February 2008 Archives

It's been another long week here at GFY HQ, what with the Oscars, and blogging about the Oscars, and then complaining about how boring the Oscars were... but, at long last, TGIF. Which around these parts stands for Thank George It's Friday.

What better way to end the week than to borrow again, with respect, a gimmick from The Daily Show and sign off for the day with something that brings us inner peace. After a random conversation with a friend about Reba McEntyre songs, it came to my attention that she'd never been exposed to the sheer brilliance that is the video for that old duet, "Does He Love You?" I remember seeing this when the song came out back in the 90s, and it plucked every soapy heartstring I have.

Behold the glories of what Reba is wearing in the very first shot! Of the hat she so boldly wears in extreme close-ups in Act 2! Of the hugeness of her hair in Act Three!  The total generic himbo they're fighting for, and all the associated top-notch acting! And that ending. The ENDING! (Ignore the stupid tag with Rob Reiner; I don't know what that's there for, except perhaps to comfort the world that It Was Acting, and that if you happen to have misplaced Linda Davis since this video, it's not because Reba is an actual Love Terrorist.)

All I know is, if this video ever mated with one of Joan Collins' legendary on-screen catfights, the world would be a better place. Have a lovely weekend.

Admittedly, I haven't bought or read InStyle in a long time, because it's a little too rich for my blood -- I don't walk by Banana Republic and think to myself, "Aw, how sweet, a bargain-basement store" -- but this past weekend I snapped up the March 2008 issue with Eva Longoria on the front, because it was wickedly hideous and I had to have it.

Inside she says, "It makes me feel old, but I love it," and she's referring to being called "Mrs. Parker" when they're in Texas, but it might also refer to the cover photo.

Seriously, that doesn't even really look like her face to me. It's so... sharp. In my mind's eye, that's actually a Miami Beach socialite in her late thirties who just got fresh cheek implants, and is about to start a gig on a cruise ship opening for Kathie Lee Gifford at the Lido Deck Lounge.

Even InStyle clearly felt so concerned that you wouldn't recognize the pursed lips and cocked brows that the designers chucked any reference to the story inside (a peek inside her closet, which offers almost nothing interesting or surprising except MAYBE that she owns an entire wall full of black shoes and a minimum of $7000 in Louboutins), in favor of slapping her name over the picture in the biggest font size possible, as if to be like, "No, SERIOUSLY, it's HER. WE'D GET SUED FOR THIS IF IT WEREN'T, SO IT HAS TO BE." Although frankly, if I were her, I might sue them for it anyway.

Many moons ago, back when Britney washed her hair and we didn't know what a Kim Kardashian was, we amused ourselves with a little game called "Busey or Nolte?" It involved distinguishing between Gary Busey and Nick Nolte in photographs -- which wasn't always that hard, but certainly used to be much tougher. Time and plastic surgery have torn them apart like Shakespearian lovers.  Also, I'm pretty sure the game is up forever because there is no way Nick Nolte is going to berate Ryan Seacrest at the Oscars and then try and chug a pint of Jennifer Garner's blood. 

But the spirit of celebrity doppelgangers remains, born for us in them but living on in others. Today, we're honoring its manifestation in two slouchy, sloppy blondes with crappy taste in men. I present: Miller or Moss?

Waif-watchers in the UK know that Kate Moss and Sienna Miller inhabit a similar style, which some might suggest -- and have suggested -- Sienna cribbed off the Queen of Heroin-Chic. Why anyone would WANT to do that is beyond me, but honestly, I'm okay with living in a world where I don't understand what's going through Sienna Miller's head. I don't need to be haunted with dreams in which I am ENJOYING Rhys Ifans dancing naked in my living room with a shoebox on his head, or whatever it is that he does when they're together.

If you are stumped on whether that's Bedhead 2.0 or Original Flavor, this might help -- as it happens, both Miller AND Moss were in attendance at this party, and here they are pictured together:

The Setting: The offices of Paper Magazine

The Players: Two staffers: a stylist, and an editor

The Topic: Lindsay Lohan's upcoming cover shoot:

THE EDITOR: Do you really think she'll wear this?

THE STYLIST: Sure!

EDITOR: Is this a robe, or a tunic?

STYLIST: Sort of six of one, half-dozen of the other.

EDITOR: It's knee-length...

STYLIST:...with this crazy high-slits up the side. Cute, right?

EDITOR:  Yeah. I'm just worried it might be too...

STYLIST:  Modest?

EDITOR: Yes. Considering the subject.

STYLIST: Have you ever worked with Lindsay?

EDITOR: No.

STYLIST: Oh, honey. Don't worry. She'll find a way to make it look like she hasn't got any pants on, come hell or high water.

EDITOR: I don't know whether to be relieved by that or not.

I caught an eyeball or two of Aisha Tyler at Fashion Week and thought to myself (as opposed to thinking to someone else. I haven't mastered that yet), in the following order:

"a) Damn, she is tall and good-looking. I hate her.
b) Is that Aisha's boyfriend? Hot.
c)  Is that GWYNETH PALTROW OVER THERE? No, that's a dude.
d) La Tyler's been dressing so well lately.
e) I just really love bagels."

And then this had to go and happen:

Yeah. This was not her wisest decision. I'd wager this hurts her more than that time the plane landed on her head on Ghost Whisperer and killed her off.

So, get ready for me to blow your mind. We're entered an alternate universe, one where up is down, black is white, salt is pepper, Salt is Pepa, and cats and dogs are lying down together. I think Mariah looks cute here in her Sandy Olsson from Grease shiny black leggings-esque get-up, although TECHNICALLY, I think these are more like....pleather skinny jeans:

I know, I know: I've spent the last sixty years (more or less) whinging and whining and wailing and crying and tearing out my hair about the leggings and leggings-esque pant-like items, and don't get me wrong.  This is not what I would have dressed Mariah in, myself, although....you know, she is kind of working it. Let's just say that I just like them better than this:

REBECCA MILLER: Darling, you look so dapper.

DANIEL DAY-LEWIS: Thanks, sweetness. I thought it was about time; I'm tired of lumberjack plaid. You look gorgeous, too, of course.

REBECCA: We're so in love.

DANIEL: Although...

REBECCA: Wait, what? I never said anything before about the plaid or those silly earrings, and now you're giving me an "although"?

DANIEL: It's just... you're marvelous, but the dress is a bit Death Of An Accessories Salesman.

REBECCA: Daniel, if you want to throw my father's work in my face, he ALSO wrote a radio play called The Pussycat and The Plumber Who Was A Man, which is what we USUALLY look like when we leave the house. Well, minus the cat. But you get my point.

DANIEL: No, I...

REBECCA: Maybe I wanted a turn being the wacky one. Did you ever think of that?

DANIEL: All I'm saying is, what if  someone comes up and tries to use the door-knocker on your breasts? Then it's all "knockers" puns, all the time, AND I'll have to punch someone. And I'm just not that guy.

REBECCA: No. You far prefer to be wearing your wood-cutting loafers than starting fights.

DANIEL: At least I might have made these myself.

REBECCA: Well, maybe I made this, too. You don't know. You're not the only crafty one in the family.

DANIEL: Let's not squabble. Let's just agree that we're both a little crazy, and then go home and recreate that scene from Ghost but with my cobbling equipment.

REBECCA: You naughty crumpet! I can't wait. Make your acceptance speech short.

It's been a head-scratching time for all of us, trying to figure out exactly WHY multiple Razzie Award winner Lindsay Lohan persists in squeezing herself into The Lycra Scourge during every waking and/or daylight hour. Is she ashamed of her legs, somehow? Are they nocturnal?

Apparently we can cross both of those off the list. Behold her leaving traffic school:

[Photo: Splash News]

Maybe she realized wearing leggings in a classroom would be an impediment to anyone else learning anything about driving, as all they would do is ask her nosy things like, "Seriously, how many pairs of those do you own? What is wrong with you? Have you fired your mother yet?"

However, now we have a potential new slippery slope to monitor. Remember when Britney Spears did nothing but wander around town in crinkled, ratty, miniscule denim cut-off shorts, replete with Cheeto crust and Federline residue and the muck of a thousand gas-station bathrooms, and it looked like they hadn't been laundered in about six years? These shorts of Lindsay's are rather evocative of those. Hopefully there is no kind of filthy, deranged thrall that jean-shorts can cast over a young mind. At the first sign of an orange fingerprint or a backup dancer, someone needs to intervene -- although if she shows up on TV with a flesh-toned bodysuit and a giant snake, let's wait and see how it plays out, because that could get interesting.

I first saw this ad on a plane trip, and it was all I could do not to turn to one of the strangers on either side of me and say, "WTF? Have you seen this?"

[Photo: Splash News]

I mean, it's not like Candie's is known for deeply artistic and emotionally evocative ads that art, art history, theatre, English and photography students are going to rip out of their copies of W and stick on their dorm room cork boards between black and white photo spreads of Morrissey and the complete collection of those infamous Calvin Klein "Wow, These Turned Out Pornier Than Usual" ads, or whatever artsy college students are putting up in their rooms these days. (In addition to these cultural touchstones, my dorm-mates played a lot of Rent. I presume that slot is currently being occupied by Once soundtrack. Ah, college. Smoke all those cloves while you still can.) I mean, this is the company that ran an ad featuring Jenny McCarthy on the toilet:

And as much eye-rolling I did at that one back in the day, I'd venture to say that the McCarthy ad is almost cuter. It's a youth-oriented brand, and at least Jenny looks sort of fresh-faced and charmed by the fact that you're snapping a photo of her on the can. Hayden, on the other hand, looks like a Paris Hilton impersonator on her way to the 7th Annual Slap-Off, an event at which local entertainers compete to see who can put on the most make-up without his or her face actually sliding off. If I were feeling particularly bitchy, I might add that she also looks like she might be tempted to earn her Slap-Off entrance fee by putting in an extra hour on her regular corner. But that just seems mean.

As I'm sure you've heard, there's HUGE NEWS in the world of foreheads: GFY HQ Girl Crush Rachel Bilson has CUT BANGS?!?!11111!!! BANGS!

We've heard from readers waxing both pro and con re: THE BANGS, and as we've been sort of run ragged by the delicious Oscar shenanigans of this week (looking up how to spell Marion Cottilard multiple times can be tiring!), we thought, let's put it to a vote:

Dear Miss Janet Privacy Control-Jackson (I understand that is your full name),

I must thank you for your body of work. What other artist has provided more opportunities for both car-dancing and elementary school roller-skating parties? And yet, I suspect your body is not thanking you for this particular piece of work:

Yeah. Call them whatever you want: genie-trousers, blouson-pants, harem-suit bottoms, pouffy leg-sleeves, pirate breeches, capri-bloomers, parachute-knickers -- I'm sure our friends at the glossy magazines will think of some more palatable euphemism for what you're wearing. When, let's be honest, they're actually about twenty minutes away from being Hammer pants. That's not a Behind the Music you even want to approximate.

You know, I'd been wondering what Eliza Dushku has been working on lately, so it's refreshing to know the answer at long last:

She's been moonlighting on the other side of the Phantom Tollbooth as Plussy Galore, by day the  High Priestess of Operational Voodoo and leading Symbols player in the Mathmagician's marching band, and by night the Dodecahedron's nimble mistress. No wonder she didn't have the energy to change her clothes.

If you're trying to decide whether a tight, shiny, stretchy turtleneck is a good or a bad idea, allow Kerry Washington to aid in your pro/con list.

Pro: No chance of a nip slip.

Con: Unsightly, unexpected perspiration in the face of flashbulbs. Am I crazy or does it look like her nipples are sweating?

