Lipstick Jungle: A Little Bit Naughty, A Little Bit Nice

The pilot of Lipstick Jungle opened with a pair of shots that couldn't be more cliché: a helicopter view of the cityscape, then each of the three women's shoes walking along the city street. We learn that all three are on Wall Street Magazine's list of 50 most powerful women in New York. Wendy is on top; Nico is moving up; and Victory barely made the list at the bottom. It's Fashion Week, and Victory is trying to recapture some lost glory. The show goes well, but the reviews aren't good, and the three women gather to commiserate.

Wendy juggles an early morning call from her boss (Hector, who is also Nico's boss) and the demands of her husband, kids, and cat. She's trying to put out a fire involving another studio's rival Galileo project, and get her son into a good private school. She's also dealing with a difficult director, and seems to have a complex relationship with muffins. She pulls off quite a coup and averts a crisis by getting Leonardo DiCaprio to do her project instead of another studio's. Her good day does extend to her personal life, however, because her husband stood her up for their son's school interview, leading to a big fight. They made up later, sort of, but it looks like Wendy's marriage is in trouble.

We learn that Nico is responsible for turning the magazine she publishes around, although her professor husband thinks she is wasting her talents. The magazine is launching a new website, and a younger male colleague has undercut her authority. At the party (which she discouraged her husband from attending), she starts flirting with another younger guy and later they end up making out in the bathroom. (Incidentally, after playing a paramedic on Third Watch and a frequent hostage on 24, it's nice to see Kim Raver get a chance to be glam.) She eventually tells him she doesn't want to get involved because she's married, and he hikes up her skirt to write his phone number on her thigh in two-inch letters. Because that's not going to tip her husband off at all. Actually, apparently it isn't, since he catches her washing it off and doesn't take any notice. It turns out that Hector is considering passing her over for a promotion because he thinks she'll get pregnant and leave. To cheer herself up, she calls Kirby, the guy from the party. I guess it's a good thing he used a Sharpie.

Victory calls Nico from the street, where she is applying wand lip-gloss while walking and talking on the phone. That's talent right there. She arrives at work to be greeted by her depressed-sounding staff. The assistant of Joe Bennett, a famous billionaire, calls to arrange a date, and she agrees after hearing he praised her collection. He sends a car to pick her up, and she heads out the door dressed in a shiny pink peplum monstrosity that Barbie would be embarrassed to be seen in. Did she design that? No wonder her business is in trouble. In the car, she calls him on some of his rich-guy jackassery (after he gets off the phone, that is). She also impresses him by picking up the check for dinner, which results in the type of extravagant flower delivery only seen on screen. Later on, he calls her while she is in Japan on a disastrous business trip. He sends his private jet and a cupcake to rescue her.

So, how does Lipstick Jungle stack up next to Cashmere Mafia? Well, it certainly isn't nastier, yet, that's for sure. In fact, since there have yet to be any conflicts with women outside their circle, it may be nicer. I did like it a bit better and I can't quite put her finger on why. It could be because these three women, although they have fabulous clothes, look more like real women. (Props should especially go to Brooke Shields, who is looking her 42 years, which is not a bad thing, and doesn't seem to have had any plastic surgery. Good for her.) Maybe it is because there are only three of them, so we get more time to focus on each in every episode. Or maybe it's because Paul Blackthorne (who plays Wendy's husband, Shane), is all cute and scruffy and British.

Actually, I think it is probably because I am already tired of Miranda Otto's sour faces and complicated hairdos on Cashmere Mafia. Also, in several episodes of Cashmere Mafia, we have had some promised juicy affairs, but no payoff. Lipstick Jungle just got right down to business, as Nico started her affair with Sharpie guy before the pilot was over. One negative is Nico's tendency to deliver speeches that sound like they came out of some manual of feminist clichés. In the pilot, she delivered no less than four such rants. Hopefully that will subside as things get going.

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Amy Kane spends as much quality time with her television as possible, when she's not busy at her day job as a cube dweller.

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