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The Changing of the Guard at Revlon

© Susan Colebank

One of the media highlights from this past month included a piece on Cindy Crawford, the international model with the mole that launched a thousand ad campaigns. For the past 11 years, Crawford's face has been the force behind Revlon cosmetics, hawking wares to the ever-profitable teenager/twenty-something/aging-woman demographics. Crawford's face has sold the cosmetics responsible for the trends that launched entire fashion movements: the 1980's opulence that led into the 1990's "natural" look that heralded in the minimalist/mannequin look of the 2000s.

However, the time has come to move on. Crawford will allow her contract to expire come February to make room for a new, "fresh" face. Whoever belongs to that face will receive a highly coveted cosmetic contract--an opportunity that will lead to not only fame and millions, but also to a lifetime supply of makeup and opportunities to be an Oscar presenter or maybe a Bond girl.

Current Revlon faces include Melanie Griffith and Lauren Hutton, neither of whom are spring chickens. Yet, both are not the "symbol" that the moled-one is for Revlon. Revlon states it isn't Crawford's age (34) behind the impetus for this change. Revlon says it is pursuing someone who will represent a "new Revlon;" however, the media has translated "new" into meaning "younger." In rebuttal, the company lists flagging revenues, new executives and a stagnant campaign as the reasons that led to this changing of the guard.

The media speculates that the cosmetic giant is just blowing smoke in its face. Industry insiders speculate that Crawford's spot may be filled with either the young Kate Hudson, the 21-year-old actress and daughter of Goldie Hawn, or the even younger Gisele Bundchen, the 19-year-old model of the moment. With other fashion mavericks like Lancome and Estee Lauder switching out thirty-somethings (i.e. Juliette Binoche and Elizabeth Hurley) in favor of twenty-somethings (i.e. Uma Thurman and possibly Gwyneth Paltrow), Revlon is predictably following an age-old pattern of throwing out the old to bring in the new. The beauty business has followed this practice long before an older Isabella Rosellini was fired by Lancome. It actually may have started when the ultimate beauty icon, Marilyn Monroe, died young, forever immortalized in her 30s. Can you imagine where the beauty industry would be today if Monroe was still alive, gracing the cover of the National Enquirer at 70 years old schlepping around in sweats?

One day, it would be self-affirming to see Sophia Loren or Jane Fonda selling lipstick and nail polish or maybe even an issue of Cosmopolitan rather than AARP? Until America embraces an ageless beauty, stick-thin women with airbrushed faces and bodies will continue to define the beauty ideal, and Crawford, once valued as the most beautiful woman in the world, will go down in history as the crone who lost her $3 million-a-year contract because of laugh lines and stretch marks.

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