FabSugar

Trend Alert: The Great Gatsby

FabSugar — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 12:03:33 PDT

Here is my ode to The Great Gatsby. Fashion is experiencing a throwback to the times of art deco, pleats, beading, speak-easies, and the Belle Epoque. Legendary designer Paul Poiret has been referenced and you can see his dropped hemline and flapper hats in a major way in the Proenza Schouler Fall 2007 collection. After all the 70s and 80s we've been seeing on the runway these seem fresh and a step in a new fashion direction - just don't take away my booze!

Looks like this is a trend that's going to be around for a couple seasons so if you fancy it, check out these glamorous Spring Gatsby finds,

Love from Ya-Ya Bone Caravan Sweater, on sale for $211 (originally $264).

Ascension cloud white sequin pleated skirt, on sale for $149 (originally $175).

Taryn by Taryn Rose Lift, $250.

Source

Meeting My Sperm Donor

The Good Men Project — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 10:00:50 PDT

We're happy to present this story from one of our favorite sites, The Good Men Project. Ben Sommer, conceived through alternative insemination, is a young man now and tells the story of deciding to meet his donor.

I grew up in a middle-class home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with two loving parents, both of whom are women. My conception was perhaps the most organized and scientific miracle of the modern American family - my architecture, the dream of dozens of individuals conducting their work across thousands of miles.

Objectifying Ryan Gosling

I was conceived through alternative insemination. A donor submitted his sperm to the Sperm Bank of California in Oakland (TSBC). Later, it was sent to the Fenway Community Health Center in Boston. Since opening its doors in 1982, TSBC has helped families without the ability to conceive on their own to birth over 2,000 children. Two thirds of those have ended up, like me, being raised in a lesbian household. TSBC is also the first sperm bank to offer a donor-identity-release program, which allows children of alternative insemination access to their donors' information when they turn 18.

I am not as much an oddity as you might think. As of 2005, some 270,000 children in the United States had same sex-parents. We are a generation that is just now beginning to come of age and able to share our stories. This is mine.

Growing up in a lesbian household was much like growing up in any other family unit, I imagine: vacations to Cape Cod, parents working late and sometimes not, play dates with a diverse group of friends.

I never gave much thought to that mysterious figure across the country. I never questioned the fact that I didn't have a father. As far as I was concerned I didn't need one. Is having two moms really all that different than having a mom and a dad? Parents are parents, right? I didn't see a difference at the time. My parents didn't either - at least at first.

They decided to conceive through a donor, in part, to avoid the complications that a third parent would bring. Asking a close male friend to donate, like some couples have done, can create unforeseen consequences. In the past, there have been custody battles between the donor and the parents raising the child. This was the case with a friend of mine, whose parents arranged donation from a male family friend. With a semi-anonymous donor like the man my parents chose, it would be clear who my parents were. And it was.

That's not to say that it was smooth sailing. "When we first learned you were going to be a boy, we really panicked," my mother told me recently. "Who's going to teach him to throw a ball? We didn't have many male friends. There was even basic stuff, like who's going to teach him to pee standing up. That doesn't come naturally."

Read the rest of the story below.

5 Best Celeb Mom Tweets of the Week

LilSugar — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 03:35:31 PST

Victoria Beckham and Lily Allen on their fave new parent products, Jenny McCarthy's little man Evan (pictured above) keeps breaking hearts, and more in our favorite celebrity mom tweets of the week.

@MrsLRCooper (Lily Allen)
whoever bought this for/sent this to me THANK YOU !!!!! Dont know if i could survive without EWAN THE DREAM SHEEP

@JennyMcCarthy (Jenny McCarthy)
Evan fell in love here. He said I need to call his other girlfriend and break up with her for him. yfrog.com/h7zwdsoj

@rzrachelzoe (Rachel Zoe)
If i could freeze a moment in time . . . Skyler said "ma ma" . . . life is complete. xoRZ

@victoriabeckham (Victoria Beckham)
Amazing! baby knee pads for when babies start crawling!! X vb yfrog.com/mn1azsuj

@brookeburke (Brooke Burke-Charvet)
Dance class, yoga for the kids, karate, & 1 more hip hop class to go. Over stimulation on Spring break! Ya think?!?

