Its that time again...Tim's Podcast!
() Are his
[] are mine!
[Before I start, I just want to state that this is probably the most enlightening and disheartening podcast I heard. Stuff went on behind the scenes that we, the viewer, didn't see, especially in the case of Bonnie. And this was a difficult podcast to transcribe. Lots of information here!!Now that its done I also say I wanted to wring Tim's neck on this podcast. He is usually very succinct-this time he was rambling, changing sentences halfway through...but I made it work!]
Hi, I'm Tim Gunn and this is my podcast for the Macy's challenge. Uli won the last challenge so she comes into this challenge with immunity, and Katherine is out. We bid farewell to Katherine and we miss her.
So this is the challenge everybody has been waiting for, to say the least. Heidi presents the challenge, which is to design an outfit for Macy's private label, I.N.C. (International Concepts). We have 12 designers remaining and tensions among them are escalating to say the very least.
We move into the model selection, and we have a bit of a turnaround because Uli, who was our winner from the last challenge, goes first of course and she decides she no long wants to continue working with Lindsay-she's taking Keith's model Nazri. One of the comments she makes is that she feels that Nazri is really the element of Keith's presentation that is most compelling to the judges. Everything looks good on her and [Uli] wants to win this challenge. Even though she has immunity, she wants to keep winning, and she feels that Nazri will be her lucky charm. Bradley ends up getting Lindsay, and all the models and designers are not completely turned around or kept the same-but we have an opportunity for there to be some changes here.
So the designers meet with Mehmet Tangoren, who is VP of Contemporary Sportswear for Macy's, and Mehmet. goes into more details about the challenge. He tells the designers they will be making a three piece look for INC and he also describes the goal of INC and a bit about the customer-that the design work should be ageless, very fashion forward, that the customer for INC is someone who is very knowledgeable about fashion and really wants something new...on the edge! This is a huge opportunity for the designers because INC will be putting the winning look into production and it will be sold at Macy's largest flagships in Macy's largest cities. For the designers, this is really big and very important-and of course, it will make their work highly visible.
Then we reveal that this is team challenge. They will be working in four teams of three, they have 30 minutes to sketch their design ideas and prepare a presentation to Mehmet, and then we go to Macy's corporate offices here in New York and each designers have 5 minutes with Mehmet. and his team. The team will in turn caucus and decide who among the 12 designers will be the four team leaders.
So based upon the quality of the design work and the impact of the presentation, Keith is selected, Bonnie is selected, Robert is chosen, and (laughs) sorry for my little snicker...to the surprise! Of everyone, Angela (laughs again)...and I have to tell you, being behind the scenes, there was no funny business here. Angela won it on her own-there was no prodding on anybody's part saying, "why don't you choose Angela cause it will really shake things up in the work room, not to mention in the selection process with the designers!" When (laughs) Angela's name was called by Mehmet, you could just see it on everyone's face, especially the look of, "Oh my god, please don't let her choose me for her team." So she was thrilled, and I was thrilled for her. Her presentation was wonderful-in fact, when I saw how good it was, I reflected upon the comment she made the last time they were pitching for a team challenge, which was to Tara Conner, Miss USA, when Angela said she didn't sketch. Really?! Well, what happened between challenge 2 and challenge 4 that suddenly gave you this artistic flair?
Keith chooses Alison and Jeffrey, who, if you remember, worked together before on Miss USA. Bonnie chooses Uli and Bradley; Robert chooses Vincent and Kayne and Angela chooses the dynamic duo of Michael and Laura, who also worked together on the Tara Conner Challenge. We have 4 very interesting clusters of designers. They have 15 minutes to caucus as a team and then we are off to shop. There is a budget of $100 and the designers have 2 days for this challenge.
