Vanity Fair UK 09.2021

FROM A special issue
PUFFY devoted to the
TO TURN OF THE
DIDDY
TO CENTURY
LOVE
F E AT U R I N G
The (next)
reinvention of BRITNEY
Sean Combs SPEARS
DONATELLA
By VERSACE
TRESSIE
McMILLAN THE
COTTOM MATRIX
Photographs by MONICA
CARLOS “KAITO” LEWINSKY
ARAUJO
ELLE
SEPTEMBER 2021 WOODS
JONATHAN
FRANZEN

RUDY
GIULIANI

FIGHT
CLUB
HANGING
CHADS
TONY
SOPRANO
LIL’ KIM
BJÖRK’S
SWAN DRESS

plus

ELLA
EMHOFF

(b. 1999)























Contents /Issue No. 731

K E K E PA L M E R’ S D R E S S BY C A R O L I N A H E R R E R A ; E A R R I N G S BY I R E N E N E U W I R T H ; N E C K L AC E S ( F R O M TO P ) BY I R E N E N E U W I R T H , C H A N E L , A N D VA N C L E E F & A R P E L S . F O R D E TA I L S , G O TO V F. C O M / C R E D I T S . Vanities

27

27 / Opening Act Ella Emhoff
takes off.

30/ Trending What to wear
when you’re back on the town.

32, 35 / The Gallery The
baguette is back; a new Chloé
classic from Gabriela Hearst.

34 / Books & Flats Brilliant
reads and on-point footwear.

36 / Test Drive PEN15’s stars
offer timeless beauty tips.

38 / Beauty Sam Visser’s
fresh take on aughts excess.

40 / Dining Clubby dinner
spots are back.

Columns

42

Navel-Gazing

BY SONIA SARAIYA

From Britney Spears
to Love Actually,
the aughts’ most potent
fashion symbol may
have been designed by
nature: the belly button.

46 PAGE 74

Gawker Stalker “Many movie buffs consider 1999
to be one of the greatest
BY MICHAEL CALDERONE
single years of cinema ever.”
On the eve of a Gawker
relaunch, we map
the most influential alums
of the former enfant
terrible of media.

TRASH TALK On the Sean Combs wears pants by Tom Ford; ring by Lorraine
Cover Schwartz; necklace from New York Vintage. Grooming products
4,700,000 + by MAC. Hair by Marcus P. Hatch. Grooming by Lucia Rodriguez.
Number of readers of tawdry Tailor, Tatyana Cassanelli. Set design by Bette Adams. Produced
Florida-based Trump favorite the National Enquirer on location by Westy Productions. Styled by June Ambrose.
Photographed exclusively for V.F. by Carlos “Kaito” Araujo in
at its peak. [P. 62] Los Angeles. For details, go to VF.com/credits.

VA N I T Y FA I R PHOTOGRAPH BY E M M A S U M M E RTO N SEPTEMBER 2021 11

Contents /Issue No. 731

PAGE 96

“Fight Club is something more
than great. It’s prophetic.”

Columns 50 Features 62

48 Critical Moment 54 Postcards From
the Edge
Dear Jon BY RITA OMOKHA With Love,
Sean Combs BY JOE HAGAN
BY EMILY GOULD Checking in with PHOTOGRAPHS BY BRUCE GILDEN
ILLUSTRATIONS BY RYAN McAMIS Columbia and UCLA law BY TRESSIE McMILLAN COTTOM
professor Kimberlé PHOTOGRAPHS BY A visit to the place that
Franzen. Lethem. Safran Crenshaw, cofounder of CARLOS “KAITO” ARAUJO most embodies our
Foer. Once upon a time, critical race theory, dysfunctional 21st-century
achieving literary stardom who’s landed in the middle Sean Combs—a.k.a. Puff politics: Florida.
meant you were likely one of the culture wars. Daddy, a.k.a. Diddy—is a
of the Jonathans. perfect cipher for our journey
of the past two decades, and
he’s ready to spread the love.

“The networks had this unerring sense to 18 Editor’s Letter
go for just what made the thing good and tell 22 Contributors
you to take it out.” —DAVID CHASE [P. 70] 24 Behind the Issue
132 Proust Questionnaire

12 VA N I T Y FA I R PHOTOGRAPH BY M E R R I C K M O RTO N

Features 74 Spotlights Features

70 Future Nostalgia 100 90

Wise Guy A PHOTO PORTFOLIO BY Viva Versace Rudy Country
EMMA SUMMERTON
BY MATTHEW LYNCH BY KIA D. GOOSBY BY AATISH TASEER
Recasting turn-of-the- PHOTOGRAPH BY ILLUSTRATION BY
David Chase ignited century movie classics DAVID LaCHAPELLE NIGEL BUCHANAN
a prestige-TV arms race with next-gen stars in our
with the launch of favorite roles. A conversation with As the 20th anniversary
The Sopranos in 1999. the grande dame of 9/11 approaches,
Now he’s getting the gang of millennium style, the ignominious story
back together. Donatella Versace. of Rudy Giuliani comes
full circle.

96

Rule of Men

BY LILI ANOLIK
PHOTOGRAPHS BY
MERRICK MORTON

Panned by critics, Fight Club
became a cult classic that
proved eerily prescient
about modern male rage.

102

The Good Wife

BY JULIA IOFFE

How Yulia Navalnaya
became the power
behind Russia’s
opposition movement.

62 110

“The lines between where the heritage of The Way We Wore
Gianni ends and where I step in have blurred.
We are now one.” —DONATELLA VERSACE [P. 100] BY LEAH FAYE COOPER
ILLUSTRATION BY
JOHN P. DESSEREAU

The looks that defined
the Y2K era—and helped
launch the red-carpet
fashion industrial complex.

PHOTOGRAPH BY B R U C E G I L D E N SEPTEMBER 2021 13

®

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Contributors
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Contributing Photographers
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Contributing Editors
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Bruce Feirstein, Nick Foulkes, Ariel Foxman, Alex French, Paul Goldberger, Vanessa Grigoriadis, Michael Joseph Gross,

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Elissa Schappell, Jeff Sharlet, Michael Shnayerson, Chris Smith, Richard Stengel, Diane von Furstenberg,
Elizabeth Saltzman Walker, Benjamin Wallace, Jesmyn Ward, Ned Zeman

14 VA N I T Y F A I R SEPTEMBER 2021



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16 VA N I T Y FA I R

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Editor’s Letter

There’s a temporal side FOUND OBJECT did more to shape our current world order
effect of the elongated Radhika Jones, than any other individuals in this century so far.
COVID crisis, a sort of looking very turn of
dislocation of time. Our the century in an It’s not just geopolitics, either. As I write
calendar memories slip up: advertisement for the this letter, I am 400 pages deep into the galley of
The marker “last year” has East Village hair salon a forthcoming novel, Crossroads, by Jonathan
lost its meaning, because Ringlet, in 2000. Franzen. The novel that made him a household
2020 is less last year than name, The Corrections, was published 20 years
ago this September. A fourth Matrix movie arrives DAV I D M AG E R .
a lost year. Twenty years ago, 9/11 caused a this year, directed by Lana Wachowski, as does
related kind of dislocation. The sheer impact of a Sopranos prequel movie, written by David
the event subsumed both the years immediately Chase—both harking back to game-changing
before it and the years after with its long shadow. originals from 1999. The princess of pop,
For those of us who remember the day, who Britney Spears, released her first two albums
witnessed its terror, it can be hard to summon in 1999 and 2000; they remain two of the
what else happened around it. best-selling albums of all time, and yet this year’s
news has established Spears as a tragic
The recent past is full of blind spots. History inversion of the sexually empowered 21st-century
happens in an instant, but its effects take time woman, allegedly stripped of agency over her
to settle, and new generations come up who live
and dream by different memories. The pull of SEPTEMBER 2021
the noisy present encourages inadvertent (or
willful) amnesia, while the long-term passage
of time acts as a filter. In a certain sense it’s
easier to see clearly events that happened 50 or
100 years ago than those of two decades ago.

