THE INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY
Size-zero debate: fashion industry is told to 'grow up'
By Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor
Published: 22 May 2007
The chairwoman of an independent inquiry into the fashion industry's relationship with size-zero models warned yesterday that it was time for the industry to grow up.
Baroness Kingsmill, a former deputy chairman of the Competition Commission, said stronger measures may have to be taken to protect young women aspiring to be top models.
She was speaking at the launch of the inquiry by a panel including a psychiatrist, an academic and leaders of the fashion world into the casting and selection process for models and the impact on their health of the demand for the super-skinny look.
But critics said it was hard to see how a minimum size could be imposed without incurring charges of discrimination.
The three-month inquiry, backed by the British Fashion Council, comes in response to growing disquiet about the risks of modelling to young women desperate to meet the industry's waif-like norm. The deaths of a Uruguayan model, Luisel Ramos, 22, and her sister, Eliana, 18, within months of each other last year fuelled the debate. Luisel died of heart failure after starving herself for days before a fashion show and Eliana died of a heart attack. In November, the death of Ana Carolina Reston, a Brazilian model aged 21 who lived on a diet of apples and tomatoes, sparked worldwide concern.
Leading actresses have condemned the pressures on young women. Kate Winslet said: "I feel very strongly that curves are natural, womanly and real." The demands on women to pursue size-zero figures was "unbelievably disturbing, " she said. Billie Piper, the former Doctor Who star, described the trend as disgusting.
Their views have been echoed by ministers. Rosie Winterton, the Health minister, said the impact on girls aspiring to be super-skinny was "deeply worrying," and the Culture Secretary, Tessa Jowell, called for extremely thin women to be kept off the catwalk.
Last September, Madrid Fashion Week announced that it was banning models with a body mass index of less than 18, the lowest weight considered healthy, equivalent to 8 stone 4 lbs for a woman of 5ft 6ins.
London also refused to follow suit, with the British Fashion Council, which runs London Fashion Week, instead urging designers to use only healthy-looking models aged over 16.
Lady Kingsmill said the issue could no longer be ignored.
"It is time, in a way, for the fashion industry to grow up," she said. "It is a real and a very important industry and the people working within it have to be taken seriously and have to be treated well."
She added: "We are going to explore what the legal obligations are both domestically and internationally. There are lawyers who have said they could put up quite an interesting personal injury case on behalf of a model whose health has been damaged by her working environment or on behalf of a model who has been denied work because of her model size."
http://news.independent.co.uk/health/article2567983.ece
Sunday, 30 September 2007
Saturday, 29 September 2007
TV Review (new york times)
TV Review 'Ugly Betty'
A Plucky Guppy Among the Barracudas
By VIRGINIA HEFFERNAN
Published: September 28, 2006
“Ugly Betty” is indeed cute. But she’s the new girl. Let’s not all pounce on her at once. It’s too much to ask of this mostly guileless, slightly ungainly series that it be another “Lost” or “Desperate Housewives” for ABC this year, so maybe we should watch aloofly, starting tonight. Let’s let Betty find her locker and her lunch table, and observe her without asking that she be more than she is.
Of course we can still gossip. This ABC melodramedy, which has attracted big attention both for being an American telenovela and for being funny and good, has a slight premise: an ungorgeous Latina goes to work at a fashion magazine. She’s hired by the father of the party-boy editor in chief because she’s too homely to tempt him into dissipation. Can this sitcom setup work in an hourlong format?
Seems dubious, but “Ugly Betty” is onto the doubts about it and stands ready to turn them into plot. As Betty Suarez, the sexy actress America Ferrera, here defaced by braces and bangs, sets her mouth, squares her shoulders and takes on the part like a linebacker. She’s bravely playing a character who’s coded as ugly, which means she’s still eating food, which is apparently about the bravest thing a television actress can do.
Nourished, braced, standing firm, Betty asks that the world come at her, and come it does: fink boyfriend, vain sister, ineffectual father, trampy neighbor. And that’s just in Queens, where she lives. In Manhattan, at the Vogue-like Mode magazine, Betty finds conniving executives, ruthless monomaniacs, strivers without principles, chubby clock watchers, Uriah Heeps and Iagos and the usual New York office crowd.
