Movie
Photo: Watkinssportswear · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikimedia Commons Photo shows actor Burt Reynolds in the Bandit jacket (1976)
The Bandit (Bo Darville)
Burt Reynolds' cowboy-hatted trucker-outrunner drives a black Trans Am and wears the chevron that made the 1970s the 1970s.
- Actor
- Burt Reynolds
- Film
- Smokey and the Bandit
- Year
- 1977
- Medium
- Movie
- Style
- Chevron
- Fan Votes
- 0 legendary · 0 meh
Why The Bandit (Bo Darville)'s Mustache Matters
Burt Reynolds was the biggest box-office star in America in the late 1970s, and Smokey and the Bandit (1977) is the movie that bottled his appeal: a cowboy hat, a red shirt, a black Pontiac Trans Am, a wink at the camera, and the mustache.
The Bandit's chevron is thick, dark and effortlessly masculine — the lip of a man who knows he is the most charming person in Texarkana. It sits under a constant grin and above a CB radio, and it became so identified with Reynolds that the style is still sometimes just called "the Burt."
The film spawned two sequels and a spike in Trans Am sales, and the mustache arguably did as much for the 1970s facial hair boom as any single film.
- *Smokey and the Bandit* was directed by stuntman-turned-director Hal Needham and co-starred Sally Field and Jackie Gleason.
- It was the second-highest-grossing film of 1977 in the U.S., behind *Star Wars*.
- Burt Reynolds (1936–2018) wore the mustache through most of his career peak.
- Pontiac Trans Am sales rose sharply after the film's release.
How to Grow the Chevron
The Tom Selleck. Thick, wide, and confident. The default setting for a man who means business.
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