One of the more encouraging developments in the evolution of men’s fashion over the last few decades has been the elevated style with which many professional athletes now dress. Lucrative contracts, around-the-clock sports channels, endorsement deals, and a competitive drive to outshine their athletic peers have propelled today’s sports stars to build serious and stylish wardrobes.
From LeBron James’s teal paisley tuxedo to Kobe Bryant’s ESPY Awards suits, we’ve hand tailored for the best. And not just basketball players. Hockey legend Wayne Gretzky, boxing great Evander Holyfield, and my very own New York Giants’ Michael Strahan, who has made us so proud by moving from an All-Pro football career to become a cohost on Good Morning America—Martin Greenfield has dressed them all.
Dressing athletes poses several challenges, not the least of which is that many of them are giants. But few are as large as the seven-foot-one-inch, three-hundred-pound NBA star Shaquille O’Neal.
We received a call from a sports agent who said one of his clients needed a suit. “I’ll have him in New York. You can measure him at the Four Seasons Hotel,” the agent said.
Jay and I entered the hotel room to find the largest man I had ever seen in my life. We had dressed the New York Knicks legend Patrick Ewing, but Shaq made Patrick look scrawny. When I shook Shaq’s hand, I came up to his belly button. He wore a size 58 suit, which required enough suit fabric to make a small tent. I needed a step stool to measure him properly. When I ran my measuring tape down the sides of his legs, I couldn’t take my eyes off his feet. “My goodness!” I said. “What size shoe do you wear?”
“I wear a size 22,” he said with a giant smile.
Sometimes our Hollywood work has influenced the styles we create for our pro athletes. Case in point: New York Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony. Carmelo, whom Vanity Fair has named one of the NBA’s top-ten best-dressed players, has a sophisticated fashion sense. Not surprisingly, he likes rag & bone. Jay measured Carmelo at the rag & bone showroom, and we’ve had him out to the factory for fittings as well.
Carmelo’s stylist asked me to help convince him to wear tails to the 2014 Costume Institute Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. “Here’s a picture of Steve Buscemi’s character, Nucky, wearing tails on Boardwalk Empire. Carmelo loves that show, so maybe if you show him that picture and tell him we can do something similar, he’ll go for it,” she said.
I smiled so wide I could have eaten a banana sideways. “You do know that we make all the suits for Boardwalk Empire, right?”
Her jaw dropped. “You what?! Wait, you mean all the suits the characters wear are ones you all. . . .”
“Every single one of them.” She couldn’t believe it.
When Carmelo came to the factory, I told him the old-school elegance of tails never goes out of style. “Carmelo, here’s a picture of the tails I made for President Clinton,” I said, handing him a photograph.
“That’s real nice,” he said. “But that’s President Clinton. He’s the president of the United States. He has to wear tails.”
“Trust me, Carmelo. We’ll do yours with a modern twist. All the clothes you love on Boardwalk Empire, we make those by hand. You’re going to love the tails we do for you. You’ll be the talk of the Met Ball.” Still unsure, he trusted us enough to show him what we could do.
We made Carmelo’s tails in a smart navy fabric. Just in case, Tod and Jay also suggested we have a made-to-measure navy tuxedo jacket ready in the event Carmelo didn’t like the tails. In the end, though, he loved the tails. His stylist outfitted him with dapper finishes, and Carmelo ended up being one of the most stylish men at the event.
The sports world’s frenetic pace forces you to get creative to find the time necessary to properly measure and fit sports figures. During our decade working with Donna Karan, Fox Football approached us about dressing all of the network’s announcers, including Terry Bradshaw, John Madden, Howie Long, Pat Summerall, Jimmy Johnson, and James Brown. The producers said they would bring the whole gang together in Los Angeles for preseason preparations. We could come out then and take measurements. The session was pure insanity. Terry was being his usual joker self, Madden and Jimmy wouldn’t stop yapping, and the show’s producers had poor Howie on the roof of a building filming a skit while riding a motorcycle. Somehow we pulled it off and created looks each of them loved.