So who is Betty in the midst of these grotesques? She’s meant to be nothing but smart and good, though in life the two traits rarely fit perfectly together. And because she’s also “ugly” she’s assumed to have made the ultimate personal sacrifice in our vain world, and her intelligence and wholesomeness are meant to be not only absolute but perfectly compatible. This improbability causes some problems in characterization. The big joke of tonight’s episode is that Betty interprets the comeback of the poncho as permission for her to turn up at work in a red eyesore emblazoned with the word “Guadalajara.”
Naïve and touching, yes, but just to play devil’s advocate what kind of college graduate, as Betty is supposed to be, wears a gift shop poncho on her first day at work, thinking it’s what she’s seeing in magazines? This error is less evidence of a mind on higher things than it is a cognitive disability.
For a serious-minded girl not to understand couture or street-trash ensembles like the designs of Jeffrey Sebelia on “Project Runway” might be admirable. But for a literate, sentient, self-aware young woman to prefer bulky belted layers in clashing patterns and cacophonous shades of red and orange to (at least) the affordable A-line skirts and cotton button-downs at Old Navy or Target, that makes no sense. Commedia characterization on pseudorealist television can be exhausting: just as not every rich person has to wear an ascot, not every provincial girl has to dress like a mental patient.
Betty’s clothes, in other words, the most flamboyant side of her, have not been integrated into her character. They’re a free-standing gag, and that gag cannot last long. Whether there’s a show without that gag, though: that is the question.
Salma Hayek, an executive producer who will also appear sporadically on the show, adapted “Ugly Betty” from a Colombian telenovela called “Yo Soy Betty La Fea.” Ms. Hayek has an uncanny aptitude for blending comedy and melodrama, and she’s managed to infuse the show upstairs and downstairs with soapy fun. There’s a dark corporate plot at Mode, and outrageous catfights in Queens. The ambience of telenovela is everywhere, and conspicuously on the television set in the Queens house, where everyone is addicted to the makeuppy theatrics.
Betty also likes the show — she’s smart but not skeptical — and that’s a nice touch. That wonderful moony side of her comes through even more in her scenes with Daniel Meade (Eric Mabius), her boss; Mr. Mabius, who is handsome, and Ms. Ferrera have a sparkling rapport that is the making of this show. He can hold his own with her, and Betty’s crush on him is so hopeless as to seem genuinely and tragically muted.
Daniel, for his part, is sexually drawn to Betty too, but out of perversity — She’s his servant? She’s ugly and thus would be grateful even for abuse? — that this show should probably never make explicit. In any case the two have a valet-hero back-and-forth that, if the writers really explore it, might make them a prime-time Wooster and Jeeves.
But I’m getting ahead of things. Way ahead. “Ugly Betty” is a sweet, funny show. It’s worth watching. And we’ll see.
A Plucky Guppy Among the Barracudas
By VIRGINIA HEFFERNAN
Published: September 28, 2006
“Ugly Betty” is indeed cute. But she’s the new girl. Let’s not all pounce on her at once. It’s too much to ask of this mostly guileless, slightly ungainly series that it be another “Lost” or “Desperate Housewives” for ABC this year, so maybe we should watch aloofly, starting tonight. Let’s let Betty find her locker and her lunch table, and observe her without asking that she be more than she is.
Of course we can still gossip. This ABC melodramedy, which has attracted big attention both for being an American telenovela and for being funny and good, has a slight premise: an ungorgeous Latina goes to work at a fashion magazine. She’s hired by the father of the party-boy editor in chief because she’s too homely to tempt him into dissipation. Can this sitcom setup work in an hourlong format?
Seems dubious, but “Ugly Betty” is onto the doubts about it and stands ready to turn them into plot. As Betty Suarez, the sexy actress America Ferrera, here defaced by braces and bangs, sets her mouth, squares her shoulders and takes on the part like a linebacker. She’s bravely playing a character who’s coded as ugly, which means she’s still eating food, which is apparently about the bravest thing a television actress can do.
