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Project Runway |
| A few weeks ago, I made the decision that I’d like to write a novel. And
not just in the “oh gee, wouldn’t it be nice” sort of way, the way where I
sit down in front of my computer and try to write and write and write and come up with
something. I’ve worked hard to find my own voice in my writing and not just
turn it into the detached, emotionless “I am saying things plainly and
unbiased”. How am I ever going to understand the motivations of my characters
and be able to write truthfully if I can’t express my own emotions when I
write? So I’ve worked and written and brainstormed and typed and deleted and
did the writer dance in a circle. I think I did it wrong because it’s been
raining here all week. The problem I’ve discovered is that when I sit to just spill everything out and write for no other purpose other than writing, I don’t have a problem. However, writing on a topic or a story, I end up sitting at the computer screen staring. I’ll write one sentence and linger on it. I become Billy Crystal in “Throw Momma from the Train.” The night is moist for me forever. Since this sort of block is common for me, I’ve come up with ways to deal with it. Sometimes I take a shower because I seem to be good a getting ideas there. Other times I’ll take a nap and try to have a dream, though that doesn’t always work. Like last night I went to sleep early when I got stuck writing and I ended up having a dream about bees building a hive inside of Jessica Simpson’s head. I wish I was kidding there. More often than not, what I do is try to get away from my computer. I take a walk or I go and read or well, let’s be honest, I sit and watch some TV. In general there are not many shows that I will watch every week they’re shown. At one time it was the Simpsons, more recently I’ve been watching 24. In between I’d have a series here and there that I would try to remember to watch. In general, I’ve managed to avoid most reality series. Several seasons of Survivor, 4 seasons of American Idol and countless others have passed by without me tuning in weekly or paying attention past seeing in magazines who had won big prizes. This all changed when I sat down last year with my mother and sister and found the one piece of reality TV that I have watched week after week. A one hour show about designers and fashion is the one show that has kept my attention all of this time: Project Runway. Project Runway should not be confused with Project Runaway where they show holograms of Lita Ford and Joan Jett. To describe the set-up of a reality TV show is rather simple, there is a host that runs the show, a cast that is assigned tasks and by some process members of the cast are removed episode after episode. It’s like eating a banana; you have to peel away the unwanted layers in order to eat the fruit. Unless you’re from K-PAX, like Mike Fireball.
Designers are given an assignment and guidelines to make a design and
are judged after the time given is elapsed. The designers create and outfit, buy the
material with the money that they are given and sew it together. Their outfits are
judged and the winner of the competition gets money to start their own line, a Banana
Republic mentorship, a car and a fashion spread in Elle magazine with their designs.
Thankfully, because this show is not run by Tyra Banks, we don’t have to watch Heidi Klum lead a pack of tall, skinny girls around them and whine about how tough modeling is. Yes, Tyra. Anyone who has watched America’s Next Top Model where there was a girl that gained five pounds knows you complain that you CAN’T CHANGE THE INDUSTRY SO LIVE WITH IT because she wants us to know that she has compassion for fat girls, but there is no room for fatties in modeling. Instead, the models are shown when they are modeling clothes. And unless there are going to be more models on Project Runway like Morgan from season one who never shut up and disappeared for a weekend on a drug binge, I really don’t want to see them past the runway show.