Fortunately for her, it took me a while to notice that little problem, because I was wholly engrossed in the children's book illustration that is her outfit. I keep expecting The Very Hungry Caterpillar to pop out of that thicket and take a greedy bite out of her skirt.

Because we are nothing if not committed to keeping you up to date on the movements of the Sisters Peldon:

They're alive! They're attending Oscar parties in outfits which may have been purchased at Forever XXI, but hey -- a girl needs to save her coin sometimes! They're at an Oscar party partially sponsored by something called Tummy Tuck Jeans, which would have prompted me to hiss, "WHAT ARE YOU IMPLYING?" at the invitation. And most disturbingly of all, Brown appears to be going blonde, an alarming development that surely signals some kind of Single White Female/Kelly Taylor's Friend From Rehab Who Tries to Steal Kelly's Life And Also Murder Her situation. I'm just saying, if we start seeing but one Peldon around town -- one sort of unidentifiable, blonde-ish Peldon -- the authorities should probably be alerted.

Wondering what Tara Reid's been up to, other than gracing the pages of our book, in which we might be a leeetle mean about her propensity to be, as Heather once said, "too often Wild and not nearly enough On"? Well, someone invited her to an Oscar party!

And she remembered her spray tan! Is it me, or is this dress way too big? I know La Reid has lost weight -- I've been reading my Star Magazine! -- but the droopy dress + the tan + a sort of aggressive expression + the blonde + a resemblance I never noticed until now = Rachel Zoe. I don't mean that she appears styled by Zoe, I mean that if you squint and shake your head and move ten feet away from the computer, she sort of LOOKS like Rachel Zoe. Though surely Zoe would have accented this with giant sunglasses and a fur stole -- and would kill me if she knew I were comparing her to Tara Reid -- but you know what I mean. My question is: does this mean that Tara Reid is on the road to producing a book about style, perhaps titled From A to Reid, all about the stylistic merits of denim minis, excessive boozing and drunk-dialing Alyson Hannigan at midnight to yell that SHE should be the one in a sitcom? I certainly hope so. I would be first in line to buy it.

Being the employers of one of the country's sauciest bachelors and smoothest-sailing dreamboats, we understand Sarah Larson's pain: All eyes are on her because George brought a date, she's the only one of his string of brunette-bots that he's brought to something like this, the magazines are screaming that she's the lucky girl who'll get him to commit again, and she knows we're all wondering why Clooney is making out with a girl who once ate a scorpion on Fear Factor.

But dating Intern George has its plus side -- you know, one or two -- and that is the fact that designers were probably throwing gowns at her by the dozen in an effort to woo her into their camp for the Oscars. She must have had an entire room at the villa full of options, and she picked this:

It's apparently a Valentino couture dress, but it looks more like Jessica McClintock passed out one night on top of a book of Monet paintings and woke up with drool on her cheek and a jones for wearable water lilies. We complained about a lack of interesting colors at the Oscars this year -- it was all red and black, making me wonder if there was a poker theme we didn't know about -- but I'm not sure I can get behind a crazy melange of pastels that may once have upholstered a couch in the lobby of my grandmother's condo building in Florida.

Oh, George, don't be like that. You know we're right. We're not saying she's not NICE -- not that we'd know, though, since we never heard her say anything all night and you never bring her around for dinner or Diet Coke breaks or donuts, but WHATEVER. So chill with the skepticism. Also, you've never seen that couch.

That's better. Now come home! We want to hear more stories about Tilda Swinton.

Today, we encountered several people who said one of the following to us:

1) "Oh, GOD, are you actually HAPPY Diablo Cody won for writing Juno?"

2) "Oh, GOD, are you one of THOSE people who are PISSED Diablo Cody won for writing Juno?"

Personally, and shallowly, I'm stoked for her -- everyone loves a stripper-to-screenwriter tale (or at least I do, especially if she has an evil twin lurking somewhere), so I say let her have the bronzed naked dude. It's just a trophy. And if it turns out she's secretly the daughter of a wealthy oilman who only stripped out of self-indulgent fascination with her own nipples, well, whatever. That's between her and her therapist.

Who, it's worth noting, may be getting paid overtime to counsel Cody through her Oscar fashion debut.

Objection #1: This feels a bit off-the-rack, which is fine when you're at an Oscar viewing party but not when you're viewing it from your awesome seat at the Kodak alongside the people you're about to beat. It has no shape. It's billowy. I'm pretty sure someone's slutty grandmother in Boca Raton wore this to Red Lobster on Unlimited Shrimp Night in the hope that she could eat all she wanted and still get groped by Original-Teeth Jim. If she didn't use a stylist, she should have -- most of them were probably clamoring to clothe her; she was the unanimous choice to win in our GFY HQ office poll (Intern George abstained because he was busy, or something), and you know she's going to make it in Us. GIVE your services to her, folks.

If Diablo did have a stylist, here's Objection #2: That person is BORING. Like, Cold Mountain boring. Ivanhoe boring. Or, more relevantly, 80th Annual Academy Awards boring. I like a good animal print, but when you're outfitting an unusual and rebellious sort, it's the laziest and easiest choice (except for black, possibly) if you are trying to say, "Hey, CHECK IT OUT, this woman is unusual and rebellious!" Diablo could look bitchin' in a bunch of colors and cuts that wouldn't blunt her edge, so stop sleeping on the job, people.

Objection #3: Yes, there is something really charming about a woman who clearly didn't pick her dress by thinking, "Okay, but how's it going to look when I win?" However, seriously, you're at the OSCARS. Even if you're Entertainment Weekly's 100-1 shot, you HAVE to pick your dress by thinking, "Okay, but how's it going to look when I win?" Otherwise, this happens:

Hey Jer,

What's up? Not a lot going on right now, huh? Kinda just bored at home? Doing a lot of "chillaxing" with your bros? Yeah, us too. You know,  just doing our thing. I feel you.

One thing, though:

I know it was The Most Boring Oscars EverTM, and everyone -- except Marion Cotillard, whom I've decided upon reflection that I might be in love with -- looked Totally Boring, but do you really think it's wise to attempt, once again, the old I'm Too Cool to Bathe, Dude, I Just Show Up And Do My Thing scuzzathon? It's possible no one told you, but Colin Farrell JUST did that.  And he actually made me laugh during a leaked sex tape (not that I watched it, I totally just made that up, but if I had watched Colin Farrell's sex tape -- under duress obviously -- then I might have laughed when, whilst manning the camera, he commented that his cinematography was REALLY terrible and embarrassing.). So I think it's apt to note that he might be the more skilled man at Charming Scuzzery. You know?

Hilary Swank is someone who should probably avoid making statements -- I wasn't a fan of the navy backless dress the year she won for Million-Dollar Baby, and of course there was that pre-GFY Academy Awards to which she wore a pink minidress wrapped in full-length tulle. It's like she thinks we still don't Get It that she's attractive and womanly, but in fact, we do.

So I was relieved she stayed away from statement dressing -- for her sake, of course; OBVIOUSLY we were hoping she'd show up in a piñata. But in the end I still don't think I'm entirely on board with what she picked.

The translucent skirt is sort of fine, but I'm not wild about the way she's woven into it, nor how the design makes it look like the cross-hatching is slowly coming undone and will eventually leave her semi-nude in a big swinging, filmy black drape. And my early interest in the bodice wore off the longer I stared at it, at which point it began looking like arachnids on parade.

And then, of course, there is the close-up.

In a year when a lot of people showed up in red, I half-expected Katherine Heigl to whip out a shiv and shank the hell out of Anne Hathaway for arriving earlier in a jazzier, more romantic version of her tomato gown. Not that it's Hathaway's fault; I just feel like if a girl is so annoying as to complain about her husband and married life every time you shove a microphone into her face, then she's the type of pill who will sneak up behind Anne at the post-party and husk, "You know what the devil wears? HOSPITAL SCRUBS, bitch. Sleep with one eye open."

So let's compare the dresses. First up: Katherine Heigl, because maybe by putting her first she won't leave a flaming bag of manure on our doorsteps.

It's nice. And it fits snugly. Her makeup is a splotchy hot mess and I'm a little tired of her trying to morph herself into Marilyn Monroe -- which, speaking of pilfering, I wonder how Christina Aguilera feels about her aesthetic being snatched out from under her nose while she was doing her laamaze breathing. But otherwise, there's nothing really overtly wrong with it.

However, although the dresses aren't identical and certainly there's room for both of them in this world, we're guessing Katherine Heigl took one look at Anne Hathaway and immediately ran for the bar:

Oh, ELLEN:

I know, I know. You love the Converse. You live in an old converted whorehouse. You're a smart kid and a bit of a tomboy. I like you. You seem smart. I think you're adorable. If I lived next door to you, we'd be hanging out, shooting the shit all the time. And if that were the case, today I would go shuffling over some time after noon with Tito's Tacos (for the hangover) and the papers, and we'd eat six or seven bags of chips and then I'd say, "Ellen, WTF?" And you'd roll your eyes, and then I'd say, "WHY DIDN'T YOU ASK ME?" and you'd say, "because you would have told me not to wear it." And I'd said, "And?" And you would say, "and you would have been right."

On one hand, it looks like what might happen if fish scales and lace mated. On the other, it's French and so is she, and she's so pretty and she was so, so lovely and adorable when she won, and you know what? I think I might sort of....like it.

I mean, for one thing, it's certainly very flattering on her. She looks like a sexy fish-lady on her wedding day, which I know SOUNDS weird and rude, but I mean it in totally the most complimentary way. You feel me, right? Tell me you feel me:

"This performance goes out to my grand old frenemy, Andre Leon Talley. It's all for you, A.L.T..."

"And I am TEEEEELLLLING YOOOU,

IIIIIIII AM NOT CALLLLLING.

You're the WORST STYLIST that I'll ever know.

What the HELL was that gold bolero?!?!?

No, no, no, NOOOOO way,

NOOOOO way

IIIIIII'M letting you clothe MEEEEE.

I don't want to look CRAZY.

I'm free, I'm free!

And you, and you, and YOU,

You're gonna RUE MEEEEEEEEEEEE."

Listen, it's hard enough to get up and get into that suit. Clean hair is JUST TOO MUCH TO ASK.

Oh, look, it's Renee Zzzzzzz......

Sorry, I nodded off there for a second. Not that there's anything empirically wrong with this; it's a pretty cut, a dazzling fabric, and a lovely cool metallic hue. But doesn't it feel like we've seen this a thousand times before on her? Okay, maybe not with that exact haircut -- which Renee has GOT to grow out before someone comes up to her and asks what it was like to be one of the Von Trapp sons -- but the rest is so cookie-cutter Zellweger. It has such a strong aura of been-there-done-that even Carolina Herrera herself probably had to take a No Doz to finish the assignment. Try some sleeves for once, Renee. Or a wig. Poke your legs through a stuffed Simba. Hell, at this point Renee could wear Bjork herself, and I'd applaud her for being refreshing.

"HELLO FRIENDS. I am SHARON STONE. And I am FABULOUS. BEHOLD my white suit, a tribute -- nay, a glorious homage -- to my peep John Travolta. Admit it. I look kind of rad in this. You know I do. For I can do anything: I had a brain thingie that exploded in my head...and LIVED. I had a husband who got bit by a dragon...AND THEN I LEFT HIM. I was the FIRST actress to show people my vagina -- THE FIRST! Well, sort of. Okay, that's a total lie. But for the purposes of my current argument: THE FIRST! I AM LEGEND. And yes, I look like a tapping-dancing maitre d' in this. I KNOW THAT. But I'm an AWESOME tap-dancing maitre d'. AND YOU LOVE IT. You'd look like a refugee from a college production of one of those Busby Berkeley musicals where people twirl around in concentric circles holding giant coins. But I look GLORIOUS. BEHOLD ME!