So we dedicate this issue to the turn of the
century—how the years 1999–2001 set us on
the path to today. The roots of contemporary
power and influence are hiding there in plain
sight. On January 1, 2000, Boris Yeltsin made a
surprise announcement, resigning the presidency
of Russia six months early and naming a
47-year-old former KGB apparatchik, Vladimir
Putin, as his chosen successor, in advance
of free elections that were, in retrospect, a mere
formality. In December of that year, 537 votes
cast in Florida plus one controversial Supreme
Court decision determined that George W.
Bush would be the 43rd president of the United
States. One of these men recently presided
over the near-fatal poisoning of the leader of his
country’s opposition party; the other makes
oil paintings on a ranch in Texas while the war
he began, the longest in American history,
shudders to an end. Arguably, these two men

18 VA N I T Y FA I R

INTENSE SOPHISTICATION A110 LÉGENDE GT 2021

bfO4o1afr.fs5itechWidaelLoTAfnuPlpet;hilCnecOeoW2nraesLnuTmgmPiesptseatiosirotenn:cs4yocc2onl.em2mwb–pih4ngi0ecahd.9nw(dgWi/ClkLlOTmb2Pe);e:uC1ms5Oe4i2sdsWeitomoLnTicssPas(.lgiEco/umnklmsaistc)esoifomovnerbshtihinscetelaedAntld(apgaxi/nrkodemn: AE)f:1ui1r1r5s0ot2Lr6–eédgg1-5ieFs7nCtrdMWaet-LiIoTGSnPCT... 2021 petrol, 215KW are: Total consumption combined (mpg):
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Editor’s Letter LO P E Z : H E R B R I T T S , VA N I T Y FA I R , 200 1 . C R U I S E : A N N I E L E I B OV I T Z , VA N I T Y FA I R , 2000. PA LT R O W : M A R I O T E S T I N O , VA N I T Y FA I R , 2000. A F F L E C K : A N N I E L E I B OV I T Z ,
VA N I T Y FA I R , 1 9 9 9. S M I T H : A N N I E L E I B OV I T Z , VA N I T Y FA I R , 1 9 9 9. R E E V E S : M A R I O T E S T I N O , VA N I T Y FA I R , 200 1 .
FROM THE VAULT
Some of our favorite covers SEPTEMBER 2021

from 1999 to 2001.

own body. Two decades ago, Björk wore a
swan dress on the Oscars red carpet; this June,
Dior sent a swan dress down the runway.

Sean Combs, the artist and entrepreneur
who is also an avatar of how potently those
two identities can combine, creates his own
eras, and the turn of the century saw his
transformation from Puff Daddy to P. Diddy.
It wasn’t just a name change, as Tressie
McMillan Cottom observes in her brilliant
cover story, but an inflection point marking his
success in taking hip-hop iconography to scale.
“He understood hip-hop as a lifestyle at a time
before ‘influencer’ had entered our cultural
lexicon,” she writes. How his next era (with
corresponding name change, this time to “Love”)
will land depends in part on his ability to evolve,
but also on the evolving conditions around
him—changing views about social responsibility,
about contesting the grip of capitalism, about
the viability of the hustle.

We will remember the COVID-19 crisis and
the systemic failures it exposed as propelling
us to a crossroads, just as 9/11 did. Twenty
years from now, what will we say about how we
emerged from it? Will we be able to see the
opportunities for reframing our culture and
our politics, and act on them? Can we get a
jump on revealing our blind spots? This issue
delves into the past, not just to remind us of
what we’ve lived through—and what we
live with—but to sharpen our focus on what
lies ahead. n

radhika jones, Editor in Chief

20 VA N I T Y FA I R

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Contributors

Clockwise from top left:
Aatish Taseer, June
Ambrose, Emily Gould,
Nigel Buchanan,
Julia Ioffe, and Tressie
McMillan Cottom.

Aatish TASEER June AMBROSE Emily GOULD A M B R O S E : C O U R T E S Y O F J U N E A M B R O S E . B U C H A N A N : L I A S H O E R L E I N . G O U L D : S Y LV I E R O S O KO F F. I O F F E : M A X AV D E E V. M C M I L L A N C O T TO M : C H I O K E I ’ A N S O N . TA S E E R : O M A R A LO N S O.

“RUDY COUNTRY,” P. 90 “WITH LOVE, SEAN COMBS,” P. 54 “DEAR JON,” P. 48

“I thought it was important to take Ambrose first worked with Diddy While Gould’s publishing career has
ownership of what had become of nearly 25 years ago on the set of often been exhausting, she says,“I also
Giuliani,” says Taseer, who wrote about the “Mo Money Mo Problems” music feel a lot of fondness towards the people
the former New York mayor as the video. “It was a time when we were who are still getting up in the morning
20th anniversary of 9/11 approached. taking risks to shift culture through the and thinking about how to unite books
“To understand how we were implicated images we were creating,” says with readers…. I wanted to write an
in the tragic collapse of this once Ambrose. “And who better to make exasperated, mean but ultimately fond
impressive public figure.” magic with than Sean Combs.” tribute to the industry as I knew it.”

Tressie McMillan COTTOM Julia IOFFE Nigel BUCHANAN

“WITH LOVE, SEAN COMBS,” P. 54 “THE GOOD WIFE,” P. 102 “RUDY COUNTRY,” P. 90

Cottom first met Diddy more than Ioffe first profiled Alexey Navalny “The extreme expression I illustrated
25 years ago when she booked his new in 2011, and reporting on his wife, Yulia, reflects what I would guess to
act Biggie Smalls for the homecoming was heartbreaking. “It was hard be his constant state of mind,” says
concert at North Carolina Central to get my mind around how someone Buchanan of depicting the former
University. Surprisingly, in 2021 he said could be so absolutely sure of New York mayor’s distinctive and
he recalled a “spunky” girl who fit her herself, so calm and steady in the lately ubiquitous face, “panic, a
description. “I was charmed, despite my face of such pressure, violence, difficulty with logic, and a strained
very best intentions,” says Cottom. and terror,” Ioffe says. relationship with truth.”

22 VA N I T Y FA I R SEPTEMBER 2021



Behind the Issue

ElleWoods’s MICHAEL KRAMER.
signature pink.
Neo’s futuristic black. From top: Addison Rae as
Patrick Bateman’s Betty in Mulholland Dr.; Dylan
Sprouse and Barbara Palvin as
business formal/murder casual. Richie and Margot Tenenbaum;
For the most memorable characters accessories for Legally Blonde;
of turn-of-the-century cinema, the photographer Emma Summerton;
wardrobe has become synonymous costume designer and stylist
with the personality. “Costume Arianne Phillips (second from
design intrinsically creates character,” right) with her team.
Oscar-nominated costume designer
Arianne Phillips says.

For our September portfolio, Vanity
Fair tapped Phillips and photographer
Emma Summerton to reimagine nine
of our favorite films of the era through
a contemporary lens—with next-gen
standouts playing the leads. The
concept: a glimpse behind the scenes at
classic screen tests; hair and makeup,
lighting, actors reading lines between
takes—all the elements that come
together to define the role before
filming begins.

Fourteen young stars, 25 trunks of
clothing, more than 100 pairs of shoes,
and countless accessories later, the
nostalgia was in full force. “On the day
of the shoot, we really went with
the vibe of what the talent were doing,”
says Summerton. Keke Palmer, cast
as Legally Blonde’s Elle Woods, was
all about embodying the character’s
attitude. Patrick Schwarzenegger
embraced his inner American Psycho
“to the point where he was kinda
scary,” says Summerton.

The films featured in our portfolio,
from The Royal Tenenbaums to Moulin
Rouge! to Love & Basketball, span
comedy to musical to romance, but
they have this in common: All nine
original costume designers were
women—including Phillips (Hedwig
and the Angry Inch, 2001). For Phillips,
honoring those original designs lent
this portfolio special meaning: “It’s
less about re-creating and more about
paying homage, celebrating the
work of all of these female costume
designers,” Phillips says. n

24 VA N I T Y FA I R SEPTEMBER 2021

The
CHYPRÉ
Fragrance Family



VA N I T I E S
VANITAS VANITATUM

H A I R , N I K K I N E L M S ; M A K E U P , W I L L I A M S C O T T ; M A N I C U R E , E R I I S H I Z U ; S E T D E S I G N , M AT T J AC K S O N . P R O D U C E D O N LO C AT I O N BY B A D G A L P R O D U C T I O N S ; LO C AT I O N , E L K S T U D I O , B R O O K LY N . F O R D E TA I L S , G O T O V F. C O M / C R E D I T S . ELLA EMHOFF

is a model second
daughter

PAGE 30

A NEW LEASE ON
NIGHTLIFE

PAGE 34

STACKS OF FLATS!

