Project Runway Surreality

I wrote this a while ago after auditioning for Project Runway, Season 1. You didn't know that? Oh yeah... Anyways, I found this recently and thought I'd re-post it here because the new season starts next week, and...la plus ça change.

We all know that PR is due to go to the Lifetime Network after this season, and that production is moving to Los Angeles - tragic and double-tragic! So, I found it interesting that for season 1 it was still co-produced by Project Greenlight. I remember being attracted to the cache of indie-filmmaking that the Project Greenlight title lent this project, thinking that with the Weinsteins involved it would probably have some smarts to it. It did, and Project Runway is still smart...let's see what happens when Lifetime bleeps out the rest of the dialogue.

To complete the post, I've added images of the jackets that I brought to the audition - the same ones that Tim Gunn thought were unsophisticated... I think he'd love me if he really got to know me!

June 2004

Alright Sportsfans...here's the low-down on what transpired at The Standard Hotel in downtown LA yesterday....If I didn't tell you before...I went to LA for an open call audition for an upcoming Reality TV show being produced by Bravo. I know what you're thinking, but no, I wouldn't do it unless it was appropriate. This one is going to be called "Project Runway" and is being put on by Miramax, Project Greenlight, Elle magazine, etc., and is meant to showcase up-and-coming fashion designers. You can read about it here:http://www.bravotv.com/Project_Runway/ I found out about this only on Friday afternoon, but after much encouragment from most everyone I know, and after getting the go-ahead from my wonderful boss, Audrey...I took off for LA in Betty Beetle on Monday afternoon. I stayed with my friend Joanne in Westwood on Monday night and left for The Standard at around 6:30 yesterday morning.

I was in line by 7:15, and there was your typical array of crazy designer types there. (A lot of BAD outfits, and a lot of BAD Vuitton counterfeits... ;-) GenArt was the company organizing the whole thing, and they didn't get their act together to give out applications, etc. until about 8:45. (Everything was supposed to start at 8...) First there was the headshot - a quick polaroid, and then the 10-page questionnaire. It included your basic job application hoo-hah, but also things about fashion & whatnot: Can you sew?, Can you make your own patterns?, Who are your favorite/least favorite designers?, What is your design philosophy?, What are your favorite movies?, What TV shows do you watch?, What is your most embarassing moment?, What are your best & worst characteristics?....Yes, it was a cross between a job application and an online dating questionnaire.

So, I'm standing there in line reading my book (Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides...) and the production people are moving through giving out pages, taking pictures, and then there's a cameraman & interviewer doing short spot-interviews with everyone in line. So I get interviewed: "Just look at me, not at the camera, and answer all of my questions with complete sentences." Then this gal goes on to explain to me what complete sentences are...Then, she goes on to ask me what I'm reading, and wether or not I'm actually a reader or if I'm "just reading to look smart." (Honestly - she said that.)This little interview was something like, your name, your line, why are you here, who are your influences, etc... nothing special. But everyone's running around with headsets on and talking to each other and being FABulous.

So I'm application #23...At around 9:45 I get asked to enter the hotel lobby, where I wait with numbers 6 - 22...If you've never sat in the lobby of The Standard on a Tuesday morning, well, it's not as hot as it would like to be. In that space, it's Friday night all the time. I have to say the fuschia mohair couches we were sitting on provided some doleur exquise, and the bass was sufficiently bumpin' for that hour of the day. I don't know about you, but if you're heading into the most nerve-wracking moment of your life, and you've barely been able to keep down that Cafe Americano you had three hours ago, you probably don't want to be hanging out in a trendy hotel lobby cum nightclub where again, everyone is running around with headsets on and talking to each other and being FABulous. I keep trying to tell myself "Fortune Favors the Bold" while really I'm asking myself "What am I doing here?" What on earth posessed me to get in my car and drive to LA and think this was something I wanted to do? It's then that I realize I need to start thinking about controlling my oxygen intake. While waiting there, the gal next to me gets an instant message from her friend, who is still outside in line with the other 200-odd people saying that someone had just been chosen. "Can you believe it -they picked some guy. Isn't that great - his life just completely changed!" I guess she thought I'd be excited...?

