Gwyneth Paltrow’s P.R. Plan and the Brooks Brothers Pseudo-Revival

0:03Hello and welcome to Fashion People. I'm Lauren Sherman, writer of Pucks Fashion and Beauty Memo line sheet. And today with me on the show is author Marissa Meltzer. We're talking goop and Gwyneth, Brooks Brothers, vacation clothes, various scandals, and so much fun. Happy Tuesday, everyone. I hate April Fool's Day, so I'm not going to act like it's April Fool's Day because who cares? It's the worst thing you could ever do to someone. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. Anyway, I'm in Los Angeles. I'm laying fairly low, if you can call it that, Tonight, I'm heading over to the opening of the new Skim store to check that out.

0:44But otherwise, I'm just really on the phone a lot. Call me. In Monday's line sheet, I wrote about this pretty wild situation over at this company called Castle, which you've probably never heard of. But essentially, it's a white label platform for companies and people who want to layer on a clothing rental service onto their e-commerce. Anyway, who cares, right? Well, a lot of people in the American fashion industry cared. not to mention a lot of fancy investors, including KKR, Henry Davis, Bill Ackman, and a bunch of VC firms that you've heard of. The founder, Christine Hunsiker, she actually raised over$500 million and turns out she was allegedly not being straight about how much revenue the company was bringing in.

1:28She was saying like hundreds of millions of dollars. It was actually last year, like something like 16 million. And she's now being investigated by the authorities for various things. So we'll see what happens. But Hunsaker also happens to be a partner in the investment firm P180, which you may have heard of, which currently owns a majority stake in Vince and a minority stake in Joseph Altuzara and has a partnership investment in Elise Walker. I don't know the exact number for that one. And they said it's a strategic in the deck. It says it's a strategic partnership, but they're all wrapped up with each other.

2:03And I know many of you have talked to Christine over the years for one reason or another about investing, about using the service. Anyway, it's a fascinating sort of microcosm for some of the bigger issues in the industry. It's just a pretty fascinating story. Also, if you love crossover episodes, I'm going to be on Jam Session this afternoon with my bud, Amanda Dobbins. We're Graydon Carter's memoir, which I guess is celebrity culture. So check that out. Speaking of Graydon's memoir, here's Marissa, who has something to say about that and Keith McNally's memoir and plenty more. Marissa Meltzer, welcome back to Fashion People.

2:47Hi. Thanks for having me again. How's it going? How's life? It's good. New York had a heavy winter and all I can think about is spring, but the weather isn't totally cooperating. But we had, I'm sure you saw on social media, like three hours of 70 degree weather or something like that. And people freaked out. I saw, I want to say Central Park or... I think it was the Sheep Meadow. There was like a viral video. it was insane and and you know what i thought when i saw it i thought this is why i don't live there because there are no parks like that in la because of the fact that it's nice like that all the time well also because people have backyards it's true yeah it it part of me was like whenever i see that there's part of me that is a little envious the one that i always feel envious of is that Dolores Park in San Francisco.

3:50Oh, Dolores Park is beautiful. But again, San Francisco, I say this as a native of the Bay Area, it doesn't get that hot very often. No. It's not park weather. But see, I love a crowded park. It feels very convivial. And I don't know. I was not cognizant for the 70s, but I feel like that's what the 70s were like, Just like packed parks with people being friendly and sexy to each other. I think that you got the sexy part right. People selling like, you know, a lot of drugs. Well, no. Yeah, maybe. But I was actually going to say cocktails like out of their bags. No, no. Yeah, I feel like I like park culture.

4:40I do feel like, you know, if you if you got in New York in the 70s, it feels like you got in on the ground floor. Oh, absolutely. And I do feel really like jealous of people who bought homes in the 70s, who bought homes outside of the city in the 70s. Even the 90s. Yeah. Even, you know, 2005. But I don't know. Have you read the Grading Carter memoir? I did. I'm almost done with it. And I read the Keith McNally one that's, I think, coming out soon as well. And, you know, it's it's such the classic line of like it was gritty. There was, you know, I had an apartment for two hundred dollars that had two bedrooms in Soho and it was disgusting.

