Runway Jury: Revenge of the Noodle

| Print Post This | Like (0) | Comments (3)

DID ANYONE EXPECT a different outcome?

Leanne won and Korto placed and Kenley and her horse-teeth showed, as it were. The collections told the whole story, no travesties of fashion justice took place, the snail is on the thorn, etc.

Except.

Tim Gunn should not have been a judge. I understand from his recounting of the frantic backstory that his position on the tribunal had all the inch-by-inch inevitability of the slow-cooked frog in the parable. But by the time he ended up fricasseed on the plate, his role as the "Project Runway" mentor, advice-giver and sometime adversary was compromised by his role as a judge. He'd seen the work in the designers' ateliers, watched it grow in the Parsons workroom, he's walked the vines — as the owner of Arrowine says in that local ad that play 7,394 times per episode — and came into the judging process with opinions, an understanding of how closely the designers listened to him, and the inspiration themes in place. Well, not Kenley's, because she's an ass and refused to tell him.

As Tim tells it, J. Lo came down with a headache in her foot, no other celebrities were willing to ring the opening bell — even Fern Mallis, who was there and is an awesome judge? — and at 10 minutes to showtime, Heidi hauled him into her interrogation dungeon and put the big Teutonic boot to the man. (I may be interpreting some of this.) Why not just scrap the fourth-judge position? Three is a tie-breaking number anyway.

But because the collections were so distinct and, really, none of the work was a departure for the ladies, the clear points of view on the runway made for a clear winner.

CATFIGHT!
The show zips along, beginning three days before the show. Leanne and Korto weakly try some mean girl stuff on Kenley, who has already half-assedly apologized for her behavior, so face-to-face confrontation doesn't really go anywhere. (Except when Korto asks Kenley, "You're gonna get your wedding dress in there?" and Kenley brays, "Yeah!" Because it's so cool, it's really pretty, she LOVES it. Man, I am done with this broad. I wish she'd been on Season Two so we could all have watched Santino yank her hair. I sense he's a hair-yanker.)

So the sniping moves to the talking-head interviews. Kenley whines that Leanne "doesn't know how to use color," presumably because Kenley has never seen the ocean or is colorblind or doesn't understand that what fashionistas so charmingly and vaguely call a "color story" means consistency and atmosphere, not, like, lots of it.

Leanne interviews that Kenley's collection looks "Holly Hobby," not accurate — although Kenley's line is a conceptual mess, it isn't dowdy, homey or underworked. Boy, is it not underworked.

SOPHIE'S CHOICE
Leanne's muse, Tia, has developed a diva complex over the course of the season, and swans into the workroom bearing 2003's must-have accessory — a tiny little horror of a doggie. The dog, Sophie, shows her own poor taste by choosing Leanne's work area as the perfect spot to take a dump disproportionally large in regard to her size. Sophie! Over here! Kenley's stank purple and white Balenciaga rip-off mini with the structured skirt cut away to reveal a flowered mess of a print — the materials are divided by rope! Yummy rope; good doggie! Aw, forget it. She's probably colorblind, too.

The designers meet with Collier Strong to discuss makeup, and then with the hair person — I tune out and go back to Sudoku, because the styling, unless it's patently insane, is always incidental. Nothing Will Shortz does, on the other hand, is incidental. Oh, Shortz, you maddening fiend! I can't stop filling in your little boxes.

They're asked to edit out two looks, taking the number from 12 to 10. That is an excellent last-minute challenge; it's a fine barometer of taste and way to demonstrate that we must all kill our darlings. No wonder Jerell didn't make it into the finale — he'd be a wreck, weeping among piles of glitter fabric and illusion netting, Sophie poop everywhere, yarn tangled around his feet.

MODEL DRAMA
Morganza has the weapons-grade nerve to audition — guess you're not getting much work in real shows after your Season One highjinks, eh, freakshow? Kenley asks to see her famous walk, which admittedly still rocks, and snaps her up. "She'd better not act up," Kenley whines. Sweetie, may I refer you to a little thing I like to call "Blair Waldorf"? That is how to sabotage a fashion show. Then again, Serena (Leanne) will just get a bright idea and save the day with extra-plus power and become a superstar, and you'll be left in her shadow again, all brunette and pouty. Nate (Korto) will be perfectly nice about everything and still not matter much.

