a three-button front and a ventless back. However, this jacket’s sleeves are finished with three-button cuffs and the shoulders—while still wide—are less structured with a softer natural line.

Hayden almost certainly wears his own wristwatch, a dress watch with a shining light-colored dial on a brown leather strap. This is almost certainly not the larger two-crown Wittnauer Longines that Hayden wore over the last three decades of his life (as investigated by WatchUSeek users) and was prominently seen in the German-produced 1983 documentary Leuchtturm des Chaos chronicling the actor.

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The Car

Johnny’s getaway “woody wagon” is specifically a 1952 Chevrolet Styleline De Luxe. Characterized by the real wood paneling along its sides and rear hatch, woody wagons are emblematic of mid-20th century American automobile culture as all “Big Three” manufacturers followed Ford’s lead in continuing to produce genuine hardwood-framed wagons that suggested rugged leisure.

Chevrolet had introduced the De Luxe trim line in 1941, though—like most American automotive manufacturers—halted civilian production during World War II. After reintroducing them as the Stylemaster and Fleetmaster series following the war, Chevy redesigned and consolidated its full-size lineup for 1949 into the entry-level Special (Series 1500) and upscale De Luxe (Series 2100) models. The variety of body styles were sorted into the fastback Fleetline two- and four-door sedans and the new notchback Styleline reserved for two-door coupes and convertibles and four-door station wagons.

Despite these updates, all De Luxe models were still powered by the same 216.5 cubic-inch (3.5-liter) “Victory Six” that was introduced in 1941 and generated between 90-92 horsepower. From January 1950 onward, Chevy introduced the option for users to purchase models equipped with the new two-speed Powerglide automatic transmission as an alternative to its stalwart three-speed manual. The Powerglide was only mated to a new 235.5-cubic inch “Blue Flame Six” that boosted output to 105 gross horsepower, giving it an edge over the older 92-hp engine now re-dubbed the “Thrift-Master Six”.

1952 Chevrolet Styleline De Luxe Station Wagon

Body Style: 4-door station wagon

Layout: front-engine, rear-wheel-drive (RWD)

Engine: 235.5 cu. in. (3.9 L) GM “Blue Flame Six” I6 with Rochester 1-barrel carburetor

Power: 105 hp (78.5 kW; 107 PS) @ 3600 RPM

Torque: 193 lb·ft (262 N·m) @ 2000 RPM

Transmission: 2-speed Powerglide automatic
For all intents and purposes, let’s assume Johnny Clay wanted the added power with the new Powerglide transmission option.

Wheelbase: 115 inches (2921 mm)

Length: 197.5 inches (5016 mm)

Width: 74 inches (1878 mm)

Height: 70 inches (1781 mm)

1952 the final year for Chevy’s Special and De Luxe nameplates, which would be collapsed into the 150 and 210, respectively. It was also the last year for Chevrolet producing true wood-bodied wagons, as genuine hardwood had stymied owners as labor- and cash-intensive to maintain, especially as modern steel bodies proved to be more affordable and structurally efficient. However, the appeal lasted as American automakers continued to produce wagons with faux wood-paneled exteriors for decades to follow.

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The Gun

Johnny arms himself for the heist with a customized Remington Model 11-48 semi-automatic shotgun that was stashed in the racetrack’s locker room. The Model 11-48 was Remington’s first shotgun introduced after World War II when it was launched in 1948. More than 450,000 Model 11-48 shotguns in all standard calibers—including 12-, 16-, 20-, and 28-gauge and .410 bore—were produced over the twenty-year production timeline that ended in 1968.

L. Ray Crittendon, Ellis Halston, and C.R. Johnson designed the Model 11-48 to replace Remington’s earlier Model 11, continuing to use the semi-automatic recoil operation designed by John Browning a half century earlier: up to four shells are loaded into the tubular under-barrel magazine, with the barrel and bolt recoiling together when fired to both eject the spent shell and feed another one into action—unlike the more common pump-action shotguns requiring users to rack the slide for each shot. The Model 11-48 improved upon its predecessor by incorporating stamped steel components that lowered assembly costs while allowing for more interchangeable parts.

Johnny’s Remington Model 11-48 shotgun in The Killing has been customized for his felonious purposes. The 20-inch barrel is the shortest that Remington made on the Model 11-48, typically reserved for law enforcement models while civilian catalogs touted the 26- to 30-inch barrels. A Thompson -style vertical foregrip is molded onto the stock horizontal foregrip, allowing Johnny greater dexterity as he maneuvers the shotgun within the tight quarters of the racetrack office.

“You could take care of a whole room full of people with that gun,” Nicky Arcane (Timothy Carey) tells Johnny during their target practice. Hayden’s screen-used shotgun was likely modified for the production, as there are set photos of him and Carey with a Remington Model 11-48 rigged with just the stock foregrip.

Remington would continue to refine its semi-automatic shotgun design, introducing the gas-operated Model 1100 that eventually replaced the Model 11-48 in its lineup. The later Model 11-87 would famously—if anachronistically—be wielded with a suppressor by Javier Bardem as Anton Chigurh in No Country for Old Men, continuing the tactical shotgun tradition that blasted its origins on screen in The Killing.

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What to Imbibe

In an earlier scene, Johnny drinks a bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer. First brewed in 1844 by the Best Brewing Company in Milwaukee, the award-winning beer grew popular through the turn of the 20th century when brewery president Frederick Pabst directed that blue silk ribbons be tied around the necks of each bottle to celebrate their many accolades. Frequent barroom requests for the “blue-ribbon beer” informed the eventual brand name, and it remained a top seller for much of the century—peaking with 18 million barrels sold by the late 1970s before it would be revived in the mid-oughts hipster scene.

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How to Get the Look

There are several reasons why you—the BAMF Style reader—may wish to temporarily conceal the shirt and tie you’re wearing. Maybe you’re flying somewhere on a trip and don’t feel like packing an extra shirt in your checked bag or carry-on? Maybe you’re robbing a racetrack, and—you know what, don’t tell me.

Either way, Johnny Clay outfitmaxxes with his four-pocket sport jacket and beltless slacks in The Killing by buttoning a checked shirt up to the neck over his dressier shirt and striped tie.

• Mid-colored soft wool or wool/cashmere single-breasted 3-button sport jacket with notch lapels, two patch chest pockets, two patch hip pockets, 4-button cuffs, and ventless back
• Windowpane-checked slubby rayon long-sleeved sports shirt with loop collar, five-button plain front, button cuffs, and straight-cut hem
• Light-colored double forward-pleated trousers with 3-button side-adjuster waist tabs, slanted side pockets, jetted back pockets, turn-ups/cuffs
• Dark-brown leather plain-toe two-eyelet derby-laced chukka boots
• Dark socks
• Light-colored felt fedora with narrow grosgrain band and matching grosgrain-trimmed brim
• Metal-framed sunglasses
• Dress watch with light-colored dial on dark-brown leather strap

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Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

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The Quote

What’s the difference?