5:22It was the greatest time of my life. You know, it's become a cliche, but it seems to be a cliche for a reason. Two hundred dollars a month, a garden and an expense account. I actually went yesterday. BookSoup did a talk with Graydon. A friend of mine had tickets. Oh, I did not bother to buy them. Someone gifted me a ticket. Oh, I went to one up in a temple manual. How was it? Who interviewed him? Bette Midler. She's amazing. Oh, that's amazing. She's our last great American. She's so quick and witty and she was great. this was I had to leave early because I had child care responsibilities, but this was Monica Lewinsky, who I love, who's a lovely human being.

6:10Her hair looks amazing. She just looks truly incredible. Like she looks so good. But I would say that. I was like, OK, I read all these anecdotes in the book already. Yeah, I saw him first. It was I think it was the day the book came out and they were all new to me. And then I reread them and thought, oh, okay, a lot of these. But you've done a book tour. It's kind of how it goes. People love asking in book tours, what didn't make your book? And it's like, babe, everything, we put it all in there. Anything decent is in the book. Yeah. I felt like I was actually thinking because you interviewed interviewed Chantal and me at McNally Jackson, South Street Seaport, which was really great.

6:59I don't know. I think if I was interviewing Graydon, my line of questioning would have been totally different. So I think it's also about obviously you have the most famous person you can. And Monica has plays a big role in the book. And she was really like, everybody should read the book if you're interested in this stuff. It's very it's a very polite book. That's how I would describe yes it's polite it's a very like a little bit of a it's laudatory it's a lot of kind of giving praise and and thanks where it's due and and poking fun of people that can take it but um yeah yeah I think I mean look it's hard to I like to go off piste and like just have a conversation with people in front of me but I'm also a journalist so that's my job is just being good at conversation.

7:52And that is not the job of Monica Lewinsky. And I will never have hair as glossy as hers or like, you know, it's a different skill set. But yeah, you want to get like the biggest draw. And that is, yeah, she's, Bette Midler was amazing. And I had forgotten that she had played Sue Mangers in a Broadway show that Graydon Carter had produced or that vanity care or both. Yeah. Yeah. I like that story in the book of his turn as a Broadway producer question for you. I have not read the Keith McNally book. I need to get the, the, I don't even know if it's a galley at this point, just a copy, but which one would, would you say got to you more emotionally?

8:38I don't know if I'm supposed, I feel like I'm going to get in trouble for saying anything, but who cares? The Keith one is extraordinary. If the Keith one wins, you know, awards, I wouldn't be surprised. I think there's, I think because his life, at least to me, is less public in terms of details. There are things about his life that were surprising to me. And it's written with a depth of emotion that is pretty moving even to people with hearts of stone like myself. I cannot wait. I have a funny little anecdote in Monday's line sheet actually about, you know, he scheduled one of the book parties the same night as the Met Gala.

9:27Did he really? Yeah. Which like, it's a power move. I love it. And what I did was I reached out to people very close to him and said, what's the deal? And they were like, we're not going to that one. We're going to one on Tuesday. So I think there's probably like seven or at least a couple. And this one seems to be the one that like a lot of downtown people are invited to. And there's going to be a Richard E. Grant reading. and there's like songs by people I'd never heard of before. And so it sounds fun. But the person was like, I'm sure he doesn't even realize. Also, because, you know, he's very good friends with Anna.

10:07That's true. But also not that many people are invited to the Met Gala. I mean, and a lot of the people that would want to go to a Keith McNally, maybe in the 90s, there would have been a higher overlap. But now I don't think that like, I don't know who's going to be there, like Bad Bunny and Sabrina Carpenter. Like, it's just not the same. This is exactly what I wrote. Oh. Because someone, the person who told me about it was like, isn't this funny? Said, well, you know, maybe this person. And it named some like downtown socialite-ish people who were big in the night, like very part of the 90s fashion scene.

10:46And I was like, they're not invited to the Met Gala anymore. The Met Gala is like brands and celebrities. The only crossover, it's like Chloe Sevigny, Maybe like Annabelle Dexter Jones or something like that. And, and Anna herself. Yeah. So I think the thing I, I just, my assumption is that there is another thing that Anna will be involved in. And, and also the book comes out on Tuesday. So it's like the book comes out on Tuesday. You're going to have the thing on Monday and do something. Probably maybe Anna's going to something on Tuesday. That's the thing. I mean, she could also throw him a party in DC.

