Allure Defends Nicole Richie With a Drug Reference

We found this amusing bit in Allure’s “Bottoms Up!” by Rory Evans, July.  Evans mentions gossip blogs, but we are quite sure we’re not reading the same ones.  These two sentences of hers actually made us laugh out loud.

If an actress gets too bony-assed, the paparazzi turn on her and so does public opinion.  (Could anyone imagine blogging smack about Audrey Hepburn the way they do about Nicole Richie?)

Because, you know, there isn’t a single gossip-worthy detail about Nicole Richie other than her weight.  But that surely unintentional reference to “smack”?  Genius!

Comments

[Jessica]

One of the things I thought was so silly about that was that, other than slenderness, there's no comparison between Audrey Hepburn and Nicole Richie. Audrey was an actual A list working actress; Nicole is famous for a reality show and her misbehavior. Comparing the two is apples and oranges.

[Glossed Over]

Exactly. Their slimness is pretty much the only thing they have in common.

[lizzy]

My beef with this quote is not that the writer seems to be comparing their careers (or "career" for Ms. Richie), but that somehow Hepburn's slimness is the same is Richie's. Granted, I agree that even in the 50s and 60s there was far too much emphasis placed on the perfect slight figure, but when you see photos or films of Hepburn you can tell that slim is just the way she is built; she looks healthy and slim. Of course, I'm not sure what Richie's natural figure looks like, but it isn't the emaciated and clearly malnourished one that she has now. While I do actually regret that she gets critiqued for it when it is clearly an eating disorder, I don't think that the two should be compared in such a manner.

[lara]

Audrey Hepburn lived through a famine as a child in German-occupied Holland, when toward the end of the war food became scarce. She suffered from malnutrition, and supposedly this made it difficult for her to gain weight all through her life. It's also why she was so involved in UNICEF.