Don’t hate me but I did NOT know that Bob Mackie is still alive and available for comment! Bob Mackie is a still-living fashion designer/costumer, famous for creating iconic looks for Cher and many other men and women. He has a new coffee table book called The Art of Bob Mackie, full of vintage photos, sketches and insight into his iconic, over-the-top aesthetic. He chatted with Page Six to promote the book and he ended up being kind of shady about the Kardashians. Some quotes:
He just wanted to be in show business: “I’ve been in the business so long,” he said with a laugh, noting he knew it would be a “pretty big book.” “I’ve been doing this professionally for about 60 years, and that’s a lot of shows, a lot of costumes, a lot of stars. So I’ve been very lucky, and I feel so lucky even having the book. I love doing what I do. And you know, as a little kid, I always wanted to be in show business.”
He’s not keen on the Kardashians: “The Kardashians are very attractive and some are downright beautiful but they’re just famous for being famous. You know, they made a lot of money, so I guess there’s something to say about that. A couple of them really have copied Cher’s clothes just line for line, beat for beat, which is interesting. It’s like, whatever. I did those [designs] so many years ago that I don’t worry about them being copied or anything. It’s kind of a compliment, really.”
How he feels about Cher: “There is an amazing charisma with Cher. I could put anything on her and she was never intimidated by it. It was never too much or too little. She just loved getting dressed up. She had the most amazing figure and looked great in everything. And you know, everybody thinks she’s so tall and statuesque. [But] she’s only 5 foot 6 — that was it. Everybody thinks she was this tall, glamorous thing. She and Sonny [Bono] were the same height exactly, which I thought was interesting.”
Mackie also credits Cher with helping to change American beauty standards: He notes that before she became famous, the Hollywood ideal was “that blond kind of movie star, the Sandra Dees, the Debbie Reynolds — and then all of a sudden there was Cher with her larger nose and long beautiful black hair and her big eyes. … The whole idea of beauty changed drastically in that time, it really did.”
Kim Kardashian especially has been pretty open about how much she loves Cher and how much Cher inspires her, not just as a fashion icon and pop culture icon, but as a fellow Armenian-American woman. I haven’t really caught Kim copying Cher’s Bob Mackie style all that often, but then again I am not familiar with every piece in Mackie’s archives. I think that’s a legitimate criticism too, that the Kardashians copy other designers’ work and it should be discussed. But I get the feeling Mackie just think the Kardashians are super-tacky in general. Which, fair enough.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.
Cher circa “Turn Back Time” is Kourtney. Kourtney even has a fiancé who looks like a Cher boyfriend.
I did not realize that Cher is only 5’6, she really does look taller than that. I can see where he would say that some of those women have copied Cher, but I think it’s more of them copying the pop stars from the 90, and early 2000’s. Those artists designers definitely had Cher as a style influence .
Kim Kardasian lives for Cher; that’s her style and overall icon. They even did a professional photoshoot together where Kim was purposefully styled as 60s-70s Cher. Actually Kim’s wigs long wigs are a modern take on Cher’s famous long hair. She has dressed like her for Halloween as well.
Slightly OT: I don’t know if it’s available anywhere, but Cher’s mother and sister were fair blondes, and here she pop’s out with her father’s coloring. I have great admiration for Cher’s ability to parlay her insecurities about her coloring into being an icon. Fun fact: I’m old enough to say that I had a Cher doll. Yes, it was the 70’s.
The Kardashians created this “aesthetic” that is basically a mixed bag of cultural appropriation and some styles that suits their purpose of being sexy at all cost that now influence designer that want to be connected to them. Example: Balmain.
To tell you the truth, I didn’t know that Bob Mackie was still alive. I think he was on Oprah once with Cher talking about his designs for her.
I’ll probably get raked over the coals for this, but at some point people need to acknowledge that Kim Kardashian clearly hustled to get where she is, comments like “famous for being famous” make it sound like she is only where she is because of a sex tape. She might have gotten the initial notoriety from that and from her friendship with Paris Hilton, and she definitely got a bump in notoriety from her marriage to Kanye West, but a lot of her success is a product of work. No one handed her Skims, or KKW Beauty.