11:23There's just so many, you know, the book rollout, as we've seen now, can be such a long, ever loving thing. She could be in conversation with him. And also, he knows that she supports him. Like, she's been, you know, there from his days at one-fifth. And so, also, she's busy. It's not like your good friend who has kids who, you know, the barrier for entry is getting a babysitter. Like, it's Anna Wintour. Yes. Yes. I would say that seeing Sarah Hoover's book tour and also Josh Duboff, I've been like, we didn't do enough stuff. How are you feeling about because they've both Sarah has been pounding the pavement and I feel like Josh has to.

12:07Yeah. Do you. You have a book. Is your book coming out in the fall or it just got moved up a month. It's coming out in October. Oh my God. It's coming out right around when yours did. I think it's on like October 6th or something like that. 7th. It's basically like the last day of Paris fashion week. Amazing. And, and it's about Jane Birkin. It's a biography of Jane Birkin. It's called it girl. Amazing. It's going to be a huge hit. I know it. How are you feeling? You've done this before. So I have, but in some ways that makes it worse because it's not a blank slate. Like you can't just get press because you're a new person writing a book, but I'm very proud of it.

12:49I think it's like it's it's kind of the best thing I've ever written in some ways because it fuses like gossipy reporting with criticism with like real kind of revisionist history and style and movie and music criticism in a way that and plus doing it in two languages. It was, you know, it was a task, but I think it's really good. And I think, you know, the question of like, how do you keep the spotlight on someone who is always kind of this like muse or ancillary character in their own life is a really important one. So I'm excited. I'm exhausted and overwhelmed. And all I want to do is like have a mag like Vogue from 1996 call and send me to a spa or or like we need to get you to that spot that would land.

13:46store all i want is for lanzerhoff to call and for me to bring a friend and to do and i'm like just give me the hardest i want the hardest regime that they can give me it's gonna let's secret this to happen for you yeah i mean i have a sub stack i can write about it then i'll write about it for you know the magazine of anyone's choosing but yeah i want to eat like the really hard crumbly brown bread that they make you chew a ton of times. I want to take the weird laxatives. I want to, I mean, I just reviewed the book about Gala Dali and so much of her early years were spent at sanitariums in Switzerland, just getting like fresh air cures.

14:32Like bring us back. Anyone who could teach me how to chew my food, which I never learned.

14:45Okay, so moving on another press run. I wanted to briefly, Rachel last week wrote about sort of what's happening at Goop where, you know, there really aren't that many people working there at this point. Apparently, they're hiring an editorial director. There's a tip for anyone who needs a job. But but the week before GP Gwyneth Paltrow had done a Vanity Fair cover and in-depth profile with Michelle Ruiz, who I thought did a good job of it about a movie, Marty Supreme, that she's doing that's not coming out until Christmas. And then she also simultaneously did. A Q &A and fortune about the company.

15:28And I was like, and, you know, she used to have a chief brand officer, Nura Raj Brown, who did all this stuff. I'm a big fan of hers. Yeah. Nura is great and is, is, um, she has a great, she has a very fun sub stack. It's a great sub stack. And, and also is, was really good at her job. Yeah. Like very, very good at her job because, you know, we, we were calling her all the time about stuff that, you know, they don't want to talk about, but she was really good at protecting the company, but also not ignoring us, which is always helpful. Like I thought she's very good at her job. Yeah. Who is a quite the question for me is like, who managed this?

16:08And do you think, cause like you just did a piece with GP last year about Goop's 15th anniversary. And I've interviewed her a couple of times. My thing about her and you have more experience with celebrities, but is that like, she's really good. She doesn't need a PR in the room with her. Like she knows what she's doing and she can manage herself. And most like old school celebrities like that who have been around it forever are like that, but she's excellent at it and she's consistently doing press. But I just felt like this was too much. Like if I were her advisor, whoever was advising her, I'd be like, I don't think you need to come out right now and talk about the state of this Goop business, which is not like, is in a restructuring mode, which is totally fine.