PS: I AM WEARING A RABBIT'S FOOT, IT'S TRUE. Watch out, I'll use as a swizzle stick in your cocktail if you displease me, HUMAN"

Last year I wrote that Cameron Diaz's white Oscar gown "inspired me to plug in my iron." Which I remember not because I am so amused at myself, but rather because her gown this year felt like an equally dusty "before" shot from an ad extolling the glories of spray starch.

Last year it felt like a linen napkin; this year, it's a bedsheet, and -- it must be said -- possibly a very low thread-count bedsheet she bought from Target because her old linens smelled like Justin and so she had to burn them.

It doesn't get much better from the back:

Okay, full disclosure: when Tilda here won, both Heather and I clapped with glee. Sure, she dresses like a nutjob some of the time, but she seems really coooool, and, like, authentic somehow. You know, she's got that crazy living situation where she and her ex and her current boy toy all live together and she never wears make-up, but it doesn't seem like an affectation and she and Intern George love each other, and if she's good enough for Intern George, she's okay by me. Plus, there's something to be said for someone who's a reliably crazy dresser: I might hate what she's wearing, but at least it's interesting.

See:

I mean...let's just say that Jessica Simpson wore this somewhere. If I'm being honest, I would so let her have it. There would be so many garbage bag jokes, Hefty would cut us a check. And she does look totally uneven, like she caught one of her arms in the limo door on the way over and had to leave it behind as a casualty of war. Or like one half of her body is going to the nunnery to take the veil (after her true love dies in the war, of course, and she will spend all her time in the convent looking radiantly beautiful as a heartbroken-yet-brave bride of Christ, and it will be SO heart-wrenching when it turns out her lover is ALIVE, and yes, I watched a lot of movies about nuns as a child, so what?), and the other half looks like she's going to the nunnery to take the veil, but it was really hot that day. So, yeah, she is not at all wearing what I would wear to the Oscars (two words: turbans!), but it's....Tilda Swinton. This is totally what she wears, like, grocery shopping. I can't totally ding it for her.

To celebrate the fact that the Night of a Thousand Stars is coming to us as originally scheduled, we'll be live-blogging the red-carpet shenanigans for New York's Web site, starting when the festivities do at 6 p.m. Eastern time and continuing right up until they shove the last desperate, gowned celebrity inside for the ceremony.

If you want to read along with us, this link will -- at the appointed time -- take you to us, and of course on Monday we'll have our usual coverage right here on GFY. We are so excited we might plow through TWO wheels of Brie.

And at least one of these.

Chris Gorham not included. Tragically.

Actually, I'm fairly sure I know how I feel about this.

Love the pattern, but unless Katie is planning to carry Suri in that thing until her high-school graduation, wearing a dress with a gargantuan built-in baby sling is a tad over the top. Perhaps that's where she keeps Tom when he gets cranky and needs a nap.

But, what the hell. It's Friday! The Oscars are upon us! I just had an awesome peanut-butter, banana, honey, and nutmeg sandwich! Everything's coming up roses. So I'll put Katie's hellacious houndstooth hammock to a Fug or Fab vote, because there's nothing like a little democracy to start your weekend right.

I guess Kimberly Wyatt here is one of the Pussycat Dolls:

I really hope she shows up on Girlicious --which I hope you're watching, as it is CRACKTASTICALLY entertaining, in a completely shameful way --to explain to the cast why over-the-knee boots paired with a strapless spring dress ganked from the costume closet of your local junior high school's production of Bye Bye Birdie REALLY enhances your confidence, your sexiness, or your sexy confidenceness. I just want to hear how she would explain it.

Oh my god, Jaslene. Girl. You know I love you. Of all the Top Model winners, you might be my favorite (although who doesn't like Danielle?). But COME ON:

Peep-toe wrestling shoes....with tights? A belted....I don't know what to call it? A pillowcase? From the thighs up, you look like a mannequin at Forever XXI, from the bottom down you look like Sienna Miller's next outing to the pub. What would Tyra say?

So, I might be watching Cashmere Mafia. Trust: it's not good. But it is kind of fun in its badness, and the clothes are predictably Pat Field-y, which is to say, totally irrational for the real world but evoking a sort of delightful WTF? This is FANTASTIC/TERRIBLE! feeling in the television viewer. For example, this past week, Lucy Liu went for a jog with her super-hot neurosurgeon boyfriend:

IN A FUR COAT. In nearly four years of writing this website, I have become slightly better at maintaining my poker face, but I turned the TV on to see this and actually said -- aloud, to the empty house -- "WHAT IS SHE WEARING?"

Later, Lucy Liu was sort of stalking this dog (don't ask. It was a metaphor), and went to the dog park in this:

Obviously. What you can't tell -- because my technology here might be slightly low tech -- is that her sleeves are made....of chain mail. Yes. Awesome/terrible!

But be that as it may, what's the point of a nighttime soap without crazy outfits? Dynasty would have been nothing without its giant fur turbans and ear-level shoulder pads. It's when the show's stars start getting used to being trussed up like a wacky couture turkey (...a couturkey, if you will) and begin showing up in real life looking completely wacked-out that it all falls apart. Like Bonnie Somerville for example:

DEMI: All right, everyone, this is it.

RUMER: Whatever.

ASHTON: Hey, chill, pretty baby. Be fly like a hep cat.

RUMER: I just can't believe YOU got to wear the hat. The hat is MY THING.

DEMI: God, stand UP straight, Rumer! Miss Golden Globe does not slouch.

RUMER: Well, fine, THANKS FOR THAT, 'cause I never got to BE Miss Golden Globe, remember?

DEMI: Then you will damn well use the dress I bought you tonight and smile and look interested for a change. Will it kill you?

RUMER: I AM NOT YOUR ACCESSORY.

ASHTON: Chill, honey-mama, all this arguing is making my face-lace twitch. Let the spawn do her thing and we'll catch her on the flip-side, dig?

DEMI: And what the hell is up with you in that zoot suit? What is that stupid scarf?

ASHTON: I think the word you're looking for is "snazzy," baby.

DEMI: God, all I wanted was an old-school glamorous night on the town. NOTHING WORKS OUT FOR ME.

RUMER: WELCOME TO MY LIFE!

ASHTON: You broads are churning my bread basket. I need some giggle water.

We're all for Miss Tyra torturing a fresh crop of girls every cycle on Top Model, but some glories need to be experienced twice. Like Jade, that batshit leftover lady who assured us that elephants are in the dinosaur family, or Questionably Blind Amanda. So we put together a list of twelve girls we'd love to see face off in an All-Star season. Essentially, if you ever wanted to hear Elyse give a confessional about Jade, this could make that dream come beautifully, condescendingly, eloquently true.

Jade, Cycle 6: Too old to compete, too crazy to ignore: Jade is the cream of this show’s deluded crop. Remember her in-house rampage with panties on her head? The beat poetry? That dragalicious Cover Girl ad? The hideous aging-poodle-style makeover with shockingly fierce pictures? Jade once told housemate Furonda, “One day I’m going to write a book, and you should read it, because you might learn something.” Please, God, if ANTM won’t have her back, just publish that book.

To check out the other eleven we picked, check out "Our ANTM All-Star Dream Team" on NYMag.com's The Cut.

I'm not opposed to a good love triangle when it's done right -- why, hello, Brenda/Dylan/Kelly! -- but as fans of the Gossip Girl books know, the TV series has drawn its characters just differently enough that the entrance of dreamy Dan's "best friend" Vanessa has been pretty unwelcome. In the books, she's kind of punky and cool, he's moody and pretentious, and Serena isn't as grounded; in the show, though, Dan and Serena are mostly adorable, and so being asked to swallow a duller incarnation of Vanessa is a bit like washing down your cheesecake with a glass of curdled milk.

And of course, in life, it's kind of hard to follow Blake Lively no matter WHO you are. She's so pretty.

Even when she's evoking a special performance of "You're The One That I Want" as costumed by the late Fred Rogers, Blake makes it all look very cool and comfortable, as if she could as easily wear this out to the video store as to a party. It's not quite my favorite outfit, but by and large it works on her and she elevates it into something more interesting than its component parts.

So the deck was kind of stacked against poor Jessica Szohr, who, in addition to playing second fiddle to Serena on Gossip Girl, on this night was also fifth chair in the clarinet section while Blake nailed her solos. Check it:

Socialite Jennifer Missoni (of the Missoni Missonis. Wow, that word has lost all meaning for me after writing it three times) is really very cute, right? So cute:

I think the dress is cute, and I even rather like her Ceremonial Breastplate Necklace. But I have one question for you: are thick old-school pantyhose back?! PLEASE SAY NO. Thick, ice-skater style hose remind me of several moments in my life I'd rather forget: my horrible first job out of college, at which I was not ALLOWED to wear pants, despite the fact that I had to do a lot of climbing of ladders and such; a church function I was dragged to against my will by an individual who will remain nameless, because I truly believe that she had no idea the event was going to include a long talk about how everyone should be trying to convert the "heathens"; and the summer I was experiencing a life-crisis which culminated in my making a list of pros and cons as to whether or not I should join the FBI, which was recruiting at the time. On the "pros" side were perks like, "when I go to pick up my friends, I can pound on their door yelling, "OPEN UP, MOTHERF'ER! IT'S THE FBI!", and the possibility that my partner might be David Duchnovy-esque. On the "cons" side was, in addition to the possibility of my being shot, "probably have to wear pantyhose."

I can not bear to revisit those dark, strange, frustrating days. Please tell me they're not upon us once more.

Dude, green IS gold. I am WITH you.  I totally recycle. I make the kids at the market pack my groceries in unbleached cotton bags and then get annoyed when they half-ass it and place my six-pack of organic spring water (read: Bud) on top of my delicate bananas (read: Doritos), and then feel like an asshole about it. I've replaced all my light bulbs with those other light bulbs that look sort of like DNA that Domino magazine told me to use unless I wanted the world to burst into flames. If I had a yard, I would TOTALLY be composting, because I am kind of obsessed with composting and think it's fascinating. I am a full-on treehugger with you, man. But you know what else is gold? TUCKING IN YOUR SHIRT.

Kelly, Kelly, Kelly.

Bjork's had an actual face. And illusion netting. And an EGG PURSE. Were you even trying?

So, it seems pants were in short supply at the Brit Awards -- by which I mean, trouser-pants, and not underwear-pants, and it's important to clarify this point because of the great and almost impassable cultural chasm between this mighty nation and our parent country. Apparently when they landed here, "pants" took on a whole new meaning that didn't make it back across the pond, and suddenly merely saying something innocent like, "I'm just wearing pants and a sweater to the bar," became equivalent to dropping a ticking time-bomb of accidental nudism onto the kingdom that begot us. I don't know how we have managed to be conversant with them since. Fortunately, our t-shirt works in both languages; thank God we are fluent in both.

At any rate, leg-and-crotch coverings were  at times absent from the proceedings -- Abi Clancy being one instance and Alesha Dixon of girl group Mis-Teeq being the other.

It's here that Alesha learned that "Brit" refers to the country in which she lives, and not to Britney Spears -- and that, ergo, this ceremony was NOT an homage to the fabric-to-flesh ratio our cherished, troubled singer so frequently employs. I am pretty sure that dress is made of the foil lining from a box of Valentine's chocolates. Would that Alesha had shared those with us instead.

