It was a moment of fashion activism, but it wasn’t just about wearing black. The ones who got it right were the women who resisted plumage, cutouts and plunging décolleté. Frances McDormand in a don’t give a damn black crepe smock, Christina Hendricks in that fabulous trouser skirt hybrid, Greta Gerwig in simple, asymmetric black velvet and Zoe Kravitz in a perfectly understated column. “The fevered political rhetoric surrounding the Time’s Up injunction to wear black seemed to imply it would mean something more than solidarity of color alone,” writes Rhonda Garelick over at The Cut. “It seemed to imply a solidarity of refusal: an organized refusal by actresses — our birds of paradise — to wear their customary bright plumage. For glamorous film and television actresses to dress in black might have meant a voluntary tamping down of their star wattage in deference to the grave issues at hand. But that is not what happened. Rather than serving as a humbling or even a unifying agent, all that black fabric had simply been configured into the usual array of splashy, sexy, lavish, outrageous (and outrageously expensive) “statement” dresses — each one distinct, and clearly chosen not with collectivity in mind, not to “fly in formation,” as Holly Hunter suggested, but with the goal of showcasing the individual wearer and her assets.” Read the whole article here.
