Bargain Shopping

A ball gown for $7 – try to top that

 From the

Sharon Dunn
A ball gown for $7 – try to top that
In these uncertain economic times, there’s no point spending money needlessly.
When my editor asked me to do a piece for the ‘frugal ‘series, I knew she was on to me. It must have been my bragging that did it, because I do love to save a buck, particularly on clothes, and I do love to talk about it. I think it goes back to my university days at Dalhousie in Halifax, when I bought a ‘hot’ sheepskin coat off the street for 20 bucks. I didn’t know it was hot at the time, but when I recall how the ‘sales clerks’ (tough looking dudes) jumped off the back of a white, unmarked van with about 100 coats for a two-minute sales frenzy before folding up and disappearing into the night, I think it’s safe to say the garment was suspect. Although that was the beginning and end of the purchasing of stolen goods for me, it does seem to have been the start of my addiction to buying clothes at good prices — really good prices.

And it can be fun being frugal. Last year, I met CNN’s Larry King, and he complimented me on the dress I was wearing. It was a Chinese-inspired red (with gold background) brocade that cost me a whopping $24. I graciously accepted the compliment as though I was wearing Valentino, instead of five-and-dime couture. Luckily, he didn’t ask the name of the designer, although that has happened. I once wore a one-shouldered black sheath dress to a large awards show. I was an underpaid television news anchor at the time. A Toronto columnist, recognizing me, stopped and complimented me on it. When she asked who designed it, I froze for a moment, before telling her I didn’t quite remember. (I actually remembered very well. I had bought it from a clearance house for $19 from a rack of thousands.) I told her I thought I had bought the dress at Holt Renfrew, the most expensive store I could think of in Toronto where I lived. Fortunately, she left it at that.

There are braver sorts than me out there. Take Toronto society maven Catherine Nugent, just back from France, who told me, “I bought a wonderful caftan in the market in the South of France for $30. It had three layers with silver weights holding down the layers. I bought it four years ago and wear it still. I dress it up with nice beads and jewellery.” Nugent had no problem letting people know where she got the frock. “I told them the truth,” she said, “I got it at the market.” And they all ran out to get one,” she laughed, although she did concede that not all society types would shop for clothes at a market. “I think it takes courage and selfassurance”, she said. “Buoyed by Nugent’s example, I’m now about to make a bold admission, to go where no woman has gone before. (I’ll probably regret this, but here goes.) To last year’s Brazilian Ball, I wore a copper-coloured gown that cost me $7 — yes, that’s $7. I bought it at Winners. Even for Winners this is a very low price, but I guess the price just kept going down because the dress didn’t fit anyone. Of course it didn’t fit me, either, but that didn’t stop me — a deal’s a deal. The amazing thing is that I liked the dress even before I looked at the price tag, and then after looking at the price tag I really liked it.

I feel I should admit that the night I wore the gown, I was also carrying a $1,200 Christian Dior purse. I should also admit that the Dior bag didn’t exactly cost me $1,200. (I bought it at an outlet mall for about $200.) In my opinion, that purse, which I’ve had for years, is the only reason I was able to get away with the $7 gown, assuming I did get away with it. I knew Marlene Borins, the president of the Mount Sinai Hospital Auxiliary, would tell me the truth. She’s a fabulous dresser herself and a blunt and forthright type. I’d spent time at her table during the ball and asked if she remembered the dress I wore. Insisting she did, she said, “I thought it looked great.” When I told her that it cost a mere seven bucks, she replied, “Best $7 you’ve ever spent.” Was she surprised at the price? “Yes,” she said, “I thought it cost a few more zeros.” When I asked if she would ever consider wearing such a dress, she answered wryly, “I haven’t been as lucky as you, to find a dress at that price point.” Though she did admit that, unlike me, she wasn’t looking for a dress at that price point. And, by the way, she doesn’t even recall my Dior bag!

In my opinion, the best-dressed women I’ve met are not necessarily the ones who walk out of the couture houses, the ones who insist on being dressed from head to toe in Gucci or Chanel at all times, even while gardening or power walking. No, the best dressers I’ve encountered tend to be ‘costumers’, ‘eclectic dressers’, those who mix expensive and chic. Speaking of chic, take Suzanne Boyd, editor-in-chief of Flare magazine. The first time I met her, she was sporting what appeared to be a man’s shirt, open to the waist, exposing a frilly pink bra. The effect was incredible. Suzanne was not only able to pull it off with class, she actually looked dignified.
Let me point out that if I wore that outfit, I would be arrested.

by Sharon Dunn
Edited Jan5/24

Sandra Beckett

“The most reaction I’ve ever seen”

 From the

Sharon Dunn
‘The most reaction I’ve ever seen’
But not everyone at the races loves my $575 see-through number with the marabou fur trim

[Photo: Peter Redman, National Post]
Milliner Sandra Beckett dons a Philip Treacy creation at her Chelsea’s of Oakville hat stand at Woodbine on Queen’s Plate day. In the hat trade for 12 years, Beckett says that her business has grown tremendously. “It used to be older clientele, but our store has changed. Now it’s 18 years to 80.”

