Last February, Jennifer Lopez was considered – in no particular order – an up-and-coming actress, a singer with one hit album, a diva with training wheels, and a companion to Sean “Puffy” Combs.
What a difference a year makes.
And four yards of chiffon.
Her latest movie, “The Wedding Planner,” led the box office for two weeks and earned her a $9 million paycheck. Her album “J.Lo” debuted last month at the top of the Billboard charts. With that Lopez joins Whitney Houston and Barbra Streisand as the only women who have topped both the music and movie charts in the same week.
Oh, yes, and she’s no longer Puffy’s girlfriend.
What happened?
On Feb. 23, 2000, Lopez sashayed down a deep red carpet to the Grammy Awards ceremony wearing an ethereal creation by Donatella Versace. It made her a media star.
It also underscored the importance of dressing for the occasion – in this case, any awards ceremony that involves a red carpet, television cameras and millions of viewers. “A lot of people snicker and call fashion so shallow,” says Steven Cojocaru, West Coast style editor for People. “But the reality is you file fashion – in Hollywood and in the celebrity game – under image. It’s up there. It’s one of the main ingredients.”
Cher, Elizabeth Hurley and Sharon Stone would probably agree. They all wore clothing – debatable in the case of Cher – to awards ceremonies that won them lots of attention.
Before last year’s Grammys, says Cojocaru, Lopez “was an actress and a singer. That dress, I believe – and this is only my opinion – turned her into a media star. She was on the nightly news and it became part of the show and it was a moment in pop culture – and a moment that refuses to die.”
Why did that particular dress on Lopez create such combustion?
“First of all, it was the way she wore it,” says Jimmy Newcomer, a professor of fashion design at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. “Second of all, she’s a very beautiful woman with a very beautiful body. … She’s a celebrity. She’s in the public eye. She’s going to be on television. She’s going to make a big splash. She knows it’s good for her career.”
Or maybe, as Cojocaru believes, the timing was just right. “These things happen by accident. Yes, she could have engineered this. Yes, it could be calculating. But then it’s really up to the gods after that,” he says. “You know, you can put Christina Aguilera in beaded dental floss and she might not make the same splash. I believe it has to be all those ingredients combined. . . . The dress was the final piece of the puzzle.”
Whether or not donning that dress was a careermaker is debatable. “The dress can’t act. The dress can’t sing,” says Lopez’s publicist, Alan Nierob.
Adds Newcomer, “I think it was just another good move for the career. Let’s just say it kept it going. She was already known at the Academy Awards going back a couple years for wearing these skin-tight things that were cut very low in the back to emphasize her figure. . . . It’s just like Britney Spears wearing all those little tiny bras and very low-cut tight pants. That’s what we want to see these women in. We don’t want to see them looking like nuns. . . . So isn’t it fabulous that she can get away with it.”
“This helps her, but this is going to haunt her the rest of her life,” Cojocaru says. “That dress. The dress. You don’t even have to describe it. You just go Jennifer Lopez and you go: The Dress.”
In fact, knock-offs of “The Dress” have been worn since then by, among others, Lopez herself on a recent “Saturday Night Live” show and several men, including “South Park” creator Trey Parker (at last year’s Oscars) and “Today Show” host Matt Lauer (for Halloween).
Whether anyone will show up with a careermaking (or breaking) outfit at Wednesday night’s Grammys remains to be seen. Lopez won’t be there. She’s busy promoting her “J.Lo” album overseas and has no plans to stroll down an awards ceremony red carpet until the Academy Awards in late March.
“Fashionistas are in mourning,” Cojocaru says, “and I’m wearing black because I am very sad, because first of all, I don’t think anybody is going to top it.”
“That was just one of a thousand,” Newcomer adds. “That’s just part of being in the public eye and trying to get attention because you are sharing the stage with a couple of hundred people and you’ve got to make your name as important as theirs. So whether you’re Madonna or some up-and-coming rap star, you’ve got to try to get the public’s attention because if you do, they will buy your record just because they saw you in this exotic dress.”
Is there a reason for those hungry for fabulous fashion and fashion faux pas to tune into the Grammys?
“Madonna’s still carrying the torch. Madonna is up there with Cher — one of the great style setters of all time,” says Cojocaru, cautioning that “a major ingredient in this is shock value. So somebody who keeps doing the same thing — whatever — the shock value isn’t there. . . . The only person who seems to be able to maintain a consistent shock value is Cher. And she must have a special relationship with somebody. She must consult with a higher power. Maybe she is channeling Halston — or maybe Liberace.”
Don’t be surprised if someone does show up with an intriguing item, like the “Will it blow open or not” Versace worn by Lopez. It’s part of the plan.
“Those things were all taken care of,” says Newcomer, of Lopez’s taped-on-the-inside dress. “That’s not the first dress of that nature that has been manipulated so that we know that there won’t be accidents. And then there are also cases where maybe an accident is not such a terrible thing. If you go back to Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield, in those days, they would always have their little spaghetti strap on their dress loosened so that it would pop. . . . Please, that’s publicity. This is your career. Your career is how much space you get in the papers.”
And if it’s outrageous you want, count on the Grammys, not the Oscars.
“It’s very safe at the Oscars, I mean the Oscars is practically a librarians convention. Everything is so tasteful at this point because the fashion stakes are so high. The Grammys has a bit of a circus element,” Cojocaru says. “Lil’ Kim can show up holding two torches and nothing else and that’s fine because that’s the tone of the Grammys. It’s about anything goes, it’s rock ‘n’ roll, it’s music. Over-the-top is the dress code. It’s almost like a costume party. It’s not even about fashion anymore. . . . It’s much more eye candy. Definitely there are going to be shocks. There’ll be a sea of bad outfits.
“After the Grammys, it feels to me like I’ve had a good meal. I feel full and I’m purring,” he says. “After the Oscars, feels more like I’ve had Chinese food.”