I have to explain something to everyone structurally. Heidi introduced the challenge on a Thursday evening. Mehmet. came in on Friday morning to present the details and give the designers more information and then we had our pitches, and we came back to Parsons for the team...and we had to go shopping, and I'm saying all this because we really weren't back in the workroom until about 4:30 or 5 that afternoon. We had about til midnight. This was leading into Memorial Day weekend. We were going into suspension for two days because we had a full day of photo shoots and a full day of filming, taping, TV commercials, the opening segment of the show...I mean we had two full full days of additional work over that Saturday and Sunday. We weren't going back to the workroom until Monday. There was a lot that had to happen and frankly, the designers were at risk of losing the momentum that we rely upon for this. It was the only time we could get the two studios to shoot in and we were bringing back the designers who had already been eliminated cause they have to be part of this whole thing. So Stacy comes back, Malan comes back, Katherine comes back-and of course, having the three designers who were out come back also adds to a lot of the dynamic that was going on among the designers. [Honestly...this paragraph is a mess. He rambled.]
Now, Friday evening (night-late), I had just come back from the workroom and I am called by the producers and told that Keith has been found with materials that are against the rules of the show, and these materials are fashion books. One is a pattern book and one is another book related to fashion. When the designers arrive for the show, these materials are confiscated. There is a call for them-these aren't the only things that are against the rules, but we are very specific about things like this not being allowed. Not only was there a call for these materials early on in the show (well, early on...the day the designers arrived), but about a week later, because there were rumors that perhaps some of these materials were floating around, there was another call. Very specifically, "if anybody has this, reveal it now, and just do it!" So, Keith didn't. Before going off to Silver Cup Studios in Long Island City Saturday morning, I went to Parsons to meet with the producers and to look at the books because they had confiscated them. And, sure enough, this was unsettling. In particular, the pattern book for me. I mean, the 20th century fashion book, well yeah, there were lots of references to designers with photographs of their signature looks, but....all right. The patterns were all together different. I have to say, Keith is extremely talented. Whether you like him or not, he is a talented designer. He is very adept at construction. Yeah, we know his background is menswear, but he was a fashion student at one point, and unless you are only studying menswear (which no one does-well, I shouldn't say that...some people may) everyone does women's wear. I mean its like Emmett McCarthy in Season 2-he was a Parson's graduate, and I knew he only designed for women when he was in school. The fact that he was a menswear designer didn't mean he was incapable of designing for women. Keith has been excellent as a designer-consistently excellent-and do I think its because he is possession of these books? No, not for a solitary moment. But he is in possession of the books. That says to me that he must have harbored a lot of insecurities about his own ability, and I can't speak to that (I'm certainly not a psychiatrist), but it was really disappointing and, again, severely unnecessary. It would have been different if it had been Star from Season 1, I could have under stood it! This was not good. So not only did he look at books, but the producers asked me to come look at Keith's work table, because on it were drawings of patterns that directly mimicked the, not only the patterns in the book, but the whole placement and relationship of those patterns. That was not good. Did he use them? I mean-I'll reveal to you, the patterns were so dumb and basic-it was a pant! Menswear, women swear? I mean, women have a different shape than men and vice versa, but it just seemed totally unnecessary. Maybe it was just a doodle. I don't know, but it was incriminating. It wasn't good.
The producers and Bravo caucused, the Bravo lawyers became involved needless to say, and decisions would have to be made on how we were going to move forward. We still have an obligation to move forward with our advertisements for the show and the still photography-I mean we had a lot of stuff to do that had to involve Keith no matter what, for Keith had already been there for 3 of the challenges and into this 4th one. This was super super confidential, and I left Parson's to go out the Silver Cup studios to be with the designers. We were going to be together all day. When I arrived there, (I thought at the time, Tim you're projecting into this) I perceived that Keith was really marginalized with the designers. He was sitting (though he was only 5 feet away from them) alone looking kind of hurt. I made a point of reaching out to him and talking to him. I didn't ask him what was wrong (because I knew what was wrong). Frankly, I didn't know if he knew that the books had been confiscated. The books had been found under his bed, which was also rather damning. Oh! Then I should add, though Jeffrey was Keith's roommate, he was not the one who told the producers-it was Kayne, who is actually in another apartment [Tim is wrong here. Kayne lives in the same apartment, different room with Vincent. He will contradict himself later in a latter bit of the cast]. This came with additional embellishments, such as, routinely Keith would get up in the middle of the night, go to the bathroom and run the shower for an hour, and then come out, and that these books were hidden under a robe or something. I can't speak to that-it's-I mean but who would know that other than someone in the apartment? There is lots of background stuff going on.