Did you know that at Woodbine Racetrack on Queen’s Plate day, there is actually a hat shop set up off the second floor for last-minute purchases? It’s a fine layout of lavish brims, provided by Chelsea’s of Oakville, owned by milliner Sandra Beckett, who sounds a lot like Sharon Osbourne. I bring along my one and only hat, a sorry black number with long feathers that my son says makes it look like a crow landed on my head. It’s sporting years of dust. When I last wore it, to the Kentucky Derby eons ago, my head ended up in the sought-after society pages of The Louisville Herald solely because of my unusual hat. Sandra likes it, but I have no intention of donning it again. I’m already salivating over her grandiose selection. I convince her to let me “borrow” a hat from her store. She agrees, and I find a couple of candidates that look marvellous — until they reach the top of my head.
“You have a big head,” Sandra says, as she tries to pull a bowler number over my skull.
Yes, a big head has always been my problem, but that’s another story.
“What about that one?” I ask, pointing to an extra-wide-brimmed see-through straw hat with white marabou fur trim.
“Yes, you can wear that, but in black,” Sandra tells me. “Black is more severe.” She says black will stand the test of time.
“But I only need it for an hour or so,” I remind her. “I don’t want severe.” She insists I try a huge black and hot-pink heavy straw hat that feels as if the roof of a car has fallen on my head. It must weigh at least 20 pounds.
“You look like a wizard,” says my son Jay, ecstatically, not the look I’m trying for, so I reject that option. In a final attempt, Beckett plops a Philip Treacy of London straw on my head. We agree that I do nothing for the hat, with its asymmetrical crown and “profile brim,” so I head off with my transparent white marabou, and the milliner’s blessing. (By the way, the hat I’ve chosen costs a hefty $575, for those who are paying, that is.) Sandra promises me that it’s an attention getter. “It is a hat that you would see in Hello magazine. It’s by the number one designer for Royal Ascot,” she boasts, even showing me the stamp of approval on the label.

“Who approved it?” I want to know. “The Queen,” she says, with a car salesman’s zeal. The Queen?
I don’t think so, but it’s a good selling pitch, just the same. Today, her highest priced hat is $700, but in the past, she tells me, she has usually had one for around $1,400. “Best to keep things moderately priced this year,” she whispers. Her more popular section includes a number of Eric Javits hats, the renowned packable hat, ranging in price from $250 (for a small one, I’m told) to $1,000 (I guess that’s for a really big one). “Good for a horse race, or a wedding abroad,” she says. “When it comes out of the suitcase, it springs back into shape. Some of these are investment pieces,” Beckett insists when I balk at the prices. “A milliner will only cut so many pieces, like a Chanel purse.” For the faint of pocketbook, Beckett carries a Canadian packable hat by Heaslip out of Hamilton for $45.

Beckett, who says she does many of the hats for MuchMusic and did all of the hats for the movie Four Weddings and a Funeral, even has hats for men. My son buys a Tropic 504 by Kangol, the same cap, he tells me, Samuel L. Jackson wears. It costs a mere $40.
“J.Lo, Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow all wear these hats,” Beckett says. And Joy Behar of The View recently dropped into her Oakville shop, “during a visit to see her daughter, who lives in the area. “Three-quarters of the hats in the walking ring today are ours,” says Beckett proudly. “The ones that aren’t, don’t complement the woman or the outfit.” The key, she says, is in the fitting of the hat. “You don’t want a red line across your forehead. And,” she adds, “you have to have discretion. If we have a dozen ladies to the Four Seasons for lunch, we must make sure they look unique.”

In the hat trade for 12 years, Beckett tells me that her business has grown tremendously. “It used to be older clientele, but our store has changed. Now it’s 18 years to 80.” Part of the reason, she says, is skin cancer. “People want to protect their skin from the sun, so the manufacturers are becoming more youth-oriented.” Now that I have my protection, I decide to hit the stands and try out my hat.
“It’s the best I’ve seen,” says one of the racing officials, and I do observe nudges, and some oohs and aahs, but I quickly discover that I’m still missing a lot of the action. My son, walking a few paces behind me, is getting the real truth.
“It’s the most reaction I’ve ever seen to one piece of apparel,” he gasps, obviously taken aback. I notice a friend of mine in the distance, pointing at me and laughing, and that’s even before she knows it’s me under the topper. “It’s cute, it really is,” she says as I get closer and she recognizes me, but still, she rolls her eyes.