A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas: A Highly Recommended Holiday Treat

Becky Kirsch — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:48:34 PDT

A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas is, in a word, silly. But here's why I loved it: the ridiculous hijnks made me laugh out loud, the 3D actually makes the movie much better, and it packs just the right amount of humor and holiday cheer into the metaphorical pipe.

It's been seven years since Harold (John Cho) and Kumar (Kal Penn's) fateful trip to White Castle, and they've grown up quite a bit since then. Well, at least Harold has - now married and settled down in the New Jersey suburbs, Harold has left his days getting high with Kumar behind in favor of making the big bucks on Wall Street and trying to start a family. Aimless Kumar, on the other hand, is hitting his bong harder than ever now that girlfriend Vanessa has dumped him. The former BFFs are brought back together by a mysterious package for Harold that shows up on Kumar's door. When its contents - a giant joint - sets fire to the prized Christmas tree grown by Harold's overbearing father-in-law, the incident ignites a reunion for the guys as they set out to replace the Frasier Fir.

To see why I loved taking another ride with Harold & Kumar, just

The formula is basic: it's a night of horrible incident after horrible incident that would make you want to crawl under your seat if it wasn't so entertaining. As Harold and Kumar are consistently thwarted from their plan of securing a tree, they encounter gangsters, a strangely endearing waffle-making robot, and of course - Neil Patrick Harris. Peppered throughout are nods to other holiday films and the Harold & Kumar franchise itself. Devotees of the franchise will appreciate the winks, but the movie also stands on its own just fine.

3D movies are a dime a dozen these days, which is why I especially appreciated the fact that Harold and Kumar plays up the technology at every turn. We're talking smoke rings in your face, egg yolk in your face, and the like, but the execution enhances the experience like no movie since Avatar. The humor here is raunchy, over-the-top, and often offensive, but it also happens to be side-splittingly funny. If you've seen the first two Harold & Kumar movies, then you know what comes with the territory, so it's best to just let the jokes leap out of the screen and come right at ya.

Harold and Kumar's rift is easily the most believable aspect of the plot, and their wounded egos and jabs at each other give the film heart (an important piece that was missing from Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay). What ultimately keeps A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas on track is the message that's buried under all the drugs and nudity: tis the season to forgive and forget. And if you're anything like Harold & Kumar - to get high with a little help from your friends.

Photos courtesy of Warner Bros.

The Night Circus Author Erin Morgenstern Talks Twilight and Harry Potter Comparisons and Her Casting Wish List

Tara Block — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 04:00:33 PDT

As a huge Harry Potter fan, I must admit my interest was piqued when I heard about a new book last month being compared to the magical series, The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. To add fuel to the buzzy fire, the film rights for the book have already been picked up by Twilight's entertainment company Summit. After reading the enchanting, sensory love story (targeted for adults, I should add) about dueling magicians who fall in love while competing in a mysterious circus that runs from nightfall to dawn, I believe it stands on its own. We chatted with Erin, who has a background in theater and studio art, about her first novel and whom she could picture playing protagonists and star-crossed lovers Celia and Marco on the big screen. Read her thoughts below.

TrèsSugar: What do you think of the comparisons being made to Harry Potter and Twilight?

Erin Morgenstern: It has some aspects in common with Harry Potter. I'm still not sure where the Twilight comparisons come from, maybe the fact that Summit is involved with the film rights. There are plenty of books that I think would be a little more apt, like Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell by Susanna Clarke, but not enough people have read that. I hope that it ends up being the kind of book that people don't have to compare it to anything. A lot of people tell me that they have trouble describing it. It's a complicated work because it's about the circus, but it's about the love story, but it's about so much more than that at the same time.

