Project Runway All Stars Is Perhaps A Few Feet Short For Flight

Our staff writer Terry Sawyer watches television. Sometimes he writes about it. This is one of those times. --Ed.

We all live to see our opinions outlive their usefulness; to end up on the other side of an argument with yourself is a sign of passion well spent. For the longest time, I saw Michael Kors, Heidi Klum and Nina Garcia as chair weights whose opinions usually amounted to several variations of “you made her look over thirty, monstrous”. But as the seasons wore on, I began to see their charm and utility, egotists checking egos, a bitch klatch with reluctant warmth. Among the many weaknesses of Project Runway All Stars, the worst is the absence of these regular players. With the exception of the hissing headband, Mizrahi, the new judges and mentor might grow on me as the season progresses, but the opening episode had all the awkwardness of bad marital sex: a stiff, cold and rehearsed compilation somehow more unnerving for being familiar.

Only in the world of reality television could the phrase “All Stars” mean “previous losers”. The producers did a solid job of stitching together fan favorites with reliable basket cases like Austin Scarlett, who hails straight from Andy Warhol’s island of lost toys. It’s not the greatest designer hits of seasons passed where All Stars fails most, but in the awkward wreck of the catwalk judiciary. Angela Lindvall, the new Heidi, skids across her teleprompted lines, like an America’s Top Model wannabe stuttering through “easy, breezy Covergirl”. Not that Heidi didn’t have her own undead, Teutonic delivery, but she was able to project more confidence than Lindvall who seems to be shrinking every time she opens her mouth. Georgina Chapman similarly underwhelms as Nina Garcia’s replacement, a glamorous benzo of a Brit with none of Nina’s concision or observational acuity. But give me a glossy, boring surface any day over Isaac Mizrahi, the world saddest museum of camp affect. When he tells Rami that “you mastered all of these elements and made them your bitch”, you can see that you’re going to be dealing with an entire season of the Pet Shop Boys singing “Camptown Races”. He’s not amusing, entertaining or intelligent; it’s little wonder why the resident sweetheart, Tim Gunn, couldn’t help but publicly out him in his book as a insecure ego inferno.

Which brings me to All Stars' worst misfire. There is an infected void where Tim Gunn once was; he’s the one component of Runway least able to be seamlessly replaced like an interchangeable soap opera character. Gunn works as an amazing foil for the entire tone of Project Runway through being authentically human, sincere and genuinely concerned with the designers development. The substitute teacher, Joanna Coles, comes from more traditional fashionista stock, a world where disdain is oxygen and ingenues are ashtrays. Coles lurches toward intimacy with the designers, her eyes stricken with fear from these alien interactions with loathsome underlings. She’s had some gleefully snotty turns as a guest judge and it’s unclear why they would try to force her into the confines of the mentor role when it looks like she’s tasting throw up in her mouth every time she tries to be kind.

Getting the framing chemistry perfect on a show like Runway makes all the difference in the world, as anyone who suffered through the lifeless season in Los Angeles can confirm. In doing a total staff rehaul, I wish the creators had erred on the side of excess of personality, insight and talent on the judging side, where some healthy friction makes sense as opposed to the contestants where it’s done for the purposes of creating a drama terrarium. Despite my misgivings, the clothes were the irony-free all stars, as it should be. The designers executed the 99-Cent-Store challenge with the kind of stunning imagination and technical magic that make the show so transfixing. Not to mention, Eliza Jimenez’ elimination, pure schadenfreude cake, as she yammered on about using “sacred geometry” to make a holistic Wonder Woman bathing suit and butterfly cape scrawled with cursive Zen dipshittery. The only thing that would have given me greater joy would have been to see her pelted off the stage with runes. At this point, sating our collective hunger for just sacrifices should be enough to get to the second episode even as we hope that that the new hosts will grow into their roles or recede into the backdrop enough to allow the show's natural momentum to take hold. .