TV personality Fearne Cotton, it turns out, is TECHNICALLY wearing something trouser-adjacent. At first I thought it was a miniscule skirt, but no:

In light of this photograph, it shouldn't surprise you to learn that Ms. "Make Up Your Mind, Please" Clancy is: a) a former lingerie model; b) a runner-up of Britain's Next Top Model, dinged by the judges for being too "glamour," which is essentially UK modeling code for "soft-core porn"; c) a WAG, or more specifically, the on-off G of toothy giant Peter Crouch; d) was allegedly dumped once by Crouch via fax; and e) tried to solidify her career by allowing herself to be taken under the musty wing of professional exhibitionist and gold-plated nutter Janice Dickinson, purely for televisual purposes.

Given all that, it may surprise you that she bothered wearing panties at all. Didn't Janice teach her better than that?

Oh my god, you guys. The LohanLeggingitis has mutated! It's turned from Leggings As Pants to...NO PANTS AT ALL.

Seriously, Geri, a Man's-Shirt-As-Outfit works only on very specific occasions: the Morning After scene in a romantic comedy; as a costume for the Sexy Rumpled Woman Who Just Loves a Clean-Shaven Face in a Gillette Mach3 ad;  and those actual real-life occasions when you decide to pretend you're in a razor commercial while your boyfriend shaves.  Two of  these events are fictional, one of them is personal, and neither of them involve being escorted places by boy back-up dancers while wearing a pelt.

You know, whether it's fair or not, I feel like if Cate Blanchett wore this I'd be sitting here thinking, "Oh, that crazy Cate, always trying something endearingly wacky." Maybe she'd even pull it off. But when fellow Aussie Nicole Kidman attempts things that are off-kilter, it just makes me tired.

It's like, "Remember me? From that movie I did a long time ago that you liked? Well, this movie didn't really work out, but hey, I'm still acting! Still here! My younger husband waxes his chest and I brush his hair! It's what all the kids are doing! I'M HIP AND RELEVANT! PAY ATTENTION TO ME! " Meanwhile we're watching her airbrushed, still-Botoxed face stare smugly at all those sheer panels on the sternum, the thighs, and the ribcage, relieved that it is not the one dressed like an overly treated art-deco window in a Victorian funeral home. Although I'll give her this: At least it's distracting us from fixating on her bump. Or her allegedly missing Botox.

I secretly wonder if this is a "Well Played, Will Ferrell" in disguise -- albeit a very good disguise.

Sure, his vest comes down to his knees, and yeah, it makes his legs look two feet long. And the turtleneck gives off the vibe that he's partly in traction. But don't you think that, at the premiere of his movie about basketball, Will Ferrell intentionally showed up looking like he'd borrowed clothes directly from Shaquille O'Neal? Or that he was styled by Charles Barkley? Used Dwayne Wade's tailor? I know he didn't show up at the Blades of Glory premiere in junk-cradling spandex, but that doesn't mean he isn't trying to distract everyone from how bad this movie looks by doing something amusing at the premiere. It's like a loving tribute to a Big & Tall store.

That's got to be it, right? Because I would hate to believe that Will Ferrell has suffered a head injury and woke up thinking he's Karl Malone, or that he's got some sort of bizarre elephantitis of the torso that's caused it to take over three-quarters of his body. Those things are sad. The idea that this is a fashion gag makes me much happier. And because I can't handle trauma without having had my caffeine yet, I need to cling to the latter.

I was talking to someone the other day about Pearl Harbor and how, when you saw it the first time, you thought things like, "Josh Hartnett is the only good thing about this movie," and now, you reflect back on it and think, "JOSH HARTNETT? Wow. That movie WAS bad." And it was. I mean, I love Ben Affleck but I think even HE would agree that he was god-awful in it, albeit god-awful in a period piece which found it historically accurate for his flyboy character to have HIGHLIGHTED HAIR. And then you have poor Kate Beckinsale, who was not truly terrible in it, but who was hamstrung by the fact that she was dressed like a quasi-porno version of a World War II nurse the whole time. But the fact is, I'm pretty sure she must have thought that movie would catapult her into the Hollywood A-list, and it really did not. So apparently she's dealing with her currently perhaps-less-sterling-than-anticipated-at-this-point career by going out and catching a raging case of LindsayLohanLeggingitis:

GIRL. I don't care HOW MANY sweaters you wear. You're still not wearing pants. Has that worked well for Lindsay, I ask you? Exactly.

Full disclosure. I love this coat. I love a kitschy, costume-y coat, especially if it looks like something Auntie Mame would wear to brunch to talk about all the money she's not leaving you until you clean up your act.

In fact, I have to be honest and admit that I might -- nay, totally would -- wear this whole thing, with sluttier shoes and different accessories. But I was discussing this very look with some people recently, and there seemed to be the thought that there's something about the huge string of pearls and the hair and the Giant Proffered Cig that pushes her right into Wackadoo Old Broad territory. Wackadoo Old Broad Just Exiting Manhattan Divorce Court, if you will. And while I unironically can't WAIT until I can legitimately be a Wackadoo Old Broad, I am.

So, I tried to figure out who this Eureka person is, but Wikipedia could not help me -- unless I am mistaken and she IS, in fact, Dorothy Gale's cat from The Wizard of Oz, a large-scale business-plan competition in India, a town in Nova Scotia, or a WWII paratrooper beacon. Otherwise, it's never a good sign when you are a performer but you don't have a Wikipedia page. Surely she has a friend who could get on that, or a few hours in her schedule.

All that may change soon enough, though. This mysterious "Eureka" person is performing at an NBA All-Star Weekend event, and based on what she's wearing, she may soon get her own entry under "Eureka (singer, Lil' Kim impersonator)":

[Photo: Splash News]

This is not an outfit. This is that page in the Victoria's Secret catalog that you come upon and the snort at, because normal people don't lounge around the house -- or a club, or a formal party, or any event that doesn't involve seducing the pool boy -- in itchy-looking sparkly sweatpants and a shiny, swirly bra that's barely holding in your goods. Only Lil' Kim, our favorite nudist sprite of yore, would have the tenacity to wear this outside and call it clothes -- and frankly, Latter-Day Lil' Kim, who got sprung from the pokey after spending all that time in full-coverage orange jumpsuits, would probably snort that this is "too obvious." So this is either a touching homage to the tiny exhibitionist we came to love back in 1999, or just Eureka's desperate attempt to get Diana Ross to grab her boob. Either way, we're pretty sure a Wikipedia page might be born today. Go stick a candle into a cupcake and celebrate with her.

However, I'm still not convinced the beacon entry wouldn't partially apply. You could probably see those pants from 30,000 feet, although they certainly would not make me want to jump toward them.

So, this went badly:

So, let me see if I've gleaned the correct message from this cover: this Spring, it will be the height of chic for women previously renowned for their cute, off-kilter spunkiness and sexy regular-girl charm to re-envision themselves as stoned-looking, moderately greasy mannequins with quasi-80s hair, wearing a scrunchie as a top? Good to know.

Can we discuss Natasha Henstridge for a moment?

She looks really pretty on Eli Stone, right? I mean, I assume she does. I haven't watched it yet, though it's waiting for me on the TiVo. But she looks pretty in the commercials, so I assume she looks good on the show. But when she's out in the wild, as she is here, she looks....kinda rough. Sorry, Natasha, but you're wearing a bath mat as a shawl. You smell what I'm cooking here.

Of course,  said roughness may also be because NO ONE ON THE WORLD can pull off WIDE-LEGGED PLEATHER PANTS.

Okay, maybe Grace Jones. But that's it.

So, there's a part in the book where we talk about Diane Kruger, and how sometimes she looks AMAZING, and sometimes she looks like she woke up in an alternate universe where everyone wears trash compactors as hats. That happened again this weekend.

First, we've got the fantastic:

I love that. I think she looks so chic and unusual and....you know, very Dramatic Gorgeous European Actress who bathes in alpaca milk and owns a leopard. In a good way.

But then, the next day the pendulum clearly swung into the other direction. The fully batshit crazy direction:

SCARLETT JOHANSSON:  Thanks for taking the fall this time, Natalie. It's nice of you to step up to the plate and get all crazy looking, right after I made that big fuss about how imperfect you make me feel.

NATALIE PORTMAN: Huh? I mean, excuse me?

SCARLETT: You know, you totally took the pressure off me by showing up to this event wearing a complex array of curtains. It's nice of you.

NATALIE: What?

SCARLETT: I'm saying, I hate what you're wearing, and THANK YOU for that. God. You went to that fancy college, you'd think you'd have better aural comprehension.

NATALIE: I understood you, I was just perplexed and distracted by your unusually ratty hair. For your information, this dress is extremely significant.

SCARLETT: So was Bjork's swan outfit.

NATALIE: Well. I never! I had no idea that you were pure evil.

SCARLETT:  I am NOT evil. I am GRATEFUL that you are taking the pressure off me! Why has this conversation gone so terribly wrong? No one understands me!

NATALIE: My significant dress and I are going to go over there and stand next to Eric Bana now. I'll talk to you when you feel ready to apologize.

SCARLETT: BUT...oh, never mind.

I think it's about time Adrian Grenier reconsidered the beard.

[Photo: Splash News]

I don't know if it's for Entourage, or something else, or if nobody told him that strike beards are so January 2008 because that whole thing is over. And I'm not an anti-beardite, I swear. Lots of splendid people have beards, like Santa, and my dry cleaner, and sometimes Judd Apatow. But the one-two wallop of bushy hair plus facial shrubbery give off a whiff of Adrian having been sequestered in a woodland cabin, scraping bark off the trees to make his own paper, foraging for berries to turn into homemade jam, and preparing for when the aliens come to get us by building a rocket-sidecar he can use to transport more people to the promised galaxy.

Don't get me wrong -- I'm sure that whoever is on the receiving end of bath soap made entirely out of leaves and spit will really appreciate the gift, and I bet Adrian needed the detox after hanging out with Paris Hilton so much. But it also might be a good time for him to rejoin civilization. It's not worth missing Lost episodes just to become one with nature and make your own coasters out of fish heads.

When I saw this photo of Charlize Theron, the second thing I thought -- after wondering if she's slightly over-tweezed, or if it's just me -- was, "She is pretty. Stuart Townsend looks like he just realized he has a piece of spinach on his teeth and he's desperate to keep it hidden, but she seems happy and she's probably wearing something cute." Then I concluded, per usual, that she could probably poke her legs through a giant handbag and pull it off with, if not ease, something approaching aplomb.

Of course, then I saw the full-length photo.

When I was in seventh grade my class did one of those weekend trips to York, and all the girls got so excited to be away from home that once we got to the hotel, we all dumped out whatever makeup we'd managed to get our hands on and dolled ourselves up but good. By which I mean, like teenage hookers. We had no clue what we were doing, and add to that the fact that our rooms and bathroom were dimly lit so we couldn't even really tell how much we had on; when we couldn't see any difference in our faces we'd slap on more, and more, and more. Looking back, I now understand why our teachers took one look at us and practically passed out cold.

But, looking back again, I DON'T think Sarah Michelle Gellar was in that class, or on that field trip, or in York at the time watching a flock of painted pre-teens drift past all proud of themselves. So I'm not sure what's going on here:

She doesn't even look like herself. Especially at a Vaseline event about keeping skin amazing, where you'd think a minimalist approach with makeup would've been more logical, as opposed to creating the illusion of two black eyes and a frostnipped mouth.

Smidge also might've wanted to reconsider her minimalist approach to boob support -- sticky bras, altering the dress, wearing a different one altogether -- but perhaps she thought with all that stuff on her face nobody would recognize her. She should've just told photographers she was Ivanka Trump. By the time they noticed that those aren't Ivanka's boobs, Sarah Michelle would be long gone.