Nourished, braced, standing firm, Betty asks that the world come at her, and come it does: fink boyfriend, vain sister, ineffectual father, trampy neighbor. And that’s just in Queens, where she lives. In Manhattan, at the Vogue-like Mode magazine, Betty finds conniving executives, ruthless monomaniacs, strivers without principles, chubby clock watchers, Uriah Heeps and Iagos and the usual New York office crowd.
So who is Betty in the midst of these grotesques? She’s meant to be nothing but smart and good, though in life the two traits rarely fit perfectly together. And because she’s also “ugly” she’s assumed to have made the ultimate personal sacrifice in our vain world, and her intelligence and wholesomeness are meant to be not only absolute but perfectly compatible. This improbability causes some problems in characterization. The big joke of tonight’s episode is that Betty interprets the comeback of the poncho as permission for her to turn up at work in a red eyesore emblazoned with the word “Guadalajara.”
Naïve and touching, yes, but just to play devil’s advocate what kind of college graduate, as Betty is supposed to be, wears a gift shop poncho on her first day at work, thinking it’s what she’s seeing in magazines? This error is less evidence of a mind on higher things than it is a cognitive disability.
For a serious-minded girl not to understand couture or street-trash ensembles like the designs of Jeffrey Sebelia on “Project Runway” might be admirable. But for a literate, sentient, self-aware young woman to prefer bulky belted layers in clashing patterns and cacophonous shades of red and orange to (at least) the affordable A-line skirts and cotton button-downs at Old Navy or Target, that makes no sense. Commedia characterization on pseudorealist television can be exhausting: just as not every rich person has to wear an ascot, not every provincial girl has to dress like a mental patient.
Betty’s clothes, in other words, the most flamboyant side of her, have not been integrated into her character. They’re a free-standing gag, and that gag cannot last long. Whether there’s a show without that gag, though: that is the question.
Salma Hayek, an executive producer who will also appear sporadically on the show, adapted “Ugly Betty” from a Colombian telenovela called “Yo Soy Betty La Fea.” Ms. Hayek has an uncanny aptitude for blending comedy and melodrama, and she’s managed to infuse the show upstairs and downstairs with soapy fun. There’s a dark corporate plot at Mode, and outrageous catfights in Queens. The ambience of telenovela is everywhere, and conspicuously on the television set in the Queens house, where everyone is addicted to the makeuppy theatrics.
Betty also likes the show — she’s smart but not skeptical — and that’s a nice touch. That wonderful moony side of her comes through even more in her scenes with Daniel Meade (Eric Mabius), her boss; Mr. Mabius, who is handsome, and Ms. Ferrera have a sparkling rapport that is the making of this show. He can hold his own with her, and Betty’s crush on him is so hopeless as to seem genuinely and tragically muted.
Daniel, for his part, is sexually drawn to Betty too, but out of perversity — She’s his servant? She’s ugly and thus would be grateful even for abuse? — that this show should probably never make explicit. In any case the two have a valet-hero back-and-forth that, if the writers really explore it, might make them a prime-time Wooster and Jeeves.
But I’m getting ahead of things. Way ahead. “Ugly Betty” is a sweet, funny show. It’s worth watching. And we’ll see.
My View:
I do agree with this review as it summons up what the show is about. However I do disagree to a certain extent as the review states that Betty’s clothes are the most colorful and loud side of her, which, has ‘not been included into her character’. This can be seen as untrue as Betty’s character in Mode building is not seen as bold and loud due to her clothing only- it is also due to her perspective being different, and her view and background are symbolized via her appearance, as this way she stands out from the rest overtly and covertly.
Moreover, the review talks about Daniel being sexually drawn to Betty, and that Betty has a crush on Daniel. Although this is an interesting viewpoint, and could be true because and audiences expectations are mainly that Betty becomes pretty gradually in time, and then gets together with Daniel- at the moment it seems unlikely that they are drawn to each other or that Betty even has a crush on him- as she is shown to take on the mother role and look after Daniel, and Daniel is shown to be the lost little boy who needs guidance (which is provided by Betty) so he is very child-like in a sense. However, as the show progresses, the characters will change and grow so there is a possibility that Daniel and Betty will get together.