So I am out in Astoria, out in Long Island City, and as far as I know, other than Kayne, the other designers don't know anything about this. Kayne knows, Keith may or may not know, though he surely has the books, and knows he isn't supposed to, since everyone has been spoken to, twice.
We finish up that day, and the next day we were to be at Industria Studios (Some people say In-Doo-stria, but I can't say it) which is in the West Village in Manhattan. The designers are coming down by van from the Atlas apartments, and when the van pulls up, Keith bolts. He runs for the hills. There are no cameras-the cameras are inside the studio. They aren't outside, we weren't expecting this to happen. None of this is recorded. I learn about this when I arrive about an hour after the designers (that's my call time). I arrive and hear this from the designers, along with, "well you know why he ran away? Because he's a big cheat!" So its revealed to me that everybody knows about it! The first person who revealed this to me was Laura. I asked Laura how long she had known, and she said everyone had known for days! Well, great! Everyone knew before I did! It also caused me to reflect on the day before and realized that I wasn't projecting-Keith was being marginalized and ostracized. It caused me to read a lot of things into this running away episode. My first response was this poor guy is really hurting, and I know he is obnoxious and irritating and all that, but he really is hurting...and I, the producers and Bravo-we want to help! Tell him, look we can get through this, and its upsetting. I also read something else into it-which is, he had been in the van with the designers, he is being marginalized and ostracized...I'm sure his feelings were hurt. Yeah, on the one hand, cry me a river, look at what he did! On the other hand, he is a human being, he has feelings and ...I dunno. I really felt for him, even though we have all this evidence? Things going on. Where is Keith, and what is he doing? Well, naïve me, I'm like, "Well! He's gone home, he's going back into his life as if this never happened!" Project Runway, that is. The producers told me, well, he can't. We have his keys, we have his credit cards, we have his wallet, we have his id-we have everything. Their major links to a normal life, he no longer processes. He lives alone so there isn't a roommate there...I don't know anything about his living conditions, but I thought, what would I do? I would go to super, say I lost my keys can you let me in? I figured he was just at his apartment behind a closed door-a closed, locked door in the dark (physically and metaphorically).
Anyway, we felt bad about him, but the show had to go on! Talk about literally and metaphorically-the show _had_ to go on! We had all of our group photo shoots so we had a lovely guy from Bravo stand in for Keith, and we were later going to have to Photoshop Keith's face onto this guy who was really a trooper. It was bazaar and surreal-when this guy first stepped into the photograph the designers looked at him like-who are you? (laughs) "...I'm... the stand-in for Keith!" (laughs)
It was an awkward day-very awkward, to say the least. Keith showed up many hours later. It was the middle of the afternoon-3-4 o'clock-ish. He looked pretty beaten up. I remembered just giving him a hug and saying, "look, we'll get through this somehow."
I am caucusing with the producers and with Bravo and we are all saying, basically, how can he stay? He has broken the rules three times. He had the contraband books, he left the production, and while he was gone he used the internet. Of the three of them, to me, that one seemed the least harmful-but it was still against the rules. We had a triple whammy against him. One had to also ask, what would be next? Clearly he is a guy who doesn't want to play by the rules and who wants to thumb his nose at the rules and say, "Screw you." Another way of looking at it he is saying, "I'm bigger and better than the rules, so what difference does it make?" I go back to my apartment after the photo shoot and wait for the producers to call-and they do, late. It was 11 o'clock and they say, he's leaving and we want you to come to the Atlas apartments now, and tell him so. (This is Sunday)
I arrive at the Atlas and...I have to do what I have to do. I'm feeling very matter-of-fact about him, and I'm very disappointed in him...but he has to go. We talk about how this will be done logistically. I'm going into the apartment (we expect all the designers to be asleep because its almost 1 o'clock at this point) and I'm going to ask Jeffrey who shares a bedroom with Keith-to please step out, assuming that Jeffrey is going to wake up. We will do this on camera-we have to. We arrive at the apartment, knock on the door...Vincent answers the door I think? I can't remember. I, truly, was fixated on Keith at the moment I don't even remember the crew (the cameraman or the audio person)...I just don't. So I walk into the bedroom where Keith and Jeffrey are in bed. Jeffrey throws the covers over his head and makes all sorts of motions about, 'whatever you are doing, don't do it in here I'm not leaving'. So I ask Keith to step out...we are in the living room, which is the room where Vincent and Kayne are sleeping. Kayne looks very asleep, and Vincent is quasai awake. Keith and I sit on the floor beside Vincent's bed and I just tell him, very matter-of-factly, that owing to the fact he has broken the rules, he had to go home. He has to leave.
