The Enlightenment of Age
Maybe it’s something in the summer air--the ultraviolet rays wrinkling the skin or the sight of older bodies in bathing suits. How else to explain why so many magazines this month are obsessed with the subject of aging?
The focus is not on the balding pates or potbellies usually associated with men. In August, a month of maximum epidermal exposure, People, Vogue, More and Esquire look at the many ages of women through the lenses of fashion, sex and health.
People’s Aug. 6 issue (titled “Sexy at Any Age!”) showcases female celebrities at 30, 40, 50 and 60 (apparently, 70-year-old women, such as the magnificent-looking Gena Rowlands, aren’t interested).
How do those dewy-countenanced celebrities maintain their fabulousness despite dizzying job demands, you might ask?
One 30-year-old example, actress Jada Pinkett Smith, is taking care of her 9-month-old daughter, Willow, and doing rigorous kickboxing workouts in preparation for a new film. Quotes from a makeup artist and stylist praise her serene simplicity, but who wouldn’t be young-looking with stylists and makeup people around?
In fact, a lot of the comments about these women come from boutique owners, makeup artists and such, who stand to gain a lot by sucking up to their celebrity clients. Again, with friends like those, who needs liposuction?
“I think, ‘I definitely shouldn’t have that Krispy Kreme,”’ says 40-year-old Heather Locklear. “Then I have three!” A friend-makeup artist minimizes the amount of exercise Locklear does, saying, “She works out some, but even if she didn’t, she would stay in amazing shape.”
Please. How many 40-plus gals could get away with that?
Everything is tickety-boo for these glam gals of a certain age.
“The Practice’s” Camryn Manheim had vowed to be a mother by 40, and her son, Milo, came just two days before her birthday. “In my universe, things seem to work out the way I plan,” she says.
Martha Stewart, 60, “wears sunscreen and swears by Mario Badescu skin-care products.” Anjelica Huston says she has stayed sexy in her 50s with the help of a certain moisturizer that sells for $85 per ounce.
Eschewing the Plastic Touches
Only Mariel Hemingway, 40, says she won’t take the plastic surgery route, having had breast implants at 19. No word, however, on the other lovelies. Excuse me, but Faye Dunaway saying “I like naturalness” is like Luciano Pavarotti saying “I like watercress.”
In Vogue’s “The Age Issue,” writer Judith Krantz bemoans this as a time when clothes are being designed for the “young and perfect.”
“Do designers imagine that most women have the body of Jennifer Lopez?” she asks. “Don’t they understand that women with the money to buy really good clothes and who still have active social lives are not so young? Oh, don’t get me started!”
Dressing for day, Krantz says, is no problem for her: She lives in pants. But finding suitable evening clothes is a problem: “I’ve recently conducted a sweep of all the better dress departments of Beverly Hills without finding one single acceptable long dress that covered the upper arms, the Bermuda Triangle that few women over a certain age want to reveal, or, as Boaz Mazor of Oscar de la Renta says, ‘Never wave goodbye over 40.”’
But then the magazine features pages and pages of young models wearing get-ups that few trim 50-year-olds could pull off without seeming too, well, jejune.
Vogue selects role models for each decade, among them Serena Williams and actress Leelee Sobieski representing the teens; Stella McCartney and Erykah Badu for the 20s; Nicole Kidman and Aerin Lauder (Estee’s granddaughter), the 30s; Rene Russo and Iman, the 40s; Lauren Hutton and Vera Wang, the 50s; and Lauren Bacall and Brooke Astor, the 60-plus crowd.
More magazine challenges readers to “Guess Who’s 42,” with a photo lineup of 10 women who could be that age, but who are actually ages 37 to 53. Just reading the bios of these exuberant go-getters might wear you out.
“I’ve been in peak shape since running my first marathon at 40,” says one actual 42-year-old.
“At 48, I fought a 22-year-old for my green belt--and won,” says a 53-year-old who looks at least a decade younger.
“After years in fashion, I moved to Paris, where I could cover shows and find time to paint,” says another woman, who is 42.
You go, ma’am.
Esquire’s cover story, “How Women Age,” is essentially a guide for men. “The aging of your own battered frame is enough; her machinery is a complete mystery,” writes Ted Allen.
Esquire, which has also published stories on how men age, presents concise explanations of women’s physiology in the decades from 20 to 60. Sex, muscle tone and age expectancy are part of the discussion, and there’s a sobering photo gallery titled “My Wife” by Diego Goldberg, depicting Goldberg’s wife, Susy, from age 31 to 54.
The terrific-looking Sigourney Weaver, 51, shares her thoughts on aging and says she’d like to act as long as she’s around. “Can you imagine?” she says. “‘Alien 97.’ With a cane.”