LET'S END THE SHOW
OMG it's Chris March! And Uncle Nick! And Christian Siriano. And Rami Gesundheit. Yeah, so ....

Leanne is up first with her ocean-and-wave-inspired line. Cohesiveness? You got it. Beauty? In spades. Variety? Aplenty. Wearability? Honey, if it weren't for this economy, I'd be bidding on this right now. And the structured cambric-tea skirt, the high-waisted white pants, the milky-coffee two-tiered skirt covered in noodles, and the Caribbean-blue strapless gown Tia's wearing — that dog-poop smell on the hem will come right out.

Proportion is the watchword here, and though I think Leanne's skirts are awfully short, they're tailored with such mature taste they defy hoochiness, and her ice-white shorts and perfection. Her range of neutrals is divinely nuanced — the beiges range from dry to wet sand, the white sparkles like foam caps and her blues are pale and transcendent without being girlish. There's a lot of subtle layering, giving the costumes movement not as apparent on the dress forms. A-

KORTO B+
Korto is up next with an African-inspired line of bright, deep green, yellow and blue, a subtle tropical print, white satin and the grayish-cream she used for her wedding dress. That awful thing, by the way, has been reworked into a really lovely, subtle one-shouldered gown with draping that would make Rami cry.

The silhouettes veer from simple halter shapes — a little first-episode-challenge in the case of the short dresses, I think — to very full skirts and or with very full sleeves, a difficult silo for women to pull off without looking kinda ... wide all over. I'm not sure what the white is doing there — it's not combined with color, so the looks seem incongruous, and the long white gown is a ruffly nightmare. There are some beautiful individual looks in this collection, few missteps (here's the the-world's-your-gynecologist dress Tim Gunn gasped at last week)

And a lot of bold jewelry and witty manipulation of the collar area. Plus, her daughter is so damn cute. Oh, and her music was fabulous.

KENLEY C-
Kenley's secret story is "Alice in Wonderland," a good idea executed, not poorly, just haphazardly. (Her headband for this experience appears to be made of frightened cicadas.) There are more hideous prints on dispay than at Grandma Esther's mahjongg marathon. A green one in particular is overrun with paramecia; about the purple and white, the less said, the better; a random fuschia overskirt has different fugly prints on each side (!!); a — snore — high-necked, puff-shouldered sheath is pocked with those sketched-looking tulips she likes so much.

The aces up Kenley's sleeves are her blue bridesmaid dress, which has nothing to do with the "Alice" story, the McQueen wedding dress she insisted the judges loved and the fact that she hand-painted much of the fabric. But the silhouettes are all over the place, the waists unflatteringly high, the color cohesion just not there — what's a slinky black She-Wolf of Bryant Park sheath doing down the rabbit hole? — and she's proved to be a pony with limited tricks.

One hand-painted silk dress, a demure thing in cream with a spray of flowers running assymetrically from shoulder to hem — is a winner.

IT'S SO YOU
Look, I get that it's a runway show, so the designers have to walk a very fine line between couture drama and salability. But in the end, this is not some Viktor & Rolf fantasy funhouse. You want retailers to buy your stuff, and women to buy the stuff from retailers and to see your stuff in magazines, on the street, at charity balls and whatnot, on the red carpet.

It does come down to wearable clothes — ask Michael Kors or Diane von Furstenberg. And considering that a total of none of these bitches were able to run up a convincingly avant-garde look when asked, why not just sew a bunch of damn clothes that look nice on girls? Leanne did. Kenley didn't (and responded to her loss with a lovely, "That's bullshit!" Watch it, pottymouth — the entire tugboat-American community is listening). Korto split the difference. Lord, what I would have given to see Fern Mallis in Tim Gunn's judging seat. Lady knows her stuff.

Ah, well. That's it for another season, pigeons. Thanks for taking a trip down the runway with me, it's been ... taxing yet exhilarating. What did you think of the final collections and the outcome?

And as gracious winner Leanne put it, "Drinks are on this brothuh!"

Photos courtesy Bravo