Moreover, the review talks about Daniel being sexually drawn to Betty, and that Betty has a crush on Daniel. Although this is an interesting viewpoint, and could be true because and audiences expectations are mainly that Betty becomes pretty gradually in time, and then gets together with Daniel- at the moment it seems unlikely that they are drawn to each other or that Betty even has a crush on him- as she is shown to take on the mother role and look after Daniel, and Daniel is shown to be the lost little boy who needs guidance (which is provided by Betty) so he is very child-like in a sense. However, as the show progresses, the characters will change and grow so there is a possibility that Daniel and Betty will get together.
Is Ugly Betty de-uglifying ?
it seems as if Betty Suarez has been slowly de-uglifying ever since. Many of our readers have noticed that America is noticeably slimmer than she was when the show started. But I've also noticed that her hair (is it a wig?) isn't as much of a shaggy mop as it has been, her clothes aren't as loud (still frumpy, but not as silly), and her brace-face isn't quite as prominent.
All this may be in an effort to shape the character -- in other countries' versions of the show, Betty eventually goes through a transformation into a gorgeous woman. At the very least, it may be showing that Betty's time at Mode might be rubbing off on her in small ways. But, according to TV Guide's Mike Ausiello, some of the changes might be coming from Ferrera's reps, as he reported in a blind item today. In other words, he doesn't mention the name of the show, but most of the commenters seem to think he's talking about Betty
Some of Ausiello's readers cited other sources that said that Ferrera requested that Betty lose her braces because they're painful to wear during what I'm sure is a pretty grueling shooting schedule. I can understand that; people don't wear braces forever, and it's perfectly realistic to see Betty lose the metal and either go with a retainer or nothing at all..
And America might be feeling the usual Hollywood pressure to lose weight. But I can tell you from personal experience, she still looks more natural and normal than 90 percent of the actresses I encountered when I was out in L.A. Most of them were so skinny, their dresses just hung off their shoulders, not showing any evidence of a figure.So is Betty Suarez getting a little less ugly? Sure. But she's not becoming a beauty queen, at least not yet. And the character is still kind at heart. That's why we started liking her in the first place, anyway...
Glamour interviews America Ferrera
Glamour Asks America Ferrera What It's Like To Be Fat
How in the world is America Ferrera making it in Hollywood despite not being white or thin? That is the question Glamour seeks to answer in their latest issue. Sure they call her a bombshell and praise her for being the actress women love, but they also photoshopped the fat out from under her arms, gave her a hip and breast reduction and tanned that hide. As witnessed by the comparison at right to a recent file photo snapped in August.So we decided to translate some of the more interesting parts of the interview to reveal what’s really being said. Join us while we read between Glamour’s lines:
GLAMOUR: So 11 Emmy nominations for Ugly Betty, two new films in the works. You’re huge!
[Translation: How can you be successful? You’re huge!]
AMERICA FERRERA: What’s crazy is that when opportunities to work come along, they are countered by just as many opportunities to piss it all away. Thank God I’m too busy to say yes.
[Translation: Thank God I’m too Latin to pull a Lindsay Lohan.]
AF: If this is my chance, I’d hate to look back and say I sacrificed it for partying.
[Translation: Unlike Dina Lohan, my mamá would kick my ass.]
GLAMOUR: Have you ever felt limited by your status as a Latina?
[Translation: Have you ever felt you should be cleaning someone’s house?]
AF: …[W]hen I came around with Real Women Have Curves…[w]e screened the film all over the world—in Jewish communities, black communities, Greek communities, German communities— and people across the board said, “That’s my family.”
[Translation: Fat people rule the world.]
GLAMOUR: So do you think Hollywood is moving away from the tall, skinny blond as the actress ideal?
[Translation: Should we be frightened?]
AF: At the end of the day, studios are learning there is a market out there that doesn’t necessarily want to go with predictable choices.
[Translation: No.]
GLAMOUR: Do you still pinch pennies out of habit?
[Translation: Are you the first in your family not to live on welfare?]
AF: My first big, extravagant purchase was a convertible BMW […] but a month after I bought it I was biting my nails, waiting for my tax refund to arrive. Eventually I thought, What’s the point? I just need something to get me from A to B. So I traded in my BMW for a Toyota. But I’ll spend any amount of money on tickets to a show I want to see. This weekend I’m going to New York City with my boyfriend to see Patti LuPone in Gypsy, my favorite musical ever!