PAGE 36

BEAUTY TIPS
FROM THE PEN15

CREATORS

Dress by Dior.
Throughout: hair products

by Maui Moisture;
makeup products by
Shiseido; nail enamel by
Chanel Le Vernis. Styled
by Nicole Chapoteau.

VA N I T Y FA I R PHOTOGRAPHS BY QUIL LEMONS SEPTEMBER 2021 27

Vanities /Opening Act

One in a Million

A new Aaliyah
biography takes a hard look

at old narratives.

Purls of Clothing by Salvatore “This is a book by an Aaliyah COVE R CO U R TE S Y O F P U BL I S H E R . E D DI E O TC H E RE . F O R DE TAI LS , G O TO VF. CO M / C RE D IT S .
Ferragamo; slippers by fan, for the Aaliyah fans,”
WISDOM writes music journalist
Proenza Schouler; Kathy Iandoli in Baby Girl:
Knitwear designer, model, bracelet by Panconesi; Better Known As Aaliyah
and meme queen ELLA EMHOFF rings by Bottega Veneta. (Atria). Even 20 years after
has style to spare the singer’s death in a plane
“It’s probably just going to be Ella Emhoff.” crash, Aaliyah has continued
Ella Emhoff, daughter of second gentleman THIS ISN’T how she expected to get into to impact music, fashion,
Doug Emhoff and stepdaughter of Vice modeling, “which I think makes it all kind and culture. But in a time of
President Kamala Harris, caught the nation’s of more exciting.” She got her first offers reexamination, Iandoli saw
attention thanks to her now infamous Miu on Instagram and had done a few smaller an opportunity to “really
Miu inauguration coat and a moment of projects before her exposure catapulted hold a magnifying glass to
unplanned eyebrow wiggling toward Mike her to top designers’ attention. the narrative and show
Pence. Since then, Emhoff has graduated PARIS COUTURE WEEK was her first “semi- who she was: an incredible
from Parsons, launched her first knitwear live” modeling gig, for Balenciaga, following talent, an incredible singer
collection, and signed with IMG Models. her pandemic virtual runway debut for and songwriter, and a
From her Fashion Week lodgings in Paris, Proenza Schouler in February. “I’m nervous, survivor,” says the writer,
Emhoff is carefully mum about all things because I am not really good at walking referring to Aaliyah’s secret
Momala but candid about her newfound in heels,” she said prior to the show. marriage, at 15, to R. Kelly,
notoriety and her own future in politics. SHE CONFIRMS she is dating Samuel Hine, an who is now facing trials
editor at GQ, and describes her perfect date for, among other charges,
SHE SPENT her childhood in Los Angeles as a stop at the market, buying the wackiest widespread sex-related
biking around the Venice canals but “didn’t produce, and figuring out what to cook with crimes. “She was always
feel like I was able to fully grow into myself it. She also insists on adding soft-boiled eggs so gentle and delicate
until I moved to New York.” when and wherever possible. and angelic,” Iandoli says,
HER MOM taught her how to knit at a ON POLITICS: “My dad asks me very often, ‘So “but that woman was
Disneyland hotel when she was a child. Her have you reconsidered law school?’ And made of steel.”
capsule collection (with Batsheva Hay) I keep saying, ‘Doug, not happening. I’m going
launched this spring, with hopes of a full line: to leave it to you, and I will be the artist.’ ” —Kia D. Goosby
SHE’S READY for a new style. “I am growing
28 VA N I T Y FA I R my hair out. Heard it here first. It had its Aaliyah, photographed in the
moment, and I want to move on from the mid-’90s, from Baby Girl.
mullet. I’m ready for the big curly mane.”
BUT SHE STILL LOVES her inauguration outfit.
“I still dream about that coat, but I feel like if
I ever wore that [again], it would just be like,
‘Really? We get it.’ ” —Brit t Hennemuth

THE SMARTEST AIRBNBS
TO RENT IN THE UK

AS SELECTED BY CONDÉ NAST TRAVELLER’S EDITORS
BOOK NOW AT CNTRAVELLER.COM/GALLERY/BEST-AIRBNBS-UK

PHOTOGRAPH: TAYLOR & PORTER

Vanities /Trending 3. SCHOOL OF ROCK
2. 1. Berluti jacket, £5,450.
1. (berluti.com/en-gb)
2. Celine Homme by
4. 5. Hedi Slimane necklace, PAR K E R P OS E Y : E V E RE T T CO L L EC T I O N . M I C HAE L KO R S , AR MAN I , R AL P H L AU RE N : L IAM G O O D MAN ; S T YL I N G,
£1,400. (celine.com/ E L I Z A B E T H G O U R L AY. A L L O T H E R S : C O U R T E S Y O F T H E B R A N D S / W E B S I T E S .
 Night MOVES 6. en-gb) 3. Michael Kors
Collection dress, £2,650.
We’re going out again! (michaelkors.com)
But party girls and boys can 4. Giorgio Armani
trade “going out tops” for Beauty Lip Power lipstick in
sky-high platforms, glitter, 500, £33. (armanibeauty
and chrome .co.uk) 5. Prada boots,
£1,300. (similar color
available at prada.com/
gb/en) 6. Swarovski
earrings, £239. (swarovski
.com/en_GB-GB)
7. Chanel Ombre
Première Laque liquid eye
shadow in Lamé Ivoire,
£28. (chanel.com/gb)
8. Ralph Lauren
Collection bag, £1,500.
(ralphlauren.co.uk)
9. Emporio Armani shirt,
£470. (selected Emporio
Armani boutiques)
10. Saint Laurent by
Anthony Vaccarello skirt,
£1,020. (ysl.com/en-gb)
11. Valentino Beauty
Eye2Cheek blush
and eye shadow, £45.
(selfridges.com)

7.

8.

10. 9.
11.
Parker Posey dances toward this century in
Party Girl (1995).

30 VA N I T Y FA I R

DAVID OLIVER The List

OUR INDISPENSABLE ONLINE
GUIDE TO THE DESIGN WORLD

Featuring the best interior designers,
architects, landscape gardeners
and artisanal suppliers

VISIT US AT

thelist.houseandgarden.com

Vanities /The Gallery

Warm FUZZIES

When Fendi launched the baguette in 1997, it became not only an It bag,
but a founding artifact of fashion It-dom. Carrie Bradshaw toted it all around

Sex and the City; Paris Hilton took it to the clubs. A couple of decades later,
Fendi family matriarch and accessories director Silvia Venturini Fendi has given

the bag a makeover fit for a new moment—a swath of textural shearling
and a double shoulder strap—and sent it down the runway alongside the debut

ready-to-wear collection from the house’s newly appointed artistic director,
Kim Jones. To quote one of those early adopters: “That’s hot!” —Daisy Shaw-Ellis

Fendi Multi Baguette F O R D E TAIL S , G O TO V F. CO M / C RE D IT S .
handbag in shearling,
£3,100. (fendi.com/gb) PHOTOGRAPH BY PAU L KOOI K E R SEPTEMBER 2021

32 VA N I T Y F A I R

I N D E XTHE INTERIORS

The Interiors Index is The World of Interiors’ definitive
online directory of shops, galleries and services.

Find specialists whose ethos of quality and style
mirrors that of the magazine itself.

worldofinteriors.co.uk/interiors-index

Vanities /Books & Flats

Slip STREAM

Last time the ballet flat reigned, it was paired with black skinny jeans.
Might we suggest a good book instead? By Keziah Weir

1. BEAUTIFUL WORLD, 1. 2. MATRIX 3. IN THE COUNTRY
WHERE ARE YOU Lauren Groff OF OTHERS
Sally Rooney In this bildungsroman Leila Slimani
Doubling down on about the real-life After World War II,
relationship excavation, 12th-century poet Marie married couple Amine
Rooney’s newest depicts de France, a teenage (who is Moroccan) and
a year in the life of two Marie is exiled to a blighted Mathilde (French) settle in
friends—an editor and a Benedictine nunnery, Amine’s home country,
reluctantly famous author where she finds strength where they navigate the
(ahem!)—and the men and power as a prioress. oppressive French colonial
they love. (Faber & Faber) (William Heinemann) regime. (Faber & Faber)

The Row, £690 Dior, £918 Roger Vivier, £820
(therow.com/gb) 2. (dior.com/en_gb) (selected Roger
Vivier stores)

4.

