Marlene Dietrich knew a good thing when she wore one. With all her femininity, the Blue Angel turned a man's tuxedo into hers.
In the decades that followed Dietrich's foray into cross-dressing for film, the tuxedo moved from the male wardrobe into the unisex arena. Like jeans, silk shirts, briefs, loafers and kilts, this 11 staple of black-tie dressing has been appropriated and personalized by both sexes.
So although the old black cummerbund and bow tie remain proper, they're usually perfectly boring.
After all, the tux as we know it has been either deconstructed or dressed up even more.
Take the ideas that came down the fall/winter Gucci runways. Snappy, fitted ebony tailcoats framed elegant white vests, crisp white shirts and white ties. White French cuffs slipped blatantly past sleeves. Narrow trousers over substantial heels strode with satin-piped lines. All these were accessorized with attitude -- lots of it.
And these were women's tuxedos.
In women's wear, a tuxedo can be a mere shadow of itself. One of the most memorable adaptations of a tuxedo for women was at the heart of a lawsuit filed last year by French-based Elf Sanofi against American designer Ralph Lauren. The dress in question was a sleeveless, double-breasted, satin-lapeled tuxedo gown from Mr. Lauren that French courts later ruled unfairly copied the Yves Saint Laurent original.
This dress version of the tuxedo, especially when shortened to the knee or above it, has become a well-knocked-off design for evening wear.
There's a parallel movement in menswear to borrow or adapt from or take apart the tuxedo.
Men's tuxedos have become much more relaxed, and the one-time de rigueur bow tie is becoming an endangered species.
The softening of this black-tie attire is in the hands of designer Donna Karan, who in her menswear line borrowed from the tuxedo with a soft black mandarin-collared tuxedo jacket over a white convertible-collar shirt and, of all things, drawstring pants. Her ensemble had enough formality for a creative black-tie event but had a touch of casualness for a sit-down holiday dinner in a friend's home.
For all intents and purposes, the jacket and the trousers remain the only constants in men's tuxedos. The trimmings -- the shirt, the tie, vest or cummerbund -- are all optional and personal.
But why wear a tuxedo?
The answer comes from Anne Hollander in her book "Sex and Suits" (Knopf, $25). "Today, a modest gathering at which men really obey the 'black tie' rule, for example, will often have an embarrassingly unequal look," Ms. Hollander writes. "The women will look dowdy in tired, out-of-date evening dresses, or else insufficiently festive in nice daytime wear, whereas the men will all look marvelous in their dinner jackets, however old their fashion is and whatever their degree of shabbiness."
Not anymore.