Paul the Man (Not the Star)

I always thought that the sight of Paul Newman in a tux was the main reason to tune in to the Oscars. He never wore anything gimmicky; he just looked effortlessly elegant. When I met him, I understood why. He wasn't vain in any way. And he was always a little embarrassed about his looks.

When I interviewed him in 1986 for a New York Times Magazine cover story, he was in the same outfit almost every time I met him: old jeans and a six-pack. The only fashion accessory that seemed to matter to him was his sunglasses. Not the brand or the shape, just the fact that they served as a barrier between those famous blue eyes and the world. He would not take them off at first. He'd peer over them when he got to know you a little. As he got to trust you, he'd let them hang from his left ear. The second time you met him, if he liked you, he would take them off.

In my New York office, I keep a picture of Paul Newman that Michael O'Neill took for that magazine cover. He's standing by the ocean in a classic trench coat, looking over his shoulder. He was 61 then, just on the cusp of winning an Oscar for reprising his role as Fast Eddie Felson for The Color of Money. He looked so impossibly glamorous that Abe Rosenthal, then the Times's ecutive editor, scrapped the shot because, without even trying, Newman glowed like he was done up for a fashion magazine. (Rosenthal chose a tight close-up instead.)

Newman never seemed like he was trying, but he was always trying. He compared himself to a terrier gnawing on a bone. To live a better life, be a better man, be a better actor, build a safer world, help more sick children end their lives a little less painfully. His fashion statement was caring. And what could be cooler than that?

Dark and Handsome

A narrow tie, loosened at the neck, instantly makes any dark suit less formal.