It's A Sliq World

MARC JACOBS: “I DON’T KNOW WHAT THE KEY TO HAPPINESS IS”

Mr. Jacobs, how would you describe your ultimate goal as a designer?
To make nice things and to get them out there so people can enjoy them.

Are designers selling an image more than clothes nowadays?
No, I don’t think so. Different people buy for different reasons, but I don’t think we are selling an image. I think we are selling products and those products have some kind of intrinsic integrity or some sort of aesthetic or sensibility. Whether it is a t-shirt or whether it is a party-dress, the approach to them is exactly the same: it is something we wanted to make. So I don’t really think we are selling an image. People can buy for whatever reason they want but we are basically just involved in the making of things.

Yves Saint Laurent said in his farewell speech: “I now understand that the most important encounter in life is the encounter with oneself.” Have you reached that moment yet?
I feel I know myself pretty well at this point. I am still open-minded and still kind of curious and have a wonder about things, but I feel quite strong as a person and I’ve developed a certain confidence and a certain self-awareness. It doesn’t make life easy all the time, but it gives me a certain strength that perhaps took a long time to develop.

Is success a key to happiness?
I don’t know, I don’t know what the key to happiness is. Happy is just a feeling like every other feeling. I certainly feel happy some days and in general I am pretty happy, but I have all the other feelings as well. So I don’t know if there is a key. Maybe the Buddhists have it right where they just sort of honor all feelings and just go with the flow. And then I think you have no problems.

Can success and constant flattery be distracting?
Well, I just do my job. I’m not really distracted by it. Nice things are very nice to hear and it is flattering when one is given some kind of recognition, but none of that distracts me from what my job is, what it has always been: to make things. And honestly, no matter how flattering or even un-flattering something is, it doesn’t prevent me from getting up and going to work and doing what I love to do.

You have made a huge transformation in your image over the past 6 years. Was getting physically in shape a necessity in order to achieve the image you thought was the best for you and your brand?
No, I didn’t do it for the image. I did it for health reasons. I was really very weak. I had been working very hard and I had some stomach problems, so I saw a nutritionist and he recommended that I go to the gym and change my diet and all of that.

Has it been a new feeling for you?
Of course. I liked the results on a lot of levels. I felt better, I felt stronger and I think I also gained a lot of confidence with the physical transformation I made. One thing just led to another and I feel that I live a happier and richer life since I’ve been taking care of myself.

There are no exceptions?
With the exception of smoking cigarettes. But besides that I take pretty good care of myself. I enjoy it.

Besides looking into the mirror, what else do you enjoy more now on a day to day basis?
It’s funny: I enjoy clothing more, I enjoy getting my haircut, I enjoy grooming. In a way it kind of helped me to understand more of what the customer sees in terms of fashion. I got to appreciate it more from a first hand point of view. I like to shop, for example, which I never did before.

What about other people’s perception of you, has that changed as well?
It certainly changed a lot of people’s perspectives. Some people say that they liked me better the way I used to be, but those people don’t really know me so they don’t know that I am exactly the same person and I just look different. But I just feel stronger and better.

Is it hard to keep it up?
I love going to the gym, I love exercising – it helps me sleep better. I feel much more secure with my body and in some ways I can relate more to the joys a woman gets in terms of taking care of herself.

Like how?
Now I get up early in the morning and I really enjoy getting dressed and putting lotions on my skin and getting manicures – all those things. It’s a joy, it is really nice. I like beautiful environments. I like to eat well. I think I gained an appreciation for things that I had taken for granted. I just thought that I had to be in the office and that I had to work all the time but now I enjoy so much more than just working. It is the pure result of taking care of myself.

What did your start to the day look like before?
You know, it used to take me five minutes to get in and out of the bathroom. I would get in the shower, get out of the shower and put on the same clothes every day and I didn’t care.

Would you say that people are generally more into nice things like fashion than they used to be?
It has probably escalated like everything. In this day and age information is more readily available and just like people who are sports fans or music fans, there are lots of fashion fans today. There are lots of people who want to be touched or they want to possess some part of the fashion experience. That creates a kind of excitement and maybe it is on a bigger scale now than it was 20 years ago.

(Source: the-talks.com)

When a bad combination produces something good!

MILA KUNIS: “THEY BUILD YOU UP JUST TO KNOCK YOU DOWN”

Ms. Kunis, would you call yourself a perfectionist?

That’s the thing where I think I fail in life; I’m not looking for perfection. I don’t think it’s achievable; I think it is impossible to achieve perfection. If you are six feet under you are still six feet under. You can have everything in the world that you consider as perfect but you are still going to be six feet under. So I don’t think that there is such a thing as perfection.

Is that a problem in Hollywood, the pursuit of perfection? So many girls at your age try exactly that: to be and to look perfect.

