Category: celebrities

Let’s stop glamorising pregnancy out of wedlock

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Pregnant and unmarried

Call me old-fashioned, but I’m getting tired of the endless parade of celebrities getting pregnant out of wedlock. Beauty Addict has run a series of posts showing magazine covers of pregnant celebrities:

  • Jessica Alba (unmarried)
  • Lily Allen (unmarried)
  • Halle Berry (unmarried)
  • Jennifer Lopez (married!)

No, I am not suggesting that we go back to the days when Ingrid Bergmann left the U.S. because of the relentlessly hostile press she had for conceiving out of wedlock. Media has simply gone too far on the other side of the pendulum, and it’s time to go back to the center. One can’t escape these magazines – these magazines are point of purchase items when one checks out at the cashier.

What sort of example is this giving to young women that pregnancy out of wedlock is desirable? OK, I take marriage seriously – I’ve held to my heart what my father-in-law wrote to me prior to my marriage – that marriage is a sacrament, not merely a contract.

I received negative replies when I posted my opinions on Beauty Addict. Kristen herself said my comments about Halle Berry were “insensitive.” I know Halle Berry’s story: her family abandoned by her father and two wrenching divorces (the first from baseball star David Justice, the second from singer Eric Benet). No wonder that she’s bummed on marriage. Still, this is not reason to emblazon her picture on magazine covers such as InStyle and People (does her publicist have an “in” with Time Warner, which owns both magazines?). Is Halle Berry seeking validation from the magazines’s audiences for her choices?

Gossip drives this blog

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My stats are running wild today! And it’s mostly on account of this photo of burlesque dancer Dita von Teese (nee Heather Renee Sweet):

Could it be because her divorce from Marilyn Manson just became final? As with other celebrity marriages, Dita von Teese and Marilyn Manson had a long courtship (4 years), but their marriage imploded in a matter of months.

Another driver to this blog are rumors of Presidential candidate John Edwards’s alleged affair with one Rielle Hunter. who was featured in an article in the now defunct yoga-cum-lifestyle magazine Breathe. Rumor has it that she’s pregnant by Edwards. The story is in the December 31, 2007 issue of the National Enquirer – for enquiring minds who want to know! 🙂

Odd – I haven’t been one to dish on celebrities’ personal lives, but it’s celebrity gossip that has made this blog popular.

Gratuitous Beyonce photo

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Given that I’ve blogged on Beyonce several times already, why not another time?

Here’s a photo of Beyonce as we often don’t see her, with little makeup and casually dressed in a knit cap, oversized hoops, a turtleneck, and high-waisted, wide-legged tie-fronts pants.

But she looks great anyhow. To see more, Music Royalty Eats on the Cheap – omg! photos on Yahoo!

Viva Glam

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M·A·C Cosmetics | Viva Glam

Although it’s been over a year since MAC launched Viva Glam VI, it’s brought back Eve and Dita von Teese for a new ads to promote the Viva Glam series of lipsticks where the proceeds go to fight HIV/AIDS.

I didn’t blog on Viva Glam VI when it was first launched, but the current promotion makes a review relevant once again. MAC describes Viva Glam VI as a “Warm terracotta-plum fusion with subtle pearl.” Terracotta and plum are among my favorite makeup colors, so this fusion sounded very tempting.

However, Viva Glam VI was disappointing. It had less pigment than other MAC lipsticks that are among my favorites (Plum, a discontinued satin lipstick, and Bourbon, a lipstick from the limited edition Beauty Icon 3 collection featuring Catherine Deneuve). Moreover, the color didn’t intensify my lips. I’d practically recommend giving the money directly to an AIDS cause, but I know that getting a lipstick at the same time is a lot more fun.

I certainly can’t imagine burlesque dancer Dita von Teese, who was in the original Viva Glam campaign, wearing this lipstick. If red lipstick was created for anyone, it would be her, with her raven-black hair and fair complexion.

