Oscars

Mostly, the people who swapped outfits after the Oscars were ladies who had really dramatic trains that risked getting ruined -- people like Marisa Tomei or Penelope Cruz, who clearly did not want to look down and see a plate of shrimp, half a glass of red wine, and Madonna's shoe-print all over their beautifully elaborate hems. However, Alicia Keys joined the ranks of those who changed just because.

Here's what she had on for the red-carpet portion of events:

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I love that pinkish-purple, and her lipstick complements it nicely (I cannot thank her ENOUGH for not doing a nude or pale-pink lip, because I am generally tired of those), although that shiny eyeshadow does contour her a TAD too much -- sometimes I had to blink to make absolutely sure it really was Alicia Keys, and not some lookalike who only got in because she hummed two bars of "Fallen" to the security guard. And I admit to being semi-distracted by the bodice; when she was on-screen, I'd immediately wonder why her right boob was higher and two cup sizes smaller than the left, and then have to remind myself it's just a trick of the dress.

But in the end, there's something undeniably floaty and romantic about it. Her actual loveliness often gets lost by some weird ensemble or other -- skintight jeans, jumpsuits with lumpy crotches. Not so here. For which I am ALSO profoundly grateful, because if she'd shown up wearing a spandex jumpsuit with a biscuit-sized bulge in exactly the wrong place, I'd have gotten an attack of the vapors.

This dress didn't make it to the after-party, though. Here's what did:

February 26, 2009

Oscar Fug Carpet: Beyonce

From The Desk of Etta James:

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"Sunday, Feb. 22, 2009. Afternoon. Watched Oscar red-carpet. Read in Us Weekly that Jessica Biel's stylist wanted her to start the day with a hike and a sauna; noted that lack of mention of scheduled shower time might explain her coif problems. Suspect stylist should not have said that out loud to a reporter. Saw that cow Beyonce doing her thing, waving her stupid hand, holding her stupid robot pose where her other arm doesn't touch the rest of her body. Took vitamins with shot of tequila. Nice to see that, at last, Beyonce's dress sense has not come along. HA HA. I slay me. Looks like she took a black gown and did a brass rubbing over it. Paid pizza delivery boy. Still can't fathom why that Beyonce diva is toting a tuffet around behind her. Who does she think she is, Little Miss Muffet? I wish she would Little Miss MUFFLE-It! DAMN, Etta, you are on fire tonight. If that woman sings so much as ONE LINE of my song at the Oscars, vow to throw knives at my damn wall. HATE."

"Sunday, Feb. 22, 2009. Late evening. Woke up from rage-induced coma. Now spackling holes in the wall. Plan to send disrespectful strumpet a care package of curds and whey with a tarantula in it. Must remember to water plants. Also, add arsenic to curds. Just to keep it interesting."
Oh, RACHEL WEISZ. She's normally so pretty, but this weekend...well, we had some issues. Let's start with her look for the Vanity Fair party, AKA Night of A Million Networking Moments:

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I saw this on the runway like two days before she wore it -- this sounds so glamorous, but please believe me when I tell you that seeing it on the runway was book-ended by, like, spilling coffee all down the front of my Gap turtleneck and being serenaded for twenty minutes on the subway by a man who seemed to specialize in soft, yoga-inspired flute-jazz that did not, in fact, make me want to find my deepest chakras but actually brought me to the brink of flute-inspired MURDER -- and it looked much better there than it did on her, even with the white tights and shoes.  I've been trying to figure out why for like the last three days, and I think it might be HER shoes. I love the dress, but I think the cut of the skirt is fighting with the strappy strappiness of the shoes, and, as that ancient proverb taught us, when your lower body can't agree, truly fugly you might be.


And then we had the ensemble she threw together for the Independent Spirit Awards:
What's going on with the not-quite-skirts, y'all? First Marion Cotillard, then Madonna, and now Gwen Stefani:

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[Photo: WENN]

Seriously, it's like she stole the thatched roof off someone's tiki hut, dyed it black, and hit up a funeral luau. Has she traded in Harajuku for Hawaii? I'd just appreciate a little warning so I can prepare myself mentally, in the event that she shows up on American Idol in a grass skirt and a coconut bra while a posse of 14 women in leis carry in a pig on a spit.
[First, just a quick house-keeping note: our Oscar coverage is long this year, so if you haven't been checking the site a lot recently, you may have missed the pieces that have fallen off the front page. So make sure to click to the next page once you get to the bottom. More procrastination material available!]

As much as I love Paulina Porizkova on America's Next Top Model -- and I love her A LOT -- I don't think I've ever fully gotten over losing Janice Dickinson here:

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Paulina is like the man you marry: You adore her, she's funny and insightful, and you're thrilled to be with her. You know she is the right fit for you. And Janice is like the crazy hot dude you spent one wild summer with, on whom you look back with great fondness, a bit of wistful longing, and a huge sense of relief that you're not tethered to him for the rest of your life because, as hilarious and fun as that summer was, it was also mildly scary because he was nuts, and you knew that at any moment he could show up drunk and start humping Tyra's leg. But that doesn't meant that when you see him, you don't think, "Man, GOOD TIMES." Which is what I think whenever I see J. Dick. I mean, look at her here. From the waist up, she looks great -- if a bit Futuristic Amelia Earhart. From the waist down, she looks like a department store mannequin circa 1991, when someone at the Mannequin Factory decided that it would be awesome if Macy's had to display its wares on something with no head, no hands, and silver skin. So we could all more accurately guess how that blazer would look on the alien on our Christmas list. Which is kind of what Janice is, after all, anyway, isn't she?

