Posts Tagged ‘Beauty & Body Image’

David Duke Cock

Monday, February 15th, 2010

John Mayer is deeply sorry, and everyone is accepting it. Our society allows racism in people as long as there is an apology after. It’s better if it is tearful and really should be accompanied by an icon like Rev. Al Sharpton or Bishop Desmond Tutu in your corner, like they have your back. Like they are gonna notarize your ‘hood pass.’



I am angry about the hateful word he used. And I am super mad about the other thing….What does it mean that he has a “David Duke cock?” Is that supposed to mean that women of color are not sexy and beautiful? That women of color are unfuckable to him? That is rude and disgusting and I don’t care if his music is good (I don’t know it well, so I can’t say. I only love Jon Brion and Garrison Starr and Ani Difranco and Grant Lee Phillips and Tegan and Sara and Cypress Hill and Billie Holliday and Doria Roberts and Fiona Apple and Joan Armatrading and MIA and The Cliks and Miles Davis and David Bowie and Ben Lee and Susie Suh and Rachael Yamagata and Andrew Bird and I don’t know much about how John Mayer sounds).



What I do know, is to say you have a ‘David Duke cock’ is demeaning to women of color. What I know is it’s a slap in the face to all beautiful women of color. And I must say, it’s hard enough to be a woman of color in this world and feel beautiful. It’s hard enough to live in this skin and feel good without having rock stars saying that you are not worthy. We feel unworthy enough. Society tells us enough we are not worth it, by not including us in anything. By not showing us in our glory. We are not presented in the movies or TV as much as beautiful desirable creatures. We are barely shown at all. And then you – John Mayer – rock ‘god’ tell us that we are not fuckable? I don’t care if you don’t want to fuck me. But keep this to yourself. Keep the idea that you don’t like to fuck women of color to yourself. Keep it from our ears because we don’t need to hear that the man who would say “your body is a wonderland” really only means it if our bodies are white, if our hair is blonde. If we are Jessica Simpson. And only if we are Jessica Simpson.



Keep this from the ears of all the young beautiful young girls who love you, who have your posters on their walls and now are looking at those posters and feeling weird because they are not white and now your music, which they so loved, makes them feel bad inside. Like you don’t love them. Like you never did. Like if you saw them you would look the other way. Like they’d be invisible to you because they are not white. These young girls who are not white – they loved your music so much and you are paying them back for it with arrogance and blistering hatred that you don’t even know would hurt like it did. I am glad not to have known your music before this and been a fan of it, because if I loved you before and you said that, it would make me hate myself even more than I do already. This revelation of yours would have crushed me. If I was a young fan of yours and you said that it would hurt me so much. Thank god I am not. Was not. But I am hurting now for the many many many many many young girls who are fans of yours. You wounded them and they will never be able to heal. Ever. I hope you read this. I hope you think about this part of it. it’s not been talked about in press. But I hope you know that part. The young girls who love you who are not white. Think about them. So it keeps you from doing it again.



I try to think about Duran Duran, and how I loved them and how they always had women of color as objects of desire in their videos. In “Hungry like the Wolf,” Simon was chasing down a beautiful black/asian mixed girl. In “Rio,” she was latino with curvy hips and black hair and a bright bright smile. If they’d said something back then like what you said John Mayer, I would have killed myself. I would have died. If they said only white girls got them hard, it would have been the end of me.



It’s sickening to think that we can exist in a world where these words of hate can be cast off quickly without repercussion or blame. People forget. But that doesn’t make racism go away. It infuriates me because I can’t cast off my ethnicity with an apology. These are people who have never been discounted because of their race. They’ve never been left out of a comedy show because they’ve already got an asian or a gay or a woman. They’ve never been passed over for a part because the producers decided not to ‘go ethnic.’ They’ve never had to endure the invisibility that people of color live with on a daily basis.



I am so used to being invisible it stuns me when people pay attention to what I say. I am so used to blending into the scenery that it’s shocking that anyone cares what I do. I am so used to people looking at me like I am ‘the help’ that it doesn’t even bother me. I just stay there and I try to help. And I don’t care. These stars who toss about racist hateful speech have never felt what it feels like to be called something hateful – that they cannot deny. They’ve never been in that situation, when you are a victim of hate, but you have to agree. That is what racism is. What hate speech is. Why it’s so terrible is that the word you may have called me – it’s correct, in your racist estimation. It hurts because its meant to. That is why we don’t use those words. Because of the history and the pain and the shame and the tears and the rage they have caused.



