STYLE: Best and Worst Dressed from a Disappointing Golden Globes Red Carpet

The 2016 Golden Globes Red Carpet was awash in questionable fashion choices, unimaginative re-treads and a handful of downright hilarious I-chose-this-while-I-was-drunk creations.

BEST DRESSED:

Topping my Best Dressed is the saucy Jennifer Lawrence in Christian Dior, where a traditional column silhouette got an edgy twist with sexy cutouts and a modified crop top, yet she was still drop dead elegant. Add a sleek, yet not old updo, a magnificent, modern Chopard diamond bib necklace and we are done, people! Done! Just divine.

Lily James, the lovely, young Brit who plays Lady Rose Aldridge on Downton Abbey and was Disney’s Cinderella avoided looking too precious with a sophisticated Marchesa tulle gown and sultry, yet refined makeup. She owned the spotlight and worked those poses flawlessly. I predict she’s going to emerge as a serious style star.

I was thrilled that Jennifer Lopez finally gave the mesh-sparkly-Vegas-cut-out-skin-tight numbers a much needed rest. I looove this elegant Giambatista Valli dress but I was torn about making it a Best Dressed, because I despise this murky, mustard color. I dislike most shades of yellow anyway but especially this shade and it matters not if they rename it a euphemistic “marigold.” This same dress in white would have been my number one. (*Ladies, if you have skin with yellow undertones, usually Hispanics like me and JLo, should run screaming from this color like the house is on fire). Hence why you couldn’t pay me to wear it. Darker-skinned women look fine in it which is why Twitter was blowing up about JLo’s new mahogany skin. But that’s why she went all New Jersey tanning salon and deep wine lip. To try to make her skin look better against the what? That yellow! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Amy Adams glowed in tangerine, which was a hot color trend on the Golden Globes red carpet. The beaded Versace column fit her like a glove. It was effortless glamour yet dressed up like a movie star should be. She looked radiant with controlled beachy-waved hair.

E! Fashion Police host Giuliana Rancic slayed it in designer Alex Perry whom she’s been wearing a lot lately. She was on point with the cutouts trend as well as the dramatic sleeves. For me, Giuliana can do no wrong. Other color trends on the carpet included different shades of red, from bright to dark wine but no dresses worth mentioning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The fabulous Helen Mirren has never looked better in a body-con, black Badgley Mischka with mesh inserts at the shoulders framing a blinding Harry Winston diamond necklace. She’s slimmer with a new short haircut and always the embodiment of timeless class and style, and no I’m not going to say “for her age.” She’s just stunning!

My Best Dressed in the Avant Garde category is Jamie Alexander in iconic Italian label, Genny. While this powerful, architectural statement of a dress could have easily overpowered many, Jamie wore it, not the other way around. It goes with her personal style. The styling was perfect with big emerald studs, simple hair and dramatic, but not overdone makeup. A showstopper.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jenna Dewan Tatum gets my Best Over-Dressed pick since she wasn’t a presenter and wasn’t nominated. She was there with husband Channing Tatum, and usually, wives keep a lower fashion profile if they aren’t in the award show mix. She obviously didn’t care and said ‘yeah, I’m wearing a ballgown bitches’ and wowed in this splendid, navy masterpiece by a favorite of mine, Zuhair Murad. Just fabulous!

Another showstopper was trans actress Laverne Cox wearing Elizabeth Kennedy. Kennedy has designed for Donna Karan, J. Mendel and Isaac Mizrahi Couture starting at a very young age, but this was her first time creating a dress under her own name for one of Hollywood’s hottest stars. Cox knows how to work a red carpet. Especially in the signature sculptural gowns she wears so well. Her soft, romantic hairstyle balanced the sharp silhouette of the gown. Makeup also flawless. She gets it right, again. *(Note to all Worst Dressed: call Laverne’s stylist STAT!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ALMOST BEST DRESSED:

I just had to create a middle category for dresses that missed the mark within Best Dressed but needed mentioning. I loved Lady Gaga’s Atelier Versace’s modern twist on a 1950’s “Monroe” gown but we’ve seen this style before. Her overly-bleached platinum hair made her look like your vampy Auntie Sheila from Boca Raton. Still, I’m loving her career re-tooling and personal style reinvention.