In theory, I think Kerry Washington's dress here is cute:

But am I crazy, or does it all seem about half a size too small? I want to both yank it down and pull it up. It's the Catch-22 of cocktail dresses.

This picture of Christel Khalil from The Young and the Restless -- who played the daughter of crazy-hat-wearing Victoria Rowell, made out with her current boyfriend at her own divorce party, and had a whole storyline where she got gonorrhea, although everyone seems to have forgotten about that -- is technically not a scrolldown, because it was better at the bottom than at the top.

So I MADE it a scrolldown.

The color is fantastic, I love the train, the dress has so much potential.... and then, the accessories.

It's hurting my head to look at them this way, so let's flip her over again.

NATALIE PORTMAN: I'm fabulous.

SCARLETT JOHANSSON: I'm stumpy.

NATALIE: Oh, ScarJo. No, you're not! Don't be so hard on yourself. Have a vegan cookie!

SCARLETT:  I mean it, Natalie. I look like 1993's national president of the Blind Melon fan club posing with you. What possessed me to wear these flats with this?

NATALIE: Why, I'm sure you have a good reason. Have your arches fallen recently?

SCARLETT: No.

NATALIE: Have you hideous bunions?

SCARLETT: NO.

NATALIE: Are you perhaps just trying to be sensible?

SCARLETT: At a photoshoot?!?

NATALIE: I don't know! I thought it was an homage to the costumes on the pages in our movie, The Other Boleyn Girl, premiering soon at theatre near you!

SCARLETT: NO.  God. Do you ever do ANYTHING wrong?

NATALIE: I accidentally killed a lady bug on Tuesday.

SCARLETT: I'm gonna kill SOMETHING.

Well, it had to end. At the Fendi store opening, LiLo had on a dress, but the next day when she returned to shop, she hit up the Kaiser's newest lair in these:

[Photo: Splash News]

OF COURSE. I'm starting to wonder if she was wearing them under that dress the entire time.

Also: Nice makeup, there, Linds. That is some seriously messy, heavy, uneven slap she's spackled onto her face, and it's making her look unusually toothy -- like a deranged Easter Bunny caught gnawing on his own chocolate-egg stash. Do we think this is last night's face touched up desperately before a shopping spree? Or are her friends just like, "Oh, yeah, Lindsay... [snicker] ... it's great, totally great... [snort]... maybe MORE... hahaha, ahem, I mean, have some of my blush"? You'd think she could've checked her makeup in the sheen emanating from those dastardly leggings, but with this one, you'd think a LOT of things might've happened differently.

On the pro side: no leggings. Red-esque hair. Mesmerizing cleavage:

On the con side: well....those giant tulle doily hip-wings come to mind, don't they?

Oh, Ali Landry. Remember when you were the Doritos girl? I'm sure you do. And then when you got married to Mario Lopez and divorced like two weeks later? I imagine you recall that. And then you sort of disappeared. And then you showed up wearing this:

I GET it. Theoretically. But in practice, you look like you've gotten a role on a day time soap and are currently in the midst of filming a cliffhanger in which there is a giant sewage line explosion at a charity ball, and you're wading through the muck to safety, not knowing that -- at any moment -- an evil mastermind is about to kidnap you and lock you in his harem, which is located in a mineshaft. Not to get too graphic about it.

KELLY: Oh, GOD. Don't look now. It's KIM STEWART.

KIMBERLY: HI HI HI OH MY GOD LET'S GET A PICTURE.

KELLY: Great. Now people will think we're friends.

KIMBERLY: OMG, THAT DRESS IS DIVINELY OLD-SCHOOL HOLLYWOOD FUNERAL! LOVE IT! LOVE YOU! WE'RE TOTALLY FRIENDS!!!!

KELLY: I can't believe she even looks halfway cute. This is so depressing. First I'm forced to hang out with this clingy idiot and I don't even get the benefit of looking comparatively fabulous? She makes all my makeup look even HEAVIER.

KIMBERLY: HANG ON I HAVE TO BRING IT DOWN A BIT and look very serious. Okay, I'm ready now.

KELLY: Let's just take this damn picture before I smack you.

Rihanna is fascinating to me. Style-wise, she is all over the map -- tight satin, lace bodysuits, short skirts, leather, and more -- and while there's nothing wrong with that, it means that Rihanna is also a bit of a roller-coaster. She's under a huge fashion umbrella-ella-ella, is what I'm saying (because you all know I can't resist the hacky joke when it's there, and even sometimes when it's not).

As proof, check out her array of Grammy outfits. First, the ones I more-or-less liked:

Some of the details on this are nice; others are overly fussy. Mostly, the skirt just makes me wonder if it's a tribute to Sam The Eagle, or perhaps what one would wear if she was the Bride of Grover. Still, on the whole, it works. And she IS young, after all. That's the time to play around with ruffles, both of the fabric AND potato-chip variety.

This one, for me, turned out pretty cute also. The longer I look at it, the more I think the ruffles work -- at first I feared they looked like she poked her arms through two giant Fancy-Dress Scrunchies, but actually they're an interesting way to spice up the classic little black dress. Unfortunately, though, when I factor in the hair, I can't get over thinking she looks like some kind of exotic bird.

But maybe that's just because I had already seen her in this ode to A Creature:

Apparently, our favorite demi-nudist Bai Ling was arrested for shoplifting -- and not, in fact, skirtlifting, which is how I first read the news, and which prompted me to sigh, "Oh, come on, people, that's just WHAT SHE DOES. LET HER LIVE, DAMMIT!"

Let's enjoy her in happier times.

This is our girl as nature intended: smiling, finding creative ways to circumvent a top that appears designed not to show any boob, and overall looking like she leapt out of the pages of a Dr. Seuss book. We wouldn't be at all shocked if her first call from inside the pokey went to her ex-boyfriend The Lorax. And, yes, those ARE Band-Aids with writing on them that she is using as shin jewelry -- one is in Chinese and the other says "Happy" and... something that look like "New York," maybe, and... Well, see for yourself:

Dear Readers,

Happy Valentine's Day! Are you sitting at your desk right now thinking, "Wait, what? It's Valentine's Day? TODAY? DAMN IT!"  Well, if we may offer a suggestion, nothing says "Ooh, baby, I love your way" like a book about people in really hideous outfits:

You can totally get it at A Bookseller Near You on the way home, and it goes beautifully with flowers (or chocolates; one reader e-mailed us already today to let us know her divine boyfriend gave it to her with a box of Godivas, which is smooth-like-Intern-George).

On the other hand, if you're single this year, what better way to remind yourself how gross other people are than said book? You know it's true. We promise that it will make you feel thusly:

And now back to your regularly scheduled fugging, with 100% less self-promotion. Happy Valentine's Day!

Love,

The Fug Girls

There is something very pretty about this outfit. And something very "Once upon a time, in a far-away land, there lived a prince and his girlfriend."

"They were the happiest couple in the land, or at least in the twelfth grade; she gave him a good-luck pin to wear on his breeches, and she was often to be seen running around the village with his Varsity Jousting Team Cape affixed to her shoulders. The girlfriend would go to all her prince's  tournaments, and in turn he would help run her campaign for class president and show up at fundraisers and let her auction him off for charity to handsy old women who wanted a hot dinner date. It was a match made in heaven, until she caught him making out with her best friend in the spear shed near the castle moat, kicked him in the gauntlet, burned his cape, and then went on to become the owner of the most powerful mead brewery in the country -- which bought his pro jousting team and then fired him. The moral of this tale: Revenge is sweet; capes are not."

Sometimes I feel like it's probably a bit hard to be Goldie Hawn. Laying aside the still-hot life partner, the money she's banked from all those movies, and a history of national adoration for her nutty personality, she's also the mother of her own replacement. Kate Hudson evokes her so strongly, it's like watching Version 2.0 come along and render you obsolete, consigning you to a life in someone's junk drawer while they play with the pretty new model that has video and is lighter. And now I want to go hug my second generation iPod and tell it that everything will be okay, and it did a good job, and that it's not personal.

But, back to Kate and Goldie. This is what Kate wore to the Elle Style Awards last night:

Vogue just did a whole piece about how Kate Bosworth is the embodiment of effortless chic, but I think in many ways they had the wrong Kate. Not that Bosworth is bad, but I think Hudson is by and large better at it. She doesn't look like she's trying as hard. Granted, this isn't my favorite thing she's ever worn -- the creases in it from sitting in the car make the fabric look weirdly thick and springy, like those sheets of foam that movers sometimes use to wrap stuff before they lug it out the door and down your tight spiral staircase -- but I get what she was going for, and she looks comfortable and not overdone.

The point, though, is not so much whether I like or dislike it, but that it's essentially the upgraded, more polished version of what Goldie wore in Berlin a few days earlier:

I love Wikipedia. I know it's somewhat unreliable, but where else would I read that Sophie Ellis-Bextor's first job was as a child snood-model?

It also claims that S E-B is a "rival" of Posh's. In which case, I suspect that Posh snuck into Sophie's house in the dead of night and replaced the dress Sophie was planning to wear to this event with this very...exuberantly be-collared celebration of The Curtain. In which further case, while I doubt that Posh ever even sleeps -- or that the likes of Posh can be destroyed by anything other than a silver bullet dipped in wolfsbane -- she might be smart to take her all disco naps with one of her eyes at least partially open in case Sophie decides she needs to enact some revenge.

Okay, first off, let's all just take a moment and acknowledge that this is what a bee would wear to a cocktail party:

That being said, I can see where someone might see this hanging on the rack and think, "god, I wish that were in other colors. But it's kind of cute. I might as well try it on." And then by the time you get it on, you're sort of enamored of its kookiness and it fits and your legs look good it in, and the next thing you know, you've got a fancy-ass bee dress in your closet. These things just happen.

Camilla Al Fayed's father owns Harrods. So you'd think she wouldn't ever show up places looking like a cater waiter:

On the other hand, maybe she just loves taking people's drink orders.

Children, gather round and let me tell you a tale. This woman pictured below, Juliette Binoche, is secretly tremendously good-looking. So why, you ask, is she showing up places in a dress seemingly purchased from Dowdy McBland's House of Frump?

I wish I could tell you. It is, indeed, a tragedy. Perhaps she's in preparation for a role which requires her to look downtrodden and monochromatic. Perhaps she's appearing in a film called Shades of Gray, about all the subtleties and ethics of modern life, and is doing very secretive PR for it. Or perhaps she's just depressed.

I know I was out of town for a while, but I'd think I would have heard the news that Katherine Heigl was joining the cast of a new sitcom about six sassy sexy singles living together in a big city, trying to make it it big while living in an expensive loft and working at a series of glamourous, unrealistic jobs like: magazine editor, model booker, fashion designer, wedding planner, TV producer, and personal chef (because NO ONE on television is ever, like, an account manager at an insurance company or a paralegal or works for the county or something). I feel like I DEFINITELY would have heard the news that she was taking over the role of the sassy Mona-Robinson-esque downstairs neighbor/landlady, formerly played by Ellen Burstyn:

"You kids! I came up here to tell you to keep it down, but you're just too cute for me to stay mad at! Regale me with tales of your romantic problems, so I can respond with comments that are too comically graphic for my advanced age, in the hopes that this will evolve into the sort of part where the studio audience claps with barely-contained glee at all my entrances! Pass the Ensure!"

I feel like taking a tour through Natasha Bedingfield's closet would be a really interesting way to spend an afternoon. She veers from cute dresses to crazy '80s wear as fast as most people blink, plus I am always fascinated to see what kind of stuff people keep in there, buried under shoe boxes or stacks of sweaters -- or, in my case, the paint-splattered jeans and shirts I keep around for the inevitable day when I finally say, "No, seriously, THIS TIME I really AM going to paint the bathroom."

