Good review of this show. LMAO @ Ms. Givhan's description of Carson's nellyism. 
washingtonpost.com
'Queer Eye' Gives Unblinking View Of Trendsetters
By Robin Givhan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, July 18, 2003; Page C01
The arrival of the Bravo cable show "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" represents a moment of truth for the fashion industry.
The show, which debuted Tuesday, introduced viewers to a team of five gay men, whose mission in each episode is to aid a straight man whose aesthetic sensibility is stunted. Focusing on fashion, grooming, food and wine, interior design, and culture, the stars assess the home and personal appearance of the straight man -- announcing with wit and bite precisely where he has gone wrong. They then proceed to sprinkle on the glamour dust.
While "Queer Eye" engages in generalizations, and several of its stars -- particularly Carson Kressley, who is in charge of fashion -- use nellyism as a form of slapstick, it also shines a light into the fashion industry's backroom. It brings a reality of fashion out of the closet, along with the reassurance that there is nothing to fear from either the fashion message or the messenger.
In the first pair of episodes, the show's stars had two willing victims who seemed eager to polish their rough edges, although one of the men -- Adam Zalta -- was inexplicably attached to his thick eyebrows, which had grown into one massive caterpillar stretching across his forehead. The hirsute situation was remedied with the help of an aesthetician and a pot of warm wax.
The cheeky band went on to recommend a seaweed wrap and an exfoliating scrub, introduce him to pastry bags and kosher foie gras, upgrade his suits, make over his home and show him the payoff in remembering his wife's birthday.
The show exploits the stereotype that gay men have an additional gene that gives them particular skill at coordinating stripes and plaids, and allows them to intuit that mid-century modern furniture would see a resurgence. Whether fine style is the result of nature or nurture has yet to be proved, but the long-held assumption that the style industry is populated by a significant number of gay men is correct. A great many of those men are on the front lines at fashion houses as designers and stylists. And so, to some degree, gay men have been making over straight men at least as far back as the rise of the power suit.
Some of these designing men have made flamboyant pronouncements about pencil-thin trousers, velvet suits and translucent shirts. But others are far more subtle in their style recommendations. They championed three-button suits and then one-button versions. They popularized unconstructed blazers and square-toed loafers. They encouraged straight men to engage in monochromatic dressing in which their ties matched their shirts. They persuaded them to exchange their briefcases for messenger bags. And they have trained many a straight man to run a quarter-size dollop of gel through his hair before rushing out the door.
Most folks in the fashion industry are not particularly guarded about their sexuality -- although they do not announce it to the public at large. They are not as fretful as actors, who often fear they won't be accepted as romantic leads if moviegoers know that in their personal lives their significant other is a man. Designers do not have to worry so much about their image. Except for a handful of designers, the bottom line of a fashion company is more dependent on a general brand image than on the personal life of the man who sits at the sketch pad.
The challenge for the fashion industry most often comes in advertising in which designers aiming for provocative images often end up evoking homoerotic ones. Abercrombie & Fitch has long been notorious for its pictorials, as shot by Bruce Weber, of buff and naked young men romping and roughhousing. It's well known that the catalogue has been a favorite coffee table book among some gay men. But publicly, the company plays coy because it needs to have it both ways. Play to gay customers without alienating the straight ones -- that is, those who define manliness by whether one prefers cheesecake or beefcake.
When Kressley prances onto the screen -- and indeed he does have a rather high-stepping strut -- he is extreme. And at times, his fashion advice is a little shaky, as when he suggested that one makeover recipient forgo a belt and roll down his trouser waistband for a cummerbund look. The only visual effect of that trick is to suggest a man too lazy to put on a belt. But in all of his hyperbole, Kressley -- in the character of "fashion savant" -- is the jester, willing to go to any length to get a laugh. And quite often, he is successful. His camp behavior plays to and satisfies any preconceived expectations.
The rest of the team is then free to be more understated, more natural and to go about the job of catering to their straight man without having to be coy about their own private preferences.
© 2003 The Washington Post Company