OMG!Just this afternoon, the Beebster and I were plotting fashion shenanigans and he happened to share with me a photo of his own recent personal homage to queen fashion scribe, The International Herald Tribune's Suzy Menkes. A matter of hours later, the first EP of Project Runway Australia hit the airwaves and who should jump out of my television screen but Sydney underwear designer, and BB/Menkes hybrid clone, Brisbane-based Filipino Mark Antonio (pictured above).
Suzy Menkes and Bryanboy. Which is which?
What's going on?? Is Bryanboy taking over the world as we know it? Did Imelda have anything to do with it? Or did the producers simply hunt down the most flamboyant, diminutive mincer with There's Something About Mary hair in a bid to match the feroshness of the winner of Season 4 of the US version, Christian Siriano - and he just happened to be Filipino?
Mentor - and Max Headroom dead ringer - Henry Roth.
Either way, Antonio proved one of the most entertaining contestants thus far, alongside the winner of EP #1, Leigh Buchanan and the uppity, self-taught dressmaker Helen Manuell, who refers to herself as "the frocker" - and who appears to be at the epicentre of some EP #2 drama, at least according to the teasers.
Will the show work downunder? Hard to say at this stage.
With just glamazon host Kristy Hinze and the models to mince about in lowcut dresses, the show's babe quotient is significantly lower than ANTM's - but then who said straight men are the ones who are going to clinch the ratings?
One thing is for sure, fashion has never fared well on Australian television. At least not on the commercial networks, whose producers always attempt to dumb things down to make fashion appeal to what they, in their expert opinions, firmly believe the masses want. Thereby stripping the subject of its vital aspirational component.
Then they wonder why the shows don't work.
Of course, if Project Runway proves to be a raging success - you can expect one of the commercial networks to rip off the concept pronto.
3 comments:
Yes i felt the show to be rather choppy, there was little or no cohesive flow from one scene to the other, and felt that the designers chose designs which were very safe, and boring in sense of good design not drama or amobiguous acts... there was little well to me that showed any insight that any would be actuve in the high fashion market with that i see Lee, Petramov (excuse name) and Mark being the designers to watch.
Hopefully i wont have to be so critical as the show progresses
YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME! HAHAHA
Of course I had something to do with this, I’m the ‘omnipresent’ despot! My army of Filipino lady-boys (otherwise known as The Imeldette’s) are taking over the world one blog and one poorly produced (isn’t there already a ‘White House’ on another show???) reality TV show at a time.
Patchwork how could you have forgotten ‘champagne on heels’????
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