Even though I love Lenny Bruce, I do have to say, I disagree when he says that these words can’t hurt you. I think they do. They hurt me. When people use hate speech, it hurts me. It hurts even though I am not that particular race. It hurts because I know what it feels like to be in an inescapable skin. I can’t escape this color. I can’t be the right color. I can never.



It could be hard too for those who are not ‘of color.’ I am never going to be white, and I’m never going to know what it feels like to have the responsibility of not being a racist. I guess I feel bad for white people sometimes because they do have to watch what they say, but then again, it really doesn’t matter does it? Michael Richards is back on tv, and it’s cool. Everyone’s forgotten his terrifying, violent rant that to me sounded like what klansmen would say before they lynched someone in the 30s. I don’t know him, and I don’t know personally that he’s a racist. All I know is that in the two times that I have seen him in public, close enough to touch, he has been screaming at someone, and those people were not white. I guess he was sorry because he got caught doing what he normally does and it was on TMZ and it made him look bad to the world. He was super sorry about it. Way super sorry. And that is nice that he was sorry. He even went to Mexico behind it, as if there was some special retreat for racists there where you could read bell hooks and Angela Davis and Cornel West all day and think about what is wrong with you and right with them.



Dog the Bounty Hunter never left the small screen. His racism was kind of just buried under that amazing mullet. I don’t know if he is racist, but I think his hair is racist.



And Mel Gibson never had to stop making movies. He is even in a big one now. Really big. And no one mentions a thing.



Does racism hurt your career or is it good for it? I don’t know. If I was white, I think I would try to be as racist as possible because it keeps you current. Keeps you relevant. People will tweet about you more. People will be outraged but you’ll still be on the homepage of Yahoo and everyone will want to know exactly what you said, when you said it, and how you said it. And aint that showbiz?



Cho Clips from the View

Monday, July 20th, 2009

If you missed Margaret on “The View” a couple of weeks ago, check out these clips below!



Wrap up on Jezebel.






Here’s a Behind the Scenes video
where Margaret dishes on her tattoos and LL Cool J.



Drop Dead Diva premieres tonight on Lifetime!

Sunday, July 12th, 2009

Catch Margaret in the season premiere of Drop Dead Diva, a new series on Lifetime starting tonight!



Drop Dead Diva tells the story of a shallow model-in-training who dies in a sudden accident only to find her soul resurfacing in the body of a brilliant, plus-size and recently deceased attorney. Television newcomer and stage actress Brooke Elliott (Wicked, Taboo) stars as lawyer Jane Bingum, and Margaret plays her gal Friday, Terri.



Says Margaret, “This show, I absolutely love. It’s really funny, but it’s also touching. It has a lot of heart, and I think the acting is really incredible. I think people are going to fall in love with Brooke and the character Jane and realize that beauty comes in all sizes. When you look at women in movies and TV, it’s an unrealistic view of what women really look like. With the show, we are promoting a real woman who is beautiful with real curves, has a real attitude and is fabulous.”



Read advance reviews of Drop Dead Diva here, and check out Margaret’s latest blog entry about the show, “On Being Invisible.”



You can watch previews and extras here!



LA Times Review of Drop Dead Diva

Thursday, July 9th, 2009

‘Drop Dead Diva’
Lifetime’s new comedy offers an interesting twist on the old dippy-meets-dumpy scenario.



By MARY McNAMARA, Television Critic



The press material for Lifetime’s new comedy “Drop Dead Diva” contains a lot of accolades from “women’s groups” in which terms like “role model” and “grab your girlfriends” appear with alarming frequency — as if the publicity department were bracing critics for a show that should be viewed through a political or genre framework instead of simply as, you know, a television show anyone might enjoy. (The term “role model” especially tolls in a critic’s ear with as much anticipatory delight as Poe’s funeral iron bells.)



None of which was necessary, as “Drop Dead Diva” is a lot of fun to watch, with the added bonus of introducing TV audiences to Brooke Elliott, a stage actress with fabulous comic timing and enormous dramatic flexibility.



