What’s on the fashion, entertainment and scandal radar of XEX’s Editor-at-Large? Get ready…
December is always a time of post-anticipation. All of the brouhaha over the collections in New York, London, Paris and Milan has settled down, and now that we’ve seen what is on the fashion horizon, we’ve already begun to incorporate it into our closets. The choruses of “Hot Fun In the Summertime” we sang on the jitney up to the Hamptons are a faint memory as NYC evenings go from bustling street fairs and humid heritage parades to bucolic images of changing leaves, heavier clothing fabrication, and/or an increase in the number of layers we wear. Everything changes. Tan lines are gone and Vitamin D deficiencies abound as the days get shorter, nights get longer, and our cabin fever sets in as we pay more attention to the return of new episodes of our favorite television shows (“Scandal”, anyone?) and pay less time to reminiscing about seeing Beyonce perform at the Barclay’s Center on that summer perfect night in Brooklyn. We have already leafed through and rabbit-eared the September issues of our favorite magazines and are now back to our New York Times Bestsellers. Reading eyeglasses replace sunglasses. We are all in a collective state of limbo, wondering what the time between now and Christmas has in store for us. Namely, we are contemplating; what is next- or rather, what’s “neXEXt”? Well, I’ve looked into my crystal ball, people, and these are the things I see on the horizon…Jean Dixon, move over!
In this weird timebubble known as the “post- Miley-Cyrus-twerking-extravaganza”, most TRUE twerk fans (and the music that inspires it, New Orleans ‘Bounce”), have been gagging at the body-bending antics and the real down-home-in-New-Orleans authenticity of the Fuse-TV reality show that follows the REAL Queen of Bounce, Big Freedia. Make sure you get some now, before Big Freedia goes all Hollywood on y’all. According to my crystal ball, Big Freedia- having set a Guinness World Record for “Most People Twerking Simultaneously” (358) in New York City’s Herald Square in September- will reach icon status in the ass-capital of the world (Brazil), releasing the album-equivalent of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” which will be on constant rotation in every corner of Rio, making Freedia the NEW “Girl from Ipanema” .
Take THAT, Miley!!! I had seriously considered attending the infamous Red Rooster Restaurant annual Halloween party this year dressed as Big Freedia, but my twerk game was lacking a bit. Anyway…
Someone will eventually realize that we have never seen actresses Jennifer Lawrence and Leelee Sobieski in the same room. Bloggers, hoping to raise their readership, will start to contend that they are indeed the same person! This theory will gain the kind of traction that was only previously reserved for those who swear that both Tupac and Elvis are still alive and that Michael and LaToya are indeed the same person. To kill this hilarious but unlikely rumor, some clever Hollywood director will cast both Lawrence and Sobieski as sisters in a dramatic movie, and- in a touch of movie brilliance- cast Helen Hunt as their biological mother! Someone else will then surmise that Jennifer Lopez and Kate Hudson were separated at birth, but with much less success and credence than the Lawrence/Sobieski conspiracy.
R&B and hip hop have traditionally given us the newest diva bitch- whether she possessed the sex-siren braggadocio of Lil Kim proclaiming herself the “Queen Bitch”, Missy Elliott’s pumping single “She’s a Bitch” , Mya’s “Somebody Come Get This Bitch” or the underground thumpfest of Zebra Kats’ “Imma Read (that Bitch). 
Ke$ha and Brooke Candy step aside; Britney Spears returns, (with a vengeance) with a rather saucy single which references the well-worn expletive. Our favorite Disney debutante has gone absolutely rogue with her new single and video, “Werk Bitch”. With its legendarily insistent beat and catchy hook paired with the video’s fabulous styling, this song is sooooo neXEXt!!! Spears has outpaced (and perhaps outclassed) fellow Disney alum Miley Cyrus with a single that while on the surface sounds base, is actually a HOT track. However, even though she’s not saying anything in the title that anyone from the LGBTQ community hasn’t uttered since before the StoneWall rebellion, we should all prepare ourselves for the inevitable fallout from the success of this single; EVERYONE- not just supermodel drag queens, fag hags, butch queens and reality show vixens- EVERYONE will be using this one phrase as common vernacular to end sentences while paying homage to all things fabulous. You want to knock Britney off of her throne? You better “Werk, Bitch”…
Detroit rap phenom Danny Brown (who blew the whole Ozzy Osborne bat-eating legend out of the water when he famously received oral sex from a fan onstage), will definitely start to change the rap game offstage as well. His hipster frothy ‘do will be requested ad infinitum by both white women at Frederic Fekkai and by black women at Ri-Ri’s House Of Beauty. His trademark missing tooth will replace Lara Stone’s gap as the latest dental craze-cum-fashion-accessory, as legions of fans will- in a show of Nicki Minaj-like fan solidarity- have their periodontist ripping their right molar clear out of their heads. But seriously, Danny Brown is DEFINITELY neXEXt!!!