It is really sad, because it’s true. Everybody is starting to look the same. It is bizarre how everyone has the same facial features now. One person dyes her hair brown, everybody dyes her hair brown. I think people lose all sense of themselves. It’s unfortunate.

Is that something the entertainment and fashion world caused itself?

I don’t know what caused it, I don’t know what came first: the chicken or the egg, but something caused it. I don’t know if it’s the covers of the magazines where you see the most perfect, most beautiful people. The sad thing is that it is all photoshopped. There is no such thing as perfection. What I consider beautiful, most likely you don’t. That doesn’t mean that I am right and you are wrong, it’s just a difference of opinion.

But you also lost a lot of weight when you got an important part in Black Swan. You suddenly looked very skinny.

And you said it: it was for the part. It was much easier gaining the weight back. (Laughs)

Didn’t you like being so skinny?

No, it was disgusting. I looked like Gollum from Lord of the Rings. People would hug me and panic. I hated being that skinny in real life so I wore big sweaters and baggy clothes. People who hadn’t seen me for a while would come in for a hug and get all freaked out. I saw them feeling me. I got a lot of, “Are you okay?” and “Do we need to talk?” I always said, “I’m fine, it’s just temporary.” I must have looked so scary thin. My arms were just so little. It was gross.

Is Hollywood very competitive among girls your age?

It is and it isn’t. It is competitive but it is also all based on opinion. I can go in and the first director might think I am a horrible actress and the next director might think I am great. All a matter of opinion. That is the sad thing, there is no right and wrong, there is no 2 + 2 = 4. Not at all. You can be the greatest actress and you will never get a job.

You were born in Ukraine and moved to LA in 1991. Do you consider yourself American or do you also see certain elements of your personality that are very Ukrainian?

I think I am pretty American – I am very Westernized, let me put it that way – but I do believe that the older I get the more I realize that I have a very European background to me, whatever that means. But I am very much LA. I was raised since second grade in Los Angeles, but what my parents instilled in me was very different from what my friends grew up knowing. But I think the older I get the more I realize it.

Was it difficult to adjust back then?

Yes. But luckily if you are seven or eight years old you don’t really know consequences. So you don’t really understand that if you do this, that will happen, because there is no concept of that. So you kind of just throw yourself in. As a kid you kind of just do it without even understanding what you are doing. I learned English by accident, by just being rather than studying. It works when you are little. Kids are great, they have no fear.

Did you want to become an actress from very early on?

No. Not at all. At one point I wanted to be a teacher, at one point I wanted to be a doctor but then I realized that I don’t like blood. Then I wanted to deliver babies until I realized that there is a bit more involved than just the delivery process. I thought for a while that babies just appear, you know. (Laughs) I wanted to be everything and anything – except acting.

So how did you end up with this profession?

Purely by accident. Very organically. I was nine years old and I met my manager, who is my manager to this day, and it was a hobby; it was something I did after school and something that got me out of school sometimes – which was a big plus. It was fantastic. I got to go play and pretend and then I didn’t have to go to school. I was 21 or 22 when I decided that this could be my career. So when I decided to make it my career everything changed.

Was there ever a danger that you could lose yourself?
I’ve been doing this for so long that I’ve seen a lot of people who lost themselves. The theory says that you only learn from your own mistakes. It’s life. But when it comes to this industry I tell you this much: I really, truly believe in learning from other people’s mistakes?

So what is the greatest lesson you learned from someone else’s mistake?

One? There is a whole list. Everything and anything. In this industry you have to be constantly aware of your surroundings and be aware that they build you up just to knock you down. I really do believe that, because it creates better stories. It’s not enough talking about how great somebody is – it doesn’t sell. What sells is talking about somebody’s downfall. I think the greatest lesson I learned is to keep my private life private. And I will fight for that forever and ever. That is my lesson.

It must be difficult for you because you are exactly the target group the outlets are aiming at.

Yeah, but I will never talk about things. There are certain things that I will never discuss. I don’t care if that makes me not the nicest person. I will discuss any film I have done, I will discuss anybody I have worked with, I will discuss politics if you need me to – I will discuss anything and everything under the sun, but I will not discuss my personal life.

(Source: the-talks.com)

TOM FORD: “I AM REALLY A LONER AFTER ALL”

Mr. Ford, have you had a midlife crisis?

Yes. Leaving Gucci was devastating for me. Devastating because I had really put everything into that for fifteen years and all of a sudden I had no identity. “Who am I? What am I doing? I have no forum to speak to anyone anymore or to convey my thoughts or ideas.” Maybe I drank a little too much – living in London that’s a very easy thing to do. The emphasis in my life maybe switched to things that were not the important things. So yeah, I had a bit of a midlife crisis. I wish there was a better term for that. It comes to everybody, maybe in your thirties, maybe in your forties, maybe in your sixties or seventies, who knows. You get to the moment where you feel the clock is ticking and you are wondering if you are really getting the most out of your life.

