There's a certain irony, isn't there, in watching a woman slather on lip gloss while plotting revenge? A smear of pink, a flash of steel. It's the kind of juxtaposition that makes you sit up and pay attention, like a discordant note in a perfectly orchestrated symphony.
And attention, of course, is what it's all about. Attention, and the things we do to get it. The things we buy, the masks we wear, the carefully curated versions of ourselves we present to the world.
Take Sweeney Todd, for example. Or rather, take Mrs. Lovett's latest incarnation, played with a delicious blend of camp and menace by the ever-watchable Annaleigh Ashford in the recent Broadway revival. Gone are the bloodstains and the butcher shop grime. In their place: a perfectly coiffed blonde bob and a complexion so luminous it practically hums. A look achieved, we're told, through the transformative power of Korean skincare. Laneige, to be precise.
Now, I'm not one to begrudge a girl her beauty routine. God knows, I've spent enough time in the trenches of Sephora myself. But there's something about this particular product placement that feels…different. More insidious, perhaps. Like a Trojan horse, wheeled onto the stage under the guise of female empowerment.
Because here's the thing: Mrs. Lovett isn't just using Laneige's products. She's selling them. Literally. In between hawking meat pies made with questionable ingredients, she's peddling skincare to the women of Fleet Street, promising them the same radiant glow that's captivating the judge (and funding her murderous escapades).
It's a brilliant marketing ploy, really. Take a beloved character, give her a makeover, and suddenly, even the most macabre of professions becomes aspirational. Who wouldn't want to be the kind of woman who can bake a man into a pie and still have time for a ten-step skincare routine?
But it's also, I can't help but feel, a little bit depressing. A sign, perhaps, of the times we live in, where everything is commodified, even our darkest impulses. Where the line between reality and performance has become so blurred as to be practically nonexistent.
I remember, years ago, interviewing a designer who told me that fashion was "the most immediate way to communicate who you are and who you want to be." A powerful statement, to be sure. But what happens when the "who you want to be" is a carefully constructed illusion, sold back to us through targeted ads and influencer endorsements?
It's a question that lingers long after the curtain falls on Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett's final, bloody embrace. A question that, I suspect, will continue to haunt us long after the last tube of lip gloss has been squeezed dry.
Because in the end, it's not really about the products, is it? It's about the promise they represent. The promise of transformation, of reinvention, of a better, more beautiful version of ourselves. A promise that, like Mrs. Lovett's pies, is ultimately too good to be true.
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