Academy Fashion Snooze

Has anyone ever asked you, “Who are you wearing?”  Perhaps with the exception of one time when I had Carter strapped to me in a Baby Bjorn I am almost certain I have never been asked that.  Since I have never walked a red carpet or been given any type of award I do not find this unusual.  I don’t know that I would want to answer for fear that I might end up on a worst dressed list anyway.

It seems to me that the “awards season” as the late winter months have been come to known in the entertainment business has gotten out of control.  Industry congratulating itself is one thing, but the industry around the awards business, such as evening wear, jewelry, shoe, and handbag designers, stylists, hair people, makeup artists, publicists, blah, blah, blah is out of control.

I used to love to watch the academy awards.  I love movies and I even used to like movie stats.  But the red carpet part is soooo dull.  “Who are you wearing?”  What I really want to know is, “Are you wearing a foundational garment or is that your real body?”  Or “When was the last time you ate something?”  Based on last night’s pizza fest run by Ellen DeGeneres, movie stars were hungry.

Rather than awards shows being fashion shows I would like for them to go back to being award shows where the winners get a chance to talk.  Yes, sometimes when a film editor wins and gets to drone on thanking all their elementary school teachers it gets boring.  But when people who normally read scripts that are other people’s words win and get a chance to speak in their own minds I find it more compelling TV than watching dance numbers or listening to all the nominated songs we already know.

The Oscars should only be two hours long.  They already took all those technical awards out and put them in their own untelevised little ceremony, which was right.  I want the awards shows to be about people’s work and not about what they are wearing.  It is such a contradiction anyway because the best chance a woman has for winning is when she plays the ugliest person she can be.  Think back, Susan Sarandon in Dead Man Walking, Hilary Swank in Boys Don’t Cry, Halle Berry in Monster’s Ball, Nichole Kidman in The Hours, Charlize Theron in Monster – Maybe just being in something with the word Monster in the title is a winner.

This year even the men got in on it with Mathew McConaughey having to lose forty-five pounds and look almost dead as a person with Aids in order to win.  But the red carpet stalkers even wanted to know what he was wearing like that was important to his performance.  I know all these stars have been loaned these clothes and the designers want the pay off, but let’s have that info be in People Magazine or Vogue.  I a just happy that regular old people don’t go around asking, “Who are you wearing?”  It’s just incorrect unless you have an actual person strapped on to you and oh so boring.