16:52But like, don't do a Q &A with a business magazine. I don't know. I thought it was too much. I don't know. I have a theory behind it, actually. Tell me. My theory is that all of this is planned towards a big Oscars award season run a la Demi Moore. and she's getting the goop CEO corporate stuff out of the way now addressing it so that she doesn't have to when she does whatever major profiles, TV segments, the big push to sort of remind us that she is an actress, that she has this very glamorous looking role that was filmed all over my neighborhood last fall. and um can't wait to see it it looks great and from some you know some people that we know some new york characters are in seem to have like little extras roles and stuff like that oh fun um and yeah i think that it's i think the goop stuff is her effort i'm not saying it's successful but um of being like i'm a ceo here's what i think about this country company that i've devoted you know 15 17 17 years of her life too she has the ceo role she takes it seriously um and then come this you know fall i imagine the movie could be premiering at um new york film festival or you know something and um you know come the fall when she really wants to do her I'm reintroducing myself as an actress.

18:35Remember me. I won an Oscar. Now I'm going to get a support in one or at least try to. I think you may be right. I also think they've been trying. They would love to sell goop. You know, nothing's ever for sale. But I think for many years, the reporting that I've done, obviously, Rachel has done a ton of it. But I have heard like firsthand of her being like, let's get this going. I'm sure. And those, you know, yeah, the financiers and VC behind it, they've got to be about as itchy as as, you know, glossiers by now of like, let's get a return. Yeah. I mean, maybe not that much. I don't think many of them are going to get a return, to be honest.

19:18I think that like the big thing that I've learned, the interesting thing about Gwyneth Paltrow is she's a founder. She's a celebrity and she's also truly the CEO of the company. Like a lot of people are like, I don't know. She's I'm like, no, she actually runs the business. Like I've I've been reporting on it for long enough. Like and that is part of the problem. She's never been able to hire someone who is strong enough to kind of run the business and that she trusts and all. Yeah, I mean, it's hard. I my book about Glossier have it. And I think so many of these sorts of like founder centric brands have that issue.

19:54where it's really hard to find your trusted number two, which I get. I'm a control freak as well. But I also, you know, I'm very comfortable with what I don't know about and love farming out information to people who know what to do. But not everyone is like that. And, you know, I'm just talking about a very small scale with like my life and not, you know, goop. totally and she she is incredibly smart and incredibly savvy and so there aren't that many people who are smart as her so it's this thing of like she has founder syndrome she has celebrity syndrome she has also is actually cop the issue of yeah yes she's also competent so it's this thing of like it's this perfect storm if she has this amazing thing and they never really figured out now.

20:45I mean, look, hopefully Goop Kitchen will sell for a ton of money, but that's a different cap table. So it's interesting. And, you know, as as our friend Amanda Dobbins always says, we wish her the best. We do. Although Amanda had a real breaking point with her sort of lack of condemnation of RFK Jr., which I agree she has. I mean, she mentioned him in the article that I I wrote about her for the New York Times. And, you know, she has a big platform to denounce him and she's not. So, yeah. And yeah, if you all want to listen to that episode of Jam Session, it's really good. And Amanda brought up a lot of good points.

21:24I think my feeling about that, and I think I said this to Amanda or made a comment when I linked to Jam Session and Line Sheet, but I just don't understand how she didn't just don't just don't say it because during the pandemic, when the vaccine stuff kind of came up and also just like the beginning of the pandemic, they were extremely goop was extremely careful. They never said anything anti-vax. They never said anything pro-vax. They just like sort of got out of that world and didn't engage with it. And I thought I was like, OK, this is smart of them because like this is litigious territory and be careful.

22:07So I'm just, I w I am surprised she didn't like just get around that question and, but instead actively engaged with it. And that was, I was, I was shocked. I did. I thought it was not, I would not have advised her to do that, but you know. Yeah. I don't know who's, I wonder who is advising her. If anyone is, I, I think part of that is the confidence and hubris of an actor, also someone who's somewhat sort of cloistered in West Coast wellness world where drinking raw milk seems pretty normal. And then, you know, you zoom out and you realize that, you know, these things have much more far reaching socio political cultural complications and connotations and consequences.

23:03So it will be an interesting year for Gwyneth Paltrow once again. She never escapes us. Yeah, I am. I love Michelle Ruiz and I thought the profile is great, but I'm very here for any for any big Gwyneth profile. I'm dying to hear all about Marty Supreme and her sort of engaging with the world as an actor again, for sure. I will read all of them. One thing I'm a little bit sick of, and then we should move on. We'll do a quick fire round because I know you want to discuss summer shopping. I think there have been too many movies about older women and young men. I'm done. I don't think it's stopping anytime soon because I'm a close reader of like Publishers Weekly, Publishers Lunch for books.