I was expecting some verbal backlash...and there wasn't any. He was very polite and equally matter-of-fact with, 'alright, I understand.' I left. He was also leaving that night, so he had to pack his stuff up then and there and go home, go wherever-be out.
The next morning I had to tell the designers. I was very careful to say that Keith was leaving because we found these contraband materials. I was also very careful to say that we weren't accusing him of anything. We were not saying he used them, or that he cheated-we were saying he was not to be in possession of these materials, and he was, and he knew he wasn't supposed to be-so therefore, he had to leave. At that time, I didn't even mention the fact he left the production the day before. The designers had a mixed bag of emotions. On the one hand, there had been such anger about Keith that people wanted him gone. On the other hand, after it happens, 'oh my god...did we bring this upon him?' Well no, you didn't. But there was a lot of guilt-I don't blame the designers. Keith dishes it out-take it, buster! His leaving wasn't revenge, it was an appropriate response to what he had done. It wasn't revenge, it wasn't retribution, it wasn't a bitch-slap...it wasn't any of those things. It was simply a consequence of his actions and he needed to take responsibility for them. From where I stood in my interaction with him and asking him to leave-he did take responsibility for them. What transpired behind the scenes as I speak this? I don't know at this point.
So we have to carry on, and Keith was a team leader. Alison and Jeffrey are in some ways, disabled in this challenge. We have one day remaining, the runway judging will be the following day (Tuesday) and they are missing the design spiritual voice, and they are also without a set of hands. Talk about make it work! This was the make it work challenge of all time, in some ways. I also have to say I have complete and total confidence in Jeffrey and Alison. I do!!! In terms of their design work...but they almost didn't finish the Miss USA challenge. We were going to the runway and they were still sewing, so I was doubly worried that they were without the extra set of hands and I felt that it was a fairly ambitious design piece of Keith's. They were going to have to...make it work! Sorry. I said to them, you are at liberty to amend this. You're leader's gone you are under serious constraints. You can't compromise the design brief presented [to] Mehmet Tangoren but you can certainly make this your own now, for you are now the leaders in the absence of the leader. The leader is not returning and the leader is not going to be on the runway for the judging-so its you guys. Do what you need to do. They were troopers-they showed that they have the stuff to move on and carry on.
To speak briefly to the dynamic of the teams, we have Alison and Jeffrey moving forward for team Keith which is now Keith-less. We have Angela working very well with Michael and Laura-I mean, there was a lot of good synergy there. A lot of the dialogue also I felt that while Angela was responsible for the design and she was the leader, she was allowing for input, and was inviting it. In some ways that doesn't surprise anybody, but it was mature of her and done in a very collaborative way, which was good. I will say the same about Robert, Kayne and Vincent. You throw Vincent into anything and I automatically worry-but it went well.
Where there were tensions were in Team Bonnie, which included Uli and Bradley. Bonnie clearly laid out who was doing what, but it was so demarcated in terms of, 'you do this, you do that, and I'll do this' that I was concerned that we were going to have three individual pieces that could potentially look okay, but would they work together as a look, given how this was developing. I will just say I felt that in terms of color story and silhouette, Bonnie's design had drifted from what she had presented to Mehmet. It looked sleek, it looked modern and it was very well proportioned, the way in which the pieces went together-I saw this, I was worried about the color, I was worried about the morphing of the silhouette...it was suddenly looking matronly to me as oppose to sleek and modern. Also owning to the fact that these three pieces were being worked on completely separately and weren't being brought together to have a critical and analytical dialogue, I was worried about the way the proportions were going to look. This didn't feel good to me, nor did they looks Bradley would give me, and even Uli. Bonnie...I won't say was in denial, but she wanted to be a Pollyanna about the whole thing. No no, its fine, don't worry about it, its great, its fine fine fine. ...Okay. But be prepared to talk to the judges.