[Photo: Peter Redman, National Post]
Sharon Dunn in the transparent white marabou that Sandra Beckett promised was an attention getter.

“Yes, yes” is a man’s enthusiastic reaction as I walk by. I haven’t heard that one for a long time, and I mean a long time.
“A Georgian-style hat,” says a good-looking man who approaches. “I want one for my girlfriend. I like that it’s see-through,” he says. His girlfriend walks up.
“Isn’t this a beautiful hat?” he says to her.
“I don’t want that hat,” she barks. “I don’t like it.” I try to explain that I’m testing it, and that there are more conservative ones available, but she obviously doesn’t feel like talking. She glares at me and walks off. The boyfriend trails behind her, about to be reprimanded for talking to the girl with the see-through hat.
“Give me a break,” I call after her, “it’s not like it’s a see-through bikini or something. Yeesh, it’s just a hat.”
“Some women are saying, look at that ridiculous hat,’ ” my son confides, terror sweeping across his face, and that does it. Bruised and deflated, I head back to the hat store. When I tell hat clerk Agatha what happened, she nods knowingly. “Pam Anderson wore that hat. I think that’s why men go crazy.” When Pam wore the hat, I suggest, she probably wasn’t wearing much else.
“Men who come into our store love when their wives put on a hat. They think it’s sexy. 90% of women who’ve never worn hats before come back and tell us how many men compliment them. It’s a way to feel sexy, and confident about yourself, and it’s very feminine.” One hat browser, decked out in a classic black straw, offers another theory for their popularity. “Men like women in hats because it’s one more thing to take off.”

by Sharon Dunn

Hey, hands off

the sourdough, lady.

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Hey, hands off the sourdough, lady!
Who says bread squeezing is a victimless crime?

[Photo: Bill Keay, The Vancouver Sun]
Don’t even think about it.

A few days ago I ran into my local grocery store to pick up my favourite fresh bread. As I approached the crusty bread counter, I couldn’t help but notice a middle-aged woman (OK, she was about my age) dressed in high-end tennis wear, looking sweaty and hot — probably fresh off the court, I thought. She appeared to be in a rush as she quickly grabbed a loaf of bread and gave it a good squeeze. She then threw the bread back on the shelf and proceeded to squeeze more loaves. Now keep in mind, this manhandled bread was half-wrapped in a paper bag, so she could have squeezed the bagged end. But no, the ‘lady’ in question pushed the bag aside in each case and proceeded to squeeze the naked end, sometimes using both hands to do her dastardly deed. I must admit she showed no prejudice in her squeezing, first grabbing the French stick and then the challah, the pumpernickel, the rye, the Italian-style — no loaf was safe from her probing, sweaty mitts. After she had rejected and thrown back about a dozen loaves, I finally sputtered, “I can’t believe you did that! You touched all the bread, and now I can’t have any.” Arrogant, she glared at me and announced, “I didn’t touch all the bread.”

Walking through the store fuming, I decided to confront the offender again and, as I passed her in an aisle, I hissed, “You didn’t touch all the bread, but you touched most of it!” She kept walking, totally unconcerned, but another shopper politely asked, “Are you talking to me?” I told her I wasn’t, but related the story of the bread squeezer. She was as shocked as I was, and encouraged me to report the woman. Spurred on by her reaction — and the prepackaged mixture of not-too-fresh buns under my arm — I headed for the customer service counter. I did feel a little silly, but I rationalized my zeal by focusing on the fact that I’d been denied my beloved French stick. And what about SARS? I don’t even touch my own bread until I’ve washed my hands.

Once at the counter, the clerk seemed very sympathetic, especially when a second customer jumped on the bandwagon and backed me up. Buoyed by growing support, I insisted the manager be paged. In the meantime, the bread squeezer was trying to make her escape through the express checkout, her own crusty bread tucked safely under her arm. I was afraid she might leave before the manager arrived, but no fear, she wasn’t going anywhere without her fresh loaf, and lucky for me the express checkout wasn’t living up to its name. The manager arrived and appeared aghast by my tale of woe, although he did admit there is no way to police this kind of thing. “You just expect people to do the right thing,” he said. I pointed out the bread squeezer and started to feel pretty good about what I was trying to do — standing up for all unsuspecting bread lovers everywhere. But wanting to do even more, I decided to try to come up with a way to prevent this kind of situation.