23:51And I am seeing the sort of post all fours Miranda July effect on books. It seems like there's a lot of memoirs and novels coming out with the themes of sort of, you know, midlife sexual reawakenings, be that with it's, you know, a younger person or what. And I imagine the same thing is going to be happening with with movies and television. I whether or not I don't know which I don't know what I don't think it was Amanda and Juliet on jam session. Someone was talking about this recently and made this point of like, can we just have older women having relationships with men their age? Like that would be interesting to me.

24:40Yes, but I will as someone who is not married and having relationships. Yeah, it is once it is interesting who is sort of. I don't know, hitting on you or who you're meeting like I all of my you know, I've dated a lot of people much younger and much older than me. And I feel like a lot of the people my age are maybe they just haven't gotten divorced yet. It's coming. They're tied up. But also like the I also care less about my age. I'm more interested in are we at similar places in our lives, you know, blah, blah, blah. But I'm also notorious for having strange taste and in men or I think you you have great taste.

25:31And I enjoy hearing about as as a person who's been married for a long time. I love hearing about your your situations. situations. I think, yes, I think the issue I have with it is it's very much about their age every single time. That's true. And it's like, who cares? Like, this doesn't matter. It needs to evolve beyond that. And I would say in all fours that it's not about what's his face's age. The age difference. No, it's about where she is in her life as sort of this paramenopausal woman. I don't know. I was just reading. Do you are you reading that like hate read thing with Delia Delia Substack?

26:18Occasionally. The one today is sort of an anti I guess like downtown dime square screed. And my issue with it is it kept being sort of like you're going to get old. And it's like if someone and there you're going to get old was like 38 or something. And And it's like, baby, as someone who's way on the other side of that age, like everyone gets old. It doesn't mean that you necessarily like go off to the pasture and are never seen again. Like you're going to turn 38, 40 and you're going to have kids. And you also may want to get a drink and be around hot people sometimes. Yeah. Not that I disagreed, but I think people are obsessed with age that haven't been that age.

26:59Do you know what I mean? Yeah. Yes, I agree. It has to be the tie-in to Gwyneth because it's written by people that are younger. The idea that someone at that age is having a sexual relationship with Timothee Chalamet used to only be the stuff of my fan fiction. I mean, enjoy. Now it's coming on screen. Not for me. Not for me. Two final things. One is that I love Delia and I would love to have her on here. I think that that is an interesting column that is very, it really illustrates the issue we're in media right now because it really needs an editor. Like a lot of great ideas. Also, people, if they're not using their names, they're not naming names.

27:49Like be more specific. Yeah. So, yeah. Let's get you an editor, Delia. I'm a huge fan. She should come on Fashion People soon. But but the other thing I just want to say closing with Miranda July. Yeah, I went to this Kim Haystrider. Is that how you say her last name? The paper magazine founder. I went to a book party that Carla Welch and some other people threw for her at the Chateau on Tuesday night. That was super nice. And there were just like a lot of it was not like it was just it was like, because, you know, Kim is really friends with a lot of people. I don't know her, but she's really friends with like Carol and Umberto were there.

28:29Like it was, it was, yeah, it was fun. And I just got to catch up with some people, but Miranda July was there and I was with Rebecca Ramsey who styles her occasionally. And she came over to say goodbye to Rebecca when she was leaving. She was wearing this skirt that was split down the back and she was wearing sheer tights. And like you could see her whole crack. It was amazing. That's amazing. She looked so good. I was just like, you look, she's incredible, has an amazing sense of style and is. Who did she write this stuff for? Was it Prada? Was it someone else that she worked? She did work with a brand.

29:11Was it Prada? She did a campaign that she wrote for Prada. She also did an amazing event Hermes did where she did like a dance at this. The dream. I have been watching her perform since I was in high school because we grew up near each other and grew up in the same sort of like punk house show circuit. So I she has been a part of like sort of someone that I've watched and vaguely associated with, although not really since. Yeah, I think we were both teenagers. She's maybe like two years older than me or something like that. But it's wonderful and wild to see her doing this like Prada stuff and all of that.

29:52Or what a dream. It's fabulous.