TS: What's your favorite love story in literature? Did it influence Celia and Marco's love story?

EM: I'm not really big on love stories. I'm not that classic romance sort of girl. Although I can't say it's my favorite love story, there's definitely a Romeo and Juliet aspect to it. I do kind of love a star-crossed romance. It makes everything so much more interesting and complicated, and sometimes angsty. I think that makes for a really good story.

TS: You say in your website's "about me" section that you were reading Stephen King at age 12 and J.K. Rowling at age 21. How did that affect you as a writer?

EM: I grew up in that time frame where there wasn't a YA section yet. There was a children's section and an adult's section. So when I hit around 11 or 12, I just started looking through the adult section. And for some reason I just got stuck on Stephen King and read practically the entire Stephen King shelf. And then when I was in college, I took a children's literature class, and we read the first Harry Potter. That influenced my lack of sense of what's an adult book and what's a children's book, because I had a very backwards reading life at certain stages. I like adult books that capture that child-like whimsy and children's books that don't hide the adult side of things. And I think there's more room for overlap between adult books and children's books.

TS: What are you reading right now?

EM: I'm in the middle of Lev Grossman's The Magician King. I finished The Magicians a couple weeks ago, and I have a couple events coming up that I'm doing with Lev Grossman. But I'm enjoying it very much, partially because I've read Harry Potter, I've read the Narnia books, and it has an interesting spin on those tales that I know really well. And before that I just recently finished the new Haruki Murakami book (1Q84) that comes out next week, and it's really just epic and wonderful. It's so, so good. It doesn't feel like it's 1,000 pages when you're reading it. I didn't want it to end.

TS: You've mentioned you could see Geoffrey Rush as Prospero in the film adaption, but who could you see playing Celia and Marco?

EM: I don't really picture actors when I write. Geoffrey Rush was sort of the one exception, because when I was coming up with him as the character he had a Geoffrey Rush vibe in my mind. For Celia and Marco, they look very particular in my head, and I don't have actors who really capture it. Celia was kind of inspired by Clara Bow. I found this old picture of her that wasn't that sort of classic short hair, her hair was all wispy and a little more Victorian-looking. She has very dark eyes, and that's sort of what Celia looks like. If we could find a modern-day Clara Bow type. And the actor who has a little of the Marco feel to me is Lee Pace, but he's going to be too old by the time we get around to the filming, which is unfortunate.

TS: Is there a sequel in the works. How long do we have to wait for the film?

EM: There's no plans for a proper sequel. I don't think it's the kind of story that lends itself well to "this is what happens next." And it was never intended to be a series. I do think at some point I wouldn't be opposed to do something like a collection of short pieces of side stories or people's back stories or a few of those things that happened afterwards.

The film is at least a couple of years away. It's in the stage of negotiations with producers, trying to find someone to head the ship.

TS: What did you learn about relationships as you wrote The Night Circus?

EM: I think that the essential thing I kept coming back to is that a relationship is about more than just two people. There's so many more factors in the equation, whether they're other people or circumstances. Relationships are never simple, there's always so much more going on.

If you read the book and want to find out more insights from Erin on the plot and process of writing, keep reading!

Courtney Love Shares Her Family Secrets With Vanity Fair

Annie Scudder — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 15:40:05 PDT

Courtney Love isn't holding back any secrets. In the upcoming November issue of Vanity Fair, Courtney shares her thoughts on her late husband and her daughter, even going so far as to show the writer of the piece a page from her estranged daughter Frances Bean Cobain's diary. Here are a few things we learned from Courtney in a preview of the article:

She's not afraid to share her daughter's diary with the reporter: "This is her diary," Love explains. "I just want you to look at this one page," which contains a list titled, "Things That Make Me Smile."

She'd kill her dead husband, Kurt Cobain: "Mad? Ya think?! If he came back right now I'd have to kill him, for what he did to us. I'd f*cking kill him. I'd f*ck him, and then I'd kill him."