One of the sweetest souls in show business is Brooklyn’s own Jimmy Fallon, a true-blue New Yorker and a diehard rag & bone fan to boot. My rag & bone boys, Marcus and David, introduced me to Jimmy in 2009 when he got his first gig with NBC taking over for Conan O’Brien, whom we also dressed, on the Late Night show.
“Jimmy,” said Marcus, “I want you to meet the one and only Mr. Martin Greenfield.”
“Such an honor to meet you, sir,” said Jimmy. He had a sincerity and genuineness that let you know he meant it. I loved the kid the minute I met him.
“What kind of suits are your stylists putting you in right now?” I asked.
“It’s a lot of Italian designer suits,” said Jimmy. “They look good but the fit is so tight and uncomfortable that I can’t move around on stage.”
I thumbed through the rack of suits and saw all the usual labels and understood the problem immediately. I showed him a few of our rag & bone samples. He loved the shorter jackets, higher armholes, and slender lapels. “Here’s what we’re going to do,” I told him. “I’m going to give you this rag & bone look you love but with the comfort and flexibility you need each night to do your show.”
“That’s awesome.”
“I’ve seen your show. You like to jump around all over the place. You do that in those suits over there and you’ll break an ankle,” I joked. He laughed and said he couldn’t wait to see what we could do for him.
When Jay, Joe, and I returned for the fitting a week later, Jimmy was beside himself. After trying on several of the made-to-measure rag & bone suits we made for him, he knelt on one knee and started kissing my ring. “I’m not the pope, Jimmy. I just make your suits,” I said.
“To me, Mr. Greenfield, you’re the pope of fashion.”
When Jimmy got the call to take over for Jay Leno, he did the right thing: he brought the show back to New York like a good Brooklyn boy. He also put in an order with us for six more suits. Every time Jay and I visit him for a fitting, true to form, Jimmy kneels on one knee and kisses my ring. No ego, all class. Jimmy’s going to do a beautiful job with the new gig and make Brooklyn proud.
One Brooklynite who has already made the world proud is Sir Gilbert Levine, the Jewish American conductor better known as “the pope’s maestro.” Levine, whose mother-in-law is an Auschwitz survivor, was the conductor of the Krakow Philharmonic in Pope John Paul II’s hometown in Poland from 1987 to 1993. The pope admired his work so much that he asked him to lead the concert marking the tenth anniversary of his pontificate, as well as subsequent concerts for the church. In his wisdom, John Paul II understood how his friendship and appreciation of this Jewish American conductor could usher in a spirit of healing between Catholics and Jews around the world.
On one of his visits to the Vatican, Levine saw Cardinal Renato Raffaele Martino, who represented the Holy See in the United Nations. Each looked at the other and admired his suit. The cardinal asked the conductor, “Where did you get that suit?” Levine replied, “There is this tailor in Brooklyn. . . .” Before he could finish, Martino opened his suit jacket and showed that he, too, was sporting a Martin Greenfield label.
In 1994, the Holy See invested Levine as a knight commander of the Order of St. Gregory the Great, the highest pontifical knighthood bestowed to a non-ecclesiastical musician since Mozart. In 2010, Pope Benedict XVI conferred on Levine the further distinction of the order’s Silver Star.
I’ve learned in this crazy fashion business of ours to expect the unexpected. When we were asked to dress the Emmy-winning actor James Spader for NBC’s The Blacklist, I didn’t realize that my own show-biz career was about to begin.
For the first season, we made twelve suits, twenty-eight vests, and thirty pants for James, who plays Raymond “Red” Reddington on the show. He and I hit it off the first time we met. His magnetic energy draws you in immediately. He and The Blacklist team loved the factory and the history behind it. So much so, in fact, that they filmed three scenes of the series’ seventh episode, season one, at the factory.
“If we’re filming at Martin Greenfield Clothiers we have to have Martin in the scene,” said James.
“Me?” I said.
“Of course.”