Oh, and she weighs a bit more than 100 pounds, which may explain all that “women’s group” nonsense.



Created by Josh Berman, who has written for “CSI” and “Bones,” “Drop Dead Diva” answers the age old question: What would happen if a dippy but beautiful woman woke up one morning with a brilliant mind but a dumpy body? OK, maybe it’s not an age-old question, but it certainly is an interesting twist on the rather worn pretty-and-witless-meets-schlubby-and-smart-narrative that fuels so much of chick lit.



All this and heaven too. “Drop Dead Diva” opens with two very different women about to meet their doom. Jane (Elliott) is a driven drudge of a lawyer who wears brooches and finds what little joy she experiences in work and carbs. Lots of carbs.



Deb, played by Brooke D’Orsay, meanwhile, is a tight-bodied empty-headed model-actress (guess which one is blond; go ahead, guess) on her way to audition for a job Vanna White made famous.



Both are tragically killed, and we meet up with Deb as she enters the Great Sorting Room in the Sky, where Fred (Ben Feldman), her celestial concierge, informs her that though she has never done an evil deed, she has neither done a good one, making her his first “zero, zero.” Stung, she manages to get sent back to Earth, but via the tragically imperfect body of Jane.



With a setup like this, it would be very easy to fall into a veritable showcase of sexism — How dumb was Deb? How fat is Jane? — but Berman produces a deft juggling trick of heart and humor, balancing Deb’s shallowness with some solid common sense and Jane’s inadequate self-esteem with kindness and legal brilliance.



Almost impossibly, Elliott manages to embody both personalities in a way that, far from some tedious “Inside the Actor’s Studio” lesson in character assimilation, is just delightful to watch. She is aided in this wacky scenario by a serviceable if predictable diagnosis of semi-amnesia and, more important, by Margaret Cho as Jane’s trusty assistant, Teri, and April Bowlby as Deb’s equally shallow but still loyal best friend, Stacy. Both hit all the necessary double-takes and are-you-crazy moments with just the right dramatic frothiness and keep things tethered, if loosely, to the recognizable world.



There’s a bunch of cute guys, of course: Fred has been demoted to guardian angel and gets a job at Jane’s firm so he can keep tabs on his runaway soul. Deb had a boyfriend, Grayson (Jackson Hurst), who has also, as luck and narrative need would have it, just joined the staff (the economic slowdown has not, apparently, hit this portion of Los Angeles).



Despite Deb’s self-centered zero, zero status, Grayson appears to be a peach of a guy, devastated by his girlfriend’s death, but Deb is convinced he wouldn’t look at her twice now that she’s Jane. There’s a scheming colleague, Kim (Kate Levering), a possibly sleazy boss (Josh Stamberg) and a host of upcoming guest stars (Rosie O’Donnell, Paula Abdul). But mostly there’s just Jane, a one-woman, two-woman show, trying to figure out how to accessorize her new life, which comes complete with sugar cravings and a job that requires she think about someone besides herself for two minutes.



If you were of a mind, you could concentrate on all the rather obvious plot devices and general silliness — a female client transformed by a single make-over — and pick “Drop Dead Diva” to death. But why?



Certainly, the show falls more in the fun category than the brilliant, and it’s not going to change television as we know it, but with any luck, it will remind us not to take everything, including television shows, so darn seriously. There is joy to be had in a doughnut, beauty can radiate from a face not made entirely of cheekbones and Botox, but that’s not the point. Deb’s zero, zero has nothing to do with looks but with deeds, and in its own light-hearted and sentimental way, that is what “Drop Dead Diva” makes clear. Not so much that beauty (yawn) comes from within, but that you actually have to do something to put it there.



On second thought, it may indeed change television as we know it.



NY Times Review of Drop Dead Diva

Thursday, July 9th, 2009

Chubby Legal Beagle, Meet Your Inner Skinny Siren



By ALESSANDRA STANLEY
Published: July 9, 2009



Someone heard the old line about a thin woman trapped in a fat woman’s body and took it literally. In “Drop Dead Diva,” a Lifetime series that begins on Sunday, an aspiring model and airhead named Deb (Brooke D’Orsay) dies in a car crash and is transported — through a bungled act of divine intervention — to the body of a recently deceased lawyer, Jane (Brooke Elliott), who is smart, fat and frumpy.



