The pop culture return of the martini seems to coincide with the mainstream entrance of the internet.
The martini fad has happened with a vengeance - everywhere from college campuses to corporate lounges to failing bars looking for a financial turnaround.
The martini has always been a drink of style, that much is guaranteed. Just look at the glass it resides in. Instantly recognizable the drink has, for good reason, been used all over the visual media as a symbol of good life, harmless sin, and self-confidence.
The cocktail turned actor has had a great life on the silver screen. If it only appeared in James Bond pictures, that would be enough. The ageless 007 has been draining the vodka version for close to 30 years in 12 pictures, and over those years his personal taste remains the same: vodka martini; shaken not stirred.
Unlike his big screen incarnation, Ian Flemming's Bond only drank the wickedly icy libation in the first installment, Casino Royale. Flemming may have attempted to create a depth of character rather than emphasize the visual aspects of the martini. James looks damn cool drinking and staying, surprisingly sober.
The latest cinematic installment is no exception. In The World is Not Enough, Bond orders a vodka martini and drinks it in one fluid sip after pinning a villain to the bar. The danger however, is falling into the cliché of the "one-drink-man"; the aristocrat across from you at dinner drinking Glenfiddich, neat; or the college football jock who only drinks "Bud" by the bottle.
But we forgive Bond, much like we forgive our oldest uncle who only drinks Bacardi and Coke because, well, that's just what Uncle Bruce does. Bond, and Uncle Bruce, don't wear their drinks like badges but we put those badges on him.
Moving from the overt to the subtle: take Vincent Sherman's The Young Philadelphians, it has one martini moment, but that moment is among the most subtle in movie history. Tony Lawrence (Paul Newman) and his summer boss are ready to receive their evening guests and, in preparation, fire-up some martinis. Lawrence breaks up with his fiancee at the party and offers his martini to Joan (Barbara Rush) and quietly comments, "It's okay, I haven't drank from it." Priceless! Or, take 1996's classic Swingers that uses the martini as a symbol throughout the movie, but rarely features the drink on the screen.
Whether the name is merely dropped in conversation or a character is constantly slipping out of their "wet coat and into a dry martini", the martini is all things classy. With it's attractive glass, and its association with fancy lounges and Hollywood decadence, the silvery spirit was an actor by birth.
"Why don't you get out of that wet coat and into a dry martini?"- Mr. Osborne in The Major and the Minor.
"The important thing is the rhythm. Always have rhythm in your shaking. Now a Manhattan you always shake to fox-trot time, a Bronx to two-step time, a dry martini you always shake to waltz time." - Nick Charles in W.S. Van Dyke's classic The Thin Man.
