On Halloween night, at the mall of the local cineplex (which is where Michael Clayton is playing and thus where Angelenos must journey to get a shot of morally ambiguous Clooney) there was a lot of moral ambiguity going on. We're talking pre-teen Snow Whites in stockings and stripper heels - and the parents who hold their cell phones. You may have seen photos from Hollywood's week-long Halloween festivities. Paris Hilton as a sexy Alice in Wonderland (bustier, tiny skirt, stockings, pinafore). Heidi Klum as a sexy black feline (figure- hugging catsuit, fangs, stripper heels). Teri Hatcher as a sexy Queen of Hearts (bustier and alarmed-looking child).
In America Halloween has morphed so completely from a night to dress "scary" to a night to dress saucy that the Washington Post recently dubbed it "Sluttyween". A large part of it is surely the absorption of pornography by the mainstream, in advertising, in fashion, in lifestyle ("cardio strip-tease" appears three times a week on my gym's class schedule). A school teacher told me that all his female students dressed "slutty" for Halloween but seemed uncomfortable and unhappy with it. The sexualisation of young women in the US is so frightening for them that Halloween is the perfect outlet.
The majority of diplomas handed out at American colleges today are to women. And any real estate agent will tell you that single women are the fastest growing group of home buyers in the country. At work and in the economy, every one of my girlfriends feels on the same level as men. Yet when asked to show creativity it automatically manifests as sexy. And the parameters of what's "sexy" just get narrower, hence the surfeit of mini-skirts and stockings.
Just this week Maxim helpfully published a list of the top three unsexiest female celebrities: 1. Sarah Jessica Parker 2. Amy Winehouse 3. Sandra Oh. Two Jews and a Korean. Heads up, ladies - if you want to appeal to men, make sure you're not from an ethnic minority!
Thus inspired, I went out for Halloween as Amy Winehouse. My co-reveller, Minnie Driver, went as our party host (and her husband on The Riches) Eddie Izzard. As did the young folk who play their children on the show. Small, medium and large, this was a veritable cacophony of Eddies. The point is, with apologies to Izzard, they weren't trying to look sexy.
And they all felt validated when they walked in, and bumped into Anna Friel, who though already a hit in the ABC comedy-drama Pushing Daisies, is still so new to this country that she came as a country bumpkin. Not a sexy country bumpkin. She had fake teeth, distorting glasses, baggy overalls and what she described as her male co-star's "stunt wig". She and Minnie chatted with a girl dressed as a sexy Japanese anime cartoon, and I spent the rest of the night thinking up costumes for next year: Sexy recycling bin. Sexy washcloth. Sexy tortoise. Sexy Grandpa. Sexy Gary Barlow. Sexy prostitute. Sexy isosceles triangle. Sexy haemophiliac.