“What would I do?”
“You’d be Martin the tailor. I think you’re perfect for the role, don’t you?”
The scene required me to fit James’s character. James is such a sweet friend that he refashioned the original script to work my name into the line so that “Red” says, “Martin, do you think the pants are too tight?” A few sharp-eyed fashion bloggers recognized my face in the scene and picked up on James’s reference to “Martin.” We also received several phone calls from friends, including one who informed us that The Blacklist “had a character on screen that looked just like Martin—and even had the same name!”
Shaping the look and styles of movie and TV characters is the professional side of the fun. Knowing about TV shows and movies before the public does excites the kid in me. Right now, for example, we’re creating the looks of at least nine characters on the new Batman-based Fox TV series Gotham; making clothes for the Oscar Isaac and Albert Brooks movie A Most Violent Year; working with Steven Soderbergh on The Knick, a Cinemax drama set in early twentieth-century New York starring Clive Owen; and making suits for a forthcoming, as-yet-unnamed HBO rock-’n’-roll series set in the 1970s directed by Martin Scorsese and produced by Mick Jagger. We are also excited to be working with Juliet Polcsa and HBO on their project honoring the life of Joe Paterno, starring Al Pacino; and dressing Ed Burns for the show he stars in and co-produces with Steven Spielberg, Public Morals, a police drama set in New York City in the ’60s.
In the nearly seventy years I’ve spent in fashion, I’ve never tired of the rush that comes when creative forces collide. Artists fuel artists. Helping directors, screenwriters, actors, and costume designers make their dreams and artistic visions a reality still sparks a childlike sense of wonder in me. The day that stops, so will I.
CHAPTER TWELVE
BAR MITZVAH AT EIGHTY
My life has been filled with far more light than darkness. America can do that—flood you with more blessings than you could ever deserve.
One of those blessings came Saturday, August 9, 2008. Growing up, I had never celebrated my Bar Mitzvah. By the time I was thirteen I had already fled from Pavlovo to Budapest. So when our Hampton Synagogue in Westhampton Beach told me I could celebrate my Bar Mitzvah on my eightieth birthday, I was ecstatic. Rabbi Marc Schneier would officiate. When he was thirteen years old, I made his suit for his Bar Mitzvah. Now he would be conducting mine.
In preparation for my big day, I had to learn a special trope (tune) to chant the Haftarah, a reading from the prophets that comes after the Torah reading. The Jewish World newspaper asked me if I was having any trouble learning the tune. It was a little tricky, I told them, but I wasn’t worried about it. “If I get it wrong, what are they going to do? Shoot me?”
I could hardly wait to share the big day with my family and five hundred of our friends. When Saturday finally arrived, I wore my three-piece lavender seersucker suit. Standing before the congregation, I looked across the rows. Every face was a memory. Jay and Tod and their wives, Cheryl and Bonnie, were there, as were Arlene and my precious grandchildren, Amy, David, Sofia, and Rachel. I cried when my eyes met theirs.
Throughout the ceremony I imagined my mother, father, sisters, and baby brother looking down on me. But instead of sadness, I felt joy. When Rabbi Schneier placed the black and white striped tallit (prayer shawl) around me, I felt God’s presence and peace.
“Here you have a survivor of the Holocaust who understands that our people’s response to destruction is construction,” said Rabbi Schneier. “Marty reconstructed his life. He built a successful business, and also a beautiful, loving family.”
When it was my turn to speak, I told the congregation that today was a day for celebration. “Did I survive because I’m a hero? No,” I said. “I survived maybe because God wanted me to survive. Or maybe I was lucky—I don’t know. But I’m here. The biggest celebration of my life is today, because the odds were so against me. And I made it here, at eighty.”
Only one explanation for my improbable life makes sense: God allowed America to make me possible.
I might have died a dozen times over, burned in the ovens at Auschwitz or slain at Buchenwald or some other camp, as my family and six million others were.
I might have fallen with the frozen on the Death March to Gleiwitz.