Lovely Alicia Vikander wore a simple, white Louis Vuitton, apron-front, gown that was more suited for an afternoon wedding or a posh pool party in The Hamptons. Very chic, but too summery-casual for an awards ceremony glam red carpet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kate Winslet wore a gorgeous color. A cobalt blue Ralph Lauren gown but with a most unoriginal, criss-crossed strap neckline that we’ve seen in a billion iterations. I alone have billions of these. I expected much, much more from this nominee, not “I’m going to my cousin’s anniversary dinner at the country club.”

Same goes for Julianne Moore in a long-sleeved Tom Ford that should have been way more form-fitting and revealing. Yes, a spectacular, shimmery, deep blue is breathtaking on this gingey, but she looks more like a conservative, chic, political wife not a movie star. Elegant but nothing to gasp about. I know it’s not the Oscars but I feel fashionably let down from these two.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The vibrant Viola Davis is in envious shape but this Marchesa gown, although I love the idea of it, made her look heavier than she is … and somewhat older. Removing that capelet disaster would immediately solve all of that, revealing the halter and showing off sexy cleavage and spectacular arms. What is going on at Marchesa, I wonder? They had a lot of these fluttery, silly sleeves and capes. Ick.

Amy Schumer. I can’t imagine that Schumer is working with a stylist. If she is, he or she must be put on probation if forgetting alterations happens again. Although from fab designer Prabal Gurung, this ballgown needed reworking. The last thing someone with wide, athletic shoulders needs is a big, white horizontal band to emphasize these even more. She has great legs, so why no slit? The skirt should have been hemmed and the bodice tailored. It wasn’t tight enough so it was wrinkled, bunchy and flattened her famously fabulous ‘girls’ and she had to keep pulling it up. Inexcusable! Amy’s decolletage should have been the star of that outfit with an elegant, low cut neckline. And why no jewelry? A strong diamond necklace or simple diamond chandeliers should have been a must. I do have hope for this girl’s fashion future.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WORST DRESSED:

The regal Regina King in Krikor Jabotian is tragedy number one. Makes me sad but where do I begin? There were more disparate themes going on here than on Ru Paul’s Drag Race. Contrived, Marcelled waved hair that had a 20s vibe; huge, modern chandelier earrings too close to a high neck on an overdone dress covered with rosettes made from bunches of heavy, sparkly paillettes. But wait there’s more. Someone thought it a good idea to attach a plain, white, random, chiffon train to all of that mess. And the final flourish? Swirly, strappy, crystal encrusted, white sandals. White sandals! Kill me now. No. Kill the stylist, don’t just fire him/her. I would have put Regina in JLo’s dress and just died over the entire look, yellow and all!

Now about the perennially sour-pussed Maggie Gyllenhaal in Marc Jacobs. Still trying to understand this one. A Victorian curtain homemade into a baggy dress by your well-meaning, but not-so-fashion-gifted grandmother? And because apparently the fabric wasn’t quite busy enough, the decision was made to add that toupee-corsage-thing on her shoulder. Fun! Maggie always looks like she’s in a period film anyway but this is just dreadful. Why this old, heavy, sad pattern, Marc, why?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Natalie Dormer in J. Mendl. Two words: Star Trek. Ready to go to the black tie gala aboard the Enterprise. Or… the neckline was falling-down loose and they MacGyvered it with Velcro. Then there’s the always, needlessly smug Jada Pinkett-Smith in a green chiffon Atelier Versace that made her look like an early 80s mother-of-the-bride who would be, of course, the third wife of a Miami drug lord. Priceless detail: the satin, dyed-to-match platforms. (Insert the “laughing so hard I’m crying” emoji).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Haute aberrations. Yes, I’m going there. To slam St. Laurent and Givenchy. Not Jane! One of my timeless style icons (I mean the woman is 78 for God’s sake and has been ruling the red carpets the past few years. And have you seen what insane shape she’s in?) Jane Fonda became a fashion victim courtesy of St. Laurent Couture. Twitter blew up with memes comparing her to a giant cupcake, meringue puffs or Pagliacci’s clown collar. To me she looked like she was being eaten by a giant mollusk. My sadness was endless. No worries. She’ll rebound.