Yes, that's right, you read the headline correctly -- this is probably going to be a really unpopular opinion, but I don't care. I am going to defend Miley Cyrus' Oscar dress. Because the more I read how much people hated it, the more I'm like, "... Wow, I really didn't think it was that bad at ALL."

To do it, though, I'm going to start with what she wore last year. Remember this?

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At the time a lot of critics -- including me, and I still stand by it -- thought this was overly aging. Like she was trying to be a demure 25-year old, and while I appreciate the instinct not to skank it up at her first-ever Oscars and ESPECIALLY at her young age, it came off more like she borrowed a dress from her mother. Under extreme duress. At the time Miley was 15 and whether you like her or not, she's got a really lively personality. She banters with Ryan Seacrest better than people twice her age, even if occasionally that banter is about how bummed she is that she got a hand-me-down Porsche for her birthday. (I mean, I hope she can also have her tight diamond shoes stretched so they don't give her blisters -- seriously, I've had the same Honda since I was 20, and I just found out the front undercarriage is being held together by a coat hanger. For real. I have no idea how it happened.) Yet somehow she hits this oddly entertaining combo of acting her age AND being personable, and this dress really wastes that.

So, now let's jump ahead to this year's Oscars and take a gander at what she picked:
Regardless of how I feel about her gowns, I have to confess that I freaking love Taraji P. Henson. First of all, her haircut is very cute, and I am easy wooed by good hair. (Just ask Patrick Dempsey.)  Plus, she seems so funny and charming any time she's interviewed. Also, according to Wikipedia, during college, "she worked two jobs--in the morning as a secretary at the Pentagon and in the night as a singing and dancing waitress on a dinner cruise ship," and if that's not the set-up for a charming sitcom, I don't know what is. But let's talk about the gowns, anyway. Here's Taraji's Oscar dress:

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Like half the stuff from Oscar night, I was unsure at the time and now I have mellowed and kind of dig it. It DOES kind of look like Formal Wear For Mummies, but I covet her necklace and I think she might be pulling it off.



Like so many Oscar-going ladies, Taraji changed for the parties. This thing is getting long, so click through for the rest.
Ugh.

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When I was a little girl, my grandmother had these pillows in her bedroom that I was OBSESSED with. They were peach, and they were covered in lace, with lace trim. They were VERY feminine and therefore made perfect staging areas on which my Barbies could try and strangle each other  -- my Barbies led very dramatic, soap-operatic lives, which is to be expected when there are twenty women fighting over two men, one of whom was ostensibly married (that would be Todd, of the Tracy and Todd wedding set, and he had some issues -- most notably that the rubber band which attached his top half to his bottom half broke when he was dancing too vigorously at his wedding reception, leaving him at worst a paraplegic and at best unable to sit down, depending on the needs of the story I was concocting). Occasionally, my Barbies would commit suicide over something or other, or one would run the other one down with the pink Corvette, or one would get trampled under the hooves of Barbie's horse, Dallas, or one would be tossed down the elevator shaft of the Barbie Townhouse, and when that happened, I often set their bodies down on these pillows for the viewing before the funeral (during which all my other Barbies, as well as said pillow, were swaddled in some excess black lace my other grandma gave me after I told her that I thought it was inappropriate for Barbie and her cronies to be so SMILELY at a funeral, even if one of them was quasi- or wholly responsible for the death). And so this peachy, lacy dress of Claire Danes brings me back to a happy time in my life. A time when I spent hours throwing dolls off the edge of my bed, getting them addicted to pain killers, and dreaming up complex love quandrangles for them (my mother used to let me watch All My Children with her during the summer and apparently, I was paying attention). But while I got great joy out of my Barbie funerals, and the shenanigans that led to them, just so you know, I would never actually want to DRESS LIKE ONE.
Clearly, Madonna is the master of reinvention, but I just wish she'd DECIDE on something already. Either she's going to compete in the Miss Jacked-Up America contest by bench-pressing a pile of tires during the talent/formalwear portion...

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... or she's slowly becoming Liza Minnelli.

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SJP: And what are YOU giggling at, Matthew?

MATTHEW BRODERICK: I'm just... hee... suddenly craving gumballs.

SJP: Very funny.

MATTHEW: Do you think your sister Glinda the Good Witch could conjure a few for me?

SJP: Ha ha...

MATTHEW: Or some Milk Duds?

SJP: Right, or how about some Junior Mints, I'm telling everyone my dress is a gentle "barely mint" color? I get it. You are SO hilarious.

MATTHEW: Look, I told you not to wear a giant boob shelf that had sprouted a tutu. You are not in a ballet called Silicone Valleys.

SJP: THESE ARE VERY REAL.

MATTHEW: Yeah, and you managed to make them look fake. That's quite an achievement.

SJP: Can it, Ferris.

MATTHEW: That reminds me -- just WAIT until you hear my stash of "cans" jokes.

SJP: Sigh.

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