Leotard making a comeback? What’s next, leg warmers?
By Beth Teitell
Thursday, May 25, 2006
People have their ‘‘fired-up-o-meters” set on stun these days. For some, it’s ‘‘The Da Vinci Code.” For others, treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo or the NSA phone-tapping scandal. In my ever-alert circle, we’re worked up about a blight of major, and stretchy, proportion: the return of the leotard. This nightmarish turn of events is set off by Madonna, of course, in her new, Lycra-ridden ‘‘Confessions” world tour, and the unfortunate boomerang of ’70s and ’80s styles.
People, we’ve been making fun of skinny jeans, leggings and leotards for decades, don’t you remember? We always laugh at old pictures of ourselves and wonder what we were thinking in such unenlightened times. Ring any bells? Apparently not, since fashion’s Axis of Evil is being celebrated in magazines, vintage boutiques and, of course, by our Madge.
And for my money, the leotard is a WMD unto itself, in large part because it goes - or doesn’t - with so many things. Look, there it is in a wrap style, tucked into a skirt; here it is with snaps going into your jeans. There it is sweating to a Jane Fonda workout video. Make it stop.
‘‘I feel the same way I did when I found out North Korea and Iran are working on nuclear development,” said a woman old enough to remember leotards from the first time around. ‘‘These things are dangerous in the wrong hands.
‘‘Just because Madonna is upping her dose of Centrum Silver and working out 10 hours a day doesn’t mean every other woman of her generation is,” she added. ‘‘But they will, like they did the first time around with the black lace and the cross jewelry, emulate her, and the result will be Soccer Moms in sausage cases mincing down the produce aisle. Shudder.”
And yet, as another woman still bearing obvious emotional leotard scars pointed out, the garment’s return may be good news. If the leotard can make a comeback, maybe we all can. ‘‘Now, do I want to see people wearing it to the office?” she asked rhetorically. ‘‘No, but think how much fun it will be to make fun of them.”
Them? That would be fine. What I worry about is us.
