Right Over the Top

Bob Mackie deserves all those costume design awards weighting his shelves because it’s clear he can--with only fabric, beads and a great imagination--convince a woman that she’s the seductress, glamour queen or movie star of her dreams.

If the runway for his fall 2001 show here were instead the red carpet at the Oscars, the billion TV viewers would be left stunned and gasping for air. Sure, the man who made Cher’s bellybutton famous and comedienne Carol Burnett a beauty isn’t one for understatement. Thank God.

With his former muse and model Jan Strimple now backstage producing his show, Mackie as we love him best was back in full, beaded, decorated force. He devoted last week’s collection to his favorite cinematic characters, “the gorgeous, world-weary adventuresses with questionable pasts and points of origin.”

Models draped in feathers, silver trench coats, beaded cocktail suits, naughtily flamboyant ostrich-feather jackets and, of course, those beaded gowns, offered women in various stages of life and physical perfection a range of entrance-makers. With outrageous headdresses, veils and glittery earrings added for more show-biz effect, Mackie appeared to be the only designer in fashion having fun this season, but that’s what he’s always been about. If it wasn’t already obvious, guests left his show dancing to a song that spelled it out: “I am what I am, and what I am needs no excuses. It’s my life that I want to have a little fun in.” And so he did.