3.

5.

4. THE ARCHER 5. HARLEM 6. POET WARRIOR P R O P S T Y L I S T : S H A R O N R YA N
Shruti Swamy SHUFFLE Joy Harjo
In Bombay, motherless Colson Whitehead In her second memoir,
Vidya discovers Kathak; Manhattan furniture 6. completed during the
the lyrical dance form dealer Ray Carney, pandemic, the United
brings meaning to her dreaming of a classic six States’s first Native
life as she wrestles with for his growing family, American poet laureate
expectations that she falls into a hotel heist gone threads personal stories
become a certain kind wrong. The gloriously of music and poetry with
of wife and mother pulpy plot unfurls against references to the power
herself. (Algonquin) activist-awakened 1960s of breath. (Norton)
Harlem. (Fleet)
Chanel, £890 (selected Mansur Gavriel, £325
Chanel boutiques) Salvatore Ferragamo, £535 (mansurgavriel.com)
(ferragamo.com/shop/gb/en)

34 VA N I T Y FA I R PHOTOGRAPH BY STUART TYSON

Chloé patchwork Vanities /The Gallery
embroidery trench
coat, £45,332; boots, Bonjour
£1,325; and belt,
£460. (chloe.com/gb) JEUNESSE

M A K E U P P R O D U C T S , C H A N E L ; H A I R A N D M A K E U P , K AT H I N K A G E R N A N T ; W I G A N D C O LO R I N G, M AG DA L E N A LOZ A ; M O D E L , A N I N E VA N V E L Z E N . F O R D E TA I L S , G O TO V F. C O M / C R E D I T S . It may be a relative youngster among
French fashion houses, but Chloé

has had nearly 70 years of generation-
defining designers, from the house’s

socially conscious founder Gaby Aghion
to Karl Lagerfeld in the ’70s and

Phoebe Philo in the early 2000s. Now,
for her first collection as creative

director, Gabriela Hearst has shaped
the brand in her vision, with nods to

classic Chloé codes (scalloped details)
and her Uruguayan background (rich
leather and patchwork embroidery). But
the biggest impact may be Hearst’s
commitment to sustainability: She has

eliminated polyester and put on a
carbon-offset show in pursuit of what she

calls “honest luxury.” —Kia D. Goosby

PHOTOGRAPH BY PAU L KOOI K E R SEPTEMBER 2021 35

Vanities /Test Drive

You Go,GIRLS

The teen BFFs of PEN15 BUDDY ICONS
moonlight as our beauty Above: Maya and Anna
correspondents (played by show cocreators
Maya Erskine and Anna
You don’t need to have been a middle Konkle). Right: ready for
schooler in the era of dial-up internet to the school dance.
understand PEN15, the Hulu comedy
that follows two best friends, Anna and ABOUT FACE MATTE FIX LIP PENCIL
Maya, through the awkward odyssey
of puberty. The show’s pitch-perfect “Basically this is the color of some people’s
details—AIM chats on circa-2000 actual lips, so for them it will not even show up.
desktops, lip gloss over braces—conjure But I would suggest doling out the moola. Let’s
a time of so much change, both bodily just say it glides on smooth. My old babysitter
and cultural. An animated special who loved Madonna would have sold me to
lands in late August, a shift in format someone for it. The inside of her lips never
that recalls a popular series from that matched the outline, and this was on purpose.
period, Daria. The gimmick of PEN15, For her, I would most definitely recommend it.
though, is that its cocreators and Five stars.” —Anna (£13; aboutface.com)
stars, Anna Konkle and Maya Erskine,
who play teens, are 30-somethings HERBIVORE AQUARIUS PORE
(and new moms) IRL. For these pages, PURIFYING CREAM “According to
the women step into character
specially for V.F., assuming the role astrologers, a Taurus (I’m a Taurus) and Aquarius
of la-di-da magazine writers opining relationship isn’t the best match. But I decided
about the latest beauty products: to give this a try. It’s baby blue, though it does
fit for actual grown-ups or those not make your face blue. I put it on this dry spot
who just want to play the part. that will not go away with my usual moisturizer.
My mom thinks it’s ringworm, but she’s a b*tch,
—Laura Regensdorf jk. She’s just wrong. Anyway, it made the spot
less dry and felt warm and sexy. Five stars.”
—Maya (available in the U.S at sephora.com) “My old babysitter S T I L L S : A L E X LO M B A R D I / H U LU . P O L A R O I D : C O U R T E S Y O F M AYA E R S K I N E . P R O D U C T S : C O U R T E S Y O F B R A N D S .
who loved Madonna
would have sold me

to someone for it.”

—ANNA

TWEEZERMAN MOON DUST
SLANT TWEEZER “First impression,

love the sparkles. Since I don’t have any facial
hair, this isn’t something I normally need,
but if I did have a mustache or hairy brows,
the angular points would be really good at
grabbing unruly hairs. It actually doesn’t hurt,
I swear. Not that I tried. Just, like, what I think
based on looking at it. Five stars.” —Maya
(available in the U.S at tweezerman.com)

MARC JACOBS PERFECT INTENSE
PERFUME “When I asked the perfume

woman to try a spray at her counter, she looked
at me like I was a child playing house. She didn’t
think I had the dough or the sensibility for this
sophisticated ointment. Joke’s on her. I co-own
a magazine, girlfriend. The cologne hit me with
a smack of citrus, and then I wafted in wicked
great flowers and musk. All together it screams
cheddar and sex. I’ll take it. Charge it to my card.
Five stars.” —Anna (£85; The Perfume Shop)

36 VA N I T Y FA I R

“After a few more MILK MAKEUP ELECTRIC GLOSSY
minutes, my lips got LIP PLUMPER “K, really, really interesting.
bigger like Anna’s
when she wakes up.” They said spicy but, like, I didn’t feel anything, so
I put a hefty dose on my lips. They looked juicy
—MAYA like plump larvae. Soon they started to burn and
tingle, but in a way that feels good. After a
TOWER 28 BRONZINO BRONZER few more minutes, my lips got bigger like Anna’s
when she wakes up in the morning. Timing
“The case is clear, heavy plastic, and I like how it of burning: two minutes. Timing of big lips: I’d
feels in my fingers. A pale sight like me can use say 48 minutes. Timing of looking hot: all day.
as much sun-kissed shimmer as possible, so I pile Five stars.” —Maya (£21; selfridges.com)
it on. I’m blown away because I’ve applied layer
after layer, and it still looks natural. One thing, STARFACE XL STARS PIMPLE
though: It says ‘Bronzino’ on the back. Maybe it’s PATCHES “I’ve never had a pimple and don’t
a play on words, but my Grammy ordered this
from a restaurant once and it turned out to be think I ever will in life, but I would def wear
fish. So. Other than that, I seriously love it and these—highlighter-yellow patches that make my
will use it everywhere I can reach. Five stars.” face shine bright like a galaxy. To give them a full
—Anna (£18; cultbeauty.co.uk) review, I had to use all my senses. There was zero
smell. It tasted like nothing, so I’m almost positive
they’re just stickers. My stomach is kinda hurting
right now cuz I swallowed one by accident. But
yeah. Four stars.” —Maya (£11; starface.world)

GUCCI EYELINER “I usually do a line

of white above and below my lashes for special
occasions, like when I married Justin. (‘Anna
Timberlake’ made me feel like a woodsman, so
I kept my last name.) The light blue is a good
substitute for my usual one, and I love that it says
‘Gucci’ because it fits in with most things in our
house that are also this brand. Five stars. The truth
is, the purple brings out my under-eye circles.
Instead, we used it around Maya’s mouth because
we thought it’d be fun drama to make someone
think she drank all the grape juice without asking.
Despite the shimmer, they got pissed. Three stars.”
—Anna (£24; Selfridges stores)

LYLAS
A middle-school locker
or a home shared
with husband Justin
Timberlake: Both could
use a fresh stock of
eyeliner and perfume.