As for Natasha, I like to think that outside her closet hangs a giant blindfold she ties on before picking her clothes for the day. It helps explain the roller-coaster between this:

And what she changed into after the Grammys ended:

As ever, I with Nelly Furtado would stop making that face on the red carpet like she just downed an entire roll of SweeTarts that had been marinating in lemon juice. But I will try and set that aside, as it might take a lifetime to deprogram that instinct from her and I have far too many seasons of The Wire to get through; instead, let's focus on the rest of it.

I've never liked the blonde hair on her. Especially here -- it looks like she dipped a comb in some peroxide and ran it through once before leaving. As for the gown, I think it's a perfect example of how all the romantic draping can backfire on a girl -- instead of making her look floaty, it pulls around her hips, gets all bunchy, and essentially makes you stare at her midsection trying to figure out what's her and what is courtesy of all those folds. She's looked better, is what I'm saying.

And she can't even stand comfortably in it without creating some weird, unflattering angles. Learn your angles, Nelly! Did Tyra Banks create magical, magical television for NOTHING? DO NOT MAKE TYRA'S LABOR IN VAIN.

I do, however, love the color.

It's like she came so close to a victory, but in the end,  has to settle for Miss Congeniality. Although in this case, it's Miss Biting The Insides Of Her Cheeks Because She Kind Of Wants To Cut That Bitch Who Won The Crown But Instead She Needs To Keep Smiling And Just Think About World Peace. So I'm throwing it open to the masses to see if the hue saved her or if nothing could -- or, if the world thinks she's a beacon of deliciousness and I should just let my tiny ship crash on the rocks and reveal my secret cargo of hot pants.  One thing's for sure, though: Based on that last sentence, I should not fug before I've had breakfast. Strange things happen.

I have a confession about Ziyi Zhang (AKA Zhang Ziyi: I've seen her name listed both ways, and I'm not sure which she prefers, or which she's using more officially in the United States. Maybe I will just call her Z?). I have a tremendous girl crush on her. I just think she is SO PRETTY. Even when she's wearing this:

Yes, she looks a bit like a bejeweled puff pastry of some sort and if Lindsay Lohan showed up in this, I would be all, "Oh, GIRL."  But in this case, you could say to me, "Jessica, she looks like a bejeweled puff pastry of some sort,"  and I would just say, "I KNOW. But....she's so pretty!"

Okay, okay. Fair enough. There's something about it that looks just like a pop over. But I love pop overs! And...fine. You're right.  YOU'RE RIGHT.

I was all set to make this post a "Fug or Fab," and then I really looked at it:

No. I don't even think I need to put this to a vote. She looks like a traffic cone wrapped in tissue paper and topped with a hastily made flower, like the world's most inappropriate last-minute baby shower gift grabbed on the way to the party as the gift-giver realized when driving past a construction site she forgot to buy anything.

And I'm sure there's an "unwrapping" joke in there somewhere, but I'll let you write it yourself.

I have some love for Kimberly Williams-Paisley.  Have you SEEN her on According to Jim? HILARIOUS.

Not really.

Okay, maybe. In the interest of fairness, I must admit I've never seen According to Jim. She might be awesome on it. But my love dates from Father of the Bride, part of which was filmed close enough to my parents' house that the generator was parked outside my bedroom window for a month. Being a young teen at the time, this was basically the COOLEST THING THAT EVER HAPPENED and it helped that the crew was incredibly nice to all the neighborhood kids. We got to watch them film scenes and stunts, and they answered all our questions and let us act like little PAs and did I mention that we had the run of craft services? It was a fascinating and exciting experience for a kid, and so I have deep fondness for everyone involved with that movie.

Not so much for this outfit, though, Kimmie:

It's not terrible. It just recalls nothing so much as the love child of goth bordello curtains and a pale, weak homage to Gwyneth Paltrow's most universally reviled Oscars look. A reminder:

I have a lot of love saved up for Whitney Houston, whose entire first and second albums I used to love belting out in my room when I was, like, eight -- despite the fact that there's no way I should've been singing about spending all night shagging my married lover, and how it was emotionally hard when he was with his family but all worth it when he dropped by my place again for Naughty Time. I even had the piano music for that one; my parents must have been relieved I never whipped either of those performances out in public.

Naturally, then, her descent into becoming the scary-bony woman who told Diane Sawyer she made way too much money to bother doing crack and demanded to see receipts proving allegations she spent $500,000 on cocaine -- because drug dealers are renowned for making sure you have receipts for each purchase -- considerably saddened me. Thrillingly, though, Whitney looks like she's getting back on track.

Pretty! Classy! No bones poking out through her skin! And she's totally fixed up the hair!

My one beef: I am pretty sure those are panty-hose (which I totally wrote as "hos" by accident the first time and had to fix; perhaps this is my subconscious' way of telling me that, deep down, I believe nude panty-hose are the trashy cousins of a good pair of tights). And I hate that with open-toed shoes, especially ones with bling attached that draw your eye right down to the feet, making sure you notice the telltale webbing on her toes.

But other than that, well done, Whitney. One step at a time, right? We have time to deal with this whole panty-hose problem -- something that, not too long ago, I might not've been able to write without secretly worrying Bobby Brown would be the death of you before we got there. But now we've got you looking radiant again, so let's call this one a victory. Dare I suggest she's rekindled the greatest love of all? Oh, I dare, I DARE.

BEYONCE: Hi, Mommy! Thanks! Thanks for the dress!

SOLANGE: Yeah. That's good. Rub it in.

BEYONCE: Whatever do you mean?

SOLANGE: Oh, nothing. Just that, once again, Mom lets you wear some giant ball gown, and I get to wear a glorified freaking shirt with shoes that look like a five-year old made them. Awesome.

BEYONCE: You're so cranky.

SOLANGE: Wouldn't you be? It's like a funeral tent. Although I don't even like your dress that much. It looks a bit like wet sand at the beach got all over it. HA!

BEYONCE: That's real nice, there, Solange. Real mature. I think I look pretty.

SOLANGE: And your highlights look like refried Tina Turner from this angle.

BEYONCE: It was an homage! For our performance!

SOLANGE: Uh-huh. Right. Mom lets you do all that to yourself, and doesn't let me wear pants.

BEYONCE: Silly child. You have to EARN pants.

SOLANGE: Oh, is that so? Like you did on stage tonight?

Good for Gavin DeGraw for -- as he croons every week during the main titles of One Tree Hill -- not wanting to be anything other than what he's been trying to be lately.

Which, these days, is apparently the best-dressed goddamn paper boy in the Los Angeles Times circulation area. Who are you? NOBODY.

I saw Fantasia with this hair earlier in the week, but I have to admit that part of me thought I dreamed it:

I am...not sure why she thought that was a good idea. The longer I look at this picture, the more I realize that Fantasia has gorgeous eyes, so maybe this kooky look is an attempt to highlight one of her best features, the way ladies magazines are all, "Got a great nose? Draw attention to it by using SUPER BRIGHT BLUSH! Make sure you make CONCENTRIC CIRCLES using a standard-issue paint brush!"  And just as effective, really, in that I HAVE noticed her lovely eyes, but only as a way-station toward noticing that this isn't exactlyt the best hair she's ever had.

But let's take a look at the full-body 'do, shall we?

All of Fashion Week was fun, but few things will match the experience of seeing this man in the flesh at a  show:

I wonder how Wilmer Valderrama felt, sitting quietly as he did in his seat before Federline arrived, having read the name on the chair next to his and therefore knowing what was coming. Hopefully this conversation does not involve Kevin giving Wilmer tips on how to apply that wimpy little mohawk to his own head. And yes, for the record, K-Fed totally changed his suit in the 15 minutes between the end of Sean Jean and the time he showed up at Marc Jacobs. I can't wait until this clothes-conscious step in his evolution ultimately takes him straight down Elton John Blvd. to wearing outrageous jumpsuits and other crazy crap. Hey, it beats saucy trucker hats.

• At Donna Karan, Susan Sarandon showed those plastic-faced actresses how it should be done.
• We were standing two feet from K-Fedat Sean John and we didn't once want to smack him! Well, maybe because of that awful hair. But otherwise, we must really be okay with him now.
• And finally, our wrap-up post, including bits and pieces we couldn't fit anywhere else and our disappointment that J.Lo didn't show up at ex Sean Combs' fashion show. Tell me that wouldn't have been dramatic.

Truthfully, Lucy Liu herself doesn't look all bad here, as she herself is gorgeous and tiny and shiny-of-hair.

But I suspect she could do with a Hoo-Ha Mafia to swarm her at all times and ensure that she's not wearing a dress so fussy it's practically having a tantrum right there on the black carpet. We have: a bodice, a gray bow, a black bow, a skirt, and a second skirt with a whiff of waist-cape about it, almost like a backwards apron. If I find out that a dying orphan in Africa designed this dress so that she could wear it to this charity event, then maybe I will apply mental mercy later, but otherwise I feel like your clothes generally shouldn't be busier than you are. Oh, sure, she's got a show on the air right now, but I've seen a whole lot of Cashmere Mafia and I suspect it might be about to strap on some cement shoes and plunge into the Hudson River.

And yet, at least it's largely flattering... except for how all that stuff makes her look like she has no boobs, and I'm pretty sure that's not true (see: my aforementioned inability to watch Cashmere Mafia despite how much I want to punch the screen every time Miranda Otto purrs her lines like a really snobby cat). I'm at a crossroads. I think ultimately I have to fall on the "fug" side, though, if only because all that stuff looks randomly thrown in for effect rather than well-planned and visionary. Then again, I both didn't see Phillip Seymour Hoffman at Cynthia Rowley and THOUGHT I saw Michael Bolton the other day at a fashion show -- way, way off base on that one -- so maybe I need my eyesight checked.

Diane Kruger is bringing special meaning to the concept of being two-faced.

The one on the bottom looks like a lot more fun, too -- I would've liked to see what it could've done to enliven some of her movies. For one thing, what with how it appears to be flirting with the photographers, it seems far more adept at creating sexual tension. Maybe Diane has several of these in her closet, one for every possible reaction she might want to express with her face but is unable to summon. By the time we get National Treasure III: Hat of Mystery, they'll just be cutting to her shirt completely and leave her actual head out of the film altogether. 

Conceptually, I think Camilla Belle looks lovely and chic, and pretty damn fortunate to get included on a star-studded guest-list such as the one for this Madonna event. And that color is gorgeous on her. But I just don't know if I can get behind a dress that's constructed to look like the tragic "before" picture in a static-cling commercial, as if the next shot we're going to see is of a  guest's horrified face because Camilla walked by her table, the tablecloth fused with her skirt, and dinner got dumped in everyone's laps while she waltzed on past.

To borrow from Natasha Bedingfield's ubiquitous hit "Unwritten," I've spent rather a long time staring at the blank page before me thanks to the following photo of her.

And tragically I can't locate a dirty window to open in the hope that it will illuminate me with words. I did open up the fairly clean minibar, though, and this is what it yielded: "It's a bit like she belongs to a Jem and the Holograms tribute band, which has been booked to play the Thunderdome." Maybe if I felt the rain on my face I could do better, but I refuse to waste vodka by dumping it on my head.

