Loved Valentino: The Last Emperor on BBC 4 last night. Must have missed it first time round. Director Matt Tyrnauer got boldly close to the temperamental fashion designer (retired) as he bitched constantly with his stoic partner - business and personal - the handsome Giancarlo Giammetti over runway sets and spare tyres in French, Italian, English.
Of Valentino's exquisitely preserved person at 78, Duncan Fallowell part-credits this to the couturier's 'very elaborate relationship with the wind.' Duncan explains to me: 'When outdoors, and especially on the deck of his yacht, he is always nervously moving about to make sure that any breeze is blowing into his face and not blowing from behind wrecking his hair-do. You think you're having a conversation with him and suddenly he has his back to you because the wind has changed direction.'
32 comments:
I so understand Valentino's problem!
Oh Izzy, I saw you in the film. Or were you dead by then?
Loved the question to Joan Collins: "What's the difference between great style and trash?" Joanie responded unfazed by the impertinence: "I have no idea!"
Suffers from wind? Join the club.
Does Duncan go crusing with him then?
"Must have missed it first time round." Sums up BBC4. If you've got something worthwhile to share, and you don't have some sort of weird Queenie Leavisite prejudice against a broad audience, well then, put it on BBC2, make an effort and bloody well try to attract an audience. Who do you think is flicking through all the channels these days: Jeremy fucking Bentham and John Stuart 'Oh all right then' Mill???? Pull your bloody finger out Mark Thompson!
Loved this film. It showed Valentino was just a great big mincer.His lover's hair is exquisite.
Enoch, I love your thrust. But I see it's BBC FOUR not 4. A matter like that would mean much to the TV hermits.
Very funny anecdote. I laughed a lot. I saw the film in Cannes some time back. Valentino made almost a new career just following the flick around the international fests, after he made the wise move to 'retire' from fashion. Aside from its insights into the slow shift of couture to accessories, it's one of the best shows on an enduring gay relationship I have ever seen. Valentino is the ultimate princess, Giancarlo his long-suffering frog.
I didn't even know there was a BBC Four.
God it's simple really - Four is on television, 4 is on Radio!!!
Yes, I was dead but made a comeback just for Val. Silly old Alexander McQueen, making such a fuss about being so successful
On my Freeview EPG at this moment, it's saying in the BBC Four slot 'No information'. Says it all.
Oh how lovely what bliss adore them both yum yum
I saw the show too. Did you see Liz Hurley sucking up to V? She asked him, How could he stay away for long from his great palace (with the polythene windows which had to be cut so the party people could breathe!). How yuck. Glimpsed Elton. I cringed when Michael Caine yelled at Joanie that he'd seen her on the telly. Deeply common.
Madame, you're a man, I see. Quite nice on the eye, too.
Do you have to be about 80 to get written about on this site ?
It's divine that MA is tansgenerational - so piss off, squeaker, or acquire RANGE
Wry
Yes, can we have a picture of someone beautiful aged 21 - you choose - I know you'll find someone - some two - a male and a female - yes - please - no facelifts - no airbrush - natural beauty aged 21 - thank you, my love - looking forward
The most striking thing about the Valentino film is how old the creative geniuses are in fashion. Same with The September Issue - Wintour is around 60, Grace Coddington pushing 70 and most of the designers well over 50, photographers in their 80s, etc. Moral: Never retire!
The only excuse for retirement is boredom.
It's obvious you never worked in the mine, Victorino, mon petit chéri.
That would come under 'boredom'.
Is that a litotes or an euphemism?
Possibly, or a sly putdown.
What happened to Duncan's interview with Valentino? It was hilarious but can't trace it. Not in Twentieth Century Characters.
There is no interview that I know of. Duncan's marvellous words on Valentino are from a note to me on Facebook and informed by a friend of his who has met the couturier.
Later, someone asked Duncan whether Valentino's hair ever moved. The reply: "The hair can't really move. It rises in flanges. Which can be a terrifying sight - like the mating ritual of the frilled iguana."
Yes, I went to Rome for it and visited him at his house on the Appian Way. I think it was for Marie Claire. It will be included in my celebrity book 'Platinum Peepshow' if British publishers ever wake up from their various self-imposed comas. Viewed overall, British publishing is DULL DULL DULL at the moment: a depressed service industry following other, more glittering media - not a hint of panache or artiness anywhere in it. It doesn't have to be like that but probably the present generation of publishing heads, creators of this desert, will have to die off before things can really change.
Duncan Fallowell
Oops, didn't know.
Duncan is right about publishing. It's a bit like the fashion industry. While the creatives are in control, there's daring, unpredictability, vision and a healthy contempt for what the public want. They don't know what they want until people with more brains and talent show them the way. The next generations come along, their graspers looking for quick easy money, and take over businesses that fit the bill, placing inordinate value on PR and other quick fixes. In time, the talents that would keep the business dynamic are ignored for sterile formula.
This is what happened with Valentino.
Wintour a genius? Raise your standards!
I'm amazed Duncan can't get his sleb book published but it's true, British publishing is run by bores. These things come in cycles and the book scene in UK at the moment has zilch glamour.
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