There is a real-life Edina Monsoon, you guys, and her name is Lynne Franks. Franks was a notorious player in London’s fashion P.R. industry in the ’80s and ’90s, and was friends with Jennifer Saunders, who based the character of Eddie on her. Franks seems to own the whole Absolutely Fabulous thing — she titled her ’97 memoir Absolutely Now and says she loves the series, which is coming back for three more episodes this winter — but has one quibble: “I like to think that my taste in clothing was marginally better than Christian Lacroix,” she says. “But the show was pretty spot on, actually.” Katherine Hamnett, a designer Franks once represented, described meeting her as being “like an avalanche hitting you.” Franks was legendary for her parties (“It was the most genius party — very aristo-posh English — with transvestites”), her power, her insane outfits (she wore a dirndl and orange-and-purple hair to Studio 54 — while eight months pregnant), her drug and alcohol use (she once passed out in a bowl of onion soup at 5 a.m.), and her neglectful parenting. When she quit P.R. in the early ’90s, she became a Buddhist. Now she dotes on a Labrador-Jack Russell cross called Noodle, runs a women-only business club she founded, and basically, Lynne Franks is our hero. In her honor, let’s re-watch the “Is it a bee?” bit. Lynne Franks, we raise our Bolli-Stolis in your general direction. [WWD]
The Hunger Games nail polish line has inspired a parody. It includes colors like “Important Reminder Purple” — the bottle comes marked with “This is a death tournament, not a fashion show” — and “Greasy Sae Surprise,” the color of raccoon gallbladder. [Refinery29]
The Hunger Games nail polish line has inspired a parody. It includes colors like “Important Reminder Purple” — the bottle comes marked with “This is a death tournament, not a fashion show” — and “Greasy Sae Surprise,” the color of raccoon gallbladder. [Refinery29]