We head into the runway judging and Vera Wang is here standing in for Michael Kors, and we have Nina Garcia of course, and Mehmet from Macy's is our guest judge. He is the client for this. He's the one who decides what goes into production. We have the runway judging and the top two designs are the designs of Team Keith (Alison and Jeffrey) and Team Angela! Angela, Michael and Laura...so congratulations to them. The bottom two are Team Bonnie and Team Robert. Frankly, I anticipated this issue with Bonnie, with Robert-I saw what the judges saw...there was a real, almost contradiction between the jacket and the look of the dress. There wasn't as much harmony as one might have wanted among those pieces. The dress being two pieces. Owning to leadership, Bonnie is out. It was disappointing to a lot of people, certainly to me, but it was the way it needed to be.
Surprise! It is revealed that we won't know the winner til the following morning. The way that we will know the winner is that the winner will be the leader of the team who worked on the design in the window at Macy's. So the dress will be there, and that person will be the leader. [...Tim...that sentence makes no sense.] Of course, with Angela's team its easy-its Angela. But with Team Formerly Known as Keith, who will win? Will Alison and Jeffrey both win? Will Keith win posthumously? (laughs) I mean, I knew he wasn't there to execute most of it. Well, Alison and Jeffrey will share the win. There was precedent for that, so that could happen. Jeffrey, really believing there is no way Angela could win, is already preparing Alison for their trip to the pedestal and wall of fame in the design room[I'm on team Jeffrey-I would be doing that too!]. They are off to Macy's...low and behold! There is Angela's three piece look. Angela, I think, is going to have to be taking to a hospital to be revived. She is so excited, she can't stand it.
I will also share with you, for this will not be in the show...if anyone things I know everything, boy do I not! Keith is gone, so we head into this challenge with 12 designers and now we have 11. This was going to be a single elimination challenge. There weren't going to be two people gone. We have already lost someone so we are talking (we: producers, Bravo and I) and we decide, surprise! No one is going to go home. At least, that is how it is left to me when we were going into the runway judging. I have to tell you, I was so keyed up and titillated by the whole thing! I get to go back to the waiting area and instead of saying, 'go clean up your stuff' - I don't have to say that!! They would have known that of course, for it would have been declared on the runway that no one was going home. We already had the lines for Heidi which were, "as you know, one of you will win this challenge, and someone is out." So there was a slight change in the wording, and we figured the designers wouldn't pick up on that, but we know.
Heidi doesn't say that...she says 'one of you will be out.' I'm thinking, well drat, she forgot the line and we'll fill it in later. Then, Heidi is getting really exercised in a way in how she is talking about Bonnie and how this isn't good and I'm thinking-Heidi, I love you anyways, but you are really an excellent actress in the way you are delivering this! This passion, this fervor! Then she says, Bonnie, I'm sorry auf wiedersehn. ...What's going on?! Oh my god! So, I have to, of course, go back and tell her to go back and clean up her space. But is she really cleaning up her space? So I leave the runway judging, go into the producer's room, and I have that look of panic on my face. What is going on? What am I suppose to do? What did Heidi just do? They look at me and say very calmly-we decided she was going home. (laughs) Well, it was that they were going to send someone home-not necessarily Bonnie. So I thought, well...alright, I wish I had known, psychologically and emotionally. I had been sitting there gleefully thinking oh all this talk, no one is going home, isn't this great, we will head into the next challenge with 11 people-but in fact, we are going in with 10 people. We lost two in this challenge. I was the least prepared of anyone for that.
So for our next challenge, the designers will be designing for an icon. And watch what happens!
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