Kurt tried to kill himself multiple times: "He tried to kill himself three times!"

She claims she didn't teach her daughter to read until she was 7: "It was my fault! I never read to her! . . . Why didn't I ever take her to a Broadway show? She f*cking loved those Broadway musicals!"

Frances, who emancipated herself from Courtney two years ago, told the magazine that her mother's statements were inaccurate. Would you be interested in hearing the headline-grabbing entertainer's thoughts on her tumultuous relationships, especially with her late iconic husband? Or do you think it's all better kept private?

Fit's Hits: From Headstands to Positive Body Talk From Hollywood

FitSugar — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 16:00:34 PDT

Yes you can! Here's how to work your way up to headstand!
Figure out how your job is making you fat; then you can avoid the office pitfalls.
Sometimes fitting in a good workout is all about preventing scheduling sabotage.
Power up your smoothie and add these superfoods to your blender.
Take your running to the next level and try this belly-blasting interval workout.
Motivate yourself on the cheap so you can burn calories, not dough.
Ten body-loving quotes from some of our fave celebs.
So many ways to eat figs. They're in season and good for ya!

Matthew Talks Ditching His Dream of Becoming an Attorney, Being a Dad, and Ryan Phillippe For The Lincoln Lawyer

Lindsay Miller — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 11:23:00 PDT

Matthew McConaughey was looking good as the center of attention at the big premiere of The Lincoln Lawyer last Thursday, and he started the day at the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills, where he chatted with reporters about the legal thriller. The actor plays wheeling-and-dealing attorney Micky Haller in the new movie, which costars Ryan Phillippe and Marisa Tomei and is out in theaters March 18. We heard from Matthew on the reason he decided to leave his own dreams of practicing law behind, why he didn't want to meet Ryan before they filmed their first scene together, and how his car is one of his favorite places to be. Here's what he had to say:

On why he didn't want to meet Ryan before shooting: You know, with Marisa Tomei who plays my ex-wife, yeah. We have a history, so when you meet us on film, we’ve met. William H. Macy, we have a history. Ryan - he’s a client, I’m his attorney. We first meet each other in this story. I didn’t want to show him my hand. I didn’t want to share anything about what I was thinking. And I didn’t want to know anything from him. I didn’t even really want to kind of get to know him in any way. I felt more comfortable just [saying] "I’ll meet you on screen the day we’re doing our work . . . I’ll meet you through the character." It wasn’t until it was over that we looked at each other and went, "Nice work, man. Hey, how ya doing?"
On whether he has a driver like his character: I prefer to drive in my real life. Behind the wheel is my favorite spot. My own car is a mobile office. I love sitting in a car seat, controlling my music, controlling the temperature, backing the seat up, putting my leg out, moving the rearview mirror, the sideview mirror. When I lived in my trailer and was traveling across the United States, [and someone would say] "OK, it’s Thursday. I can come in Saturday morning to meet you." And I’d look at the map and say, "Well, I’m heading East. I’ll be in Tucson by Saturday morning. Why don’t you fly into Tucson airport, I’ll pick ya up, and I’m gonna keep driving East. We’ll spend the day together and then you get a flight back out of El Paso. And I’ll drop you off there." Some of the best business I ever did.
On how having kids changed his car: It’s all mixed in, man. They don’t have the carseat down, do they? Have you ever tried to get one of those in quickly? I’m not very good at it. And they’re not easy to clean at all. Always crap stuck in there. Now stuff is mixed in, but I know anything the kids or anything I need, it’s somewhere in my car. Sometimes, I’m out and I go, "Oh, I forgot that." And I go, "No, it’s in here somewhere." Sometimes it means getting out and digging in the back, but it’s in there somewhere.