If you have everything in life it is easier to lose yourself, it seems.

And if you do have everything it is also easier to understand that those are not the important things. Unfortunately a lot of people don’t get to that point. They spend their lives striving and still don’t learn those lessons. Other people figure it out at age twenty and they’re completely balanced and together and understand how to keep things in check from an early age.

How would you describe your current state of mind?

I feel that I don’t need anything for a good life. I grew up in New Mexico and the older I get I have less need for contemporary culture and big cities and all the stuff we are bombarded with. I am happier at my ranch in the middle of nowhere watching a bug carry leaves across the grass, listening to silence, riding my horse, and being in open space. So I have some sort of security that if I lost everything in my life, I would be very happy with the simple things because they are the ones that are important.

So the glamour you stand for doesn’t interest you?

After just being in New Mexico for two months, I realized that I could really work from anywhere. I am really a loner after all; I am really not a social person. Because of my job people think I am out every night, but I really hate all that. I am somebody who likes to be alone and see some close friends. I am a shy and introspective person.

Do you get the most inspiration from nature? It is the ultimate beauty, after all.

Yes, nature is the closest thing to God and I don’t mean God by any sort of religion but by the connection to the universe, which I think we have lost. The American Indians had that and where I live is actually the center of the Anasazi Indian civilization. I even have two huge Anasazi ruins on the property of my ranch. I am not saying that there definitely is some sort of spirituality coming from there, but there might be. When you are close to the earth and you get up when the sun comes up and you go to sleep when it goes down, it puts everything in perspective.

Really?

Yes, all the rest of this crap just fades away. We’ve lost our contact with the earth. Dogs don’t have guilt, dogs don’t have insecurity complexes, dogs don’t think that they need a bigger house than the other dog. Dogs are just completely themselves. They’re very in touch, they’re not thinking about their death. They are just rolling on their back, enjoying what that feels like. I think that is sort of the appeal of animals in our lives; that is what’s important.

Are you a spiritual person?

I am a spiritual person in an eastern religion kind of way. I learned that happiness for all of us is a switch that you flick in your brain. It doesn’t have anything to do with getting a new house, a new car, a new girlfriend, or a new pair of shoes. Our culture is very much about that; we are never happy with what we have today. We always think that we need something else to be happy.

This all sounds like you have a tough time living the Hollywood life that everybody expects you to.

I did have a tough time dealing with it and I have learned how to separate it. It is a performance; it is me playing a role. I am not saying that there are no aspects of it that I enjoy; I love beautiful women, beautiful dresses, and beautiful flowers. But all those things have to stay in perspective. There is nothing wrong with loving the fact that we are physical beings but you have got to keep them in perspective. It is just a diversion. It’s one of the nice things in life, like eating a great steak or kissing a good kisser – well, kissing a good kisser is maybe more valuable than all the other stuff – but these are things you have to leave behind when you leave the planet. When I am on my deathbed, I don’t think I will be thinking about a nice pair of shoes I had or my beautiful house. I am going to be thinking about an evening I spent with somebody when I was twenty where I felt that I was just absolutely connected to them.

Are you really that much of a romantic?

Yeah, I’m really a romantic.

How long does it take every morning for you to become that Tom Ford you were talking about before?

It takes me a long time in the morning to become the person that other people expect me to be. When I feel depressed and I have a bad day or something terrible has happened or I have to face something, I go through a very precise ritual getting dressed in the morning. In a sense it is armor; I’m building up a layer. If everything in my material world is in order, I will be able to get through it. That perfectionism comes from me being a Virgo. My inner world is related to my outer world. If my house is a wreck, I’m a wreck. If I am together, that’s together. That’s a kind of balance.

For many years you’ve shared your life with your boyfriend Richard Buckley. Is he your idea of a good life?

Richard is the person I love the most in the world and the person I have been together with for 23 years. So yes, but so are my dogs. I’ve asked myself, “If I were to die tomorrow what are the things that I will remember?” and I realized that nuzzling up with one of my dogs is one of the most precious things in my life! That would be something I would miss so much.

It must be important to have somebody that goes with you through that whole journey of life, somebody that shows you that it is not about the next fashion show or advertisement you shoot.

Of course it is. I am still friends with the people I went to school with. A lot of them have been working with me for the past 18 years. When you find somebody good, keep them! Keep them in your life.

Do you especially treasure the people you are close to because it is difficult for you to meet new people?

Honestly, I don’t meet very many people. I am married but no one comes on to me, ever. It is like I don’t exist sexually. No one, no one.

You are Tom Ford after all, so people probably think they don’t have a chance anyways.

Maybe that is the reason, but no one, no one flirts, no one comes on to me. Usually when people are personal with me, then they want to give me their business card at the end of the conversation.

So you wish you would get hit on more often?

Of course! (Laughs) Why not? I am not saying I would act on it, but it would be nice.

(Source: the-talks.com)