[Translation: Like many Latina women, I’m uncomfortable with treating myself. On a side note, my boyfriend could be gay.]
GLAMOUR: How do you feel about being the newest spokeswoman for curvy figures in Hollywood?
[Translation: How do you feel about being fat?]
AF: I’m a size 6 or 8, which is totally normal.
[Translation: Bitch, get some perspective.]
GLAMOUR: Did you ever go through a Betty-like awkward stage?
[Translation: You grew up wearing a serape, right?]
AF: I never wore braces, but I did wear retainers.
[Translation: No more than any other White girl.]
AF: But the most awkward stage I went through has to be my freshman year of college: I had really frizzy hair [and] that extra freshman 15
[Translation: And I went to college, Esa.]
GLAMOUR:Do you have any leftover body insecurities?
[Translation: You’re not thinking of STAYING this size, are you?]
AF: Totally. I never liked my legs and I can’t remember the last time I wore a bathing suit in public.
[Translation: Another year of this success and I’ll make Nicole Richie look like Carnie Wilson.]
[Translation: How can you be successful? You’re huge!]
AMERICA FERRERA: What’s crazy is that when opportunities to work come along, they are countered by just as many opportunities to piss it all away. Thank God I’m too busy to say yes.
[Translation: Thank God I’m too Latin to pull a Lindsay Lohan.]
AF: If this is my chance, I’d hate to look back and say I sacrificed it for partying.
[Translation: Unlike Dina Lohan, my mamá would kick my ass.]
GLAMOUR: Have you ever felt limited by your status as a Latina?
[Translation: Have you ever felt you should be cleaning someone’s house?]
AF: …[W]hen I came around with Real Women Have Curves…[w]e screened the film all over the world—in Jewish communities, black communities, Greek communities, German communities— and people across the board said, “That’s my family.”
[Translation: Fat people rule the world.]
GLAMOUR: So do you think Hollywood is moving away from the tall, skinny blond as the actress ideal?
[Translation: Should we be frightened?]
AF: At the end of the day, studios are learning there is a market out there that doesn’t necessarily want to go with predictable choices.
[Translation: No.]
GLAMOUR: Do you still pinch pennies out of habit?
[Translation: Are you the first in your family not to live on welfare?]
AF: My first big, extravagant purchase was a convertible BMW […] but a month after I bought it I was biting my nails, waiting for my tax refund to arrive. Eventually I thought, What’s the point? I just need something to get me from A to B. So I traded in my BMW for a Toyota. But I’ll spend any amount of money on tickets to a show I want to see. This weekend I’m going to New York City with my boyfriend to see Patti LuPone in Gypsy, my favorite musical ever!
[Translation: Like many Latina women, I’m uncomfortable with treating myself. On a side note, my boyfriend could be gay.]
GLAMOUR: How do you feel about being the newest spokeswoman for curvy figures in Hollywood?
[Translation: How do you feel about being fat?]
AF: I’m a size 6 or 8, which is totally normal.
[Translation: Bitch, get some perspective.]
GLAMOUR: Did you ever go through a Betty-like awkward stage?
[Translation: You grew up wearing a serape, right?]
AF: I never wore braces, but I did wear retainers.
[Translation: No more than any other White girl.]
AF: But the most awkward stage I went through has to be my freshman year of college: I had really frizzy hair [and] that extra freshman 15
[Translation: And I went to college, Esa.]
GLAMOUR:Do you have any leftover body insecurities?
[Translation: You’re not thinking of STAYING this size, are you?]
AF: Totally. I never liked my legs and I can’t remember the last time I wore a bathing suit in public.
[Translation: Another year of this success and I’ll make Nicole Richie look like Carnie Wilson.]
http://guanabee.com/2007/09/glamour-asks-what-its-like-to.php
Betty: a negative role model?
Ugly Betty now in South Africa is an Ugly Role Model
Ugly Betty is meant to make women feel like there is more to life than being a physically attractive woman. And most men would likely agree, to avoid being labelled a sexist, or a misogynist, that this is true. Now let’s look the reality of the situation.