Oh, I know what you’re thinking — no big deal, a store can just hire a security guard. But you’d be wrong, and here’s why. I recently upset a carton of strawberries that ended up strewn across a grocers floor. A security guard came over and offered to pick them up for me. I thanked him and continued on my merry way, only to look back to see that, after he had collected the berries off the floor, he placed them back on the shelf! I still feel bad for the poor, unsuspecting customer who was none the wiser and ended up paying top dollar for the well-travelled berries. I wanted to say something, I really did, but the security guard had been so nice to me, offering to help and all… Determined to never again let my guard down, I decided to do an in-depth investigation on bread squeezing (yes, this is how I spend my days). Finally, my efforts paid off. I’ve discovered there is at least one bread squeezer who’s gotten his just desserts. It happened in Philadelphia in November, 2000. A 38-year-old advertising executive was convicted of bread squeezing and given a US$1000 fine and 90-day suspended sentence (he was given an extra 90 days for cookie crumbling).

In his remarks the judge said, “You engaged in behaviour that caused harm to people.” After manhandling bread and cookies over a two-year period, the judge pointed out that the accused’s actions amounted to vandalism. The judge also noted a psychiatric report that quoted the accused as saying the real bread squeezer was still on the loose. Aha! But he was charged after the grocery manager gave police a surveillance videotape that showed the accused poking and squeezing his way through the store’s bread aisle. AHA! So there is a way to stop these bread-squeezing bandits. I’m getting out my phone camera, since things are not always what they seem — like that freshly baked bread you just bought, or those healthy, ripe strawberries. After the manager approached my bread squeezer, she denied everything before adding, as though to prove her case, “I’m a nurse.” A nurse? Who would have guessed!

by Sharon Dunn
edited Jan 5/24,

Camp …

was hard on me, and I wasn’t even there.

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Camp was hard on me, and I wasn’t even there
Two days after my son left, I did the unthinkable. I called

AH, THE JOYS OF SUMMER CAMP: the swimming, the deep water, the bugs, the danger … maybe I should call …

“Why didn’t I put my son in camp?” I fret every year about this time, as I enviously watch other parents with nights free to explore the city, days free to pursue their dreams, weekends free to lounge in their yards with tall cool drinks in their hands — no reason to move, save to pick up and read heartwarming letters from their kids in camp who, by the way, are always “having a ball. And here I am spending many of my summer days and nights in ice hockey arena with my son, who has decided to get ready for the new season. Don’t worry about him — he’s not interested in camp. He’s as happy as a cold, wet clam, but I know there are more satisfying ways of cooling off. Trust me, it’s an odd feeling to go from 30-degree weather into a sub-zero skating rink. But it wasn’t always this way. Luke once yearned for the camp experience. So, and it doesn’t seem that long ago, we decided to give it a try. Two weeks, we agreed, was plenty long enough. Other parents, true adventurous types, seemed to have no trouble sending their children away for two months every summer, some leaving the day after school ends, not to return until Labour Day weekend. We know their real motive, don’t we? But we were starting slowly. I enrolled Luke in the trendy camp of the day, “before all the spots are gone,” I was warned, which is incredible in itself when you consider the high cost of these very basic camps. We merrily said our goodbyes at the bus depot, until I noticed campers and parents alike sobbing hysterically. And these were the repeat campers. You’d think they were going to war. What do they know that I don’t, I wondered. My heart sank as my son smiled bravely and travelled into the realm of the unknown. The mothers who had been crying the most, quickly dried their eyes, and waved happily to me as they sped off in their cars. But I didn’t fare as well. I watched the kids’ bus turn the final corner and then went home to a very empty and quiet house where I sat and worried for two days, and then I did the unthinkable.

I called the camp. This is usually absolutely forbidden by camp officials, and I had been warned, but I was desperate. I needed to see how he was doing — in other words, if he was still alive. After a number of calls that turned into pathetic pleas, I finally received a call back from someone who had actually met my son.”He’s so sweet,” she assured me, “but I only saw him once, the day he arrived.”
“What do you mean you only saw him once?” I gasped. “I thought you were his counsellor.”
“I am,” she said, “but I haven’t seen him lately because he’s on a canoe trip.”
“Where?” I managed to spit out.
“I don’t know,” she giggled again. “Somewhere in the Muskokas. He should be back in a couple of days.”
At this point I was blubbering senselessly. Finally she seemed to notice the fear and dread in my voice.
“Don’t worry,” she said lightly, “they’ll be OK. They took lots of Smarties with them, and the kids looking after them are really fun.”
“Smarties, the candy?” I stammered.”
Yes. Lots,” she confirmed. This was supposed to ease my fears?