For the rest of the interview with Matthew, just

On why he decided not to become a lawyer: That was my plan, when I was going to college, was to do that. Well, I looked up one morning and noticed that to do what I wanted to do was going to be two more years of this school and four more years - "I’ll be 28 when I get out to start to practice a craft and have a career?" I was like, "No way, man. What about my 20s? I got some things I’d like to say now and try and do." So I actually changed my course and went to film production and studied on that side of the camera, and you all know the story between junior and senior year. I met Richard Linklater and got my first role in acting, went back to school, graduated, got my degree, then came out here and started working.
On researching the part: What I saw was, these guys are movers and shakers. The phone’s always ringing, someone’s at the door, they’re wheeling and dealing and papers stacking up, and they’re saying, "Yeah, I’ll do this for you if you do this for me." And then when I went to some cases at the federal courts, you see how these guys are performers. Some of them good, some of them not so good. You see how it matters what judge is in there. The judge I was in there with didn’t have patience for these stories that these defense attorneys would weave into. He’d interrupt them and go, what is your point? What is your point? Other judges would let them go on for hours and days. These kinds of attorneys down in downtown LA, they’re not wearing Dolce suits. They’re down there with the clients they’re representing and they’re slick, but they’re street-smart slick, and they are wheeling and dealing and constantly on the move.
On his character's approach to the law: This guy still has a real draw to humanity, the people that he represents, these sort of bottomfeeders in society that can't really defend themselves. But he’s not naïve by any means. He still may have some ideology about defending these people that can’t defend themselves, but he’s pretty much a pragmatist and understands how the system works. And understands you gotta know how the system works to make it work for you. So he bends his own rules, he plays both sides of the law. It’s not really a moral or immoral question to him. I’d say he’s more amoral and he makes it work for him.
On what's next for him: I’ve got Bernie coming out. I did it with Richard Linklater. And I’ve got Killer Joe . . . which is from a Broadway play.
On whether he'd sign on for a sequel to The Lincoln Lawyer: Two things would make that so. It takes three things, but two things would make it so. One, it’s got to be a good movie. I think we made a good movie. Two, it’s got to perform at the box office. There’s a number, and I don’t know the number, but there’s a dollar number that it has to make for the financiers to say, "Let’s pony up for the next one." That’s just a fact. Third is, yeah, if it’s a good script, I’d love to.

Candace Bushnell Reveals Details From New Sex and the City Prequel

TresSugar — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 13:45:00 PDT

On the Today show this morning, Sex and the City author Candace Bushnell shared details on her new SATC prequel, Summer and the City, which came out yesterday. The YA novel begins where The Carrie Diaries left off, the end of Carrie's senior year of high school and the beginning of her new life in NYC. Carrie has just met the first friend from the infamous fab four, Samantha Jones, and she gives Carrie some advice that will make her the icon we all know and love. Watch the video to find out what it is!

Ryan Scott on Top Chef All-Stars Episode 13

Guest Writer — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 11:00:43 PST

Our favorite food truck chef is back! Owner of 3-Sum Eats and past Top Chef competitor Ryan Scott is here to share his thoughts on last night's Bahamas episode of Top Chef All-Stars. Take it away Chef Scott!Hey guys, you know, I must say, it does feel somewhat surreal watching friends of yours on a show that you were once on. That surreal feeling deepens especially considering these are close friends - people I have cooked with and have nothing but the utmost respect for. For instance, last weekend I was out in Charleston, SC, doing a cooking competition with Carla Hall and then three days later she's on the TV staring back at me as I kick back on the couch with my girlfriend. These are some of my favorite people in the world here, and some serious chefs too.

It can get straight up emotional to watch. There's a whole lot more than just a cooking competition on the line right now - there's integrity, reputation, jobs, families, mortgages. Not to get all sappy on you here folks, but a lot can be won or lost on this show. I don't know y'all (just picked up the y'all in South Carolina, thinkin' about bring it back to the Bay Area) sorry that I'm not as funny right now as I have been in the past, but this stuff is real.

To see more of Scott's thoughtful recap, keep reading.