This is TCM’s Most Stylish Day of “Summer Under the Stars”
- Laurie Brookins
- Jul 31, 2019
- 2 min read
Updated: Jul 11
The annual program paying tribute to a different classic-film star each day in August offers a feast for fashion fans on one day in particular this season.
Who doesn’t love TCM’s Summer Under the Stars? A full month of daily tributes to your favorite stars each August? Sign me up. Throughout the 2019 schedule you’ll find several great fashion films, from The Philadelphia Story at 8 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 2nd, to Roberta on Friday, Aug. 23rd, starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers — set in a Paris fashion house, it’s on the schedule for the regrettable hour of 4 a.m. ET, so technically Saturday, Aug. 24th. Set your DVR, it’s definitely worth a viewing if you haven’t seen it, especially for the fashion show at the film’s end, which includes a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment with Lucille Ball, who has an uncredited role as a platinum-haired model in the fashion-show sequence toward the film’s end. (The other reason to enjoy Lucy’s appearance in Roberta is knowing that, 22 years after this appearance, Ball — by then hugely successful because of I Love Lucy — would buy RKO, the studio that made Roberta, and with husband Desi Arnaz would turn it into Desilu, home of such iconic television productions as The Dick Van Dyke Show, My Three Sons, The Andy Griffith Show, and Star Trek. From uncredited bit part to owner of the studio in 22 years — you gotta love Lucy.)
But for the date not to miss, fashion-in-film fans should mark their calendars for Sunday, Aug. 18th, the day featuring 24 hours of Audrey Hepburn. All the great Hubert de Givenchy moments can be found within this tribute day, including Sabrina, Funny Face and Charade, as well as Paris When It Sizzles, Love in the Afternoon, and My Fair Lady.
It's a terrific slate for viewing, but diehard Hepburn fans also likely would have added three other films to the lineup: How to Steal a Million — not only for the partnering of Audrey Hepburn with the eternally charming Peter O’Toole, but also for his terrific tongue-in-cheek line, “Well, for one thing, it gives Givenchy a night off” — as well as Breakfast at Tiffany’s and Two for the Road. In the latter, Hepburn not only stars with Albert Finney on a series of glamorous road trips throughout their characters’ relationship, but the audience also sees her out of Givenchy and wearing pieces by Mary Quant and Paco Rabanne, both at the height of their popularity when the film was released in 1967.
But that’s why DVRs, streaming and Blu rays exist, yes? Ultimately Audrey Hepburn’s film catalog is always going to be considered an embarrassment of riches, in both cinema and style.