The trading-places formula is put to use here in a weight-conscious comedy, a “Freaky Friday” mind-body exchange that measures the eternal contest between brains and beauty by the pound.



Deb, trapped in a Lane Bryant physique, doesn’t lose her own shallow, bubbly personality. When Deb awakens in a hospital bed and discovers that her once-taut stomach is now a pillowy protrusion of flab, she shrieks at her guardian angel, “You sent me to hell?” But she also assumes Jane’s high-powered brain and legal expertise. Deb discovers that while she now craves doughnuts and cheese dip, her mind also savors a complicated and compelling legal case. Basically she thinks like Elle in “Legally Blonde,” only she looks like Camryn Manheim on “The Practice.”



And while the presumption that a woman can be either brainy or beautiful, or in this case, good or thin, but not both, is a bit primitive, the series has humor and charm beneath its facile message, in large part (no disrespect intended) to a subtle, winning performance by Ms. Elliott.



It’s gotten harder than ever to find an imperfect heroine in a series who is actually flawed. More than ever these days, television suffers from casting dysmorphia; it repeatedly takes a slovenly, gluttonous, character and casts an exquisitely groomed, Pilates-toned actress in the part.



One of the running jokes of both “30 Rock” and “The New Adventures of Old Christine” is that the characters played by Tina Fey and Julia Louis-Dreyfus are disarmingly sloppy, out of shape and addicted to junk food — and wine, in the case of Ms. Louis-Dreyfus. It’s a strain when both actresses are so petite, pretty and fit.



Debra Messing may have started the trompe l’oeil trend in “Will & Grace,” since she too was a whippet-thin actress playing a slovenly overeater. But the hypocrisy grows ever more insulting — a cognitive diss. Even TNT, which takes pride in badly behaved heroines — a slatternly sot on “Saving Grace,” a sweetsaholic on “The Closer” — assigns those roles to improbably slender, well-preserved actresses like Holly Hunter and Kyra Sedgwick.



And when a comedy does feature a female lead who is not conventionally pretty, that becomes the raison d’être of the series, as in “Ugly Betty.”



Network executives have concluded, perhaps not unreasonably, that audiences don’t really want television characters that are too true to life. “Roseanne” was a huge hit and lasted nine years, but it didn’t spark a stampede for plus-size actresses. Neither did “Less Than Perfect,” which starred a larger-than-usual actress, Sara Rue, and a venti-size sidekick, Sherri Shepherd. Ms. Manheim won Emmys on “The Practice” and “The Ghost Whisperer,” without inspiring many imitators.



Reality shows, on the other hand, feast on fat people. “The Biggest Loser” proved there was an appetite for weight-loss competitions, and now imitations abound. Oxygen has the latest: “Dance Your Ass Off,” in which chubby contestants shed weight by dancing. (Their scores are based on both their footwork and how many pounds they’ve lost.) This month Fox will present a “Bachelor”-like dating reality show for ordinary, heavyset people called “More to Love”; there is no weight loss requirement to winning a rose.



About two-thirds of Americans are overweight, many of them dangerously so. But television reflects a funhouse mirror image of society; sitcoms and dramas hold out impossibly narrow standards of beauty, while reality shows seek out and exploit the more grotesque displays of obesity.



“Drop Dead Diva” owes a lot to “Legally Blonde.” Deb, like Elle, even has a signature strut, which she calls the “booty bounce” (“shoulders back, show the rack”) and demonstrates to buck up discouraged female friends. But Ms. Elliott has a harder task than Reese Witherspoon: She has to merge two antithetical personalities without blurring the distinctions. Jane was a smarter, better person than Deb, but she was also insecure and depressed. Deb, once she settles into her legal briefs and sensible shoes, brings a dash of flirty confidence and “Born Yesterday” ingenuity to her caseload.



In the most implausible of comic mixups Ms. Elliott is convincing, and even affecting, at every turn.



Lifetime is bold to cast an actress who is hefty, without the aid of a fat suit like Gwyneth Paltrow in “Shallow Hal,” and plays a woman who is not likely to slim down magically just in time to find Mr. Right. That may be one reason so many better-known television stars signed on for small parts or walk-on appearances, from Margaret Cho, who plays Jane’s assistant, to guest stars like Rosie O’Donnell, Tim Gunn and Elliot Gould.



