Last week the hotelier and publisher Monty Bennett caused a bit of a stir when he addressed a huge gathering of people with downtown Dallas business interests and said that downtown wasn’t safe. Bennett runs a company called Ashford that currently offices near the Galleria. He said he wanted to move his company downtown, but the crime makes that impossible. The Morning News wrote about this and quoted former Mayor Laura Miller, who said, “It was pretty obvious to me that Mr. Bennett hasn’t been downtown in a long time, maybe ever, until today.” I admire that woman.
So when Downtown Dallas Inc. dropped the video of their big meeting, I was eager to see Bennett’s performance for myself. I have now reviewed the tape. He takes the podium at about the 3:50 mark and speaks for about three minutes. I’ve watched the whole thing multiple times. I’ve studied it. I have compared my notes with other editors here at the magazine. And here is what I’m prepared to say about Monty Bennett’s speech at the DDI meeting:
Holy crap! That’s an enormous collar gap he’s got going there! Especially for a guy who is supposedly rich. In most cases, rich people wear clothes that fit. Not this guy! Not only did he get up in front of a bunch of downtown businesspeople and tell them that downtown sucks, but he did it in a suit that he bought off the rack at Jos. A. Bank and didn’t bother to get tailored. I’m not sure that’s even a super 180s. Could be a 150s. And the result is that his jacket hangs on his shoulders like Yoda hung on Luke Skywalker during that training sequence in The Empire Strikes Back. I imagine Bennett’s ill-fitting jacket whispering in his ear as Bennett gets nervous at the podium and the saliva thickens in his mouth: “Mmm, right-wing tough guy you try to be. But alienate all of the city you will.”
Cringey.
For more on collar gaps and what causes them, you can check out the great Derek Guy. I hasten to add that I could be wrong about Bennett’s suit. Maybe it’s not the suit’s fault. It could just be Bennett’s poor posture. As Guy writes, only a good tailor can figure out what causes such unsightly collar gaps.
That would be my advice to Bennett. Get a tailor. And spend a little time downtown.
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