I’m not about to rake you over the coals, but I do think I will never credit Kim for being any kind of entrepreneur with SKIMS or KKW Beauty. We can never know for sure. But I don’t think any of those projects would have turned into profitable businesses without her established fame. Her businesses are famous because she is famous. To me it’s the same thing.
100% agree with you. There are hundreds of companies that create make-up and body/shapewear. Kim’s companies sell product because she is famous. There are probably better companies out there but they can’t get the pr she gets. Also, Kim is co-owner of SKIMS. The other owner is a Black Woman named Emma Grede, but that never gets mentioned. Emma is also co-owner of Good American (Khloe’s company). Now take a guess at who actually does the work? It ain’t the Kardashians.
The good news is you don’t need to guess, the Wall Street Journal had a nice write-up describing her involvement in Skims last fall. I thought it was a great article and tracks with what I’ve read about her from more serious outlets. I’m sure Emma Grede is hustling just as much, but it isn’t a zero sum game, they both can be hardworking, along with the rest of the Skims team.
I do think Kylie just sort of coasted with cash from Kris Jenner on the lip kits and overvalued her company to reach “billionaire” status, and maybe something similar was happening with KKW Beauty, not sure.
But Kim co-founded Skims with Emma Grede after getting the idea for the company based on her own experiences not fitting well in available products, and she has had an active role in product design and management since the beginning. Skims also is a good product. It has staying power, the company was valued at 1.6 billion and there isn’t any strong competition in that market.
I think a good comparison would be the Fenty brand. Sure, it wouldn’t have had as successful a launch without Rihanna’s fame backing it, but it is undeniable that Rihanna was a savvy businesswoman and built the Fenty brand based off a good product and team and earned her cred as an entrepreneur and her billionaire status and it would be nonsense to claim otherwise.
I don’t see the difference between Fenty and Skims as concerns Kim Kardashian and Rihanna’s talent and hustle, and I think the only famous for being famous moniker needs to be retired at this point.
So bored and tired of the Kartrashians🤮
Are they “very attractive”? Kourtney is adorable, and Kim certainly was very pretty in her natural days, but they’re more a freak show than anything.
Bobby M needs to update his eyeglass prescription apparently.
Why is he doing this? Is he going broke and he needs the publicity? This crapping on the Kardashians is getting old. Whatever, one may think of them, they’ve worked hard. I bet he wouldn’t have aa bad word for Kate though. Some old people should work on their entry into heaven and stop being trolls.
He has a long, fascinating, and storied career. I’m surprised he hasn’t written a book before now. Did you miss the part about his 60 years as a designer? What’s with people defending the shitty, lying, talentless, conspicuous consumption pieces of shit that compromise the Kardashian family?
More Cher please!
The Kardashians pretty much inspire fast-fashion, no matter how bad they want to appeal to a higher market.
I mean, I don’t know. There was the initial push of notoriety with the sex tape that put them on the map, but many people have had sex tapes leaked and have not maintained the level of fame and earnings that they have. It might be time for people to admit that they’re successful because people are interested in them. The people who love them, the ones that are morbidly fascinated by them, and the “haters” who consume everything about them are all putting money in their pockets. It won’t end until people get bored.
And also, I would say that most models are only famous or successful for being beautiful, which is not something they had to work towards or earn. I know the fashion people will disagree, but “walking” and “posing” are not real talents, and IMO the primary reason for their success is that people think models are beautiful which also makes them seem interesting. That’s one of the main reasons people are interested in the Kardashians. That, plus the soap opera aspect of following all of the major and minor events of their lives.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen the show. But it’s possible people watch it because they are a wealthy family that opens up their lives to the cameras so we can see what their house looks like, what they wear, where they go, etc., to satisfy some kind of curiosity people have on how rich people live?
He is an icon. No doubt about that.
Yeah a lot of famous people nowadays are like that.