Project Runway's Most Dramatic Moments, S4/5

Poodles, before we look to the future of Season 6, one last, loving look back.

You might be looking at the title of this post and asking "S4/5? What's THAT all about?" Well, it's about the fact that unfortunately, Seasons 4 and 5, while they had their moments, were, in our opinion, deadly DULL. There was a ton of talent to be had, but the personalities were somewhat lacking. We tend to think this is because the participants had become all too aware of the cameras and most of them were too self-aware to really let it all hang out. As such, there were very few dramatic moments on par with previous seasons. In fact, there was only one per season.

1) MRSA-GATE

In the midst of a "real woman" challenge that left our comments section in flaming ruins for the week (nothing like utilizing a bunch of real women who've lost weight to push the emotional buttons of the viewers), Jack Mackenroth, that Chelsea Muscle Mary who had already endeared himself to the viewers, found himself in the midst of a health crisis.

To be more specific, he had a MRSA infection and this, coupled with the fact that he had a compromised immune system because he's HIV positive, caused a bit of a concern both on his part and on the part of the producers.

As Jack struggled with the decision as to whether he should stay or go, his fellow designers, to their credit, showed great concern and affection for him. There was one, however, that got a mighty strange edit out of it:

Victorya, who for some reason, looked almost pissed off about the whole thing (granted, she always looks like that). It turns out (although you never saw this on the episode), she was FURIOUS with the producers for not offering to shut down production until Jack could get medical attention and get back on his feet. That's certainly admirable, but highly impractical. It would have been nice to give Jack the chance, but at that point they had no idea how long it would take for him to recover, and each day that the production delayed would have cost the producers tens of thousands of dollars. It's harsh, but that's the reality of it.

In what was probably the most tearful scene in the history of the show, Jack said goodbye to his fellow designers. It wasn't the kind of delicious drama that results from egos clashing, but it was the only time the show actually made us cry.

In the end, Jack made the decision to put his health and well-being before his ambition and opted to leave the show and seek medical attention. As we recall, he was fully recovered within a week, but unfortunately, the show had moved on by that point and replaced him with the recently auf'd Chris March. We still think Jack should have tried out for the next season but he appears to have moved on since then.

2)KENLEY-GATE

There were so many reasons to dislike the cat-thrower from Season 5 and so many scenes that could have gone here, but nothing sums it up like the moment it all came to a head with the judges in the final pre-Bryant Park episode, "Nature Calls."

There is, in our humble opinion, a much funnier version of the following exchange here, but for the record, this is what was actually said:

"I wanted to stay away from pretty."

"The petals, they don't look very elegant either."

"I wasn't going for elegance, Heidi."


"You get very defensive, Kenley."

"It is a little bit annoying the attitude, no?"


"Like right now, what you're doing right now."

"What??"



This all came after an entire season of Kenley acting badly on the runway, from getting overly defensive with the judges to laughing openly at her fellow designers. At this point, both the judges and the remaining designers had had it with her. We guess it's to the judges' credit that they were able to ignore the obvious disrespect and wave her on through to the finals, but we strongly suspect there was at least a little input on the part of the producers, who did everything they could to push and edit this unpolished girl to the forefront to play the part of the villain. She wasn't really villainous; she was just immature and obnoxious.


[Screencaps: Projectrungay.blogspot.com]


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Kenley: Yes, another update!

NYPost:

"The only reason why a cat was involved in this story because when I first approached Zak, I was holding my cat and it was gently tossed onto my bed," she said.

"There was no cat hurt or thrown. The cat was not thrown at Zak. It was tossed onto the bed. There was an argument. No violence was used. Nothing was thrown."

Penley did not reply to a request for comment.

But in an earlier email to The Post, he said, "The situation did not need to go that far. You simply can't do what she did. She needs to be held accountable for her actions. I feel really bad for her and care deeply for her. It was a relationship gone sour, yes, but it could've ended in a smooth amicable way."

Daily News:

It never happened, the 28-year-old Collins claimed in a Brooklyn Criminal Court hearing Wednesday at which she was promised the felony charge against her would be dropped to a misdemeanor, likely next month.

The fashion designer's story jibed with what she had told her mom.

"My daughter told me they were arguing," said Jeannie Collins, "because she broke up with him and he wouldn't get out of the apartment.

"Zak's cat, Arlo, was bothering her so she plopped him on a down comforter on the bed and told Zak to 'go feed him.' That's all there was to it," the mother said.

Sources:
I didn't fling feline, 'Project Runway' star Kenley Collins claims [Daily News]
Feline Misfire [NYPost]

[Photo: NYPost/Paul Martinka]

Kenley Update 2!