The Style Page interview with celebrity makeup artist Matin – Part 1

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Matin Maulawizada

The Style Page is pleased to present an exclusive interview with celebrity makeup artist Matin (pronounced mah-TEEN) Maulawizada. Matin has an impressive list of credits: his work has been featured in InStyle as well as other major fashion and beauty magazines and his client list includes Angelina Jolie, Beyonce, Gwen Stefani, Liv Tyler, Reese Witherspoon, Salma Hayek, and Shakira. A more comprehensive list of credits may be found by selecting this link.

Because of the length and range of the interview, it will be split over three postings. This post focuses on his upbringing in Afghanistan and what he learned about beauty in Afghanistan.

1. Your biography states that you have six sisters. Were you the only boy?

Yes, I am the only boy.

2. What was your first language?

It is called Dari. A language spoken in Afghanistan and a few other central Asian countries inhabited by Tadjik tribes.

3. What beauty rituals did you observe your mother, sisters, and other female relatives do? A magazine article said that you learned threading by watching your female relatives, but were there any others? What about mehndi (henna), lining the eyes with kajal?

Yes, I learned most of beauty trick watching my sisters go at it decades after decades. My mom would be running around with a masque on her face ordering the staff at the house on what to do and what to cook, a sister would be screaming from pain of waxing her leg, the other would be threading her upper lip, yet another one would be painting her face… It was NICE ;-). My main inspirations were my sister Mina who did incredible eye make-up on herself in the 60’s and 70’s. She cross dressed she had a Beetles style haircut until 11th grade, then did a complete turn and joined miss Afghanistan and got very fem, my sister Shakila is absolutely gorgeous and I used to sit with her and watch her get ready to go out with her fiancé in the 70’s, my sister Trina with her super smokey eyes, pale skin…wow…great 80’s face. So I watched and absorbed these looks not from the books or movies but right in front of me done by very beautiful, very talented women who were my sisters. Kajal and Surma (khol powder) is used by men, women in children in my country (Afghanistan) so it is of course my most favorite thing to use.

4. Would you care to comment on beauty as an act of resistance under the Taliban?

On one of my trips back to Afghanistan, I met a brilliant man that produced lipsticks, nail polishes, facial bleaching creams etc in his garage during the reign of Taliban and sold them to the underground beauty parlors. Make up is IS a form of expression in today’s Afghanistan, it is theatrical and it is a way to show the world that you are modern. You don’t wear it at all and when you do… you go ALL OUT.

In Part 2, Matin talks about coming to the U.S., breaking into the beauty business, and making it.

What gives?

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For me, sitting around at the hair salon is an opportunity for me to catch up on magazines. I was waiting as my husband got his hair cut, and picked up the current issue of Allure, with Britney Spears on the cover. It was surreal. The photo spread, which featured a topless Spears (with her breasts discreetly covered by her hands or arms), was accompanied by Judith Newman’s article about her unsuccessful efforts to get an interview with Spears. Then, there was Editor-in-chief Linda Wells’s tortured (and ultimately lame) justification for putting Spears on the cover. What gives?

Just go to the Allure web site – it’s all about boosting magazine sales.

PS I didn’t watch MTV’s Video Music Awards, but by all accounts, Spears’ headliner performance was a disaster. While Kanye West’s insistence that he should have been headliner is proof of his overweaning ego, he was probably right when he said that MTV “exploited” Spears for TV ratings.

Does this woman (Spears) have anything else to offer than exposing her body? Are Allure and MTV so deficient in imagination that they must exploit this woman’s tabloid-worthy escapades and problems to promote themselves?

Beyonce and the "Roboho" costume

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I stayed up past midnight last night listening to the shout-out between the Rev. Al Sharpton and Harvey Levin of the TMZ.com celebrity gossip site on Fox News concerning TMZ’s describing the costume that Beyonce wore at the BET 2007 Fashion Awards show last month as “Roboho.” The Rev. Al thought that the term was demeaning and racist; Harvey Levin said it was all in good fun.

