For those of you, like me, who enjoy the films of Ray Harryhausen you will have seen Jason And The Argonauts and Clash Of The Titans. They both feature the gods atop Mount Olympus viewing the mere mortals from their lofty heights with detached interest knowing that they can control destinies on a whim.
They may have been adorned in their finery, sipping ambrosia and popping down to earth for a bit of nooky whenever they fancied it, but Zeus and his pals were modest, humble and reserved when compared to the attendees of The Met Gala.
I first heard the term “ludicrous popinjay” when watching the sublime Frasier. This was uttered by Niles Crane when judging a pretender for Daphne’s heart. The term perfectly describes the parade of vacuous dilettantes’ posing on the stairs and red carpet in front of salivating gentlemen and women of the press at the excruciating show of preening narcissism that is the Met Gala.
Apparently, this is where "haute couture intersects with history to create the ultimate cultural moment – all in the name of art” but it is really an opportunity for celebrities to parade in outfits, one more outlandish than the other, trying to outdo each other in the ridiculous stakes.
The films The Hunger Games, Snowpiercer and Rollerball all showed a ruling elite in a dystopian future beguiled by their own sense of entitlement. Their hubris was manifested in their disdain for the general populace and that’s how it feels when viewing the conveyor belt of pompous egotists strutting their stuff.
Their costumes, because that’s what they are: costumes, designed to out flounce their opponents for column inches and photo layouts cost obscene amounts of money which makes the whole enterprise smack of Marie Antoinette and her coterie mixed with the Romanovs and we all know what happened to them.
The whole shameless display of wealth and ego is possibly the worst thing to happen to the concept of the subtlety since Roche Bobois.
It all comes across as very much the Emperor’s New Clothes. I am convinced that the designers of the hideous, performative and outlandish would cloak their effete clients in used condoms with dead geese as shoes in order to make a statement
The thing that irks me in particular is the extreme lack of self-awareness shown by these millionaires in the face of not only the global economy but the very real problems in the country in which the gala is held. As a mirror to the reality of the lives of many the few are casting a very ugly reflection. Narcissus in extreme.
"Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad" and maybe the Olympians are still looking down and testing the world of celebrity that have the audacity to present themselves as god like. The celebrities who rock up looking like an explosion in a jumble sale are clearly delusional and yes, perhaps mad to think they are in the slightest bit important or meaningful.
"Off with their heads" I say (metaphorically of course)
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having said that;