SEPTEMBER 2021 37

Vanities /Beauty

Sam Visser’s sweater by
Dior Men. Bryce Anderson’s shirt by Dior.

Styled by Nicole Chapoteau.

Universal GLAMOUR he smiles. But even that nod to the HAI R P RO D U C T S , AM I K A ; MAK E U P P RO D U C T S , D I O R ; HAI R , G O N N K I N OS H I TA ; MAK E U P , S AM V IS S E R ; M O D E L , BRYCE AN D E R S O N . F O R D E TAI L S , G O TO V F. CO M / C RE D I T S .
wide-leg ’90s-favorite denim brand— 1 : S A M V I S S E R . 4 : E VA N AG O S T I N I / I M AG E D I R E C T/ G E T T Y I M AG E S . 5 : F R A N C E S C O S C AV U L LO , VO G U E , 1 9 75 . 6 : C O U R T E S Y O F K E V Y N AU C O I N B E AU T Y. A L L O T H E R S : C O U R T E S Y O F D I O R B E AU T Y.
With an exacting eye and a circle of next-gen muses, enjoying a second life thanks to a boost
makeup artist SAM VISSER is filtering fashion nostalgia and from 20-somethings—mirrors Visser’s
aughts excess into a fresh slant By Laura Regensdorf affection for the outsize aesthetics of the
past. The word that comes up repeatedly
The actor Hari Nef flashed across the authorship is already clear to those as we speak is glamour. As in: “glamour,
Instagram feed on a weekend night in who’ve seen Kaia Gerber, Bella Hadid, glamour, glamour, glamour, glamour,”
June, at the close of the 2021 Tribeca and Euphoria’s Barbie Ferreira undergo he stresses. “I come from a generation
Film Festival. In the photo, her lipstick similar transformations. This new-guard where the attitude is so whatever, so
gleams like a newly minted penny. makeup is the work of Sam Visser. over it, very careless. But I want to care
Eye shadow in a shade of papaya turns too much. I love everything considered.”
up in deft, unexpected touches: tracing The California native, named Dior’s
the inner rim of the socket and dotting U.S. makeup artist ambassador earlier Born in November 1999, as the world
the lower lash beneath the iris. There’s this year, is a precocious force. In some braced for a would-be Y2K meltdown,
a feeling of archetypal elegance, but ways he’s in step with his peers. “I feel Visser is an apt intermediary between
in a way that elides rule. Arresting is the tuned in to the fact that social media is a analog exuberance and the digital age.
word: pulling the brakes on the habitual very present thing, that it’s a tool that In grade school, Visser absorbed the lo-fi
scroll. You can tap for the credits, but the we can use to our advantage,”says Visser. makeup tutorials of early YouTube.
“I wear JNCO jeans, so I am Gen Z,” On weekends, he escaped to the MAC
counter, designing looks on paper face
charts. At 12, during a visit to L.A.’s Make
Up For Ever store, he excitedly spotted
the makeup artist David Hernandez,
who invited Visser to shadow a shoot
with David LaChapelle. “That was kind
of my first taste of beauty,” Visser says.
“Before, it was all just on the screen of
the internet and never really in real life.”

But even a kid rooted in the online
world found some of his most lasting
influences in books: Makeup Your Mind
(2002) by François Nars and Kevyn
Aucoin’s iconic Making Faces (1997).
Dubbed the first celebrity makeup artist
for his camaraderie with the supers
(immortalized in behind-the-scenes
Polaroids and candid videos), Aucoin
had a way of quilting together references
and techniques, from silent-film brows
to drag-influenced sculpting. By
the time Visser was 16, he had taken
Aucoin’s lessons in hand, with clients
like Tish Cyrus; that year, Kris Jenner
hired Visser to do her daily makeup
(he finished high school by independent
study). The Kardashians steeped him
in another sort of dialed-up aesthetic—
the Gesamtkunstwerk of the always-on
reality TV persona. “They are the
modern version of what the Hollywood
stars were,” Visser says, “because they
get ready every single day for hours.”

38 VA N I T Y FA I R PHOTOGRAPH BY ANDY JACKSON

Time has a way of folding in on itself, Made to Last
with unlikely rhymes across decades. As
Visser has shifted his track—to editorial In Visser’s world, vintage photography and beauty books might
makeup, art projects, and experimental inspire the makeup for a zine, Y2K-era aesthetics get a softer spin, and
looks that he often shoots himself—the
Aucoin allusions have followed. (It helps smart formulas enable full-face transformations
that Visser’s circle includes a new cast
of supers, Cindy Crawford’s daughter 1.
included.) What feels fresh with Visser’s
crowd is the interplay of artist and muse, 2. 4.
with collaborators appearing on both
sides of the lens: photographer Nadia 3.
Lee Cohen wearing a molten gold lip 5.
in a portrait series from lockdown, or
Bryce Anderson (previous page) in 6.
shades of metallic seafoam and peach.
1. Designer ZiZi Donohoe in a high-contrast 7.
Anderson, a 20-year-old photographer look and portrait by Visser. 2. Dior Forever
and model, met Visser on set a couple Skin Glow foundation, £39. 3. Dior Rouge blush
of years ago. Now dating, the two share a
worldview along with a “crazy archive in 999, £36. 4. Paris Hilton in 2001.
at our house of special things that we’ve 5. A photograph by Francesco Scavullo, an
purchased,” says Anderson. He cites
a Francesco Scavullo book that inspired inspiration for Visser, in Vogue, 1975.
an upcoming zine of portraits for 6. Making Faces, the 1997 book by makeup icon
Behind the Blinds, with Visser lending
makeup in the spirit of ’70s legend Kevyn Aucoin. 7. Dior Rouge Dior metallic
Way Bandy. Neither sees their work as lipstick in 756 Panache, £32. (dior.com/en_gb)
nostalgic. Instead they want to create
worlds that transcend time and TikTok
attention spans and even fashionable
notions of gender fluidity. “For Sam, he
always says, ‘Makeup is just makeup,’ ”
Anderson tells me. “It’s not like, ‘Ooh,
you’re making me a woman.’ It’s,
‘You’re just making me beautiful,’ and
that’s always been our philosophy.”

The current thirst for circa-2000 style
feeds into that pool of references. Visser
looks back on the time of his birth as
having a reflection of the ’60s—“but
instead of going to the moon, we were
going into the internet,” he says. “All
the makeup ads became very metallic,
and everything was shiny and sparkly.”
In this look on Anderson, there’s a hint
of cyber-pop: a Paris Hilton frosted
lip, pastel shadow on Britney Spears. But
it’s more a present-tense proposition:
out of the internet and into a stylized
dream reality. Visser sees his work as
“almost punk,” in a way—a rogue
departure from the barefaced beauty
aesthetic that we’ve lately come
to expect. In another 20 years, that’s
what he hopes people look back on:
“that glamour is an act of rebellion.”

SEPTEMBER 2021 39

Vanities /Dining

Below: Jason Priestley
and an unidentified
dinner date wait for a
taxi post-Nobu in 1999.

From top: The mezzanine
view of Miami’s Komodo,
2021’s answer to late-’90s
excess; revelers at Moomba
in 1999, shot by Larry Fink.