NYPost reports:


"Winner Leanne Marshall said the incident proves the Bravo show did not distort reality.


"This should put a clear answer to the question I am most frequently asked, 'Was Kenley really that awful, or was she just edited like that?' "

Marshall told the Post. "When she got angry, I knew to keep my distance. Clearly, she needs therapy."

But though Collins frequently displayed her temper on camera and on the set, she never actually became violent.

"I feel a little sorry for her that she can't control her emotions and behavior, but on the other hand, absolutely nothing excuses physical violence and throwing a poor, defenseless kitty at someone who is sleeping," Marshall said. "I feel bad for the cat, the bruised apples and Zak."

Gunn and supermodel co-host Heidi Klum declined to comment on her behavior."

[Photo: NYPost.com/Paul Martinka]

Update on Kenley!

NYPost reports:

"Collins has now been told to stay away from the apartment. But she was permitted with police escort to retrieve her belongings yesterday. Penley was in the apartment at the time.

As cops carried her luggage out the door, Collins gleefully posed for pictures.

"Zak blew this out of proportion in the police report," she said. "It was a break-up that went badly. He got what he wanted. I broke up with him. I just thought that we weren't ready to get married."

City animal-control officials said that as long as the cat was not injured in the attack, they will not pursue cruelty charges."

[Photos: NYPost.com/Paul Martinka]

Holy Crap!

NYPost reports:

'PROJECT RUNWAY' FINALIST FACING ASSAULT CHARGES

"Kenley Collins was arrested today after assaulting her fiance with their cat, authorities said today.

After throwing the feline, a laptop computer, and three apples at Zak Penley, Collins, 26, was charged with assault and criminal possession of a weapon (of meow destruction).

"It was a miscommunication," Collins told The Post after getting released without bail from Brooklyn Supreme Court yesterday morning.

"Fights happen, And that's that. There is no case."

According to law enforcement sources, an enraged Collins woke Penley up just after 7 a.m. by hurling their cat in his face. Then she threw her laptop, and as he fell crawled on the floor, slammed a door on his head.

She threw three apples, and doused him with water, before he was able to dial 911.

"You're lucky, it could have been worse," Collins told Penley after the blow, according to sources.

Collins and Penley, an artist and musician who penned a song called "CAT?" for her Project Runway finale, were to be married in October.

Neighbors said the couple had been fighting for weeks.

"Lately there has been a lot of yelling," neighbor Ken Edge, 31, said. "I can hear Kenley much louder than I can hear Zak. When she speaks, she yells. Since she moved in around September there have been a lot of noise problems."

You don't fuck with Tugboat Girl, bitches!


"Runway" Star Jailed for Cat-astrophic Assault [TMZ]
'PROJECT RUNWAY' FINALIST FACING ASSAULT CHARGES [NYPost]

[Screencap: Projectrungay.blogspot.com]

Ugh. We're doing this for you.

We've been far too easy on ourselves lately, kittens. Throw up a post about some actress on the red carpet, say something bitchy, clock out for the day. In order to shake things up, we're going to do something extremely difficult for us. We're going to expose ourselves to that most distasteful of celebrities, Gwyneth Paltrow.

We're doing this for you, bitches.


Here's Gwyneth on the cover of ELLE UK, The Fashion Issue, March 2009 in Dolce & Gabbana. That's funny. We always thought you had to make the clothes look good in order to get on the cover of a fashion magazine.

Before we get to that, let's examine the inner workings of Gwynnie's mind, shall we? Here's what she had to say in the issue:

“I saw this blog of people writing horrible things about me. And, you know, for a second you lose perspective and your ego is so wounded. You think, how could people hate me or hate my intentions or what I’m trying to do? I’m a good person and I’m trying to put good things into the world. I am who I am. I can’t pretend to be somebody who makes £15,000 a year. That would be completely inauthentic. I know what my intention is – and if it makes one person’s life better, then it’s worth it. And f**k the haters!”

Those dirty, dirty bloggers! With their horrible opinions and everything! "How could people hate me?" cries Gwynnie to the cold, unforgiving stars. And because they are both cold and unforgiving, no reply is forthcoming. She turns away and wraps her D&G Minnie Mouse blouse tighter around herself to keep away the chill. She knows what she's doing, and if it makes just one grimy person in a lower tax bracket happy, she will be vindicated. Yes. Fuck the haters, indeed.

Oh, whatever. Let's rip her clothes.