Much to the dismay of many girls I know and to my delight in calling it, Daniel kept up
the theme of the season of having no visible testosterone whatsoever. When he’s
not taking photographs from a downward angle with on arm to post on his on his Myspace,
he’s doing choreography or gymnastics. That’s also not a joke. Alternate joke: The Necro Butcher decided to clean his act and pursue his love of clothes since he never really had any new ones, being homeless and all. When he is not riding ruffled women for sport, Santino enjoys taking old
timely pictures. He should watch out, otherwise he may be eaten by Chloe, a joke
about asians The season has 14 episodes to it, the last episode occurring during Olympus fashion
week in New York City where the final three designers each have a runway show. As of
today, only 10 of the episodes have aired: What I learned this episode: All the men are gay and no one
believed me. I don’t want to have to wear muslin because then I’ll have to
pray 4 times a day and face Mecca. What I learned this episode: Perhaps it’s my homeless like
attachment to clothes, but I think I would have a hard time cutting up something I
wore. Maybe it’s what I learned from when I tried to give my Barbies and their
clothes makeovers. YOU BETTER BE READY TO GIVE YOUR SKIN FOR FASHION IF YOU WANT TO
MAKE IT
What I learned the episode: Apparently, as most of them noted,
the male designers had played with Barbies before. Raymundo doesn’t like My
Scene Barbies because if he had a daughter, he wouldn’t want her to learn from a doll
that she should dress like a tramp making him the first person on TV that isn’t a
dowdy old lady to make this point. What I learned this episode: All it takes to design lingerie is
a lot of black lace. I guess that means if you were to go to my grandmother’s
home and throw black ink on all of the lace table coverings her home would look like
it’s covered in underwear. What I learned this episode: Santino likes high heels.
Nicky Hilton is a facetious bitch. Oh yeah, and Paris Hilton blah blah blah. What I learned this episode: The way to go from feminine
business attire to “I’m getting ready to go out on the town” is to start
removing pieces of clothing. Also, I really have “living” store
fronts. It reminds me of those human statue people. Great, you get paid to
stand really still and do a modified version of “the robot”. Way to go
guy. What I learned the episode: A 6’6” gay man dressed in a puffy pink shirt is really funny. Even to me. And Sasha Cohen is a whole lot funner when she's Borat. Winner: Zulema What I learned this episode: After watching this and seeing how
the designers were given brand new 5 mega pixel cameras to keep makes part of me want to
try out for a reality show to see what sort of free stuff I could get. With my luck,
the only reality thing that would be interested in me is Girls Gone Wild and I’d just
end up with a paper thin t-shirt and I’d sign away my rights so they could use
my image. Also, I miss New York City. What I learned this episode: Spanish moss is not wearable
fabric, it looks like a doormat. What I learned this episode: Putting Chloe in a red dress with
leather makes her look like she is an extra from Full Metal Jacket. What I love about Project Runway: An Essay While I don’t spend a lot of time looking for clothes for myself, I get a strange sense of satisfaction when I sit down with my friend Dave to page through magazines like Vanity Fair or Vogue and look at the fashion ads. We go together to the local mall that carries Prada and Chanel and look at the $1000 hand bags and sunglasses and look at everything like I would in a museum with the knowledge that some of these things are very lovely, but I would never own them for myself for many reasons. We pick apart the look, the color, the cut of clothes, their practicality, everything. It’s the part of me that loves some of the things that part of me hates. The joy of Project Runway for me comes from the fact that I can sit there and watch the process of making high fashion clothes and pick them apart as they are being made. I have my favorite designer and my favorite outfit that won a challenge. Once more, this is something that embodies that inherently feminine part of me that often gets stifled beneath baseball shirts and jeans.
The second part that I love is Tim Gunn. Tim Gunn is the chair of the school of
fashion design and merchandising at Parson’s School of Design and is practically the
co-host. He presents the real challenge, takes the designers to buy supplies and
advises them on their designs. He is a clean cut with a stereotypical deep but
feminized voice of high brow gay man. Listening to him dissect the designers outfits
and try to correct them to prevent them from being cut makes me smile. If he were part of
Team Zissou, he would be Eleanor: low key, but the brains of the organization that
keeps everything going. I’ve always been drawn towards people that are smart or
at least well read about something in particular. Tim Gunn is this dressed up in a
designer suit and I can’t change the channel whenever he is on. Just like any popular reality TV show there have been knock-off shows that aren’t
noticed and eventually disappear. But this has managed to stick around and still be
a show I can watch. Plus it gives me a chance to indulge and feel girly and watch a
show about fashion without having twenty something girls whine about how they didn’t
take a good enough picture. And if you don’t like this show, look at it this
way, at least you were able to read an article about fashion that doesn’t talk
extensively about supermodels and cocaine. That’s something to be grateful
for. |
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