AreYou ON THE LIST? expression of this style would land KO M O D O : C O U R T E S Y O F G RO O T H O S P I TA L I T Y. M O O M BA : L A R RY F I N K . P R I E S T L E Y : AR NAL D O M AG N AN I / G E T T Y I M AG E S .
comfortably between plexiglass dividers I L LU S TR ATI O N BY M IC HAE L H O E WE L E R . M O M OS É : SAM MY FA ZE .
New York’s turn-of-the-century clubby restaurants and stumbling home at 6 a.m.
changed social dining forever. The boom is back—and
in hot new locales By Gabe Ulla A number of the owners of these
late-’90s venues blurring the line
At first, Ruth Reichl doesn’t remember Splashy restaurants open, most between club and restaurant came from
Moomba. “But I looked up my review, of them close, people move on. Yet the world of discos and bars. Moomba
and it all came back to me,” the iconic Moomba provides a window into co-owner Jeff Gossett had previously
writer says of the Greenwich Village a weird and weirdly influential era in manned the door at Bowery Bar and Spy.
restaurant that represented the pinnacle New York dining that tends to get “So many people in their 20s got sick of
of New York City nightlife at the overshadowed by the great restaurant the clubs and began going to restaurants,”
close of the last millennium. Laurence boom of the early 2000s. With Giuliani Gossett told The Independent at the
Fishburne and Oliver Stone were wielding an obscure cabaret law in time. “They didn’t want to be with
investors. The Hilton sisters were always his quest to stamp out fun anywhere it 16-year-olds taking ecstasy and being
there. In 1998, Leonardo DiCaprio could be found, establishments like frisked at the door. I stopped seeing
visited four times in a single week. What Moomba offered a less rambunctious them. Now I’m seeing them again.”
Reichl remembers is that “it was dark, but no less exclusive night on the
crowded, loud, and uncomfortable.” town. Framed in today’s terms, the ideal In 1995, Reichl awarded three stars
in her New York Times column to a
Japanese-Peruvian restaurant in Tribeca
with no tablecloths, plenty of house
music, and partners who included
former Studio 54 gatekeeper Richard
Notar: the original Nobu, on the corner
of Hudson and Franklin. “You didn’t
want to be put out to pasture and you
didn’t want champagne spilled on
you, either,” says Notar of the dining
style Nobu helped pioneer. The
restaurant, which opened in 1984, was
still the place to be toward the end
of the decade as buzzy spots like Asia
de Cuba, Moomba, and Balthazar
debuted. Each, at some point, had a
doorman. Some created private

40 VA N I T Y FA I R

reservations hotlines for A-listers. the neon-lit entryway is intended to Freed Up
Moomba chef and founding partner look like the coat check at a nightclub.
Frank Falcinelli recalls that staff Every day promptly at 5 p.m., which is Julia Momosé serves luscious
would communicate via headset to keep when Cote opens, the subwoofer begins drinks, no booze needed.
tabs on the latest notable arrival. “It asserting itself. The venue is one
was like we were in the Secret Service: of many brash restaurants that cropped Chicago-based bartender Julia
‘Madonna’s here in five!’;  ‘Jacqueline up in South Florida during the Momosé does not miss the days
Schnabel is back for dinner!’; ‘Prince pandemic, including outposts of New when customers would ask for
showed up and wants to spin records!’ ” York’s Carbone and Austin’s Uchi, nonalcoholic options “almost like
and Grutman’s latest, Strawberry Moon, they were apologizing to us.”
“You can play up the exclusivity with partner Pharrell Williams. In Things have changed for the better,
and that can keep you busy for a little creating Cote, founder Simon Kim says she says, as she and her peers
while,” says Notar, “but for it to last, he wanted to marry his fine-dining explore the world of “spirit-free
you have to have something to back training with the revelry he developed drinks”—her preferred term—
it up.” From Nobu Matsuhisa’s widely a taste for as a UNLV undergrad: with verve. Now, Momosé believes,
cribbed catalog to the atmospheric “You can get lit here, but it’s the highest “the notion of going out and not
language created by architect David level of hospitality.” drinking has never been more
Rockwell, Nobu would inform electric acceptable.” At Kumiko in the West
restaurants for decades: The DNA Moomba NYC shut down months Loop, Momosé’s work in the
runs through current mainstays like before 9/11; its L.A. follow-up lasted category ranks among the country’s
Morimoto and Tao, and the very only a little longer. “From one day to best. Instead of straining to imitate
Moomba-like work of Amy Sacco—but the next, the whole thing looked a Negroni or gin and tonic, she
also in any takeout menu with a dish gauche,” Falcinelli recalls. Though the focuses on “the sensation the
combining yellowtail and jalapeño. action in Miami seems to suggest less drink should deliver.” She proudly
soul searching today than took place remembers a pairing for a rye
For a contemporary display of fin two decades ago, Notar believes that pasta with butter and truffles: She
de siècle spirit, it’s hard to surpass attitudes have changed. “Now if you toasted and steeped some barley,
Miami. Komodo, a big box in Brickell, call and they tell you they are fully and then infused the “tea” with
is a collaboration between club owner booked,” he says, “you might just look baking spices, buds the flavor of
David Grutman and Asia de Cuba at your spouse and say, ‘Okay, honeysuckle, and a banana
founder Jeffrey Chodorow. At the Korean maybe we’ll try again another day.’ ” peel syrup. Momosé served the
steak house Cote, in the Design District, drink in a whiskey glass. “You
are only limited when you work
CHEERS! Orlando Franklin, head bartender at in the shadow of the alcoholic
Brooklyn lounge-with-dancing Nightmoves, presents version.” And with the help of
a ’20s take on that old ’90s standby: the cosmo Momosé’s forthcoming book
The Way of the Cocktail, or author
0.25 oz. 1.5 oz. Julia Bainbridge’s recent hit,
Clear Creek The Street Good Drinks, you can most
Cranberry Pumas definitely try it at home. —G.U.
Liqueur Vodka

0.25 oz. 0.5 oz.
Elsewhere Cointreau
Strawberry
Rhubarb
Aperitivo

0.75 oz. lime juice 0.25 oz. cane syrup

Add all ingredients to a mixing tin, shake, and strain into
a well-chilled coupe or Nick & Nora glass. Enjoy.

SEPTEMBER 2021 41

Vanities /Pushing the Button

 Navel-GAZING

When baring your soul
meant baring your midriff

By Sonia Saraiya

I
I SUPPOSE BRITNEY Spears’s belly button
is where it begins. Life, after all, begins never so aware of it until I saw Britney Spears. She was brazenly toying with KEVIN MAZUR/WIREIMAGE/GETTY IMAGES.
at the navel—that vestige of our time Spears’s. Mine was a little divot in my sexual maturity and the scraps of
in the womb, the scar of our severed round stomach, as if my stomach was girlhood, sending the country into a
connection to our mothers, the center the event horizon of my navel’s black frenzy for pinpointing exactly what
of our earthly forms, an opening on the hole. Britney’s was a playful little indent might turn it on.
underside of our fleshy, vulnerable in her impossibly narrow stomach, a
bellies. Navels collect debris—snacking, flat slab of tanned muscle gyrating “I’m Not a Girl, Not Yet a Woman”
apparently, as they peek out from under below a sports bra and above baggy didn’t come out until 2001, but
our clothes. When you look down they pants in the music video for “…Baby that song’s paradoxical title is the
stare right back up, mouths open in One More Time.” It peeked out almost essence of Britney’s sexual appeal, the
perpetual surprise: O brave new world. by accident, as if the teen Britney had uncomfortable line she danced on for
overnight outgrown her little-girl years. That gray area lasted longer than
It’s a question of some theological clothes. That 1998 music video is a any of us could have imagined: This
controversy as to whether Adam and semiotic minefield, with Spears in summer Britney testified that for 13
Eve had navels—there are those who pigtails and lipstick, pink poufs in her years, she has been under an “abusive”
believe their prehistoric torsos were hair, dancing through the halls of a legal conservatorship that curtails her
smoothly intact. That sounds pleasing, high school in a deconstructed school independence, telling a judge, “I just
except when one is confronted with uniform. The belly button spoke of want my life back.” But when I became a
one of those rare folks without a belly childlike nudity—a kid running through teenager it was undeniably her moment,
button. Something feels off, and one a sprinkler, exposed but carefree. But it and her power held us all in thrall.
longs for the wabi-sabi pucker denoting also winked knowingly, undulating like
human symmetry. Karolina Kurkova, a belly dancer’s, suggesting other And when I say power, what I mean is,
the supermodel, barely has a visible crevices, inviting a different sort of play. her belly button. Early on, Britney never
navel because of a surgery when she I had pigtails, lipstick, and even a did a video without flaunting her navel,
was an infant, and that rarely goes school uniform, but even though I was even in “Lucky,” which is partially set in
without comment in her line of work. sucking in my stomach to imitate her, it a nostalgic movie star era. She’d pull up
(In the past, a stranger’s navel has been was immediately obvious to me that the bottom of her top and pull down the
photoshopped onto her stomach.) I would never, could never, be Britney
I watched a reality program where a Performing at the MTV VMAs in 2001, Britney
woman lamented how a tummy tuck had Spears embraced her “exotic” influences.
robbed her of her belly button. She was
in a surgeon’s office asking to get it back.
Sure it was a scar, but it was her scar.

