Vanity Fair (the Magazine)

[ennui]

Barry Diller and Tina Brown have partnered to launch a website. Diller and his IAC/InterActiveCorp. business will bankroll the effort, which doesn't have a name or a launch date. The site will be run by Brown

Early speculation is that the site will be comparable to the Huffington Post or the Drudge Report.

[satellite]

I let my subscription end because of the constant George Clooney ass-kissing, but then in the May issue they have an article on Doris Day, which reminds me how much I love their Old Hollywood and screwy rich people articles. Sigh. I guess I'll make a trip to the library.

[satellite]

This is more of a bitch at Hollywood in general than VF in particular. So they feature the beautiful Meagan Good (a personal favorite of mine) as the June 2008 Vanities Girl as she is a "promising young star" about to be in The Love Guru with Mike Myers. Um, hello? She's been in movies and on TV for at least 10 years as I had first seen her in Eve's Bayou. Granted, much of her work is geared towards the "urban" audience, not exactly the assumed VF demographic, but the blurb reads like this is her first role or something. Stomp the Yard was #1 film the week it came out, and "Kevin Hill' was a well-reviewed show when it was on. Maybe I should send them a note.

[Deleted]

I wasn't sure if there was any kind of discussion elsewhere on the boards about the whole Vanity Fair 2010 "Young Hollywood" issue cover -- I have had interesting discussions with people who fall into both the category of being outraged over the lack of diversity displayed there, and the "What's the big deal and why does everything have to be about race?" category.

Personally, I was surprised that a few actresses I consider up-and-coming weren't included on the cover, like Zoe Saldana and Freida Pinto. (For this, someone brought up the point that Zoe Saldana has been around for a while, and might be considered too old for a "Young Hollywood" spread.) Also, I believe Gabby Sidibe is featured in the issue, but they didn't bother to put her on the cover alongside the other young person nominated for a Best Actress Oscar, Carey Mulligan. On the one hand, I'm disheartened by this sort of thing, but on the other, I feel stupid taking Vanity Fair seriously (not a subscriber).

Here's what Jezebel had to say.

[Deleted]

The lack of diversity bothered me. I know its just Vanity Fair and it is not nearly as prestigious as it wishes but still. Not to mention their choices are completely unoriginal, Amanda Seyfried and Kristin Stewart were both on the new wave cover less than a year ago.

It especially pisses me off after they put Tiger Woods on the cover last month. Not for being one of the most famous athletes in the world but because he slept with a lot of women. Not to mention using the most "menacing" picture they could find (which being Tiger was still not very). Its like pretty white girls, lets shoot them like a scene from a 50s pastoral. Black dude like a scene from Oz.

[baileydash]

The absence of poc did seem odd, especially since both Sidibe and Saldana were so high profile this past year.

And diversity is important. Notice the very prominent positions given to poc in the audience at the Republican response to the SOTU address? It was carefully staged to show inclusiveness.

Images do matter. As America becomes browner, it just seems weird to see a cover that looks like it is straight out of 1955.

This seems so strange that I'm beginning to think it was deliberately done to provoke interest.

[twodollars]

Vanity Fair has a long history of doing crap like this. Normally they include one POC in these spreads, but never on the cover only on the inside flap.

It's bizarre how far behind the curve most of the media is on diversity.

[Deleted]

Some of those actresses in the IT issue are unrecognizable to me. I don't know who some of them are, even after reading their names/captions under the photo.

[Deleted]

That cover is just so... bland. Talent-wise and looks-wise. Yes, several of the girls are very pretty and some are talented, but yikes, VF didn't exactly try very hard to showcase real future stars with that cover. 90% of those girls will be forgotten in a couple of years.

[Neurochick]

Feb 4, 2010 18:15:11 GMT -4 @mimmilina said:

That cover is just so... bland. Talent-wise and looks-wise. Yes, several of the girls are very pretty and some are talented, but yikes, VF didn't exactly try very hard to showcase real future stars with that cover. 90% of those girls will be forgotten in a couple of years.

I agree, I couldn't even tell who was who in that photoshoot. To me they all looked the same. This is the same lame, message Hollywood puts out to the world, wants to show the world that America is thin, white, young and abled, even though many people in the world know that's not true.