God Save the (Beauty) Queen

This week on PR, our intrepid band of designers find out that they must design something that most of them know nothing about - a pageant gown. Of course, Kayne’s ALL over this one, and I picked him to win as soon as the words were out of Heidi’s mouth. No need for anyone to even try, this is Kayne’s baby all the way. Only question is, who’s going to screw it up badly enough to get auf’d?

Tara Connor, the reigning Miss USA, needs an evening gown for the upcoming Miss Universe pageant. She gives the designers some likes and dislikes (likes low backs and earth tones, suggests keeping away from white and anything that shows her body too much, as she wants the focus “on her” meaning “quit looking at my breasts, my face is up HERE.”) The twist to this challenge is that they will have to work in teams for the first time. This makes most of the designers start to shrivel up. Seriously, you can see some of them shrinking, they hate this idea SO much.

After their 30-minute sketch time (during which Angela badgers Kayne constantly about them pairing up and sketches nothing – what’s with that?), each of the designers get to pitch their idea to Tara. Everything is normal until Keith goes in and proceeds to put his hands all over Tara’s chest (under the pretense of showing her where everything will be fitted - but you get the feeling he just wanted to put his hands all over her chest) and tells her that her legs are “glorious” and is practically licking his lips. I half-expected him to turn into one of those cartoon wolves where the eyes bug out and drool flies everywhere whenever a cute dame walks by. It also reminded me of Daniel Franco’s lingerie pitch to Heidi last season, but where Daniel was creepy but sweet in a romantic way, Keith comes off as creepy but lecherous in a predatory way. Tara is pretty freaked out, and is probably wondering where security is, just in case.

You can tell that Tara is thinking that some of these designers aren’t sewing with a full bobbin. She LOVES Kayne, however – was there ever a doubt? – and practically swoons when he tells her “You need to feel like a million bucks”. She’d probably pick his dress right there and skip the whole rest of the show if she could. But she must suffer through all the pitches, no matter how “WTF” they are. For example, Angela reveals that she doesn’t sketch and starts asking Tara questions. Hello? At least describe an idea. Tara makes some classic eyerolling "get this wacko away from me" faces. Clearly Angela will not be a team leader – and part of me thinks she is trying NOT to get picked.

The team leaders are: Laura, Malan, Jeffrey, Uli, Keith, Vincent (shocking) and Kayne (duh). Tim pulls out the Velvet Bag, and all the leaders have to pick from the remaining designers. I hate it when they do this. It makes me think of all the times during school when you had to wait to see if someone was going to pick you for their kickball team, and how bad you felt when you were last - as Bradley and Angela must have been feeling when they ended up last. Since there is no way in heck Keith is going to pick Angela, she gets paired with Vincent. You already knew he was going to get stuck with her, because they made a point of showing him talking about how important it is to get someone you can work well with.

They rush off to Mood, pick out some blah earth-toned fabrics (except for Kayne, who grabs an iridescent purply-bronzy colored one), and head back to Parsons to get started. Bonnie tells Uli, “I wanna see people start fighting” and right away she gets her wish. Angela and Vincent start bickering like an old married couple. Vincent won’t let her touch the dress form so she wanders away. Then when he turns to ask her to do something, she’s not there. Angela later comes back and tries to make some suggestions. Vincent tells her to get three feet away from him to which she snarks “I’ll move a foot and a half this way and you move a foot and a half that way.” How OLD are these two???? (And Angela looks like she’s wet the back of her pants, too.) Tim comes over and says he’s disappointed in the dress, which makes Angela smile in a horribly unpleasant way, not unlike someone who’s just seen their enemy’s cat get run over by a steamroller. In another scene, Vincent basically tells Angela that HE likes the dress and HE’S the team leader so neener neener neener and gets all smirky, which is not a face Vincent should ever do. This gets a LOT of screen time, so you know that one or both of them will be in the bottom of the runway scores.

Meanwhile, the other designers (yes! They are still there! On the Vincent and Angela Show! How dare they?) are doing stuff. They don’t show Laura’s dress at all, but she utters what is probably my favorite PR quote of all time – “This cannot be here – it’ll look like she’s pooping.” (I hope that makes it into the outtakes section of the season 3 DVD, because I really want to know what “this” was!) In between shots of sewing, we get to hear a really sad story from Malan, about when he was thirteen and his mother hated his sketches and told him to never do it again. Now, I admit, last week I said he might be a vampire, but that story made me want to tuck some garlic down my shirt and give him a big hug. Poor Malan! Too bad his dress looks like a giant pecan coconut cluster.

Off to the runway! Jeffrey (who is wearing a jacket that makes him look like the Tattooed Beatle) is looking worried when Heidi says the judges better be wowed by the dresses. In addition to Tara, there is another guest judge – Vera Wang, filling in for Michael Kors. Let’s start the show! Some random thoughts:

• Katy should NEVER wear brown. Try red!
• Most of the models can’t walk this season but Kayne’s WORKED that dress!
• Jeffrey’s dress is too wrinkled and looks too much like my grandma’s crazy quilt.
• Laura – glorious dress but - it’s white! Tara said no white! Bzzzzz.
• The top on Malan’s moves wrong – just like Nick’s flower dress from last season – and is TOO earth-toned. The browns on top are too similar. Plus he pokes his model in the breast when he’s talking about the dress.
• Vincent’s sleeves looked like hand straps on a subway car.
• Uli’s dress is beautiful – very Grecian, with a lovely twisting detail on the front and back. Strong contender for the win, in my opinion.
  

But in the end, the win goes to – wait for it – Kayne. Obviously. (Can you imagine the horror if the guy who designs pageant and dance outfits for a LIVING couldn’t win this? Ouch.) But who is out? Should it be Malan, for his bunchy heavy dress that makes his model look like a ship's wooden figurehead, or Angela, for being a complete sack of potatoes? I’m sure, absolutely positive, that Angela’s going to get Heidi’s kiss-off, and I’ll be glad to see her go by this time - but shock! Malan is OUT! In the course of one show I’ve gone from thinking Malan is a smarmy creep to wanting to give him some chicken soup and wrap him in an angora sweater to make him feel better. Poor guy. But, as he says at the end, the show must go on, so we bid a fond farewell to Malan Breton from Taiwan. But I doubt we’ll see the last of him.