Arbiters of Hip
It’s over. The backlash has already started. Though they don’t know it yet, “metrosexuals,” those preening peacocks of product, are as good as headed on the slow walk to the hanging tree.
“Queer Eye for the Straight Guy,” the smash TV hit where five gay aesthetes lend their supposedly impeccable “style”--or, more accurately, shopping prowess--to some pathetic, aesthetic-free, heterosexual schnooks, is already being mocked by the very urban, upscale gay men whom the Fab Five are supposed to embody. Like most reality programming, the plausibility of the premise--that a quick wardrobe change can transform the most fashion-famished guy into a self-sufficient taste monger--is about as authentic as a $3 bill.
“Metrosexuality is more than male vanity, more than being well-presented,” says London writer Mark Simpson, who first characterized the phenomenon and coined the term in a 1994 essay in the Independent called “Here Come the Mirror Men.” Nine years later, he still finds himself in the thick of the metrosexual debate thanks to savvy marketers who saw in his work the opportunity to sell us more stuff.
“It’s about identity produced through shopping, and accessorizing masculinity and desirability,” Simpson says. “The sexual preference is really irrelevant. Metrosexuality is the end of sexuality. What I mean is that it asserts that there is no authentic masculinity; it’s brands and accessories.”
It’s the evil underbelly of making an effort. It’s where pride in appearance morphs into image-driven self-obsession. It’s the moment when we start believing that life should look like a Gucci ad.
In other words, are you buying that suit or having that back wax or pumping those weights because you: Need it? Want it? Or can’t live without it because you want--no, need--to be desired by as many nameless people as possible and also be affirmed in the not-so-secret discourse of the fashion/media/advertising cognoscenti?
“Real hipness,” Simpson says, “is about character, and character is the last thing fashion and shopping are about.”
Our problem, as if guys didn’t have enough issues already, is to figure out a way to present ourselves in a manner that signals a working knowledge of the better aspects of the material world, coupled with some evidence of an inner life of passion, curiosity and cultivation.
Tell yourself it’s not necessary and not masculine, at your lonely peril. It’s not going to go away.
Blame the feminists, or the idea that women don’t need men anymore. Oh, they still want them, but the days when a woman’s survival was intrinsically wrapped up in a man’s attentions are long gone.
What that means is that men are going to have to work a bit harder. Having the required set of reproductive organs won’t cut it. Being a good guy is a step in the right direction, but it’s not enough. Having a big wallet isn’t even enough (and if you think it is, perhaps you need to reconsider your idea of what’s appropriate).
No, for this new game you’re going to have to learn how to put yourself together in a way that says, “I am an interesting person,” without signaling, “I am a tiresome, preening fop.”
When the object of your affection not only holds down a job, pays her own rent, works out, reads a daily newspaper and subjects herself to high heels and the agonies of the Brazilian wax, showing up for life unshaven, with a bad haircut and your gut hanging out of a stained T-shirt, is a sure-fire shortcut to the nearest curb.
Why? Because any smart woman knows that the slob who insists on being loved just as he is, is every bit as narcissistic as the guy who is too busy looking in the mirror to look at her. And here in Los Angeles, land of the never-ending audition, the ante is automatically upped.
who better to ask for insight about dressing the part than casting director Joseph Middleton? Middleton has cast actors for major feature films including “Legally Blonde,” “American Pie” and “The Bourne Identity” as well as red-hot indie projects “Donnie Darko,” “Go” and “The Doom Generation.” Middleton sees thousands of variations--and misfires--on the art of self-presentation in the course of a year.
Common sense, he says, is a good starting point. “People dress for castings; sometimes they overdress, sometimes they underdress. If they want to deflect how important it is, they look like they just rolled out of bed, or they overdress and end up looking like they’re overselling it.”
The result, Middleton says, is “a failure to hit the right note, or there’s no note at all being played and it’s a mess all over.”
The same is true offstage. Stylish clothes should be a foil for the man, but overdoing it can have disastrous effects. “Go to South Coast Plaza or to dinner at Dolce one night,” he says. “I mean, could we just kill the accessories by half? And instead of sheer, let’s try a fabric. If you have an aesthetic tin ear, go for the grays, the navys. The New Mexico desert at sunset is very hard to pull off.”
In other words, unless you’re a WWF superstar, or Cher, chances are that if your clothes scream “Look at me!” your other qualities--empathy, intellect, spirituality--are going to end up completely subsumed.