Dolce & Gabbana Spring 2009 Collection
Model: Isabeli Fontana

We don't exactly love the look and we get that models are paid to make clothes look good, but why does this look so bad on the Elle cover? Why does Gwynnie look like she's wearing diapers?


We get it. Really, we do. D&G are working in this silhouette right now and that's fine. Some of these looks work better than others. We tend to like the two in the middle although there's some nice layering going on in the first look.

We can't help it, though. It just reminds us of this:

And honey? That ain't good.


More pics:




[Photos: Matt Jones via elleuk.com/Style.com/Barbara Nitke via bravotv.com]

Kenley's Side of the Story

Fancast: Inside TV caught up with Kenley to find out whether she is really a Mean Girl or if it was just another case of Magical Elves editing. Here's her side of the story:

"We never got to see your personal life, even when Tim went to go visit you and check out the collection.

Yeah, I had my best friend who is practically my sister who I grew up with, and my boyfriend there that day. We all had breakfast with Tim, and had mocha’s. It was a whole big thing! But they don’t show my family even though they showed everyone else’s in that episode.

What about in respect to the judges and Tim? Taking their criticisms and listening to them? Do you think that you valued their opinions?

I was always eager to see what they had to say. There’s some respect there, but I never really compromised my designs. I’m very passionate about what I do, and if you’re not a passionate artist, don’t be an artist at all. I think that defending my outfits was simply because the judges just became so repetitive. Heidi would say the same thing three times, like ‘those are horrible! I can’t believe they walked down the runway!’ So, and you’re out there for four hours listening to this, and people need to realize that. So, yeah, they did get reactions out of me. I’m shocked that no one was the way I was. It just became like jabs over and over again. I just got annoyed, like ‘alright! I heard you the first three times, now you’re just doing it for TV. Making sure you get that comment on camera and get my reaction.’ So they really did get the best of me.

Do you feel at all remorseful about anything? Do you think you did anything wrong? Or conversely, do you feel like there were a lot of positive things people just didn’t get a chance to see?

I think that’s it, exactly. Pretty much from day one Korto didn’t like me. She had this nasty attitude towards me. So, when I feel that I have the same thing back. It was just kind of ups and downs with her, and Leanne too. Leanne she kind of took under her wing, she was like her sidekick or something. I don’t know. I’m an individual. I just became the outcast, I guess probably because of me…When I feel like someone doesn’t like me I don’t really try to make the effort to try to make them like me. I think that’s what happened. As far as doing anything differently, I came on the show to get my line and my name out, and that’s what I did. It worked and I’m having things being sold on my website. That’s what I came on the show to do, and that’s what I did. As far as talking about people, I feel bad about saying mean things. Sometimes I cringe when I say something so harsh about someone because I know it probably hurt them. I know it hurt me. I regret saying some things."

Read the entire interview here.

[Photo: Getty Images]

Ripping the Collections: Kenley, Part 2

It pains us once again to admit that one of her least out-there looks is also one of our favorites. We don't like the rope at the hem at all but we kind of love the feathered collar. We heard more than one person in the tent refer to this as Kenley's "Laura Bennett" dress.

It took us a little while to come to terms with this one. Our first reaction was "ew." We thought it was too precious, too twee - and it is - but just because it's not our taste doesn't mean it isn't kind of a cute look on its own. She is once again to be commended for hand-painting the fabric but once again we have to point out that it looks like the kind of paint job you'd see on a poster announcing the school's spring dance.

We're coming around a bit on this one. The hand-painted fabric still looks a little Golden Girls to us and we wonder just how stiff that dress must be with all that paint on it but we have to admit the design is pretty nice - especially the sleeves.

Once again, the rope at the hem looks awful; way too heavy. Aside from that, we like the look. Although we're inclined to think a top like that would look better paired with a sleeker skirt.

There's not much left to say about this one. For what it is, it's well done but we simply don't believe that it's mere coincidence that it looks almost exactly like a much-talked-about dress that a famous designer sent down the runway only six months before.

In the end, Kenley showed a strong collection that also served as a strong personal statement about her style and her skill. It wasn't as good as the other two collections but that doesn't make it a bad collection by any means. It wasn't as cohesive as the other two either but there was cohesion there. For Kenley, it's all about flowers, feathers and tulle. Pinks and purples and other bold colors mixed with exuberant collars and skirts. A range of looks that nonetheless all "go together" because they all clearly came from the imagination of one person. Ignoring the bad impression she made on many viewers, Kenley does have what it takes to go further in her career but we doubt very much that she's got mass market appeal.

Watch the show:



[Photos: Getty Images - Video: YouTube/Taxiplasm]


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