:sinister carnival music in the distance reaches a sudden fever pitch: Oh hey, it’s the Oscars!…

Welcome to the Red Carpet Rundown of the BAFTAs, tha red carpet that pretends it’s more sophisticated and understanding than those Other red carpets (look! Soothing greenery!), until you actually look at it:   (Please understand how sincerely I mean this: Yikes.) This event certainly never stood a chance against the Grammys, where much bigger statements are made.…

The SAGs: The one where everyone tries the style stuff they aren’t sure will work for the Oscars, the Emmys, or the Globes! That’s not entirely fair; obviously, at this point in our late capitalist celebrityscape, every red carpet counts. And in some ways, the SAGs are a playground for actors in ensembles, where other red carpet camera appearances aren’t quite as guaranteed and they get to go all out for this one.…

Ah, the dystopia of red carpet season is really hitting its stride. Recently a friend who doesn’t watch red carpets much asked me, “You keep saying the red carpet is weird, but – what’s so weird?” And sure. Fundamentally, it’s people in the industry – many of whom routinely appear on camera for their job – getting dressed up and appearing on camera again to talk about things they did for their job.…

  It begins: Red Carpet season, in which stylists and PR reps throughout the land bring in the Red Carpet Harvest and carefully apply their dresses to the brands of various celebrities who must all pretend that none of this is a bizarre competition for greatness on this carpet and, simultaneously, any number of secondary clandestine objectives, while holding their arms nonchalantly and making eye contact with six cameras at once.…

Welcome to this year’s Met Red Carpet Gala, which lived up to its “Fashion and the Catholic Imagination” premise by being so direct yet so broad a theme that it essentially required a level of participation where you were either wearing Catholicism cosplay or probably off the brief! You got us again, Catholicism, you sneaky thing.…