In Fashion News… Alexander Wang (who is newly-ensconced at Balenciaga), will team up with Nicholas Ghesquiere (who has just been crowned the new golden boy at Louis Vuitton), “l’enfant terrible” John Galliano and citizen-of-the-world designer Haider Ackermann to form Fashion’s “New World Order”, pushing Ralph Lauren, Giorgio Armani, Oscar de la Renta and Kaiser Karl Lagerfeld, respectively, into early retirement, much to the fashion establishment’s chagrin. Print media will also get a shock when two “titans of the pen” go into the ring and one emerges victorious: Pulitzer Prize-winning ‘Washington Post’ fashion journalist/critic Robin Givhan, (fresh off of her brief tenure at Newsweek) will find herself at the International Herald Tribune, shocking Hilary Alexander at The Daily Telegraph, socking Cathryn Horyn at The New York Times, and knocking the ever-heralded Suzy Menkes off of her throne.
Patrizia Reggiani Gucci, the woman who essentially orchestrated the murder of her husband Maurizio Gucci (yes, THAT Gucci!) and who has been incarcerated since 1996, will stun the world and flourish as a successful fashion executive upon her release. Reggiani (referred to as “The Black Widow” in the Italian press after allegedly hired a hitman to murder her husband in 1995 when he left her for a younger woman) was recently offered parole in 2011 if she got a job.
Allegedly, she haughtily rejected said offer and retorted “I’ve never worked in my life, and I’m not about to start now”. (Sidenote: Now, THAT is some neXEXt-level, Linda “I dont get out of bed for less than $10,000 dollars a day” Evangelista type-shit right there!!!!
However, Reggiani has recently changed her tune, as she has been hired as a “fashion consultant” by her friend Alessandra Brunero (who runs the high-end jewelry chain Brozart). Having recently been diagnosed with a brain tumor, she will conquer her malady and work with Gucci’s Creative Director/designer Frida Giannini to produce a collection as iconic as anything Tom Ford did for the label during his turn at the label.
“America’s Next Top Model alum (and Cycle 3 winner) Eva Marcille will give birth to a baby that, thanks to the cross-pollenation of good looks from its model mother and matinee-idol-looking actor father Kevin McCall, will surpass little Nahla Berry and North West-Kardashian as the most beautiful baby on the planet. After a year raising this child, someone (whether it be a casting agent or Tyler Perry himself) will wise up and cast the 5’7” stunner in a one-woman Off-Broadway play on the life and times of the extraordinarily-gifted Lola Falana.
Marcille will master not only the coquettish persona and ever-fluttering eyelashes Falana possessed that drove most men (including Merv Griffin and Don Cornelius) absolutely crazy back in the 1970’s, but also will command the stage as she nails the Bob Fosse-esque song and dance numbers Falana was famous for. Marcille, defying all expectations and to the utter shock of a few, will be nominated for a Tony.
However, Marcille will face huge competition from Lady Gaga at the Tony awards. This same brilliant aforementioned casting director will make it possible for Mother Monster- with her trademark blank, wide, doe-eyed stare- to take on a new version of the Liza Minelli classic, “Cabaret”. The movie will eclipse anything that Michelle Williams is doing in the revival currently on Broadway. Banking on Gaga’s extensive musical training and her ability to deliver all kinds of music, from pop (holding her own besides pop QUEEN Beyonce) to hip hop (her duet with Wale) to jazz (her duet with Tony Bennett) to R&B (who saw that duet with R. Kelly coming?), Hollywood will finally be privy to Gaga belting out show tunes and torch songs alike. In a stroke of genius, Gaga will also re-do Liza’s classic “Liza with a Z” television concert (which will be shown on HBO)- dubbing it “Gaga with a G”.
Yeah, I said it. Some, all, or none of it may be true. Some, all, or none of it may come to fruition. However, that is what is ‘”neXEXt”- in my head, anyway.
Chad Groom
Editor-At-Large