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To successfully portray them, Kelly opted for clothes that fit the part. "If you’re playing a truck driver," he says, "you don’t jump off the truck in fifth position."
So, when it wasn’t a costume picture, and he wasn’t in uniform — "The Navy made the best dance costume ever," he says. "The proportions, the fit were perfect" — Kelly sought "unfussy shapes that didn’t get in the way or break up the line of the body," like gabardine pants, knit vests and full-cut shirts with spread collars. (The latter resulted in Kelly’s collaborating with the MGM wardrobe department on V-neck T-shirts, as well as a body shirt to keep his tails from flying out when he lifted his co-stars.)
"I remember one of the few times I ever actually talked to Louis Mayer," he recalls. "He came over to the set of ‘Summer Stock’ — the let’s-put-on-a-show-in-a-barn movie Kelly made with Judy Garland — "and pulled me aside and asked, ‘Why don’t you ever dress up like that other fella?’ "
Not surprisingly, many of Kelly’s most enduring trademarks — loafers with white socks, V-neck sweaters tucked into double-pleated pants, the sack suit and the loppy hat — came from his own closet.
"They’re what I’ve always favored," he says in recalling what he wore in "Singin’ in the Rain," "An American in Paris" and "Cover Girl."
"White socks are clean and they focus the eye on the feet. Moccasins are cut to show the white socks. You tuck a sweater in so you can see the body move. Astaire and I always washed our hats and then trimmed the brims off so that we didn’t look like gangsters because we didn’t play gangsters. But we did like hats. They’re a dancer’s best prop."
In his wardrobe’s renewed popularity, Kelly sees a hopeful sign that men’s wear is maturing. "Softness has never been an easy thing to sell," he says. "But tight clothes don’t do much for adults. And neither do grungy ones. Softness allows for comfort and simplicity. It’s never declasse."
He does have a few choice words for other contemporary clothing, like those "horrible plaid ties and ridiculous cummerbunds," which he says compete with a woman at the very moment "a man should be presenting her." He’s equally vexed by baseball caps worn backward. "On grown men, it’s so stupid." And though Kelly likes jeans, he doesn’t think they’re versatile. A black suit, however, is another matter. "It used to be the only thing I packed when I traveled," he says. "Along with three white shirts, a black knit tie,Christian Louboutin Boots, a black bow tie and underwear."
But didn’t Gene Kelly wear khakis?
"Only to rehearse in and around the house. Never in the movies."
 

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