Lara Flynn Boyle must have one hell of a publicist. This August, she graces the cover of Allure, which is essentially an infomercial masquerading as a magazine. Over the past year, LFBs had a decent spread in Vanity Fair and, alongside her co-stars, was featured on the April cover of Marie Claire, another bleeding-heart womens magazine. Okay, the only performance of note in the last few years of Lara Flynn Boyles career was her role as Helen Jordan in Todd Solondzs Happiness. Besides playing Helen Gamble on The Practice, Boyle has really not succeeded in doing anything other than play characters by the name of Helen. Does she, the personality, warrant all of this media attention? We all know her on-again, off-again relationship with superstar Jack Nicholson pushes the medias buttons, but exactly how much press should really be dedicated to a woman because shes got a superstar semi-boyfriend?
On the cover, the tagline advertises LFB as a drink-throwing, man-eating, body-waxing bad girl. Now, had I known that body-waxing was a prerequisite for being a Hollywood bad girl, I might have taken up that grooming habit by now. In addition to exposing LFBs more lascivious habits, the magazine claims to give up the dirt on various skin firmers; find forty-seven simple steps to shine, bounce, and volume (for your hair); and produce five smile makeovers. Im already skeptical. Interviews in womens magazines whose entire mandate is to manipulate your body and abuse your magazine sensibilities with sharp, sexy taglines are simply not to be trusted. Furthermore, the blurb alleges that the feature on LFB will shoot straight about her reputation, her body, and the men in her life. Translated into non-tagline language, this piece is simply another venue for Boyle to a) explain how she absolutely, one hundred percent, in no way has an eating disorder, b) talk about Nicholson, and c) call herself the boldest of all the bad girls. Sigh. Wouldnt it be nice if a feature in a magazine had the simple intention of actually telling the truth, instead of pointedly saying theyre going to shoot straight?
A large, glossy, perfectly manicured Boyle smirks in the cover photo. Shes wearing a large purple boa. She looks like she shaved a woolly mammoth and then had his fur died Prince-in-Purple Rain purple. Her hair is, of course, slicked back a l Helen Gamble, and her lips are so glossy that if she were to actually walk outside wearing that much lipstick, various bits of debris would find themselves hopelessly attached and begging for their lives. The whites of her eyes are very, very white, and her eyelashes are so caked with mascara that they actually jut out beyond the bones of her upper eyes. Its actually a creepy picture when you take the time to look at it closely.