What was missed in this whole shout-out was the similarity of Beyonce’s costume to that of the female robot in the 1927 film classic Metropolis.



Madonna riffed on Metropolis for her video Respect Yourself.

They’re Baaaaaaaaaaack!

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In my post Intentional Irony, I described Spice Girls as “one phenomenon of the 1990s that many would like to forget.” Lo and behold, Spice Girls are reuniting for a world tour. The Royal Observatory at Greenwich, which is the referent for zero longitude and time around the world (I won’t get into the technical details), was cleverly chosen as the site to announce their world tour.


L to R: Victoria “Posh” Beckham, Melanie “Sporty” Chisholm, Geri “Ginger” Halliwell, Emma “Baby” Bunton, and Melanie “Scary” Brown announce the Spice Girls’ 2007 reunion tour.

I hate the push-up bustiers that Posh and Scary are wearing: it looks like their boobs will spill out any moment (especially Posh). That’s not sexy, it’s tacky. Baby Spice (who is pregnant) is still cute, and Sporty looks great, better than ever. Geri Halliwell’s frock won’t win her any points with fashion cogniscenti, but I find her tousled locks and dress a refreshing change for this former topless model whose Union Jack costume made her look like some UK version of Wonder Woman.


Geri “Ginger Spice” Halliwell in 1997: UK Wonder Woman?

Given the media overkill surrounding the 10th anniversary of Princess Diana’s death, perhaps Spice Girls’ time has come around once again: after all, their single “Spice Up Your Life” displaced Elton John’s “Candle in the Wind” from no 1 on the UK pop charts two months after Diana was killed.

Miracle cream

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Miracle cream – LMX5â„¢

The hair on my chin and jaw became unmanageable, so it was time for me to look beyond tweezing and snipping hairs with a manicure scissors. A dermatologist’s office tried to sell me on a package of laser treatments, but I balked at the price. Moreover, I’ve read that the effectiveness of laser hair removal depends on the contrast between the hair and the skin. As many of my hairs were light in color, I decided that I was not a good candidate for laser hair removal and went back to electolysis.

Now, I am a baby when it comes to electrolysis. My eyes tear up and I wince and twitch like crazy. This time, however, I quietly lied on the table while the electrologist deftly removed hairs. It didn’t hurt even when she removed hairs near the lips, where there are a lot of nerve endings. The difference? LMX5â„¢ numbing cream, a topical anesthetic.

LMX5â„¢ doesn’t require a prescription, but I had to special order it through CVS. drugstore.com doesn’t even carry it – it carries only the 4%, which, according to what my electrologist heard from her other clients is not as effective as LMX5â„¢. However, Amazon.com does carry LMX5â„¢.

Don’t be turned off by the fact that LMX5â„¢ is marketed as an anorectal cream. After all, if beauty contestants can use Preparation H to treat puffy eyes, why can’t you use LMX5â„¢? It’s also supposed to be good for undergoing treatments such as Botox.


Liv Tyler, as featured on the cover of the July 2007 issue of Allure

NEW The July 2007 issue of Allure (which features Liv Tyler on the cover) also recommends numbing creme when doing a bikini wax.

Is Beyonce’s look really that bad?

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OK, this is certainly not Beyonce’s best picture and might not be her best look, but is it really the fashion disaster that Cynthia Nellis of fashion.about.coom says that it is?

Ms. Nellis writes:

What’s missing in Beyonce’s outfit goes way beyond a pair of pants or a skirt (although either would’ve helped): Beyonce is missing dignity. She owes it to her fabulous self to skip the trends — like these almost-invisible teensy shorts — that don’t flatter her and stick with what does (which is pretty much just about everything else).

A slightly longer boy short might be better, but who needs thigh coverage with legs like these?

My criticism? The bright pink lipstick. Mally Roncal (her longtime makeup artist) or the beauty professionals at L’Oreal (for which Beyonce is a spokesperson) were not paying attention here.