Capote never liked Hepburn in iconic role

Neal Gabler, an author and cultural critic, wonders if the sparkly heroine could only have been imagined by a gay man such as Capote.

“Because a heterosexual man wouldn’t have imagined her, and I’m not sure that women would have imagined her that way,” says Gabler, whose books include “Life the Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality.”

Portrayed bewitchingly by Hepburn, Holly represented a “winsome rebel” without a cause — a female type not seen in movies of the time that were dominated by the lone Male Maverick as embodied by actors like Marlon Brando, Paul Newman and James Dean, Gabler says.

The upwardly mobile Holly lived the good life — thanks, in no small part, to the rich men who paid her $50 to go to the powder room. Despite her checkered past, she had a chic fashion sense. Black and pink and loaded with accessories like a big hat and extra-long cigarette holder, Hepburn’s wardrobe of Givenchy dresses dazzled against the early 1960s Manhattan dreamscape.

“What you get from this movie is a perfect idea of how to marry glamour and eccentricity and style,” says Simon Doonan, the creative director at Barneys New York. “Just being turned out and glamorous doesn’t make you necessarily fashionable. What makes Audrey Hepburn’s character so memorable is that there is a genuine eccentricity and quirkiness to her style. For example, the little tiaras. The stripe in her hair. ... That movie should really be mandatory for every girl to watch.”

Fizzy cocktail of urban sophistication
The film version of “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” marketed a fizzy cocktail of urban sophistication and the illusion of New York as a playground for young single women, says Ramona Curry, a film professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Besides Hepburn, other star ingredients were: the Tiffany’s store; Holly’s glam wardrobe; the jazzy-nostalgic Henry Mancini score featuring the Oscar-winning song “Moon River,” sung by Hepburn in the movie; and the backdrop of New York City itself.

“If the story had been set in a small town ... it wouldn’t have had the appeal or wouldn’t have been made,” Curry says.

It’s safe to say there will never be another actress like Hepburn, who died of cancer in 1993, a true original like Holly. Over the years, other heroines of TV and film have adopted the winsome rebellion of her iconic character to varying degrees — “Sex and the City,” for example.

Carrie Bradshaw’s irreverent personality, unabashed materialism and colorful romances on the HBO series inspired who knows how many women to move to Manhattan where they, too, might drink cosmos, wear giant flower pins and meet their Mr. Big.

Carrie wound up with Big in the series finale, angering some fans who felt that the ending ran contradictory to what the show was really about: so-called female independence.

The Hollywood version of Holly found love — and a home — in the arms of George Peppard.

Capote’s ending was far more bittersweet.

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