Bonnie Bing: Oscars are all about the fashions
It’s Academy Awards time! Send in the gowns. While the women on the red carpet who have been buffed and polished, moussed and manicured, gelled and jeweled strike photo pose after pose and answer the same questions again and again, we can curl up and watch. Let them wear their Spanx, corset bodices and five-inch heels. I’ll be in my favorite old robe and fleecy socks.
The red carpet became a favorite part of the evening when the Oscars started being televised in color in the mid ’60s. Back then the stars chose their dresses. They went to their favorite hairdresser, they wore their own jewelry and no one fretted they would be named as being “worst dressed.”
My how things have changed. First of all, there are so many award shows it’s nearly impossible to keep track of who wore what and who won what. There’s a red carpet rolled out for everything from the Emmys to the ESPYs to a filling station opening.
But let’s face it. Tonight is the big night. This is the night the women have to bring their A game. That means they need a coach. In this case, the coach is the stylist. The stylist helps choose the gown, the hairstyle, the makeup and the jewelry. Everything is important from the jeweled hair clip to the satin bow on the shoes. You can bet the women who will get a lot of press – the nominees, presenters and last year’s winners – won’t have to buy their gowns because designers want their creations on those toned bods, especially those who will be in the spotlight.
No one wants to be made fun of, but it’s some of those what-was-she-thinking outfits that make watching the Oscars so much more interesting. Some of the gowns are incredibly beautiful and fit perfectly. And some, well, not so much. Watch Twitter for comments on that second category.
For example, what is the stylist thinking when he or she puts a voluminous dress on a 100-pound actress? This happens a lot. The diminutive actress is so overpowered by yards of fabric it looks like the dress is wearing her. Other times it is a mystery how a woman will be able to sit down in the confection she is wearing. And I love the gowns that make the women walk as though their knees are tied together. Julia Roberts was a knock-out in the black-and-white vintage Valentino she wore one year, but without a guy’s assistance who jumped up from the audience to help her, she couldn’t have gotten up the stairs to accept her award.
Preparation starts weeks before the Oscars. The facials and the other beauty treatments the stars go through are amazing. There is a new facial where the face is covered in thin sheets of gold. Real gold. Some stars do the old body wrap where you’re wrapped up like a mummy and sweat off lots of “water weight.” Also there’s a scrubbing and sloughing, and exfoliation of the chest, shoulders and, of course, the decolletage.
It’s interesting how some years there will be one color that is hot. One year it was bright yellow. Needless to say that wasn’t everyone’s best choice. And we must also take note of which part of the body is exposed the most. One year, cleavage was nearly out of control. Another year it could have been called the “year of the back.” Many, many backless dresses resulted in more than one case of nearly having cleavage in the back. Remember Hilary Swank’s navy blue gown in 2005? It was cut out in the back way below her waist. I must say these looks improved posture. You slump, you’re exposing something your mama told you not to show.
By comparison, the guys have it easy. Some try to vary the formal look a bit, but it boils down to bow tie or regular tie, lapel width and shirt color. Yawn.
Who knows, maybe someone will pull a Sharon Stone, who wore a ball skirt and her husband’s white dress shirt tied at the waist with the sleeves rolled up. Or remember Bjork in 2001? She donned the bird dress that had a swan neck wrapped around her neck? Outrageous creations such as Lizzy Gardiner’s gown made of American Express Gold cards in 1995 are a thing of the past. I doubt we will see anything like the “spider web” get-up Cher wore one year. And that’s probably a good thing.
This story was originally published February 22, 2015 at 9:13 AM with the headline "Bonnie Bing: Oscars are all about the fashions."