The OSCARS 2013 and 'Red Carpet Dermatology'

Feb. 24, 2013 - PRLog -- Anyone who's ever been to Los Angeles will know that, Sundays are anything but quiet. Every year, during awards season, you get to see The Good, the Bad and the Ugly - and we're not talking about the film but the outfits worn on the red carpet. I'd always wondered what the celebrities/award nominees got in their Oscar goodie bags? Alice Vincent found out and one of those things is a $5,000 'Vampire Facelift'. A more technical form of this is  the new award-winning DUBLiN Lift perfected by the Ailesbury Clinic in Dublin.
http://youtu.be/D6Ly5Mqi7hc



The countdown to the 85th Academy Awards continues. And it appears even before the ceremony starts the gloves are coming off. A recent article in the New York Times by Natasha Singer called the increased activity by celebrities in seeking out their cosmetologists in the weeks between the Golden Globe awards and the Oscars “red-carpet dermatology”. This new emergent type of celebrity behaviour begins just about five weeks before the Cadillac chauffer driven limousines roll in at the Dolby Theatre in the Hollywood & Highland Center in Los Angeles tonight and continues right up to the moment they arrive resplendent on the red carpet. Many cosmetic dermatologists along Rodeo Drive in the heart of Beverly Hills even go a step further and throw pre-Academy Awards “red carpet cosmetic” parties on the Thursday and Friday before the Oscars. Here, VIP patients, presenters and minor celebrities indulge in some complementary pre-show beauty treatments to get ready for their minutes of fame before the red carpet. The new experience is driven by the new safe quick-fix treatments such as Hyaluronic Acid dermal fillers, VASER and Lipodissolve fat busting treatments as well as Retinol peels and a new generation of skin lasers. Recent rumour has it that one of the most popular celebrity must-have for young actresses braving it under the bright-lights without an airbrush is Dysport or Botox for excessive perspiration. It appears nobody but nobody wants to face the relentless scrutiny of paparazzi, gossip magazines and internet sites with a great stain on their white Valentino dress, let alone suffer the indignation of people shunning shaking sweaty palms in front of a hundred million TV viewers. And, to be fair, it is not just the world press. When Isaac Mizrahi, was a Golden Globe interviewer in 2006, he took liberties with many female actresses pushing the boundaries of who owns the celebrity body that bit further towards the couch potato.

It is said he looked down Teri Hatcher’s dress, squeezed Scarlett Johansson’s breasts to see if they were real and drew attention to whether Hilary Swank was wearing underwear or not. Which of course, brings us to the recent tacky celebrity fashion of not wearing underwear…Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, Lindsey Lohan, Kate Moss and Christina Aguilera have all recently sinned. There has been recent scathing attack on celebrities unable to keep their knickers on and a real rebellion against the growing trend of ‘going commando’ and showing a Visible Panty Line (VPL). Bottom line, if you are going to condone this dubious celebrity fashion craze, then make sure you have had six treatments of “bikini hair” treated by one of the latest “Isolaz” lasers or you will appear like Madonna’s early embarrassing 1985 Playboy photo shoots when she was still more Ciccone than Ritchie. I know for a fact, that although in California, the new “Isolaz” by Aesthera is becoming a very popular hair removal laser as it is quick and painless. I know from experience, that Madonna still opts for the Syneron Polaris RF as it can cause skin tightening in a way that the others cannot. I take some pride in this as we were the first European clinic to have this device as far back as 2004.

Many celebrities also opt for a few treatments with the Lumenis Quantum IPL for phootrejuvenation before the big day. This fairly failsafe device is also becoming more and more popular for bride before wedding day. Many celebrities are slowly turning against the perceived wounding effects of chemical peels and recently Charlize Theron opted for the less damaging Agera Retinol Peel to control her blemishes. This treatment involves using good old super strength Retinoic Acid for a few days before getting a microdermabrasion. I know one American celebrity who has bought her own microdermabrasion machine and gets her hairdresser to perform this duty prior to her engagements.

So, the countdown has begun and we are half way there already. The red carpet dermatology may be still a type of Mateus pink but the IPLs are already flashing, the microderms are sucking, the hairdryers are blowing, the Dysport and Botox needles are pinching and the dermal fillers are plumping. Everybody wants to look Oscar polished, creaseless, smooth, glowing, and untouched by airbrush or time. As Natasha Singer says “red-carpet dermatology permits celebrities with augmented faces to utter stock lines like, “I only had Botox” — a little white lie that allows them to obfuscate a veritable arsenal of beauty interventions”.

Meanwhile, the increasing popularity among celebrities of less invasive procedures such as dermal fillers and the knock-on effect of cheeky presenters like Isaac Mizrahi has turned the idea of cosmetic treatments into a kind of guessing game as the New York Times states “played with equal gusto by red-carpet commentators and couch potatoes at home”.

Dr. Lask, who recently presented a lecture for doctors titled “Cosmetic Dermatology: The Hollywood Perspective” at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Dermatology, also added: “Celebrities are so attractive to begin with that they may have had nothing done, or it may be all lighting and camera angles, or just a new hairdo, or new makeup, or weight loss or weight gain, but it is fun to speculate.”

Another popular treatment with Botulinum is a “Botox neck lift” usually performed about two weeks before the awards show. This involves injecting the jaw line and neck to relax muscles underneath the skin, temporarily creating a sharper jaw line and a longer neck, which looks good if you are wearing a Calvin Klein strapless gown or a low-cut Armani Prive dress. Dermatologists, too, have begun watching the red-carpet parade with a critical eye on the work of colleagues. And, just because some Oscar attendees have opted for the syringe instead of the scalpel doesn’t necessarily mean the work of skilfully challenged practitioners goes undetected and Leonard Nimoy may not be the only person in the house with Vulcan eyebrows. In the face of such public scrutiny it is not only the celebrity but also their cosmetic practitioner that is on show. And, that’s why I have to sometimes see people at 3’ o clock in the morning when the birds still haven’t started the dawn chorus in Ballsbridge.