I hung up, more desperate now, than when I had called. Maybe I even went to the Muskoka’s and rented a boat for the day, going from shore to shore searching for him with my binoculars. Of course, even if I did that, I would never admit it, since it would make me look like a total lunatic, but let’s face it, separation anxiety is a powerful emotion. I spent another two nights tossing and turning, as I pictured my then seven-year-old being eaten alive by mosquitoes, or who knows what. After threats and intimidation (on my part of course), I finally got the news from camp that I was yearning for: He had returned from the canoe trip — alive! “And such a good sport” I was told (whatever that was supposed to mean). I still wasn’t permitted to speak with him.

With renewed hope, I counted the days until pick-up and, and on the final day, I showed up a couple of hours early, not wanting to tempt fate. I was even invited to stay for lunch, which turned out to be something that vaguely resembled Kraft Dinner — although not nearly as tasty. My macaroni lunch was the pièce de résistance to all of those sleepless nights and to finally see my burnt and bitten son. This is what I had paid country club prices for? So, although I might think I’d like to have my son in camp this summer, I really don’t think I could survive it again. You know, hanging around the hockey rink all summer isn’t so bad after all.

by Sharon Dunn

Chester, NS

Not your average village
AMAZING BRACE, MACLEANS MAGAZINE PRESS BUTTON BELOW TO READ
Not your average village
CHESTER, NS – ‘Our market is driven by the Americans purchasing property in Nova Scotia,” Tim Harris, of Tradewinds Realty, tells me as we tour Chester harbour by boat. Although Harris admits there has been a decline in the number of U.S. residents coming to purchase this year, he tells me his website (www.seanovascotia.com) has an incredible “900,000 hits a month and 70% of those are American origin. When Americans are here purchasing, it puts pressure on Canadians to purchase. Canadians tend to wait for the downturn in prices, then they see property selling to Americans and they get worried. In the 15 years I’ve been in the business,” says Harris, “there’s never been a downturn in real estate.”We pass a waterfront home owned by Wick McNeely, of a fifth-generation Chester summer family from Virginia, who bought the property last year for a rumoured $4-million. I’m told McNeely is in the concrete business and doesn’t give interviews. Like many Chester summer families, he’s understated, and does things for the community, anonymously.”You don’t have to be wealthy to live here,” says Harris. “You can still buy a house in Chester for $200,000, but not on the water.” In the village of Chester, the average price for an acre of land on the water, with no buildings, is approximately $1-million. “An acre of land with 200 feet on the water just sold to a man from the U.K. for $1.1-million. Many of the people who come here and pay the big prices, have an ex-patriot as a spouse, or they may both be Canadians returning home after doing well, and Chester is the place they’ll buy.” says Harris. “Chester has so much to offer, including the yacht club and the Chester Golf Club.”We pass McNeely’s magnificent sailboat, a Hinckley 51, and see McNeely in a raft with one of his grandsons. He tells me the sailboat, named Night Train, sells in the seven-figure range. “I hear it’s the nicest boat in Chester,” I tell him.”Last year, it was one of the nicest boats in St. Bart’s,” he informs me. The well-tanned McNeely tells me his great grandmother first came to Chester in 1851. As we continue on our tour, he encourages, “Say something nice about Chester.”But they don’t come to Chester only from the United States and Britain. One local artist is from Barcelona. Jose Valverde Alcalde has bridged the gap from Spanish villas to sailboats. When I visit him and his wife, Doreen, in their studio home on the main street of Chester, Valverde sweeps downstairs, dressed more for Spanish dancing in his black pants and crisp white shirt, than for painting.”When we came to Chester 22 years ago, we loved it, it’s so beautiful, the most beautiful place in the world. We raised our kids in Chester.” But he admits he winters in the coastal Spanish village of Sitges.His Nova Scotia sailboat art, he says, was inspired three years ago during some schooner races. He ships pieces around the globe.”There are people here from every different background,” he says. “You go to the yacht club, you see people and you want to give them your trousers [they look so poor], and then you find out that they are multimillionaires. It is a lovely place to live and to do business.”

by Sharon Dunn

Danielle Crittenden

Having learned that I was a pioneer …

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Having learned that I was a pioneer …
I’m feeling brave enough to ask Danielle Crittenden about that e-mail

