Fug The Cover

We have gotten a ton of e-mails about this cover in the last few days, and since it's a slow week thanks to the recent holiday -- I guess all our celebrities are too hung over to put much effort into their fuggery? -- I decided to go ahead and post it even though it might give us all nightmares.

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Considering this woman routinely wears leotards, or bra-and-panty sets, or uses pieces of actual tape to cover her boobs where most of the sane world would use this revolutionary thing called a "shirt," then being clad entirely in bubbles is really not even that shocking. It's only really a step or two removed from the norm (and she's practically already done it on stage anyway).

But I wonder if, in actuality, she would like this cover. Yes, she's naked, and yes, she looks curvy, and yes, she fancies herself a performance artist. But did the whole thing HAVE to come together and create the twisted visage of a cross between Dita Von Teese and Dee Snyder?

I think I'll just back away slowly and thank the magazine gods that Rolling Stone stopped publishing on that really huge paper.

May 27, 2009

Fug The Cover: Beyonce

I saw this on the newsstand while in line at the pharmacy yesterday, and felt so uncomfortable I had to avert my eyes. Not because of the outfit -- although I suppose the dress does subtract her actual figure from this equation, making her look rather straight up-and-down, and the bracelet seems like it's made from the digits of one of her robot hands:

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No, instead, I just wanted Beyonce to stop STARING AT ME like that. Presumably, this choice of photo has nothing to do with pimping "317 Sexy Looks," because that particular expression on Beyonce's face is not so much sexy as stalker-manic, as if she's both crazy and deeply high on Red Bull and Mountain Dew -- which makes it deliciously amusing that the cover line about caffeine junkies is plastered just southeast of her possessed countenance. Her face looks like she's ten seconds away from stalking up to a dude in a bar and blabbering, "Hey baby, I think you're really cute, and I think we should go back to your place and I'll make you my mother's special omelet recipe tomorrow morning and then we can go to the park and pet some dogs but I'm allergic to dogs so we can't go out and buy a dog together which is FINE because we SHOULDN'T do that anyway until you've met my mother BUT SHE'S GOING TO LOVE YOU, AND THIS BAR DOESN'T SELL ESPRESSO AND OH MY GOD I'M GOING TO NEED ONE SO IF YOU DON'T HAVE AN ESPRESSO MACHINE THEN WE'LL HAVE TO REGISTER FOR ONE WHEN WE GET MARRIED, AND I DON'T BELIEVE IN GETTING HITCHED DURING FOOTBALL SEASON BUT APRIL WOULD  BE A GREAT TIME SO LET'S CHECK OUR CALENDARS TONIGHT AND PICK A DATE AND WE'RE ALSO THROWING OUT ALL YOUR SHIRTS BECAUSE THEY'RE UGLY AND NO MORE NINTENDO AND COULD YOU PLEASE JUST ORDER ME A GODDAMN DIET COKE OR A CAPPUCCINO OR SOMETHING BECAUSE I WANT TO BE REEEEEEEEEEEEEALLY AWAKE TONIGHT WHEN WE CONSUMMATE OUR ENGAGEMENT!!!!!"

The above explanation ALSO could pertain to the stories about how pillow talk could land a girl in jail. All of which is unfortunate when you consider her recent movie was called Obsessed. Beyonce might want to burn all these covers before anyone discovers she and Sasha Fierce have another alter-ego sister, Bertha Nutjob.

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Here's the thing about this cover: it's fine. Cammy D looks approachable and crisp. And maybe a little older than she actually is. But it's not HIDEOUS. She has all her body parts attached, she's not wearing a beach ball as a hat, she doesn't look as though she's had someone else's eyes photoshopped onto her face. And yet. One would hope, I imagine, that one would look AMAZING on the cover of Vogue, especially considering the fact that she looks fantastic in the photoshoot on the inside (and was actually, I thought, quite charming in the interview). The choices magazines make about their cover shots are often kind of beyond me -- obviously -- and I know there are a lot of factors to consider, but wouldn't you want the BEST picture to be the one on the cover? I know smiley photos sell better, as well as approachable ones, but I suspect that one of the reasons Cameron Diaz is successful in general is that she is almost ALWAYS smiling and approachable-seeming (excluding that time she was dating Justin Timberlake and they were both unbearable crabapples) so I'm pretty sure we're not in a situation where this was like the ONLY Smiley Approachable picture. I don't know. This just isn't filling me with the unbearable desire to plonk down $4 for the magazine.  And while I've got you here: I'm thrilled Vogue is including "the fashion steal of the month" -- it's smart, considering Our Terrible Hideous Crumbling Economy RUN RUN TO THE HILLS -- but someone needs to give A Dubs the tip that a $300 bikini is NOT A GREAT DEAL. IT'S A BIKINI. TARGET HAS THEM FOR $30. SWEET FANCY SNICKERS, LADY, A $300 BIKINI IS STILL INSANE WHAT ARE YOU SMOKING I LOVE YOU DON'T HURT ME.