I might have been caught sneaking rations to the dying, been beaten to death, or been blown up when the bombs rained down.
I might never have found my relatives and known the joy that only family brings.
I might have wandered through life with an empty heart, never finding and marrying my dream girl.
I might never have experienced God’s gift of children, wonderful sons whose hearts and talents helped build and grow my only-in-America dream.
But for some grace-filled reason, against all logic and probability, God led Americans to fight for me, to save me, to claim me as their own, to nurture me with opportunities, and to help me build a home where I could love and raise my family in my beloved Brooklyn.
I’m left with nothing but gratitude and joy for my life.
Some things, it turns out, are beyond measure.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Writing a book is a little like creating a custom suit: dozens of pieces and people must all come together to help turn a vision into a seamless reality.
I want to thank Dr. Myron Finkel and Meredith McIver for helping me find Wynton Hall.
Thank you, Wynton, for helping me gather my scattered thoughts and keeping me focused. This book could not have been assembled without your laser vision and talent. Thanks also to Wynton’s lovely wife, Michelle Hall, for all her valuable help and to their two precious daughters, Bella and Blakely.
And speaking of family, I of course want to thank my siblings and my parents for the values they imparted to me. Mom and Dad: I hope you are looking down with pride.
What can I say about my wife, Arlene, who has put up with me for fifty-seven years? Thank you for your love, patience, tolerance, and understanding. You have been at my side through the good and the bad. I love you more than words can express. You are my heart and my everything.
Our two sons, Jay and Tod, are both my right arm. My pride in them is infinite. I am lucky to have Jay’s wife, Cheryl, and Tod’s wife, Bonnie, as my daughters-in-law (guys, you picked well). I am happy to have their families, the Goras and the Bronszteins, as part of our family. Thank you, Paula and Jack Gora and Gilda and the late Morris Bronsztein, for the lovely gift of your daughters. Without question my grandchildren are, of course, the smartest, most beautiful grandchildren a grandfather could ever wish for. Amy, David, Rachel, and Sofia: Know that my love and pride in you are boundless. You are our family’s future.
I’m grateful for Arlene’s brother Kal and her mom and dad who embraced me and were always there for me.
A special thanks to all my newfound cousins in America: Frances and Moe (thank you for taking me in), Barb and Stan, Natalie and Bernie, Rikki and Louis, Joan and Lou, Ronnie, Dr. Larry and Sue, Alan and Leah, and the Gelbs and your wonderful families. I love you all.
Arlene extended my family with the addition of her cousins. Rhetta and Dr. Max and the Felton family; Judge Harold; Joseph and Francine; Gerry, Sam, and Judge Irma; Vivian; Ilene; Phyliss; Dr. Richard; Dr. Harold and Elsa; Dr. Saul and Ellen; and last but not least, Vivian, and their terrific children and grandchildren.
The Mermelstein
s are like a part of my family. Kalvin was my best friend, and his brother Bennet officiated at our wedding. His brother Steve was very dear to us, as are his children Howard and Dorothy and their families. Kalvin, I hope this book makes you smile from above, dear brother.
I also wish to recognize my GGG family. William P. Goldman of GGG was not only my mentor but my surrogate father. And Adolph Rosenberg and Sam Lipshitz provided me with support and taught me GGG’s system. For that and much more, I remain forever grateful.
I want to thank Stanley Marcus of Neiman Marcus and a very special thank you to my dear, dear friend, Derrill Osborne. We love you.
I want to thank Mayor Ed Koch, who helped rebuild Brooklyn and was a great friend; Mayor Michael Bloomberg, one of our outstanding mayors; and the two greatest and best-dressed police commissioners in New York history, Ray Kelly and William Bratton.
I’m grateful for our family friends, Dr. Joe Press and Dr. Lawrence Inra, who keep me healthy and able to work six days a week. Thanks also to Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz for your forty-year friendship and the #1 Mets jacket. Being your biggest fan, I really appreciate it.
Measure of a Man Page 18