Cate Blanchett in Givenchy also disturbed me and please save your comments about this being intellectual couture for true fashion connoisseurs … blah, blah. Masses of long fringe are not a good look. The slightly OCD part of my brain wonders who will comb this pink weave throughout the night because I see tangles happening already. If a piano shawl and Cousin It from the Addams Family (Google it kids) had a baby, it would be this dress. Or… Cate is playing a new character on Downton Abbey and since the costume fitting was, you know.. right close by. Why not just pop by the Globes?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And what was with Katy Perry’s common, ordinary, econo-priced-looking, mall dress for a high school prom? In dull pink and ill-fitting with no built-in bra or bustier. I demand glam from my stars and she did not deliver. This was sloppy and it was Prada! How was this Prada? And that hair? A drugstore hair bump and a bad, do-it-yourself weave. It was Elvira-meets-country-music-singer at her first fancy party. Yee haw. I’m so confused. I really did cry a little.

Taraji P. Henson was another one who phoned it in. Fashionista Cookie would slap the crap out of her. The plain, white strapless Stella McCartney was completely underwhelming and you know it dawned on her at some point because she started whippin’ that train around and doing her best Blue Steel stare, while over-posing for the paps to distract from the total lameness of her dress. Her messy (not in a deliberately styled way) hair, sweaty face and lack of lip color looked more “walk of shame the morning after” than Golden Globes nominee. Just no. NO.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wrapping up with the Yawn category in Worst Dressed is Kate Hudson in a nude Michael Kors Collection skirt and toddler size tube top. Did she impulsively decide to cut the middle out of her dress and wrap that around her neck like when we were all wildly creative in junior high? How lackluster lazy is this, dare I call it, design? You could find more couture details in a Forever 21 sales rack. If this was on Project Runway, it would have been trashed. By Michael Kors. The irony. And I think we’ve hit the wall on fabulous, bare abs on yet another red carpet when it’s been done, oh, so many times before. It’s tired and inappropriately too casual. Plus this tube top was also slipping, with Kate adjusting it even while she was up on stage. Tack-o-la.

Then there’s the gorgeous Rooney Mara, completely washed out in a nude, shreddy, she-walked-through-seaweed Alexander McQueen. With her porcelain skin, dark hair and piercing blue eyes, this same dress in sapphire or deep burgundy would have made her a Best Dressed for me.

It’s tragic that designers continue to make frocks out of deadly nude, flesh-tone or pale blush and susceptible women are told this is a fashion color? It’s sensible underwear color. No one looks good in nude, be it fabric or lip color. (This is second to muddy yellow among my major fashion peeves). Nude tones look terrible in photos and in real life. Let’s take pages from the worlds of medicine and theatrical makeup, shall we? Jaundiced skin? Yellow. Hello hepatitis. Run to the ER. When there’s a very sick or dying character in a film, the first thing the makeup artist does is make the skin tone and lips pale and washed out. As in nude. The opposite of healthy, rosy cheeked and young! Comprende people? My one woman campaign against the “nude lip” and nude fabric is still very much on. When in doubt, contrasting color to skin tone never fails.

Now, let’s look forward to the Academy Awards. Nominees and stylists, you have been warned.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PHOTOS: SCREEN GRABS, THANKS “E! ENTERTAINMENT”