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    christine-wicker

    Christine Wicker

    Contributor

    This Year's Emmy Winner: Actresses With Curves

    Posted:
    09/22/09
    Filed Under:Woman Up, Culture
    2 Comments  + 
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    Was anyone but me shallow enough to notice that of the eight Emmy photos of women in the New York Times Monday morning, four didn't look anorexic or even real thin? (Not counting the pregnant Heidi Klum because pregnant doesn't count.) If you figure in Tina Fey, whose arms appear to have a bit of meat on them, only three of the women had "the look." You know, the beautiful head on the scarily skinny body?
    Is normal back? Is "head on a stick" no longer the only acceptable silhouette?
    Naaaah. It was probably a fluke.
    For those who didn't see the print version of the paper, front-page photos showed Toni Collette of "United States of Tara"; Elisabeth Moss of "Mad Men"; Chandra Wilson of "Grey's Anatomy"; Padma Lakshmi, a host of "Top Chef"; Tina Fey of "30 Rock"; and Mariska Hargitay of "Law & Order." Inside were Heidi Klum of "Project Runway," Olivia Wilde of "House," and Jennifer Love Hewitt of "Ghost Whisperer."
    Toni, Padma and Olivia were properly skeletal. The others were, well, normal looking.
    Not that I don't personally aspire to look like a starved child. I do. I do. As the likelihood recedes ever further each year, I desire it with greater passion. If being that thin gives me the wizened face of an apple doll, I'll wear a bag over my head.
    As Donna Trussell suggested in an e-mail, maybe everybody's watching "Mad Men" and subconsciously trying to become Joan?
    Christina Hendricks, who plays Joan, is definitely the sexiest female TV-land has ever produced. Lots of purr and plenty of claw. The regal way she waltzes through the office reminds us that there was a time, long, long ago, when real adult women would have lunched on the perky little waifs who pose as today's reigning beauties.
    Though I am loving Holly Hunter as the boozed-up broad who always gets her man in "Saving Grace," I love her even though Holly has turned herself into bone and a big hank of hair. I'm sure she had to. Nevertheless, in the episode where the evil defense attorney parades all her past lovers through the police station, her nonchalance is a moment to be treasured.
    I've heard even young stars wear multiple layers of armored underwear to get that Red Carpet look. They remind me of when I was in the seventh grade. I begged and begged until my mother finally let me wear her long-line girdle to school. Remembering the sight of me tugging all that rubber over my skinny shanks still makes her laugh.
    I wanted to be like the big girls. And now that I am, darn it, big girls are completely out of fashion.
    Underwear armor wasn't enough for actress Elisabeth Moss, as several shots showed. My first reaction as I looked at her little pooch was an insufferable, "Poor dear." It was heartfelt, though. I've been there. I am there.
    How I wish I were woman enough to have thought, "Have another piece of pie, sweetie."
    Remember Marilyn Monroe singing Happy Birthday to the prez? She didn't mind showing a bit of cushion for the right man to nuzzle up to. But isn't it pitiful that we have to reach back to granny's day to find a sex queen with curve enough to seem really dangerous? Even Christina Hendricks earns her small screen star only in a drama that brings back the '60s.
    Queen Latifah does us proud, sure. But black women can pull off all sorts of stuff that we whities ought never to attempt.
    Which brings me to my current heroine in the "hang it all" department: Meryl Streep. She was soooo skinny when she was young. And now she's not. She let it go gracefully and didn't starve herself even when the nasties went to work on her.
    I may have been the only person in America who cringed through "Mama Mia," but I never grimaced when Streep was onscreen. She was hot enough to get some handling – pounds and all.
    Come to think of it, the last movie I saw Susan Sarandon in she was playing a hot mama, and she had a little heft. From the back, if you looked at that space between her butt and her waist, we looked kind of alike. Squeezably soft, shall we say? (I'm hoping I'm the only one old enough to remember when those words referred only to toilet paper.)
    And Candace Bergen. What about her these days? A solid woman.
    Then there's Helen Mirren. Looking good, hips and all.
    And Jamie Lee Curtis?
    Not a bad line-up. Good company. Women I wouldn't mind being.
    I was going to bike this afternoon. But it's hot here in Los Angeles. I'm tired. Maybe I'll glide my thighs into the kitchen and have me a nice piece of pie instead.
    Who gives a good bikini about Demi?

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    Christine Wicker

    Christine Wicker is the author of five books and a former reporter for the "Dallas Morning News." Her life as an author began when she and a Dallas cop wrote... more

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