[Photo: Kevin Van Paassen, National Post]
“Ten years ago if you went to the park, it was filled with nannies. Now, it’s filled with sleek-looking mothers in their capris and sunglasses,” says Danielle Crittenden, whose first novel, amanda bright@home, is about a woman who abandons her job to raise her children. I’m looking forward to meeting Danielle Crittenden, in town to promote her first novel, amanda bright@home, which started as a serialized novel for The Wall Street Journal, and was also recently featured in People magazine. The book is good, but I must admit, it’s not the only thing on my mind as I start the interview. There’s also that infamous e-mail incident. You remember. Crittenden sent an e-mail to some friends informing them that her husband, David Frum, then a speechwriter for the Bush administration, coined the presidential phrase “axis of evil,” an e-mail that some say resulted in Frum’s firing from the White House (a claim, by the way, he has publicly refuted). But I’ll get to the e-mail later. It would be downright rude to start the interview with that question. I’ll have to build up to it, I decide.”I like your book,” I tell Crittenden, and I mean it. It’s a book I can relate to, because, like Crittenden’s character, Amanda, I found myself (is it really almost 20 years ago?) abandoning my job (as a TV news anchor) to raise kids.

Amanda, Crittenden tells me, originated in a piece she wrote for George magazine, “but George folded just before my article was to appear.” After the serialization in The Wall Street Journal, Crittenden reworked the story into a book, and added an ending.”The issue I’ve always been interested in, is this generation I’ve grown up with, ambitious women having children. When your whole life is directed towards having a career, what happens when you have children?” That’s where Crittenden’s fictional character, the angst-filled Amanda, enters the picture. “Things have changed,” says Crittenden. “Ten years ago if you went to the park, it was filled with nannies. Now, it’s filled with sleek-looking mothers in their capris and sunglasses. Some are former lawyers and bankers, and now they’re at home.” Crittenden’s research has shown her that this new breed of woman is totally surprised by motherhood. “It was like an explosion going off in their life,” she says. “Ten years ago, any career woman was expected to go back to work and make child-care arrangements, and if you didn’t go back to work, you were a freak.”


“Was I a freak?” I ask, about my decision to leave television. Apparently so, but times have changed, according to Crittenden. “Work, to these women today, is no longer the new frontier. They expect to have jobs. But these new mothers have no idea how to be at-home mothers and at-home wives, and it affects every aspect of their being. Aside from economics, they’re not doing at 35 what they imagined they’d be doing at 35, when they were 20. Instead they’re sitting in the park singing Itsy Bitsy Spider.”And it’s not just the mothers who are affected.

Crittenden, who also explores the dynamic of marriage in the book, says, “What happens when the woman stops working, is it’s just as hard for the man to adjust. Remember he’s a modern guy, he didn’t know that he was going to have to support a family, he thought he would be supporting half a family, and his wife would be contributing.” In comparison to her own mom, Yvonne, also a writer, Crittenden says, “What I’m most envious of is that, with my mother, it was all subconscious. It wasn’t an issue, she just did what she thought was right.” But, adds Crittenden, “there are so many moms from that generation who were either ‘frustrated housewives’ saying to their daughters, ‘Don’t make the same mistake I made,’ or feminists saying, ‘Go to work.’ ” As Crittenden explains it, “Amanda is very torn and miserable, but this story is about not just learning to accept, but learning to value the role you play.”
“So what’s the answer for women?” I ask.
“I don’t think there is a perfect answer,” she says, “but as they say in the Disney movies, ‘Follow your heart.’ Many women are afraid to do that.

A woman shouldn’t be afraid and embarrassed to stay at home if that’s what she feels.”
“So when I left my career to raise kids and clean the stove, I was a pioneer?” I marvel. She nods. After all my years housebound with kids, after all my friends saying, “Are you crazy, why did you leave your job?,” finally, vindication! Gee, I feel better.And now having established myself as a pioneer, I’m feeling braver. No better time to ask a probing question. “Is that a plastic bra you’re wearing?” What looks like a plastic bra strap is showing on Crittenden’s shoulder. “No,” she assures me, aghast, “it’s supposed to be an invisible strap.” I feel I should be honest.
“It’s not invisible,” I tell her. With that, all of a sudden, it doesn’t seem so difficult to ask that other question. “What happened with the infamous e-mail?”
“It’s an interesting coincidence,” Crittenden tells me, still focusing on her novel. “In the book, Amanda gets her husband in trouble. She talks to a gossip columnist and her words get distorted, and bring embarrassment to her husband. I wrote that in 2001,” she tells me, “and the e-mail incident didn’t occur until January, 2002. This wasn’t life imitating art,” she laughs. “It was the other way around.”
I ask her how she felt when the whole e-mail fiasco hit the media.” Half of me was completely mortified,” she confides, “but the other half, the writer half, was intrigued.”
She says that she couldn’t help but compare her own situation to her character’s similarly embarrassing dilemma in the novel. “I didn’t know going through it would be so hard,” she admits. “But at least my character and I both had to throw a reporter off our front stoop.”
“Do you think you were treated fairly by the media?” I ask.
“It’s just the way it is,” she shrugs, adding, “am I happy someone forwarded my private e-mail to Slate magazine? No.”
“Are you more careful now with what you write in your e-mails?” I ask. “Yes, my e-mails are now very boring.”