 
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[Photo: Nylon Magazine]

I'M SO SURE. The 80s flashbacks on this week's Gossip Girl felt less contrived than this does. I can't imagine either Kat Dennings or Olivia Thirlby got this in the mail and clasped her hands together with glee and gasped, "fabulous! Now more people are going to want to punch me in the face! Just what I wanted!" And yet that is exactly what this has achieved. Girls, allow me to impart a valuable lesson: when someone asks you if you're interested in recreating scenes from The Wedding Singer on camera, you are allowed to say no. A little restraint in this area will only help your career in the long run.
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When I first saw this cover, I must admit that I thought, "oh, GOD, J Simp. Can you ever take a picture without that open mouth, slack-jawed look?" Because, literally -- look at Vanity Fair''s slideshow. Her mouth is open in every single photo, with the exception of one. Which is not to say that she doesn't look beautiful, because she does. Just beautiful AND slack-jawed. At some point, you'd think someone would decide that maybe Pretty But Dim isn't the best cover choice when it comes to selling this particular magazine, which isn't exactly aimed at the world's dim bulbs and dull knives (I always think of VF as being Smart Fluff, while, say, US Weekly is Juicy Fluff, and People is Fluff Plus Babies Who Fell Down Wells). Surely there was a photo of La Simpson in which she looked like she had a thought in her pretty head...no? PS: I'm sure she's thrilled they decided to bring up The Mom Jeans Heard Around the World again. Because why would she want to put that behind her?

When I saw this cover on the newsstand, I actually stopped in my tracks and thought, "So Katie Holmes FINALLY grew out her hair and went full zombie?!?"

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But no, it's just poor, pretty Rachel McAdams, trying very hard not to look like herself because she's being forced to stare down the camera with crazy eyes -- as if her advertised "lusty side" involves rooting through your garbage, finding stubs of incense you burn that she rubs on her skin so she can smell like you, showing up unannounced on your front door clothed only in In N Out wrappers because she's followed you there five times and knows you like it, and then suggesting she will only be truly happy if she can suck on a popsicle made of your left foot and wear your skin as pajamas.

April 20, 2009

Fug The Cover: Zac Efron

We have gotten a lot of e-mails about this cover, most of them inquiring about when, exactly, Zac Efron became his own bobblehead.

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Now, I would've thought Zac Efron didn't need a continuing education in which he's taught not to hire strippers. And as much as I appreciate GQ's attempts to give him a grown-up five o'clock shadow -- or, well, maybe more of a lunchtime tincture -- it doesn't take away from the fact that he's dressed like he's hosting a '60s sock-hop for TV. I mean, the kid was in Hairspray. We've been there, done that, and watched several 13-year old girls scream themselves into a dead faint over it.

But it's ALSO totally true that Zac's head looks rather too big for his body. What is he supposed to learn from that? Not to get a huge ego? Not to agree to Zac Efron Bobblehead Night at Dodger Stadium? I suppose "Smart Clothes for Tough Times" might be a very handy primer for Zac on how to cope sartorially with this wrenching, emotional phase in which his skull is ballooning to sizes unforeseen, but I suspect this is all just a big clue not to pose for GQ any more.
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Whoa. Um. This is...unfortch. Blake Lively is a tall, blonde, gorgeous drink of water. This person is a cracked out little cup of yogurt who hasn't washed her face in three weeks and has caught a raging case of LittleJitits from dipping too deeply into Taylor Momsen's eyeliner kit. How much more clearly must I spell it out for you? I'M SCARED.

There's been a lot of brouhaha over Harper's Bazaar appearing to Photoshop Halle Berry on its cover. And I get reacting to that with an eye roll and an "Oh, gee, what a shock that people use PHOTOSHOP," because we all know magazines want to sell copies, and what most people actually look like isn't going to do it. If anyone were stupid enough to put me on a magazine cover, I would probably put a "Please Photoshop my face" clause right at the top of my contract.

No, what's MORE interesting to me is that whatever Harper's did or didn't do, it yielded a cover of Halle Berry that's mind-bendingly awful.

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Let's set aside for a second the fact that the ENTIRE thing is the color of a sunburn and makes me want to go bathe in aloe. Why would you want a cover of one of the world's hottest women, only to pick one in which she looks like a very cheap Halle Berry impersonator wearing a Jaclyn Smith wig she picked up from K-Mart? What's next? Photographing Angelina Jolie in a full mask? Putting a wig on a stick and calling it Nicole Kidman?

With any luck, by the time that happens, I'll already have gone blind from staring at this cover too long. It's like gazing directly at the sun. Everywhere I look now, I see angry all-caps words screaming at me from hot-pink backgrounds. Pray for me. And SAVE YOURSELVES.

I'm really not sure to whom this poster is supposed to appeal -- for one thing, it makes Grey Gardens look like it's a hybrid of The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Driving Miss Daisy:

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And for another, despite the fact that we've all JUST read on every gossip site how much weight Drew Barrymore lost during shooting, her picture appears to imply there is a very uplifting story arc in which Little Edie gets her wisdom teeth out. So it's for... very elderly yet plucky former dental hygienists? Glad we cleared that up, HBO.

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