So, finally my number gets called and the PA (one of the ones with a headset being terribly important) takes me up to the fourth floor to what is entitled "The Holding Room." A basic hotel room crowded with 3PAs and about 5 contestants and their designs. Of course, this is The Standard, so the beds are perched on low platforms on the floor, and the bass is bumpin' in here too...The tension is palpable and you can hear the empty, nervous, laughter ringing around the room. One person goes out to the hall with a PA to wait (like they're on deck) while the person before them gives their presentation. I'm doing my best to keep breathing and give off an overall impression of insousiance - I'm not sure how well it worked. They bring up the next designer to the holding room - a young gal who was in line behind me, who seems to travel only with her hipster boyfriend who is also her own personal photographer. The minute they arrive in the room, they toss themselves onto the bed and cuddle up in the pillows. It's basically controlled chaos, until one of the more-senior PAs comes to call my number. She's cool in that she actually smiles and has nice words of encouragement too. You can tell she's one of those successful assistant-director types with her cute heels, jeans skirt and...(talk about insouciance)...lemon yellow Marc Jacobs tweed jacket from last spring. Head to toe, I'd say she was wearing about $2000 worth of clothes, but had a sweet, ditsy air about herself: Who me? Designer clothes? No way! Honestly, she looked like the type that simply had rumpled Marc Jacobs jackets scattered all over the floor of her room, picked up *this* one, gave it a sniff test and decided to go with it.

She takes me to the hall where I'm told to wait once again. I have my four samples and my portfolio...meanwhile, a door down the hall opens and a cool Alicia Keys look-alike comes out beaming. She's the second designer to be chosen to go to the next cut phase. Immediately, a director, cameraman, and sound tech follow her with the camera light on...the director starts staging the shot: "Okay, pretend you just got out of the audtion, you aced it, and you're siked....tell us how you feel!" So, while I'm standing there waiting, Alicia Keys look-alike is telling the camera that this is the best day of her life...(You may see me in the background in episode one...) Apparently the judges need a break, so I'm kept waiting in the hall for a few more minutes. I think that during this time the four judges (fashion experts whom I've never heard of before with the exception of Sue Wong - whose stuff I've only ever seen on Bluefly or at Loehmann's - expert what?) are told that there are still about 200 people outside and they need to speed things along. I'm invited in the room, and as my coats are put on the rolling rack, my portfolio is whisked out of my hands and flipped through rather callously. All the while I'm being told to pay attention to the camera that's filming me on my left, and to ignore the roomful of producers & directors who are behind me. After about twenty seconds of perusing my portfolio (without context or presentation from me,) the man expert (Tim something...no one really introduced themselves...) told me very quickly that: "I'm just going to be frank Annie, what we're seeing of your designs is not going to be SOPHISTICATED enough to COMPETE with what we've already chosen..." At this I can't really muster a response, so the panel of four continue with a patronizing babe-in-the-woods talk..."Maybe you could get an internship with a designer," and "Don't worry - you'll be able to find a job..." At which point I realize that none of them have read the application that's in front of them, and know absolutely nothing about me...I reply with: "Well - I HAVE a job..." And when I tell them my employer, they all shriek with delight: "Why, that's WON-DER-FUL!!!" And then, for as long as I was waiting to see them, I am just as quickly excused from their presence with nothing more than the idea that I'm not sophisticated enough to compete. Never mind the fact that my resume and 10-page profile state that I've costumed five plays, have a bachelor's, have gone to night school in fashion for 2 1/2 years, AND work for the benchmark brand of fashion and luxury goods...Hmmm. I guess I'm just not sophisticated, and certainly not sophisticated enough to stand there and alert them to their oversight.

And so begins my drive back up the I-5...All is well I realize. They are probably looking for a bunch of over-the-top boat-rockers that have barely any work ethic so that they can create DRAMA DRAMA DRAMA. I also realize that they don't know shit about me or what I'm capable of, and even more so, that I'll one day be able to say that I was cut from "Project Runway..." Writing up that application was good too - I learned about myself and my design style just by having to write it down and think it over...something I hadn't really done before. Truth be told - I'm about as American as apple pie. I listed "The Philadelphia Story" and "Meet Me in Louis" as two of my favorite films, mostly cooking and home improvement shows as TV programs I watch, and with the exception of Catherine Malandrino and John Galliano, I picked all American designers as my favorites... Yes, exotic stuff, but it's me. So...in case you were ever wondering about reality TV, you've got the real skinny.

Photos by Robert Schroeder, 2005