For people who haven't had to comb the room at Fashion Week in a vain attempt to identify all the people of note we never see anywhere else and therefore almost never recognize, Julia Restoin-Roifeld is the daughter of French Vogue editrix Carine Roitfeld. And she constantly reminds people she's European, saying things like, "I'm European -- I wake up in heels." Which is kind of amusing to me, actually, but the point is that Europe itself might want her to can it if she keeps showing up to parties dressed thusly:

It was a Prada party, so I'm sure the shirt was incredibly expensive (and a lot less confounding to look at than the frightening-to-behold red velvet MANDALS that were sitting on a display case mere feet from where this was taken; we were speechless for ten minutes). With the sheen and the weird bits and pieces, it's a bit like what I imagine we might be wearing in the year 3000 when we're flying UFOs to work and commuting from Neptune, but my more immediate concerns are: (a) the baggy jeans she hacked off and rolled up after finding in them in her boyfriend's "2003 Pants" box, and (b) whatever those pouches are hanging by her waist. Couture fanny packs? Places to keep rocks to throw at people ahead of her in the bar line? An ode to saddlebags? I don't know, but I do suspect that if she reminds us one more time where she's from while wearing shorts that are only suitable for whitewashing your picket fence, France might send the U.S. government this photograph and say, "Seriously, please take her."

When I watch her on Celebrity Apprentice -- which is secretly one of the funniest shows on TV right now (against very little competition, but whatever); the episode where Jim Cramer guest-judged and was SHOCKED and HORRIFIED at Gene Simmons essentially forcing Trump's hand in firing him actually had me laughing out loud, I'm embarrassed to say -- I think that Carol Alt is aging rather well.  This is not to say I don't believe she's had any tweaks here and there; just that whatever it was worked nicely. I mean, Trump couldn't stop talking about how hot she was, but he does like tight cheekbones in his ladies apparently, so maybe that's the draw.

Anyhoo, I just don't think Carol Alt should vault from being told by The Donald every hour how beautiful she is, to reminding us with clothes that she's been around for eons.

This outfit feels so dated, not unlike the Ali Larter abomination from earlier. Tiffani Thiessen probably had to wear THIS, too, in some episode where Valerie was seriously bumming out about Dylan and/or booking horrible musical acts at the Peach Pit After Dark. It's like Carol Alt hasn't been shopping in 15 years. And, frankly, I don't ever need to see navel on the red carpet. In this photo it almost looks like a creepy prosthetic stomach, the kind of thing that, say, a really insane soap opera character would order in a series of sizes to better fake a pregnancy by flashing it all around town. We are assuming Carol Alt is not trying to convince anyone that she's having her archrival's husband's baby because they slept together during a tornado to keep warm and thought they were both going to die. So, even though she's still svelte at Whatever Age, she'd have looked so much classier flaunting it a different way. If you're that stoked about your stomach, great, but at a formal event you should keep that between you and your Ab Roller.

Let's, like Vivica A Fox, decide not to be haters, and instead to be congratulators, and congratulate Rihanna on her extreme bravery:

[Photo: Splash]

It takes stones to wear a lacy turtleneck shorts jumpsuit, and we applaud any woman who braves such a concoction, especially as that commitment means that she will not be able to pee at any point during the festivities, as it will take approximately twenty-three minutes and two assistants to get in and out of that thing.  I shudder to think what this looks/feels like when she sits down in it, and frankly, had I been confronted with such a get-up, I would have had to have been escorted from the store by professionals. Ergo, I would like to offer my heartfelt congrats to Rihanna for having managed to put this on and leave the house without having an attack of the vapors and being forced to change into something like a skirt.

Here's a question for all you kindly readers out there: has Fashion Week just smashed my mind grapes into sad, bitter wine, or does Demi Moore appear to have woken up and decided that the person she really wants to resemble most is Mary-Kate Olsen?

I mean, on one hand, she's super gorgeous (and ought to be, I think she works her ass off on upkeep in a way that makes me tired to think about. Then I have another bowl of Cool Whip). And then on the other hand, she kind of looks like she got jumped by a 2006 Rachel Zoe and styled in a dark alley.

You know, it looks like we might get out of this city without an arctic blast, after all. We were afraid to hope.

This woman is afraid of nothing.

I would be afraid, for instance, of: Diet Coke, marinara, city grime, potato chips, fruit, energy bars... pretty much anything. It takes a lot of guts to wear that much glaring white. Of course, it also takes guts to wear high-waisted jodhpur-like pants. With a belly shirt. I'm pretty sure they stuck poor Tiffani Thiessen in stuff like this both on Saved By The Bell AND on Beverly Hills, 90210, and so all Ali's really done here is a) look really dated, and b) remind us of an actress we like a whole lot more. Also, I can't figure out why Ali Larter wears so much white -- she does it with dresses, too, and it's not that flattering to her skin tone. I suspect this all began with Varsity Blues, when she wore that whipped-cream bikini and decided to make that her style inspiration for the rest of her life.

• Also, Ali Larter acted sort of rude at Calvin Klein.
• Poor Vincent Gallo -- no, really, we just said "poor Vincent Gallo" -- might've gotten quietly dissed by a little girl at Anna Sui.
• Thank God for Mariska Hargitay, or else we'd have had nothing to file from Vera Wang.
• We had a total fangirl geek-out moment at Cynthia Rowley... over Lindsay Price. Yeah, we know. But she was REALLY CUTE on 90210! Believe!
• Tommy Hilfiger's show brought us to our knees. For real.
  

When I first saw this picture of Martha -- whom, for the record, I LOVE. I love her magazines, I love her cookbooks, I love her television show, especially when she's making people drink cocktails at nine in the morning and flirting with any male guest she gets. I know a lot of people don't care for her, but I think she's the cat's perfectly laundered pajamas -- I wondered, "Martha, what is the deal with those white hose?"

Then I realized. It's clearly in homage to Gossip Girl's Queen B, Blair Waldorf. Because, truly, ISN'T Martha REALLY just Blair Waldorf all grows up? Think about it: she's very highly perfection-oriented; people do her bidding; she MEANS well but sometimes she probably threatens people with scissors; she probably has made out with a man wearing a turtleneck in a limo at some point; and you know she's got some headbands hidden away somewhere. Martha Stewart IS Blair Waldorf. And somehow, that makes the white hose extremely okay.

I know! You thought this day would never come! After all, there may be a portion in our book in which we compare Rachel Zoe to some kind of leather goods (and in HER book, she admits that she tans, for real, in the sun, every day, and frankly, I think those two items are connected).  However, never let it be said that we don't give credit where it is due.  I think Zoe looks totally fabby in this. Red is kind of great on her! And she's not wearing what is essentially a giant muu-muu, nor is she covered in wack-ass bangles like Claire's employee who's overly excited about her discount:

I just kind of love it. It's such a refreshing departure from her norm and that's exciting to see on anyone.  Also, I am powerless in face of a metallic shoe. I have to admit it. Round 614 goes to Zoe.

Disclaimer: I believe -- and this will not be controversial -- that Heidi Klum has great legs. They are an international treasure. She should not be ashamed of them, and if I could have mine amputated and replaced with hers, I would happily do it even if it meant selling my kidneys.

However, if I were Heidi Klum and I were at a Gucci event that took place at the United Nations -- hosted by Madonna and benefiting UNICEF -- I might consider wearing more than a glorified shirt.

This reminds me of that scene in Clueless where Cher tells her skeptical father of her white micro-mini, "It's a dress," and her dad Dan Hedaya replies, "Says who?" And Cher replies, "Calvin Klein!" I am assuming Gucci helped outfit Ms. Klum-Seal, and I kind of want to remind her that just because Gucci claims it's a dress, that doesn't make it so. When she sits down at dinner it's going to look like she's on the commode. I find myself HOPING she's got a pair of hot pants under there, and I generally NEVER hope for hot pants unless they're associated with a Baby Phat show or an episode of Passions in which Tabitha turns everyone into pieces of clothing in a stripper's closet. Having legs for days is a blessing, but that doesn't mean you can't take at least ONE of those days off, know what I mean?

Apparently it was catching. Behold Gwyneth Paltrow, generally someone who appears to take herself way too seriously to let much of anything hang out:

So Heather Graham has been blowing off fashion shows left and right this week, while judging from her sole appearance thus far, she REALLY NEEDS THE HELP:

As a woman in her early thirties, I have recently become obsessed with worrying that I am Dressing Too Young, if only because the whole Mutton Dressed As Lamb look can come off as so tragic. So when I saw this and thought to myself, "this is not how a 38 year old professional woman ought to dress," I wondered if perhaps I was projecting. And I realized that I was. Because no professional woman of any age ought to wear this, unless she is actually a Professional. If you know what I mean.

So, either Angelina Jolie is pregnant or she isn't, but regardless, she has got to stop with the glorified muumuus. Brad can't even look at her.

[Photo: Splash News]

Seriously, when Blanche Deveraux meets an attractive man -- who, almost invariably, has an unsightly mustache and/or is so old that all the sex jokes they make about her become incredibly ooky -- this is the type of thing she wears to dinner with him before she runs home and gets the girls together to talk about something shocking about him (he's married! He's blind! He eats babies!) that was revealed at the end of Act One. And listen, I know we bring up The  Golden Girls a lot; I hear that. But lest we forget, that show is one of society's greatest touchstones and giver of precious insights into the dietary and clothing preferences of the aged. The other afternoon, while we furiously blogged about some fashion show Sophia Bush was probably at, we caught part of an episode in which Dorothy wore a sweater and a button-down WITH A TIE over sweatpants, and then followed it up with wearing three different sweaters layered over one another and paired with a long skirt. Magical. And there was cheesecake involved.

Back to the point. The thing is, Angie, it doesn't matter to us whether you are stoked-and-wowed McConaughey-style about the life or lives growing in your womb, or you're just really into eating salt from the container and can't fight the ensuing bloat. It's all good. But you are ANGELINA JOLIE. You can dress better than this, no matter what the truth of your waistline is.

Is it already Day Six? Does this mean we get to sleep in our own beds again soon? Although we're quite giddy after today's champers-fueled event at Marchesa, at which we got to bask in the warm glow of a hugely pregnant -- and two weeks from popping -- Jennifer Lopez.

Watching her swell with child has been truly fascinating, considering this is a woman who's rear end has been the subject of national -- and probably international -- fascination. We're happy for her and she looks healthy and happy, but we still can't stop studying the effect pregnancy has had on her face. Don't get us wrong, she's still pretty, but instead of looking like J.Lo, she looks a bit like a J.Lo impersonator who went too crazy with the collagen (and occasionally, in some shots, like Valerie Bertinelli, but only from specific angles -- trust me on that one; I'm not nuts, or at least, I don't think so, but then again neither does Britney so whatever). At any rate, we were kind of embarrassingly excited to see her so up-close and personal. In Los Angeles you're not supposed to look like you're noticing the celebrities out in the wild, but at Fashion Week, it's your job to ogle. Bless.

• The highlight at Narciso Rodriguez: The Return of the Seinfelds.
• The second we saw Lance Armstrong walk into ex-girlfriend Tory Burch's presentation, we prayed for a tearful reunion. Didn't get one. Still, it made for some great speculation.
• We're crushed we didn't get a breath mint from The Donald, but thanks to Celebrity Apprentice, he's given us so much already that we can't REALLY be upset.
• Jennifer Lopez was unusually chatty about her due date at Marchesa.
• Dear Veronica Webb: It's not gingham time. Indeed, is it ever?

Oh my god, Alexa Vega, NO:

The reader who kindly alerted us to this little piece of lunacy noted rightly that it looks as though shetook a wee little sparkly bodysuit -- like something that would be sold in a store frequented by pageant moms -- and snipped through the crotch so as to make it a shirt. I don't even have words for how very wrong this is. I know she's 20 years old now, and she's certainly turned into a lovely girl, and I'm sure part of her motivation in wearing this is to remind us that she's a grown-up now and all, but the part where it all goes terribly wrong is that an actual grown-up would never wear a doctored red astroturf child-size bodysuit as a top.

