For our final “ology” post leading up to the Oscars ’18 red carpet, we saved the least predictable lady for last.While it’s true that some of our other examinees like Saoirse Ronan and Laurie Metcalf have a fairly wide set of preferences they can play with, Miss Sally’s primary criterion for picking a red carpet ensemble seems to be “Is it going to be totally different from what everyone else is wearing?”
At the Venice Film Festival in Vivienne Westwood
Having said that, she’s not always as unconventional as one might think, given her sometimes-adventurous style choices. In fact, most of her choices fall within the range of standard red carpetry, like this gown. Westwood’s not always easy to wear, though. And the color story takes this look somewhere unusual while the off-kilter styling seems to represent her personality. In other words, it’s standard in a lot of ways, but odd in other, more subtle ways. That’s kind of her approach in a nutshell.
At the Los Angeles Premiere of “The Shape of Water ” in Dior
There’s also, we think, a preference on her part to stay away from cliches like high glamour or hard sexiness in a lot of her choices (that previous gown notwithstanding). Here, she’s got a very professional sort of feel, but still something high-fashion and red-carpet-appropriate, with just a touch of whimsy.
At The Palm Springs Film Festival in Dior
Off-Kilter Glamour and Modest Whimsy may be her two most persistent style briefs.
At the Golden Globes in Dior Couture
Off-Kilter Glamour.
At the Online Film Critics Society Awards in Romona Keveza
Modest Glamour.
It’s never a strictly applied thing. We’re talking about style preferences, not costume design, after all. And her wide range of silhouettes, necklines, color stories and sleeves make it tough to pin down, but there’s always this sense that she’s doing a great job of straddling that line that separates her own quirkiness with the kind of demands a modern red carpet makes on awards-track actresses.
Case in point:
At the SAG Awards in Dior Couture
It’s a boldly colored Dior gown (the skirt’s not cooperating for pictures here), which would make it, on paper, perfect for a major awards show red carpet. But Miss Sally picked the kind of Dior that no other awards-track actress would think of picking. And because she has such a great sense of her own quirkiness and an ability to find high-fashion that appeals to her particular idiosyncrasies, this comes across chic rather than clownish. At the very least, it’s incredibly well suited to her.
At the Directors Guild Awards in Armani Prive
We dubbed this one “Robot Lily Tomlin” at the time and we stand by that description. Once again, Miss Sally proves that you just can’t predict her choices or pin her down. It’s got the professional vibe to it, plus a little touch of glam and whimsy.
At the BAFTA Awards in Ralph & Russo
Being the one major movie awards ceremony on her own turf, you’d think her choice of gown for the BAFTAs would be some sort of strong declaration about herself, or at least, something that gets to the essence of who she is, since she would presumably be a bit more comfortable in this setting. And yet, we find this look to be the least characteristic of her style, among all these choices. Both the Globes and the BAFTAs requested a dress blackout, and both of her choices for those events tended toward conventionality. This is lovely, but if we were going to predict her gown for Oscars night, we think the striped Dior and the heavy preferences for metallics will provide more of a preview than this.
But as you can see, it’s really anyone’s guess. We’re hoping she maintains her sense of individuality and quirkiness and doesn’t get talked into a shimmering perfection that doesn’t really reflect who she is. We can say it probably won’t be super-sexy and if there’s a sense of glamour, it will likely be of the off-kilter variety she tends toward.
And that’s it for our “Ology” posts this year! Make sure to read them all so you’ll head into tonight’s red carpet fully prepared and ready to wow everyone at your Oscars-viewing party with your knowledge and fabulousness!
(Meryl Streep, Frances McDormand and Leslie Manville weren’t worth the time because they either hate the red carpet or try to avoid it as much as possible.)
[Photo Credit: INSTARImages]
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