I had a navel before 1998, but I was

42 VA N I T Y FA I R SEPTEMBER 2021

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Vanities /Pushing the Button

waistband of her pants if she had to. Beckham. In the following year’s Love agents of the machines) have cornered
Her belly button invited a carefully Actually, writer-director Richard Curtis Keanu Reeves in an interrogation room.
calibrated intimacy to an orifice was reportedly so taken by her bare When he gives them lip, his lips fuse
sandblasted clean of human grime, midriff that he asked the costumers to together. As he tries to scream, the
but it was intimacy nonetheless. It also design her wedding dress to showcase agents tear open his shirt and hold him
suggested a whiff of the sumptuous it. A bridal crop top was apparently down so a skittering, buglike machine
foreign while remaining grounded in considered, but eventually they went can burrow into his navel. It’s an
Britney’s southern-accented, mall- the translucent route. unsettling torture, but given the tensions
friendly, small-town appeal. of the movie, a device nestling into the
The enticing navel invariably umbilicus foreshadows how machines
At the MTV VMAs in 2001 she leaned belonged to the same kind of belly—a have taken over human reproduction.
into her so-called “exotic” influences, flat, white, female one, often underage. It ends up being a subtle commentary:
moving onto the stage oiled and tousled And achieving the Britney bod took the horror of the invasion of the navel,
with an albino Burmese python draped some doing. Already a svelte dancer, a digital metaphor for navel-gazing,
over her shoulders. Her backup dancers, Spears herself had to shift her diet to and even a gender reversal, where it’s
many dark-skinned, lurked around her, steamed vegetables. Famously— a man’s navel that is revealed.
daubed with something like war paint. hauntingly!—she did something like
Rhinestones and scarves bedecked her 1,000 crunches a day. As the navel Twenty years later the navel-gazing
hips. And in the center was her navel, emerged, so too did the cottage of the ’00s feels shallow—an obsession
fishhooked with a prominent piercing, industry of getting midriff-baring abs with the pert belly button of youth when
glinting under the stage lights. and achieving the paradox of “toned what’s truly enticing about the navel is
but not too toned.” its universality and flexibility, how it
IN 1993, AFTER Alicia Silverstone pierced ebbs and flows with our bodies. But even
her navel as an act of defiance in the Despite its suggestion of the today we’re haunted by the Britney bod,
video for Aerosmith’s “Cryin’ ” and counterculture, with that soupçon of of course. Kim Kardashian, who has
Naomi Campbell and Christy Turlington Piercing Pagoda rebellion, the turn a pierced navel, went public about the
flaunted navel rings on runways, the expensive ultrasound-and-laser
belly became a fixture of the one-world, I became a treatments intended to “tighten” her
New Age ’90s. Fiona Apple, TLC, and teen in Britney’s belly button area after pregnancy.
Sinéad O’Connor all bared theirs. moment, and HER Beyoncé did not share much about her
POWER held us all reportedly grueling workout regimen
But once Britney claimed the navel, when she showed off her post-baby body
its tenor changed. It wasn’t vulnerable in thrall. And on the cover of Shape in 2013—but she
in its nakedness, it was powerful— when I say power, made sure to showcase her flat stomach,
especially when packaged with low-rise I mean her BELLY adorned with a jeweled piercing. Even
jeans, a “whale tail,” where the Britney is haunted by her own taut belly.
of-the-moment thong crept up past BUTTON. In the tumultuous years following her
the waistline, and a “tramp stamp” superstardom, whenever her stomach
lower-back tattoo to seal the deal. The of the millennium navel wound up displayed a hint of softness, the tabloids
fact that teenage girls were encouraged reinforcing the status quo. There’s often couldn’t get enough of it. Now, she
to empower themselves by embracing a fluid squishiness to a belly dancer’s alleges, the conservatorship won’t allow
their sexuality reveals how sneakily the stomach or a well-worn pooch over her to have another baby. Britney is
interests of the presumed male the drawstring securing an Indian literally struggling to reclaim her belly.
observer trumped the girls in question. lehenga. In Japan, festivals find men and
Ironically, Britney’s navel had power, women turning their torsos into big In the ’00s we claimed to be revealing
but she didn’t. faces, drawing exaggerated mouths our navels, but I think we were too
atop the navels. The ’00s-era bared afraid to really see them for the strange
Witness how 1999’s American Beauty navel may have suggested only freedom, shape-shifters they are. But they,
slavers over Mena Suvari’s belly. The but it ultimately became another kind and we, are still here. My own navel
image on the poster isn’t in the film, of stricture. stretched so much during my pregnancy
but the demure sensuality, beckoning that it awkwardly became an outie; now,
the male viewer, is potent nonetheless. There’s a pivotal belly button scene even though it’s back to its original
In the movie, she’s being ogled by in 1999’s The Matrix. The bad guys (the form, I can see all the way into it, where
Kevin Spacey, and the target of this the edges of that wound sealed together.
teen sexuality, as with Britney’s It’s only a plug of scar tissue from my
videos, is the male audience member, mom, revealed to me as I became a
encouraged to look but unable to mom. But it took a few decades to get
touch. Keira Knightley, and her to the bottom of it. n
navel, broke out in 2002’s Bend It Like

44 VA N I T Y FA I R SEPTEMBER 2021

CONDENASTJOHANSENS.COM

TIVOLI CARVOEIRO, ALGARVE, PORTUGAL

Vanities /Legacy Media 8. HAMILTON
NOLAN
Gawker STALKER
One of Gawker’s
The kids once shooting spitballs at the media establishment have longest-serving
taken it over By Michael Calderone writers, Nolan
chronicled the media
business—and, by
organizing the
site’s staff, helped
set off a wave of
unionization across
the industry. Nolan
now covers labor
for In These Times.

LAUNCHED IN 2002, Manhattan-obsessed Gawker Hulk Hogan, Gawker’s influence, and that of 1 . H E N RY S . DZ I E K A N I I I / G E T T Y I M AG E S . 2 . PAU L B R U I N O O G E / PAT R I C K M c M U L L A N V I A G E T T Y I M AG E S . 6 . C R A I G B A R R I T T/ G E T T Y I M AG E S F O R T H E N E W YO R K E R . 9. G E T T Y I M AG E S . 1 1 . PAU L A R C H U L E TA / G E T T Y I M AG E S . 1 2 . C O U R T E S Y O F L E A H F I N N E G A N .
became the flagship of a sprawling digital media hell-raising siblings like Deadspin, Jezebel, and 1 4. H U T TO N S U PAN C I C / G E T T Y I MAG E S F O R S X S W. 19. A MAN DA E DWAR D S / G E T T Y I M AG E S . 2 2 . CO U R T E S Y O F D O DA I S T E WA R T.
empire promising blunt takes and inside dope on Gizmodo, is evident by turning on HBO or opening
everything from tech to politics, sports to video the New York Times. As a new owner tries reviving
games. Though killed off by a Peter Thiel–funded the Gawker brand, here’s how its tentacles have
lawsuit over publication of a sex tape starring spread throughout media and entertainment.

LOS ANGELES 5. KARA 9. JOHN COOK
BROWN
18 Getting tailed by
Having explored Roger Ailes didn’t
SAN race, culture, and stop Cook from
FRANCISCO celebrity as a senior probing Fox News
writer at Jezebel, and other power
1. NICK 10 16 5 Brown is now making centers for Gawker—
DENTON her mark on the a path he’s continued
13 19 11 TV world, writing as investigations
Since selling his for Grown-ish, editor at Insider,
gossip empire to AUSTIN In the Dark, and working alongside
Univision, the forthcoming Marvel deputy (and
enigmatic Gawker 3 series She-Hulk. ex-Gawker/Gizmodo
Media chief—whose reporter) J.K. Trotter.
SoHo loft was once 6. JIA
a mildly debauched TOLENTINO 10. A.J.
media party zone— DAULERIO
has cultivated an Starting at Awl sister
air of mystery around site The Hairpin After igniting a Brett
a possible next and later becoming Favre sexting scandal
act, hinting on Twitter a Jezebel deputy at Deadspin, he
about a future editor, Tolentino posted the Hulk
“story-making app.” gained a following Hogan sex tape that
for sharp-witted sunk Gawker in court.
2. CHOIRE 3. EVAN 4. JESSICA cultural commentary. The notoriously hard-
SICHA NARCISSE COEN Now a New Yorker partying Daulerio
staff writer, her essay has since shifted
His chatty and biting After covering the Choosing an collection, Trick gears, founding
style set the tone for dearth of cool education at Gawker Mirror, racked up recovery newsletter
early Gawker (and Black characters in over Columbia critics’ raves. the Small Bow.
much of the internet). video games and Journalism School,
After cofounding the necessity of Black the early era 7. CAITY 11. CORD
The Awl, where he Panther for Kotaku, editor in chief—and WEAVER JEFFERSON
cultivated a new Narcisse went on later top Jezebel
generation of wryly to write the Rise of the editor—went on From joining a Paula Taking home an
observant internet Black Panther series to lead newsrooms Deen cruise to Emmy last year (with
writers, he went and Spider Man: at Vocativ and gorging at T.G.I. Damon Lindelof),
legit, reshaping the Miles Morales game. Mashable before Fridays, the Gawker the former West
New York Times joining newsletter writer took stunt Coast editor has
Style section before juggernaut Morning journalism to sublime written for Watchmen,
returning to writing at Brew as chief new heights. Her Succession,
New York magazine. content officer. talents earned her a and—with former
gig writing cover editor in chief Max
stories for GQ before Read—conceived
the NYT Styles a Gawker-inspired
desk and magazine scripted show
scooped her up. called Scraper.