There have been many studies to show that more attractive people get more opportunities in the workplace, in social circles, etc. So this negative role model does not in my opinion help any woman understand what the reality is in the world. In America where obesity is now almost at epidemic proportions there is anecdotal evidence that this show is giving fat women an excuse not to try and loose weight. Most people are plain lazy when it comes to working on their physical appearance yet these same people are likely to judge others on their first impressions and therefore on the their physical appearance. So what I am saying here is that we should rather point women to role models like Charlize Theron and Angelina Jolie. These women work exceptionally hard in their careers and still manage to look stunning whenever they make a public appearance or film.
http://ramonthomas.com/ugly-betty-now-in-south-africa-is-an-ugly-role-model/
Ugly Betty is meant to make women feel like there is more to life than being a physically attractive woman. And most men would likely agree, to avoid being labelled a sexist, or a misogynist, that this is true. Now let’s look the reality of the situation.
There have been many studies to show that more attractive people get more opportunities in the workplace, in social circles, etc. So this negative role model does not in my opinion help any woman understand what the reality is in the world. In America where obesity is now almost at epidemic proportions there is anecdotal evidence that this show is giving fat women an excuse not to try and loose weight. Most people are plain lazy when it comes to working on their physical appearance yet these same people are likely to judge others on their first impressions and therefore on the their physical appearance. So what I am saying here is that we should rather point women to role models like Charlize Theron and Angelina Jolie. These women work exceptionally hard in their careers and still manage to look stunning whenever they make a public appearance or film.
http://ramonthomas.com/ugly-betty-now-in-south-africa-is-an-ugly-role-model/
America the Beautiful
America Ferrera is the “fresh face” that television has been missing for many (very many) seasons. I’ve known a lot of people like “Ugly Betty”. Not just women either, men often feel this way about themselves. However, this girl (excuse me, woman) shows a side of society that is so obsessed with looks that the everyday person feels inferior and not meeting the standard the world (not the real world, but the business and fashion world) has set on them. In the interview with America, she said this series was not about an “ugly girl”, “It’s a look past what you see”. I have to agree with her. I find it amazing that Hollywood and television, is actually looking at the image (of women especially) it has produced for the past four or five decades. As Betty, it’s not about what you look like (well, not 100%) but how you feel you look like that matters and Betty feels she look great. It doesn’t take long to fall for America’s character. Ugly, Betty isn’t!
Is Ugly Betty a good role model for young women?
On the one hand, I think it's GREAT that there's a show that has a strong, young female lead as a character. Not enough of those since things like My So Called Life disappeared...and junk like that Pepper Dennis show is really just an excuse to have people ogle supermodels like Rebecca Romijn.
But from what it sounds like, Ugly Betty could be a venue for some interesting portrayals/representations of femininity etc.
But what I'm a little uneasy about is the whole "ugly" thing. Because first of all it plays into the idea that what this character looks doesn't match up with the accepted, common definition of "pretty"...and that there are two kinds of women in the world: pretty ones and ugly ones.
I also feel a leeetle queasy about what's going to be in store for Betty. LIke, are they going to let her stay "ugly" yet somehow validate her for that? Or will she have to follow the Devil-Wears-Prada-Mean-Girls-She's-All-That evolution set out in so many movies etc, where she morphs into the epitome of pretty..but still keeps enough of herself to still be HER.
http://audreybrashich.blogs.com/audrey_brashich/2006/10/is_ugly_betty_a.html
But from what it sounds like, Ugly Betty could be a venue for some interesting portrayals/representations of femininity etc.
But what I'm a little uneasy about is the whole "ugly" thing. Because first of all it plays into the idea that what this character looks doesn't match up with the accepted, common definition of "pretty"...and that there are two kinds of women in the world: pretty ones and ugly ones.
I also feel a leeetle queasy about what's going to be in store for Betty. LIke, are they going to let her stay "ugly" yet somehow validate her for that? Or will she have to follow the Devil-Wears-Prada-Mean-Girls-She's-All-That evolution set out in so many movies etc, where she morphs into the epitome of pretty..but still keeps enough of herself to still be HER.
http://audreybrashich.blogs.com/audrey_brashich/2006/10/is_ugly_betty_a.html
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