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On Monday, May 6 the first Monday in May Tom Fitzgerald and Lorenzo Marquez are in go-mode.
Itstime for the Met Gala,and, as fashion bloggers, thats basically their Super Bowl.
There are still culture writers and editors 18 years later who think were amateurs, Tom says.
Our whole marriage has been about the two of us carving out our niche.
Fuck the rest of them.
Lorenzo Marquez:We started when fashion bloggers were everywhere.
We would go to Fashion Week, and we were all there, representing our sites.
Now, you see two or three.
:Its all influencers now.
What was the blogging scene like in 2006?T.F.
:Gawker was at its height, and every blog was chasing that high.
Gawker defined what the voice and the language was going to be in blogging.
He got success doing something when nobody else was doing it and defined an era.
But we knew we didnt want to be nasty.
It sounds insane to say now, but that was a novelty: gay culture writers.
:Thats why we picked the name Project Rungay.
You are comfortable, in your self-commentary, referring to yourselves as bitchy.
What do you see as the value of bitchiness?T.F.
:Were talking about very famous people wearing very expensive clothing.
You need someone to put a little salt in the sugar bowl.
You need someone to be cynical about it.
Independence allows people to talk about celebrities in a way that is anti-fandom and anti-corporate media and honest.
I dont believe in bitchiness for bitchinesss sake.
I dont believe in being bitchy about someones physical self or the circumstances of their life.
Weve had a saying for years: We dont want to make Anne Hathaway cry.
Its about being bitchy about image-craft or the fact that they are wearing a $40,000 outfit.
:Bitchiness brings truth, with humor.
We need to talk about the Met Gala.
How do you feel that will affect the gala, which is already a rather literal event?T.F.
The year they did Camp, I was like,Everyone hey shut up about what is camp.
You have to roll your eyes.
Anna Wintour never dresses according to a theme!
Last year was the first time when people startedtrashing us.
I probably wont make that post this year.
I loved theBarbiepress tour, but I knew it was going to be bad for the red carpet.
I could feel that in your writing.T.F.
:I was like,This is a lot of fun, but this is not fashion.
That is not fabulous.
But you have to be clever about it.
:Its a very lazy approach.
You have a tennis ball, so you find where to put it.
Fashion is about creativity.
Its just gonna get worse.
The studios pay for styling jobs, so Im sure the studios love that.
What will we see at the Met Gala?T.F.
:Youre going to see a bunch of dumbass Disney stuff.
But I think this year were not going to be the grumpy old men.
:With the Met Gala, its hard because some fashion houses cannot do a certain theme.
Its just not their style.
Theres only so much that Chanel can create and still be Chanel.
And thats the goal to have the houses represented on the red carpet.
So some of them are not gonna do something crazy.
But that whole Garden of Time thing?
People are gonna show up with flowers on their heads.
What is the image that were trying to sell here?
Is it really about the love of fashion design, or is it about these moments that become controversial?
Its been interesting to watchyour coverage of Zendaya onChallengers.
Because she gets so much praise, you have more space to …L.M.
:To say the truth!
:Zendaya is thin!
She looks like a model.
They dont even have to fit her.
They can just pull anything out of an archive.
Shetold a storyabout being surprised she fit the model proportions on the Mugler outfit.L.M.
:Thats what it is.
Law Roach is styling her, and hes a God.
:And he deserves the accolades!
But it gets to a point that you cant criticize this person anymore.
I think its wonderful.
Everything is perfect, fantastic!
Social media has caused that.
You have the ability not to let anyone have a critical voice.
Im curious about your own changing tone.
Look at thatWhite Christmaspostyou put up every year its a much more raw tone.
- Whats different between then and now?T.F.
I would never publish that now.
There are notes about child abuse and eating disorders in that.
I was like, Ouch.
Youve had people come after you before.T.F.
:Last year,it was Pedro Pascal fans.
Suddenly, all these 22-year-old Pedro Pascal fans are saying, Stop sexualizing that man!
:Were not talking about a 17-year-old here.
I will sexualize an adult man because, guess what?
Im an adult gay man.
:Sarah Paulson dropped our names in the middle of aNew YorkTimesinterview.
:Sarah Jessica Parker contacted us on Instagram and said, Can we talk?
We had been doing aseriesof gal on the streetpostsduring lockdown, and nobody was doing red carpet.
We would write, Good for her.
Shes promoting her shoe store.
But she thought we were making her sound really manipulative.
Now, I love her Im a Gen X gay man but we never wanted to associate with celebrities.
Im not naming anyone, but I bet you know Im talking about.
:Im not here to judge that, but I didnt want to do this phone call with S.J.P.
Still, I felt it would be unprofessional to ignore the message.
So we said yes, and she called us.
Shes lovely; shes exactly what you think: super-earnest theater-kid energy.
:The thing with celebrities is that they dont have anyone say anything negative about them in person.
When you criticize them, they just dont like it.
Were just talking about the dress!
