Informative Caption tells us, “Shirley MacLaine attends 24th Annual Tony Awards on April 19, 1970 at the Mark Hellinger Theater in New York City,” and I’M telling you that the length of this skirt actually was very on trend for the time period but still: Wow! This is definitely a tunic under other circumstances. (Shirley is also so weirdly ageless to me; she is 35 years old here and yet I feel like she looked exactly like this for about 40 consecutive years. I think this is what happens when you hit on a hairdo early and only gently deviate.)
Also: She’d just played the Gwen Verdon role in Sweet Charity, the film (with assistance from Verdon herself, even though Gwen was irked she didn’t get the role [she was too old][I only know this from Fosse/Verdon]) and apparently someone decided she might as well shake a leg — literally — as one of the hosts of this particular Tony Awards. (The other two were Julie Andrews and Walter Matthau.) It’s so interesting to me how few nominees this particular Tonys had; I feel like if it’s down to you and two other yahoos for any given award, you will always feel like you’ve got a shot!