by Sharon Dunn

Johnny Depp

Dances with pirates

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Dances with pirates
The real reason Johnny Depp still has those gold teeth

[Photo: Walt Disney Pictures]
Johnny Depp based his character in Pirates of the Caribbean on Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards.

Even my married friends admit they are looking for the same old thing: excitement, allure, romance. Not necessarily away from their husbands, you understand, but as a friend of mine said recently after a night of dancing with her long-time mate (whom she adores, I might add), “I’d rather dance with a stranger.” Ah, the tragedy of too many years of, er, marital bliss. Because while we women say, and maybe even think, we want security, comfort and predictability provided by a steady man (a message drilled into our heads by our mothers since we were girls), what we really want is something else entirely, isn’t it? Which probably explains my reaction to the versatile and delicious Johnny Depp in the latest Disney flick, Pirates of the Caribbean.

Depp’s character, Captain Jack Sparrow, is the quintessential rogue. Easy on the eyes, the black-eyed Depp, sporting all of the traditional pirate wear save the eye patch (though he does have a braided beard), is devastatingly handsome. Ok, the producers gave him an odd swagger and a big drinking problem, but that’s just so we women would find it believable that he doesn’t get the girl in the end. But even with his strange mannerisms, it’s virtually impossible to fathom the heroine doesn’t run passionately into Sparrow’s arms and finally succumb to his charms. Instead, she runs off with cobbler Will Turner, played by Orlando Bloom, whom I really liked in The Lord of the Rings, but in this flick he pales in comparison to the exotic Depp. Bloom just doesn’t have a chance. Let’s face it — in real life, he could never beat out Depp, at least not with the women I know. I mean really, it’s such a stretch that Depp’s character can’t get the girl (even for a night) that I quickly conclud this is a movie produced by men (I subsequently found out it was). No female could possibly be involved in this flick and let this happen. “Not plausible” she would say, ‘women won’t buy the ending.” No woman in her right mind, that is. OK, maybe not in her right mind, but what does being in your right mind have to do with it? No woman with a beating heart could resist this rogue.

By the way, Depp says he sees rock stars as today’s version of pirates, and admits he based his pirate character on none other than Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards. I don’t see the comparison, but that’s because I can’t get past poor Keith’s well-travelled face. I’d rather my pirates look like Johnny Depp. And I’m not alone. Walking out after the movie, which I’ve already seen 2 1/2 times (I couldn’t persuade the kids to stay for the end of the third viewing), the remarks coming from younger and older women alike were remarkable. “Oh those eyes,” sighed one. “Johnny Depp is gorgeous,” swooned another. “So what, he’s wearing mascara,” rationalized a third, already finding excuses for the bad boy. “It suits him.” Not one woman was heard to say, “He’s so funny, he’s silly, he’s hilarious,” even though that’s what the producers were obviously trying to accomplish. Maybe he was all of those things — it’s just that most women won’t really notice. So solely because of his pirate performance, I’m proclaiming Johnny Depp Hollywood’s leading bad boy. After all, who can compete? Brad Pitt is too tame, Harrison Ford is too old and Pierce Brosnan? Well, he’s just too darn nice. Orlando Bloom? Not a chance. What women really want is a true-blue, living and breathing pirate, even Depp’s real life woman, French singer/actress Vanessa Paradis.

During a recent guest appearance on David Letterman, Depp, still sporting his gold teeth, claimed he didn’t have time to get them removed when he left Hollywood after the movie. Oh sure. Who’s he kidding? We know the truth. He loves being a pirate and his partner loves him being a pirate too.

by Sharon Dunn

Heidi Fleiss

… can’t come to Canada

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Fleiss of fancy
The former Hollywood madam has a book out, but can’t come to Canada to flog it