“Drop Dead Diva” isn’t a public-service message, it’s a lighthearted romantic comedy on Lifetime. Yet for all the farce it is grounded in reality.



USA Today Review of Drop Dead Diva

Wednesday, July 8th, 2009

Head diva Brooke Elliott is ‘Drop Dead’ terrific



By Robert Bianco, USA TODAY



There are shows and stars that catch you by total happy surprise.



Even with the participation of acclaimed Hollywood producers Neil Meron and Craig Zadan, there wasn’t much reason to expect a lot from Lifetime’s new comic drama, Drop Dead Diva. Diva’s creator, Josh Berman, is best known for two quickly dismissed crime-show flops, Vanished and Killer Instinct. And the head diva, Brooke Elliott, a young woman with little more on her credits than a few theater and TV roles, is hardly known.



That’s about to change. Berman’s script, despite a slight lean toward preachy empowerment, is surprisingly engaging. And Elliott is a find, a full-blown instant star and delight who makes you wonder where she has been hiding herself.



Of course, that’s fitting, because Elliott is playing the kind of woman we tend to overlook: a bright fat girl with a pretty face but no fashion sense or self-confidence. Jane Bingum may be the best lawyer at her small firm, but the only person who pays her any mind is her loyal assistant — played in a nice comic turn by Margaret Cho.



Diva being a fantasy, Jane’s life changes when she dies and her body is occupied by the also recently dead Deb (Brooke D’Orsay), a model with looks and confidence to spare, but no intellect. Now Deb has Jane’s brain and body, but her own personality and memories.



That’s a fairly standard fantasy plot, but what Diva adds to the mix is our obsession with body image and the way we allow how we look to define who we are. Deb is shallow because she has never been expected to be anything else. Jane is a wallflower because she’s used to people ignoring her.



Clearly, these two could teach each other a few lessons. And one of the many wonderful things about Elliott’s performance is that they are two people. Her transitions — like scrunching up her eyes when “Jane” is thinking, then opening them in wide, thrilled shock when “Deb” realizes that “Jane” has had a thought — are clear without seeming forced. There’s pain and pleasure in the situation for both women, and Elliott makes each emotion ring true.



Some of the lessons are laid on a bit thick. But the cast, including April Bowlby as Deb’s best friend, Ben Feldman as her guardian angel, and Jackson Hurst as her boyfriend, sells them with a minimum of fuss and a light touch.



A show to die for? No, not quite. But Diva is a very good reason to turn to Lifetime on a summer Sunday night, and it has been some time since there was one of those.



And that really is the nicest surprise of all.



Reviews of Drop Dead Diva

Wednesday, July 8th, 2009

“8 out of 10 score”
“absolutely… worth adding to the playlist”
“Juggling snark, schmaltz and adorable wackiness, Diva has a yummy high concept to die for.”
“Elliott is a delight playing two souls trapped in one body that’s uncomfortable in its skin, and it’s a hoot as Jane’s inner Deb learns to love having a brain, even at the expense of her fashion sense.”
–TV Guide, Matt Roush, July 13



“3 out of 4 stars”
“Enjoy a fantastical series with a smart twist.”
“Verdict: a lively delight.”
–US Weekly, John Griffiths, July 20



“Heaven Can Wait meets Ugly Betty in this unbelievably uplifting, hilariously entertaining and socially important new series.”
“…the must-see series of the summer.”
— National Enquirer, Len Feldman, July 6



“4 out of 5 stars.”
“At last, a funny and insightful series about the battle – and balance – between beauty and brains. With Rosie O’Donnell and Margaret Cho around, it’s a trip!”
–In Touch, July 13



“3 out of 4 stars.”
“Wannabe model Deb freaks when she finds her mind trapped in the body of a plus-size lawyer Jane (Brooke Elliott) after a fatal car crash. But she soon discovers their lives are more connected than she could have ever imagined in this silly but totally cute new series.”
–Life & Style, Karen Aanonsen, July 13



“3 ½ out of 4 stars.
“It sounds kooky, but there’s enough heart and humor to make it work, not to mention a winning performance by Elliott as both the attorney and the ditz who inhabits her body. Look for Margaret Cho as the lawyer’s wise-cracking assistant, a role she was born to play.”
Star Magazine, Marshall Fine, July 13