It's a "how-to" reality show, to use
the Television Without Pity categories. The reality shows I enjoy are nearly all in the "competitive" category: "Survivor," "America's Next Top Model," "Project Runway," and — though "enjoy" isn't really the right word — "American Idol." I used to like "The Apprentice" and "Top Chef," too, but I don't want to watch any more seasons of the thing. I've had enough. The other category of reality show is "candid," and I love this category when it's at its best, like the first season of "The Osbournes" or the third season of "The Real World." The first season of "The Newlyweds" was good, and I don't mind stooping to some really trashy things sometimes, like "Wife Swap" and, in its day, the Anna Nicole Smith show — was it called "The Anna Nicole Smith Show"? But how-to? I don't want anybody telling me what to do, so why would it entertain me to see some purported experts telling somebody else what to do?
But I watched the new episode of "What Not to Wear" because part of it was filmed at a cool Brooklyn shop called
Lee Lee's Valise:
This place is run by the wife of one of our very best commenters here on the Althouse blog, Trooper York. And he tipped me off that they were filming the episode, so I came down to the shop that evening after my class. The filming was over, but the stars of the show were there along with their how-to victim, and I wanted to photograph the store.
I wasn't trying to photograph the characters from the show or even act like I noticed them. I talked to the guy a little at one point, but just in the way that a shopper would chat with another customer. I didn't want to bother them, and I certainly wasn't going to act like a fan of the show, which I'm not. In fact, I still don't know the man's name. I'd have to look it up even now. Trooper York showed me a lot of merchandise and explained his theory of the place, which was very well worked out to appeal to young women who need large sizes but don't want to be hit in the face with the fact they they are shopping in a large-sizes store. The place is at the intersection of Court and President streets, which is easy for law types to remember — 2 out of the 3 branches of government.
Anyway, I just watched the show, which made over a 29-year-old woman who is a student at my old law school NYU. They converged on her at some law lecture and, horrifyingly informed her that they'd been secretly filming her to get footage of her wearing terrible clothes. They
must get some kind of advance approval before they start the filming, right? If someone did that to me without my prior approval, I'd want to sue them. It's stalking!
So then they have to tell her everything she thinks is wrong, even when it isn't. She wears black skirts. Yes, most of them are too large, but the woman has lost a 100 pounds and is still in the process of losing weight. But the basic idea of wearing black skirts is obviously a good one, and the experts insist that it's not, and then they have to backtrack and say that actually it is. They are shocked that she wears black knee-high hosiery instead of full tights under a long skirt, but why? It's comfortable and invisible unless you yank up her skirt — which the fashion experts did, for the amusement of TV viewers. She had a nice, neat black jacket that was just way too large, but instead of talking about how she needed new clothes because she's lost so much weight, the experts showed her a completely different style of jacket, a gray plaid thing that they insisted was "young" and "professional" because it had wide, high lapels and buttoned up tightly under the breasts. There was no acknowledgment at all that the jacket won't look right or feel right buttoned up like that when she's sitting down, which she will be nearly all of the time working as a lawyer. They showed her a gaudy dress and contended that a loud print camouflages the shape of your body. This seemed insane, and it was also inconsistent with another one of their theories — that you should love your body as it is and show off the shape you have.
They spent some time doing the young woman's hair and makeup. Since she really needed a good haircut and wasn't wearing any makeup, this made a big improvement, but it had nothing to do with "what not to wear." Nor did it teach us anything useful. You already know you need to get a good haircut, don't you? And what woman doesn't realize she'd look better with some foundation and a little eye and lip makeup? That's not hard.
The show ends with everyone celebrating the amazing changes in the woman's appearance. You have scenes where everyone claps and cheers and the makeover target twirls around in her new clothes — which look ugly to me — and professes to be transformed. We're assured — typical woman's TV pap — that the young woman was always a wonderful person and now her exterior matches her wonderful interior. Blah! I'd rather see a show where philosophers descend on a woman with a perfect exterior and rip into her for her intellectual and spiritual failings, put her on some kind of internally transformative regime, and turn her into a human being of substance. Can we get that?
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