At an amfAR event in New York to which almost all the attendees wore bright colors, Jennifer Esposito was no exception:

Okay, so it's a little Planet Unicorn in many respects, but whatever -- she was keeping to a theme, and when we know stuff like that in advance, we tend to take it into consideration (sorry, Toni Braxton, that we didn't realize you only wore that Campbell's dress for charity because a viewer vote told you to; that does not change the fact that those voters have lost their minds, however).

But we're not entirely sure that these were required to be on the menu.

It's been an eventful Fashion Week full of wonderful lessons -- for one thing, we realized that since we last saw her, Brittany Murphy has turned 65.

Congrats, sweetie! And good luck in the shuffleboard tournament next week.

• Brittany Murphy is by far the most entertaining person we've seen all week. No, for real, she was all melodrama and madness at Max Azria.
• Amy Adams arrived on time to Proenza Schouler. Somebody dropped the ball when it came to teaching her how to be a celebrity at Fashion Week.
• If she plays it right, that cute Ana Ortiz will probably be wearing Badgley Mischka for at least the next two years.
• As much as we love Sophia Bush, we REALLY need new people to write about, so thank you, Perrey Reeves and Kim Raver.
• Oh, Fergie-Ferg, no need to fidget. You look fine.

Why, why, why does Viggo Mortensen insist so violently on disturbing the sexy?

We have SEEN YOU, Viggo. We know that you are HOT. And when you are THAT HOT, it is really a crime to show up places looking like you just walked off the set of Not Without My Confederacy: The Jefferson Davis Story, now filming for Lifetime. We already take you seriously, dude. We saw that full frontal knife fight in Eastern Promises. We KNOW no one undergoes a full frontal KNIFE FIGHT unless they are a SERIOUS actor who cares more about the craft than about knives near important personal bits. So please, love, consider a wee bit of shampoo. All those Aragorn fantasies are about to hit their expire-by date. Don't let yourself get left on the shelf!

I don't know if it's because she's French and therefore innately somewhat fashionably fantastic, or if the sunny yellow color of this dress automatically makes me feel all warm and happy, like someone just handed me a giant Bellini, but I want to buy Marion Cotillard's dress here and throw it on my bed and roll around in it:

Sure, I might wear the belt at the waist, but at least this version leaves room for beaucoup pommes frites.

So....I'm confused. Is it possible that Paris Hilton cracked her head in the bathroom while back-combing her hair and when she came to, instead of, say inventing the flux capacitor, found herself under the mistaken impression that her new movie, The Hottie and the Nottie, was going to be awarded the Palme d'Or, or perhaps was on the receiving end of honors from Kennedy Center?

Because otherwise, I'm not quite sure what the reasoning is behind the Barbie Goes to the Oscars look. Let's be honest: in three-and-a-half years, the girl is likely to be releasing a remake titled The Hottie and the Naughty. Maybe she feels like she has to strike the Major Awards Show Look while the iron...I was going to say "is hot," but let's go with "existed."

Oh, Miss Tyra, you do amuse us so. We like to call this touching portrait A Girl And Her Twinkie:

Gotta respect a woman who not only puts greasy baked goods in her mouth, but thinks it's fun for it to happen on camera. And also, I know some people out there want us to stop yapping about Miss Tyra's wig or weave or whatever we feel like calling it that day -- it could be both, or neither; it is all things, and yet it is nothing -- and we do feel you. We do. But seriously, HOW do you expect us to do that? How? We are but mortal. We adore her crazy hair. It's impossible to resist discussing something that looks so heavy and itchy and as if it was recently shorn from the business end of a horse. So, with apologies to those non-congratulators, we not only can't not reference it, but in fact, it gets its own affectionate section in our book  -- which, shameless plug ahoy, hits stores today. The City of New York is courteously throwing a parade to honor the occasion, although I think there is some nonsense about us sharing the party with Michael Strahan and Eli Manning. Pish. We call shenanigans on that.

Here's what we were up to while Tyra was romancing her snack cake:

• Ellen Pompeo seemed very pleasant in perilous circumstances at Y-3.
• Chloe Sevigny barely conceals her distaste for Miss Sixty; Milla Jovovich at times doesn't even try.
• Angie Harmon is a smart girl, getting a hair wrangler to make sure everything was in place before her photo op at Carolina Herrera.
• We wish Tim Gunn could've stopped the rock at Catherine Malandrino. That music was scary.
• What happens when a fashion show starts on time? Some celebrities miss it, that's what.
• Do you think Betsey Johnson gave attendee Joan Jett another dime to put in the jukebox, baby?
• Maybe Eliza Dushku can figure out what the hell the gift was at Ports 1961.

You know, after a long and unpredictable day of work, there's something very refreshing about the very existence of Phoebe Price. I know that if she chooses to leave the house, she will be wearing something somehow noteworthy, either thanks to extreme shine, excessive nakedness, or overall over-the-top kookiness. Kind of like she's constantly raiding the closets of the world's flashiest ice dancers:

This costume, I like to think, was for a routine skated to an unholy mash-up of  Guys and Dolls' "Take Back Your Mink"  and Donna Summer's "Bad Girls," punctuated by a brief poignant interlude to "Nights in White Satin." And frankly, I would pay good money to see that.

Sometimes, a fug defies words. And sometimes, the words it defies are printed on the dress itself.

Thoughtful, no? Plus, by appropriating the Campbell's Soup slogan in this bold manner, Toni is opening the door for a host of other corporate sponsorships. Next she'll be in a Snickers gown that proclaims, "Not Going Anywhere For A While?" Followed closely by, "Where's The Beef?", "Tastes Great -- Less Filling," a detour down memory lane for "Give it to Mikey, he' ll eat anything!", and of course, that old chestnut from Avis, "Try Harder." Although perhaps rival Hertz's "Not Exactly" would be more apt.

For the love of little green apples, could someone please give Alicia Keys a hand figuring out what to wear?

She obviously needs the help. You know, unless the plan was to look like a really committed extra from a poorly costumed high school production of Grease.

Yep, it's that time of year again: Fashion Week in the Big Apple, minus the arctic blast, plus a few drops of freezing rain here and there, and multiplied by a hometown Super Bowl win (and to think people doubted us when we picked Eli to win the battle of the quarterbacks!).

As usual, we're going to try really hard to update when we can, but if we're not as frequent as usual, please bear with us -- we'll be back home this weekend and working on our regular schedule. In the meantime you can always get a fug fix by wandering over to The Cut, New York magazine's fashion blog, where we're posting our dispatches.

• Oh, Joy. Mandy was able to keep her goods inside her Herve Leger dress; why did your nipple sneak into our view?
• The week kicked off with Liza Minnelli singing live. No, really.
• Christina Milian later claimed her bouffant, which she debuted at BCBG, took three hours to prepare. We believe it.
• Make no mistake: Vivica A. Fox "is not a hater. [She's] a congratulator." Whatever you say, Viv!
• At Abaete, Sophia Bush demonstrated why she was always too good for that Chad Michael Murray scoundrel.
• Forget Niki Taylor -- at Alexandre Herchcovitch, we saw Miss USA hit up Nigel Barker for his business card.
• Headbanded socialite Arden Wohl was a breath of fresh, crazy air at Alexander Wang.
• The Rock & Republic show was a fatal accident waiting to happen -- and that was without Vivica A. Fox's wild gesticulating.
• More socialite shenanigans at Preen.

Again, we promise we'll put up a post here and there when we get a second to breathe, but if our best efforts aren't enough, we'll totally be back on track beginning Monday. I mean, we can't leave Intern George to his own devices for THAT long. He'll make origami swans out of all the paper towels, and those things can really pile up fast.

Well, take a look at this!

Frequent fug offender Kristen Bell looks pert and pretty and plain old adorable in something that actually fits her! I am so relieved to see that she's hopped off the 11:05 to Stumpytown and finally boarded the....huh. That train metaphor completely ran out of steam on me there. One might even say it went TOTALLY OFF THE RAILS! See what I did there?  See?! Oh, dear readers, welcome...to Friday. Or as we call it at GFY HQ: Sleepy.

Anyway. What was I talking about? How much I secretly love Celebrity Apprentice because I privately find The Donald kind of hilarious? How I recently tried Alberto VO-5 hot oil treatment for the first time in years and it actually made my hair really kind of bouncy? How STOKED I am about the return of Lost? Oh, that's right: La Bell. She looks a treat, no? Check out the back:

Listen, no one loves Becki Newton more than I do -- okay, maybe her husband. And probably her mother. But no one else appreciates her artfully cocked brow on Ugly Betty more than I, that I can promise you. HOWEVER (you knew that was coming, didn't you?):

Maybe a little too much cleav for an Old Navy event? Do you think?

I am very fond of a ruffle.  Especially a saucy neck ruffle. Very fond indeed. Perhaps overly fond. But I can't help it. I also like polka dots. So take this opinion of mine with a hefty grain of salt, as usual.  But here goes: Mayhap, PERCHANCE, a giant neck ruffle is NOT a great plan when Los Angeles is in the middle of a huge, blustery windstorm:

Aw, that's almost adorable in that Alexis Morrell Carrington Colby Dexter Dexter Rowan kind of way, and the color is fantastic on her. Also, this frock could come in handy if Kate Hudson decides to become a flamenco dancer on a whim. You never know.

And then, the action shot:

We all know Tom Brady is hot. No, it's true. It's kind of unavoidable. But he's not the only quarterback playing in the Super Bowl this weekend -- football rules inconveniently dictate that the other team must put one under center as well -- and thus it's not fair that Tommy Boy snags all the attention. So, as both sports fans and voyeurs of attractive gentlemen, we turned our attention to Eli Manning vs. Tom Brady to see which one has the edge in all areas. Including where those spandex pants are concerned.

TABLOID APPEAL: Tom Brady has been all over the rags this year, thanks to his baby-mama drama with Bridget Moynahan and his ensuing photo-friendly relationship with Gisele. Whereas we only know from Wikipedia that Eli Manning is engaged; "Giants QB Really Digs College Sweetheart" probably won't move any magazines unless he knocks her up with some baby joy. At Tom Brady's house.

If you'd care to see how these boys stack up in other ways, check out "The Fug Girls: But Who Do You Take Home To Mama AFTER The Super Bowl?"

The first time around I missed a lot of Mad Men, because I couldn't watch them fast enough to keep my TiVo from replacing old ones with newer episodes. Now, if we're being honest, usually my reaction to heavily hyped stuff that passed me by the first time around is to get kind of overly aggravated by it and ignore it, until my defenses are so worn down that one idle day I sit down with whatever it is and think, "Okay, let's see how TOTALLY BAD this really is," ending of course with me completely on board and secretly admitting it's kind of great. This happened with One Tree Hill some time ago, with Dawson's Creek back in the day, and with wedge shoes. But Mad Men, I knew I wanted to see. And as I've been catching up piecemeal in reruns, the hype is totally not misplaced. It's very well done.

January Jones (who was indeed born in January; she should be relieved she wasn't a September baby), in particular, is great in it. So I really wanted to love whatever she wore to the SAG Awards. And indeed, I love her face, which thankfully she brought with her.

But:

I can't really get behind this. It looks like a homemade Valentine. And while that's great in elementary school, and one might argue that the SAG Awards are an elementary awards show only getting major attention because the Golden Globes were out sick and needed an understudy, I just wish January had gone for a gown that reminded me less of something I traditionally would've accessorized with a doily.