There is a very select group of men who have mastered the endangered art of looking like the one who is really running things. It’s not about being splashy or flashy. Rather, it’s about taking a more subdued, but albeit well-tailored road. It’s like the quiet crime boss who outlasts his gaudy counterparts who can’t resist drawing too much attention to themselves. The operative words here are understatement and restraint.
The creator and godfather of Saturday Night Live, the most popular and longest-running sketch comedy program in television history, Michaels is the king of an army of knights, rooks and court jesters – the wizard behind the curtain who created an empire and launched the careers of legends. One look at him in a room full of people and you can tell that he’s the man at the center – the one in charge.
He doesn’t telegraph that power by being loud or flamboyant in any way. Just the opposite. His carefully chosen, effortlessly restrained, but well tailored mode rides low on the radar. He’s not trying to look hip or young; he’s not trying to keep up with the kids. This is a busy man transparently comfortable with himself, with his age and with his accomplishments.
While there are some who work themselves into a sartorial lather trying out-dress, impress and one-up everyone else, there are those who don’t need to draw the extra attention. They’re not desperate to impress anyone. To balance it out, humility, according to Michaels, plays a role, too. To quote the man himself: “If you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room.”
There are men who look like they care about their clothes, and there are men who look like clothes are all they care about. Many true emperors of industry are the former. They do care, but they’re just quieter about it. Do a casual Google image search of men like Ralph Lauren, Giorgio Armani, Lew Wasserman, Mickey Drexler, Bernard Arnault, Jerry Weintraub or even Tom Ford. In their own personal, day-to-day uniform? All powerful men with fabulous style, but most definitely not loud. Again, that word restraint comes to mind.
Taking a casual look at Michaels and his kind, one might be tempted to say “How boring!” But if you look closely with a discerning eye, it isn’t. Men like this prefer the power of carefully selected understatements that you can sense from afar, but with an attention to detail that you can’t really see until you’re close enough to kiss the ring.
Saturday Night Live first aired almost forty years ago. With a razor-sharp business savvy, an unparalleled brilliance as a producer and an uncanny eye for talent, Lorne Michaels has built an empire. He’s one of those men everyone wants to get to, and he looks like it.
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