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Journalism of Courage
When Marlon Brando stepped into the role of Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire on Broadway in 1947, he did as much for t-shirts as he did for his own estimable career. T-shirts were new then. They had emerged from the World War II as Navy skivvy shirts8217; the one part of the uniform that ex-GI8217;s kept on wearing after the war.
The t-shirt Brando wore on stage was intentionally grey and grimy. It clung to the contours of his muscular torso as if moulded by who knows, days, weeks, of wear. The public was mesmerised. There was, as Blanche Du Bois put it, 8220;Something downright bestial about him!8221; Brando8217;s acting accounted for most of that effect, but the t-shirt helped.
That was because in those days there was no ambiguity about t-shirts. They were underwear. Which meant that to wear a t-shirt by itself, as Brando did, was to walk around in a state of undress.
From that moment on, fortunes were made from the sale of t-shirts. They were smaller looking than the old style singlets, those tank tops with the narrow shoulder straps that for some reason conjure up images of labourers and old wheezing men.
But Brando was not finished with t-shirts. After Streetcar8230;, came The Wild One 1954, in which he introduced the enduring combination of t-shirt, blue jeans and leather jacket. Posters of Brando thus decked out, have now become classics, even though James Dean came along a few months later in Rebel Without A Cause and beat him for the top spot in the t-shirt-cum-jeans iconography. The image created was so strong that it8217;s being imitated till this day, thanks to Hollywood studs like Tom Cruise and Kevin Costner. Closer home, Jackie Shroff, Salman Khan, Sunny Deol, Anil Kapoor, models Milind Soman, Karan Kapoor and Arjun Rampal have managed to push their image further.
With all this going on, an American organisation that called itself the Underwear Institute8217; stepped up in 1961 to proclaim that t-shirts had become a dual-purpose garment8217;, acceptable as both outerwear and underwear.
But, it was only after Woodstock, in the early seventies, that the t-shirt caught the Indian public8217;s imagination in a big way. The post Woodstock t-shirts were made of cotton, were cheap, easily available, durable and user-friendly.
As white t-shirts came out from under, designers embellished them with colour, patterns and later on with words. At first the words were direct: names of colleges, teams, clubs, companies. Then the words turned to clever slogans, initially expressing only social and environmental concern Give peace a chance8217; and Make love not war8217;. The slogans turned into pictures rock stars and heads of states topping the list and then pictures became all kinds of kitsch, including hairy chests, pot bellies, tie and jacket.
The t-shirt 8211; so named because of its T8217; shape 8211; achieved its present form with the US Navy8217;s skivvy shirt and has remained virtually unchanged since then. The only variation in almost 50 years has been the V neck t-shirt and the t-shirt with the collar.
Over the years, the t-shirt has gained a modicum of respectability. Big-name companies like Lacoste, Benetton, Ralph Lauren Polo, Gucci, Gap in India, Proline lent their expertise and reputation and turned the t-shirt from a lounging-in-the-house clothing into a formal yet easy-to-wear garment. Soon, exclusive t-shirt showrooms, exhibitions and bargain basement sales spawned all over the world. It8217;s a heartening thought that in order to wear a t-shirt these days one does not have to be built like Marlon Brando. But it8217;s a pity that the man who did so much for this attire has ballooned so much out of proportion that even an extra large size XL t-shirt will not accommodate him. However, for most people here, it8217;s not their physique that comes in their way, but the price which seems to be deciding factor.
Subhajit Sarkar, a 40-year-old portly film maker and self-confessed t-shirt buff has recently acquired a collection of what he terms unusual pieces8217;. He picked them up while travelling abroad but is hesitant to buy them here unless they8217;re truly, yes, unusual. 8220;I wouldn8217;t pay more more than Rs 300 for a t-shirt.8221; The fact that he has a bulge doesn8217;t matter to him so long as he feels comfortable.
Rahul Bose, area sales manager, Hoechst, Pune is more discerning in his choice. 8220;I don8217;t like t-shirts that scream. It should be understood in terms of colour and texture, no slogans or pictures for me,8221; he asserts. 8220;The t-shirt is a demanding attire. It has a personality of its own like the neck-tie. The wearer has to fulfill certain conditions. Fat people look awful in them. The t-shirt demands a sense of colour; most people forget that trousers and t-shirts should complement each other.8221; Though Bose has been wearing t-shirts for more than 10 years, he has never felt the need to enter an exclusive showroom. He picks them from just about anywhere.
Manju Vaidya, a working woman in her late 20s, likes t-shirts because they are durable, informal, easy to maintain and because, 8220;They goes well with jeans,8221; but will not pay more than Rs 250. Linda Sequiera, a working mother is rather conscious of her plump figure. 8220;I used to wear T-shirts during my college days. I still wear them but only when I go outstation. But I8217;d never but an expensive t-shirt unless of course it8217;s a gift. Paying Rs 600 for a t-shirt is out of the question. I would rather go in for a salwar kameez or saree for that price8221;.
Short yet compact, Avik Lee is the odd man out. An avid t-shirt collector and sportswriter, he is the proud owner of a couple of Polo t-shirts, a Bugle Boy and several other big-name brands. He doesn8217;t mind shelling Rs 800 for a t-shirt because in the long run they prove more economical than shirts. 8220;T-shirts are easy to maintain and ideally suited for my profession. They dry fast, don8217;t need ironing most foreign brands are wash n8217; wear, very comfortable. Moreover, you can wear them anywhere except where there is a dress code, goes well with most trousers, especially jeans8221;.
In the T-shirt boom of the 90s, all kinds of shapes, sizes and colours seems to be available to all dimensions of humanity. There are fat persons wearing them, short and tall, lean and mean, women who are petite and plain and men who are thick and thin. The only exception seems to be sumo wrestlers and sadly, Marlon Brando.