46 VA N I T Y FA I R

12. LEAH 16. EMMA 19. ANNA 20. ELIZABETH 21. EMILY
FINNEGAN CARMICHAEL HOLMES SPIERS GOULD

Even Denton bristled After playing key As the founding Gawker’s founding From gracing the
at the former feature roles throughout editor in chief of editor in chief went cover of the New
editor’s scathing Gawker Media— Jezebel, she on to helm the New York Times Magazine
posts. Now Finnegan Jezebel editor reinvented our idea York Observer under to debating Jimmy
is leading a in chief, managing of blogging. After then owner Jared Kimmel, Gould
relaunched Gawker editor of Gawker three years at Kushner, whose moved beyond just
under new owner and Deadspin— the helm, she held incompetence—as internet famous. The
(and past Jezebel Carmichael has high-ranking a media owner and original “confessional
and Valleywag written for Wyatt editorial roles at White House blogger,” who is also
target) Bryan Cenac’s Problem Fusion and Topic.com adviser—she’s quick half of an aughts
Goldberg, whom Areas and, along and now helps steer to point out. Spiers media-world couple
she’s already mocked with alum Leah the Obamas’ empire now heads (she’s married to
to the press. Beckmann, was also as EVP/creative progressive digital n+1 founder Keith
working on Scraper director at Higher strategy company Gessen), is the
13. ADRIAN before Apple Ground Productions. The Insurrection and author of the novels
CHEN pulled the plug. teaches media and Perfect Tunes and
innovation at NYU. Friendship—and
At Gawker, he took 17. RICHARD wrote a column in this
on 4chan trolls and LAWSON 7 22 issue! (See page 48.)
chronicled
Goatse—maybe Beginning his 12 22. DODAI
don’t look that up— Gawker writing 21 STEWART
before exploring career as anonymous 23
internet culture for commenter LolCait, 20 A distinctive Jezebel
The New Yorker as a Lawson jumped 1 voice in the early
staff writer. He’s since from ad sales to years, Stewart
left the magazine editorial and became led Splinter, a site
and is now working one of the site’s most carrying on the
on a book. popular contributors, Gawker flame until
chronicling shuttering itself in
14. PUJA PATEL contemporary 2019. The native New
celebrity culture with Yorker jumped to
Tackling everything absurdist flair. the Times as deputy
at Deadspin from And now he’s with metro editor and
Taylor Swift feminism us, as Vanity Fair’s now deputy editor for
to the etiquette of chief critic. Narrative Projects.
people sleeping with
their coworkers, the 18. OWEN 23. ALEX
former senior editor THOMAS PAREENE
became Spin’s top
editor before joining Dropping gossip Dropping out of
the Condé Nast bombs on tech NYU to write
stable as editor in titans—such as for D.C.-skewering
chief of indie “outing” Peter Wonkette—and
mainstay Pitchfork. Thiel—Thomas put serving as Gawker’s
the industry on editor in chief nearly
15. TOM edge as Valleywag a decade later—
SCOCCA managing editor the epically acidic
and has kept it Pareene now serves
A renowned Gawker in his sights while up incisive political
and Deadspin editor, serving as an analysis as a
Scocca also wrote on editor at Business staff writer at the
allegations against Insider, the San New Republic.
Bill Cosby (when Francisco Chronicle,
nearly no one else and now Protocol.
was) and argued for
snark over smarm. 2 17 NEW YORK CITY
He launched Hmm 14
Daily before 9
becoming Slate’s
politics editor. 4

86
15

SEPTEMBER 2021 47

Vanities /Novel-Gazing

 Dear JON The Fortress of Solitude created nostalgia Jonathan Franzen
for a pre-gentrification Brooklyn
Literary stardom ain’t what and made genre flourishes trendy. And Jonathan Lethem
it used to be By Emily Gould Franzen’s National Book Award–
winning The Corrections, portentously Jonathan Safran Foer
T published on September 1, 2001,
TIME WAS, IF you read books, you’d be traced Albert and Enid Lambert and demand 24/7 access to your mind and
hard-pressed to escape the Jonathans. their miserable adult children through soul and claim to be “like family,” which
Franzen, Lethem, Safran Foer: white over 570 action-packed pages. This is accurate in the darkest sense. The
American men hewing to a midcentury Midwestern clan came to stand for a fin competition for tenure-track MFA jobs is
model of novelist as public intellectual. de siècle way of life that the author so intense that candidates are virtually
Jonathan Ames, despite being named probably never intended to hold up as a clawing one another’s eyes out over the
Jonathan, is not a Jonathan. But Michael model, except of exactly how close close chance to move to, for example, Arizona.
Chabon is a Jonathan, and so is Jeffrey third-person narration can get. Though The other way authors used to make a
Eugenides. Franzen is the über- the golden age of the Jonathans is living was journalism. In 2021, that’s like
Jonathan, most apparently concerned far gone, the templates created by their
with protecting the citadel of fiction best sellers still sway how novelists
from populist encroachment. The books write, marketers market, and publishers
the Jonathans published between 1999 publish today.
and 2003 occupied that rarefied sliver
of the market where literary fiction Modern American book publishing
and huge cash cow overlap. This sliver began to take shape in the early 1900s.
is smaller now. The demographics Highly educated, overwhelmingly
have also been shifting, though not as male editors and agents did handshake
dramatically as you might imagine. deals over three-martini lunches at
One reason must be that publishing is the Century club, then went back to the
the most hidebound and retrogressive office and sexually harassed their
of all culture industries. The other secretaries. This continued until two
reasons are even more depressing. weeks ago, or maybe the late ’90s/
Back when the Jonathans first roamed early ’00s, when Bertelsmann bought
the earth, Amazon was just getting Random House, Viacom took control
its bearings, social media didn’t exist, of Simon & Schuster, and publishing
review coverage thrived, and it was started acting slightly more like
not remarkable to encounter an all-male a corporate industry than a perpetual
masthead or awards committee. Yale reunion. But lunches, while less
Safran Foer’s Everything Is Illuminated, boozy, are still the site of agents’ and
featuring a narrator named Jonathan editors’ most important work. Novels
Safran Foer who travels to Ukraine to can sell at auction for well upwards
discover his Jewish family’s tragicomic of a million, sometimes based on
history, presaged the recent autofiction little more than a hunch. The dearth
boom. Lethem’s Motherless Brooklyn and of market research prevents literature,
for now, from being packaged based
on algorithms, reverse engineered—
like an Olivia Rodrigo album or a
CBD soda in a lavender can—to appeal
to a specific demographic. But the
Vegas-style unpredictability increasingly
makes it impossible for novelists to
have careers as novelists.

Most authors have day jobs, which is
nothing new; Herman Melville worked
as a customs inspector. The difference
in 2021 is that traditional side careers
are less viable and also less “side.” My
50-plus-year-old friends worked as
typists and came home with creative
juice left in the tank. Employers today

48 VA N I T Y FA I R I L L U ST R AT I O N S BY R YAN Mc A M I S