Peggy Moffitt: The Moffitt Movie

Moffitt makes claims for the importance of Gernreich as the 20th century designer. At the start of 1999's The Rudi Gernreich Book, which she created with Claxton (who has been her husband since 1959) she comes right out with it: "In the 20th century there have been a handful of geniuses whose innovations have changed the course of their art for all time: In painting it was Picasso. In music it was Stravinsky. In film it was Eisenstein. In theater it was Stanislavsky. In dance it was Balanchine. In jazz it was Parker. And in fashion design it was Rudi Gernreich." Got that? Not Dior. Not Chanel. Much less Armani. Gernreich. And she's not being glib. She lists the accomplishments she ascribes to him, among them: The first see-through clothes; the first cut-outs; the first "body" clothes based on leotards and tights; the first mixed patterns; the first use of vinyl and plastic; the first bathing suits without inner construction; the first thong bathing suits; the first "no-bra" bra; the first unisex looks; the first knitted "tube" dress; the first clashing color blocks; the first head- to-toe "total looks"; the first overall designer commitment to comfort; the first designer to revolt against couture, status clothes and high-cost fashion; the first designer jeans. Even if you were to attribute only half of these innovations to Gernreich, the designer's contributions still go way beyond the topless bathing suit that has obscured them.

Moffitt's willing service to the memory and legacy of Gernreich is the present parallel to her willing service as his muse in their mutual heyday. In the '60s and '70s her ambition and ego were, interestingly, not so overwhelming as to need a spotlight dedicated directly on her. To her, Gernreich was joy. She adored his vision from the first time she spotted one of his dresses in Beverly Hills's coolest shop at the time, Jax. And she adored him from the moment he walked into Jax after she'd gotten a job there. She preferred to do anything she could do with him over anything she couldn't.

Part of what compelled such loyalty was her awe at his genius. "Rudi invented modern fashion," she says today. "All fashion changed with him, Everything had to be thrown out. If you've been given the freedom, you're not going to go back to Dust Bowl dresses or things you can't run in when somebody's trying to mug you." And you're not going to let yourself be a duped fashionista, are you? The stronger bond between Moffitt and Gernreich, though, was the emotional and aesthetic twinship that made them happy kids in the same sandbox. Technically, Moffitt was a gifted model, and one well suited to Gernreich's designs. More important, she was an unusual product of Los Angeles seemingly destined to partner up in an unusual collaboration with one of the city's most unusual immigrants.

The daughter of a successful screenwriter, Moffitt spent six years in uniform at the upscale, private Malborough School, a place she describes as "interested in all of the things I was not interested in." Uniform or not, she was a natural avant-gardiste. She fell in love with ballet, which she was too tall for, and harbored dreams of acting, which took time to dispel. After going to New York to attend the Neighborhood Playhouse School of Theatre for two years (in the same class as Robert Duvall, Suzanne Pleshette and Sidney Pollack), she came back to Los Angeles. It was 1957. "The Golden Age of Hollywood was over," says Moffitt with long-lingering dismay. "Sandra Dee was the thing. Everybody was in a submarine." And the submarine was not yet yellow. "I went on go-sees and did some TV and movies where if you blink you miss me," she says. Her odd, long-limbed, dark exoticism doomed her to the margins. And, in turn, Hollywood, where she'd grown up, lacked glamour for her. "I liked the fashion world better," she says. "As an aspiring actress, I saw Hollywood as sweating fat men with cigars stuck in their mouths." She gravitated to modeling, struggled to be accepted and had developed the skill of a pro precisely at the time Gernreich, with whom she crossed paths, was gearing up for his definitive decade.

But there was another figure in the Moffitt movie, one who would give it full romantic dimension while adding to its artistic allure. That was William Claxton. As early as 1950, Claxton was already a successful commercial photographer famous for his jazz photography. He entered Moffitt's life in the fateful way things tend to happen for her. She'd been fighting with her actor boyfriend, Tom Pittman, and she happened to look out the window and see a tall man emerge from a racing-green Jaguar just below. Claxton had come to see a girl his friend Tom had recommended for a shoot, but there was "instant like" between the photographer and Moffitt. Moffitt, her boyfriend and her future husband spent the whole day on into the night in each other's company, evolved into a friendly trio, then gradually narrowed down to a destined two. They married, and within the next few years became two out of three in a new and more interesting trio.

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