Tagged: Bugsy Siegel

Bugsy’s Houndstooth Sports Coat

Warren Beatty as Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel in Bugsy (1991)

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel in Bugsy (1991)

Vitals

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, “celebrity” gangster and casino builder

Los Angeles, Spring 1945 and Las Vegas, Fall 1946

Film: Bugsy
Release Date: December 13, 1991
Director: Barry Levinson
Costume Designer: Albert Wolsky

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Everybody deserves a fresh start once in a while.

At least three times while wearing this outfit alone, Warren Beatty’s Bugsy Siegel pontificates on the power of fresh starts. While the real Siegel may not have been quite as forgiving, Beatty plays him with the actor’s characteristic charisma to better communicate to audiences how a violent gangster could have charmed the stars of “golden age” Hollywood.

Continue reading

Bugsy’s Checked Jacket and Mint Green Shirt

Warren Beatty as Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel in Bugsy (1991)

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel in Bugsy (1991)

Vitals

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, “celebrity” gangster and casino builder

Los Angeles, Spring 1945

Film: Bugsy
Release Date: December 13, 1991
Director: Barry Levinson
Costume Designer: Albert Wolsky

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

BAMF Style goes green for the first #MafiaMonday after St. Patrick’s Day!

We catch up with Ben “don’t-call-him-Bugsy” Siegel in the middle of realizing his dream – the Flamingo Hotel and Casino and, by extension, Las Vegas. Continue reading

Bugsy Siegel’s Glen Plaid Double-Breasted Suit

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel in Bugsy (1991). Photo sourced from Getty Images.

Vitals

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, “celebrity” gangster and casino builder

New York, Summer 1945, and
Beverly Hills, December 1946

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Film: Bugsy
Release Date: December 13, 1991
Director: Barry Levinson
Costume Designer: Albert Wolsky

Background

Bugsy is an entertaining and stylish drama penned by James Toback, transforming the violent mobster in a suave and romantic visionary much as the real life gangster himself tried to reinvent his persona after moving out to the West Coast, choosing to rub elbows with the likes of George Raft, Gary Cooper, and Cary Grant rather than his old associates like Dutch Schultz, Lucky Luciano, and Joe Adonis. Continue reading

Bugsy’s Tan and Maroon Desert Sport Shirt

Warren Beatty as Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel in Bugsy (1991).

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel in Bugsy (1991).

Vitals

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, “celebrity” gangster and casino builder

Las Vegas to L.A., August 1946

Film: Bugsy
Release Date: December 13, 1991
Director: Barry Levinson
Costume Designer: Albert Wolsky

Background

The second warm-weather Mafia Monday in a row transports us from the glamour of 1950s Miami to the barrenness of the post-war Mojave Desert.

Bugsy Siegel has been dealing with a lot of professional issues. Construction of his “oasis in the desert” – the Flamingo Hotel and Casino – is going way over budget, and he’s just been arrested for the murder of his old pal Harry “Big Greenie” Greenberg (Elliott Gould). What’s a volatile celebrity mobster to do? Continue reading

Bugsy Siegel in White Tie

Warren Beatty and Annette Bening in Bugsy (1991)

Warren Beatty and Annette Bening in Bugsy (1991)

Vitals

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, debonair and mercurial “celebrity” gangster

Hollywood, March 1945

Film: Bugsy
Release Date: December 13, 1991
Director: Barry Levinson
Costume Designer: Albert Wolsky

Background

Unfortunately, the ultra formal white tie dress code is all but extinct in American culture. The popularity of black tie in the post-World War I era was the first bullet to the chest of white tie, but an increasingly informal society has peppered white tie with more bullets than the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. Luckily for sartorial purists, Downton Abbey and programs of its ilk have inspired a resurgence in early 20th century formalwear. As Mad Men has taught us, all it takes is a good TV show with well-dressed characters to get Americans to dress better.

A natty dresser like Bugsy Siegel didn’t need examples from the movies, though. While I’ve never seen a photo of the real guy in white tie, it makes sense that an image-conscious guy like Siegel would sport a formal tailcoat for a night of dancing at the legendary Ciro’s nightclub in West Hollywood to cultivate his image as a romantic ladies’ man rather than a vicious mobster. Siegel even tells a photographer from The Herald that captures him in mid-dance:

See that they run that, and not one of those sinister mugshots.

Continue reading

Bugsy Siegel’s Gray Chalkstripe Suit

Warren Beatty as

Warren Beatty as “Bugsy” Siegel in Bugsy (1991).

Vitals

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, violent and visionary “celebrity” gangster

Los Angeles, January 1945

Film: Bugsy
Release Date: December 13, 1991
Director: Barry Levinson
Costume Designer: Albert Wolsky

Background

Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel is one of the most fascinating mobsters. He was certainly innovative, developing the idea of Las Vegas as a money-grabbing desert mecca. However, he had an insanely volatile personality, which made him both good and hated as a gangster.

By the film’s chronology, Bugsy is sent out to the west coast by his New York pals Luciano and Lansky in January 1945. In real life, he had made the trek out about ten years earlier, but who’s counting? On the first day, he butts heads with local boss Jack Dragna and manipulates control of Dragna’s wire system immediately. Not only that, he buys a mansion from a famous opera singer, buys a beautiful Cadillac convertible, and meets the fiery woman for whom he would throw his life away. Continue reading

Bugsy Siegel’s Las Vegas Discovery

Warren Beatty as "Bugsy" Siegel in Bugsy (1991)

Warren Beatty as “Bugsy” Siegel in Bugsy (1991)

Vitals

Warren Beatty as Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, violent and visionary “celebrity” gangster

Las Vegas, March 1945

Film: Bugsy
Release Date: December 13, 1991
Director: Barry Levinson
Costume Designer: Albert Wolsky

Background

23 years after turning vicious Depression-era outlaw Clyde Barrow into a lovable if impotent protagonist, Warren Beatty was back at it, portraying sadistic rapist-turned-gangster “Bugsy” Siegel as an ambitious womanizer whose major flaw was being a stickler for good grammar.

While Siegel’s story was kept relatively similar—he was a dreamer amongst gangsters who fell in love with Hollywood and femme fatale Virginia Hill—Beatty plays him much differently than the cinematic mobster we’re used to seeing. Continue reading