[Photo: The Associated Press]
“I’m a convicted felon, but I’m an honest convicted felon. I don’t sugarcoat anything, I’m just Heidi, I tell it like it is,” the former Hollywood madam, purveyor of $10,000 tricks to Tinseltown’s A-list, is telling me over the phone. ‘Just Heidi’, of course, is Heidi Fleiss, and the reason we’re talking over the phone instead of chatting at the Sutton Place hotel in downtown Toronto, as we’d previously arranged, is that Fleiss has been denied entry into Canada for the second time in recent weeks. She even went through the proper channels and tried to get a temporary visitor’s visa at the Canadian Consulate in Los Angeles this time. But the officials there turned her down.”Everyone knows what I did,” she says, sounding sweet and sincere. “I’m a convicted felon, but I’m an honest convicted felon. It’s so embarrassing for me. A lot of people worked hard and had a lot of things planned. I feel terrible.”The reason she was refused entry was the identical reason that she wanted to gain entry: her book, ‘Pandering’. The reason I couldn’t get into the state of Canada was because my book Pandering promotes prostitution,” she says. (I don’t tell that her Canada is a country, not a state.

Her book Pandering is a visual memoir — a “work of art,” Fleiss calls it. There’s a lot in it, though a lot of what, I’m not sure. It’s certainly colourful, and I wouldn’t mind looking at a similar pictorial history of, say, the Rolling Stones. But more than 100 pages of Heidi and her friends? I’m not so sure. The outsize book — it’s scrapbook size — includes photos (mostly of Fleiss), newspaper clippings (of Fleiss), Q&As by former associates and friends. There are even old school report cards (belonging to Fleiss). For the life of me, I can’t figure out who would sit and read this book, let alone pay $79.95, except perhaps Fleiss. And yet, the former Hollywood madam tells me the book is now in its second printing and has sold close to 50,000 in its first month. Fleiss says the tome, which obviously cost a great deal of money to produce, was paid for by “a distributor, who believed in me.” She stresses it wasn’t her money. “When the federal government gets finished with you, you have nothing. I don’t know how Leona Helmsley does it”, she says. Fleiss spent three years in prison, from 1996 to 1999, and is quite blunt about what life behind bars does to a woman. “When most people get out, they’re dying to get laid. I was looking for a pair of socks. I had nothing. “Not that she didn’t get offers. Fox TV, she says, offered her $300,000 to “celebrity wrestle” but she turned them down flat. “I’m against violence,” she says, “though I could have killed anyone they put me up against. I learned it in prison.” At first, she says, “I was scared to death. Some of the girls there were lifers,” but she eventually settled in. She even had a girlfriend — in fact, girlfriends.The first was a girl “who looked like a cute surfer guy. Best orgasm I’ve ever had in my life, but she was missing one thing ….” I don’t ask what that might be. Next, she met the woman she settled down with in jail. “She looked like J.Lo., beautiful inside and out. We bonded, even outside of sex.”

Fleiss, 37, says she is estranged from her mother, Elize (“She told stories about me when I was in prison”), but remains close to her father, Paul, a paediatrician. “He takes care of Madonna’s daughter, Lourdes, Tom Cruise’s and Lenny Kravitz’s children, and Leonardo DiCaprio.” When I point out that DiCaprio is hardly a child, she responds that: “Dad’s such a good doctor that patients like Leo, who saw him as children, still see him as adults.” Her parents, who are divorced, would have preferred that she had pursued an academic career but she wasn’t the scholarly type.” I did poorly in school. And that made me focus on other things, like going to the racetrack. I would like to have been an art curator.”

When I ask her what she would change about her life, her response startles me. She says she wishes she’d gone to prison three years earlier, in 1993 instead of 1996, because of the stress of those times. I am sympathetic, and wonder why her famous clients, who scattered to the winds when she was arrested, didn’t help her. “Why would they help me? They weren’t my friends. We had a business relationship.” It is a line of work she would not pursue again. “Once you do it the best, you don’t do it again. I understood deals and how people like to be treated.” Being a madam, she says, was never her plan. “It just evolved.” I ask her if this was just one of those situations where you start at the, er, bottom.”Yes, it’s like Phil Jackson, coach of the L.A. Lakers. He didn’t just learn how to manage. He had to learn offence, defence, he had to play the game too.”

Today, Fleiss lives in W.C. Fields’s old house, which is owned by a friend, in the Hollywood Hills. She moved there after she broke up with actor Tom Sizemore (who has been charged with assault involving an incident with Fleiss). “It’s so inappropriate to comment outside the courtroom,” she says, proceeding to comment. “He makes comments that are offensive, character assassination. Let him do that, I’m not going to.” At the end of our strange half-hour conversation, my head is reeling. She reverts to the sweet and sincere woman I encountered at the beginning of the talk, urging me to get in touch if I need anything more. “Call me back if you need to. Call me anytime of the day or night,” she encourages. “It doesn’t matter what time.”

I guess old habits are hard to break.

by Sharon Dunn
Edited Jan 26/25