And in body-conscious L.A., your rock-hard six-pack, impertinent pecs and baseball-biceps don’t require that you present yourself as the male version of Anna Nicole Smith. “Don’t wear an extra-small when a medium will fit,” Middleton cautions.
Size, it appears, still matters. And few navigate the issue with more aplomb than Los Angeles Laker forward Rick Fox, who has had to learn to dress for the seasons.
“Out of season, my frame is leaner, my clothes are more streamlined. During the season, I’m more challenged,” he says. “My thighs expand, my shoulders grow, I really have to shift my priorities then.”
Nonetheless, Fox enjoys putting himself together, and it shows. His talent is knowing when to stop. Given his size, Fox’s 6-foot-7-inch, 235-pound frame is always going to stand out in a crowd, which might be why he doesn’t seem obsessed with doing so.
“I like clothes that fit, I don’t like baggy stuff,” he says. “I get a lot of my stuff tailored--shirts, suits. I like things to fit appropriately.” This is a bit of wisdom that seems to have escaped many of his league-mates.
But here’s the kicker.
“My wife [actress Vanessa Williams] and I like to dress for each other, for romance, when we finally get a moment alone.”
Get it?
What separates Fox and other truly stylish men from the ever-growing legions of overdone beefcakes is that he pulls the stops out for someone else.
This is a very different impulse from metrosexuality, Simpson says, where the look is crafted to fit an inauthentic media-influenced ideal. The harder a guy tries to look the part, the less likely he is to hit the mark.
On the other hand, the surf scene is the perfect paradox, says Bill Sharp, former editor of Surfing Magazine who now directs Big Wave promotions for Billabong. It’s no accident that Billabong is one of Southern California’s more successful garment companies, with profits in the neighborhood of $76 million. The big money flows in because surf wear, and the inherent romance of the surfing lifestyle, has captured the imagination and wallets of millions of people worldwide who wouldn’t know a leash from a towline.
But for those Southern Californian aficionados who effortlessly drive the look, Sharp says that the key in surf culture is not what you wear but how you wear it: “Most of these guys are not looking to make a style statement. The cool guy will know not to tuck his shirt in, [and] his clothes will be a looser fit.”
More importantly, he’ll know how to surf. “The good surfers don’t need to broadcast it. If a guy’s got a two-by-two-foot Quicksilver logo on the car, chances are he’s not a good surfer,” he says with a laugh. As with all levels of fashion, trying too hard is the surest way to fail.
One of the first rules of surfing, he explains, is no posing--or “claiming” in surf lingo. “Even if you get an epic ride, you don’t raise your fist.”
The same is true across town on the Sunset Strip. Even the nightclub world, which is all about claiming, is undergoing a subtle shift, says Sam Nazarian, who, with his partners, recently purchased the Coconut Teaszer building on Sunset Boulevard with an eye toward turning it into a Philippe Starck-designed nightclub.
“A lot of the celebs and trendsetters, they’re dressing down more than up,” he says. “I try to dress more down and casual. I give off a better vibe that way. More so than a Prada shirt tucked into tight Prada pants.”
True hipsters, he says, know where to draw the line. “We had the ‘70s thing and now we’re getting the ‘80s thing, and it’s really fun and very popular. But you can just tell when someone went into a store and pulled everything off the rack,” he observes. “To reference something, to capture the vibe is one thing, but trying too hard is best left to the runway models in Milan.”
A fixture on the fashion scene, for example, is singer/songwriter Waylon Payne, whose debut album, “The Drifter,” is due in January from Universal/Republic Records. He has opted out of a discussion of trends. Sort of.
“I wear Levi’s from Denim Doctors and snap shirts that are easy to clean,” Payne says. “I like the way bell-bottoms flow around my ankles and my boots. I look for things that make me comfortable.” On Payne, what could appear like an affectation ends up looking correct.
“I think men need to feel more confident with themselves and not go with what they’re told to wear,” he says. “One of the cool perks of being a performer is that you get to wear some wild stuff. I think everyone should feel like a rock star.”
Whether Payne becomes one remains to be seen, but he mines a much deeper vein for even his most “look at me” statement: “If I ever get into real money, I’ll have a beautiful suit made. A man should look elegant on occasion. But ultimately, a man’s demeanor is presented by the way he feels on the inside.”
