Tuesday, January 8, 2008

Money Can Make Anyone Look Beautiful

Okay, okay, you knew I was going to do this. However, I'm not going to write the entry I was planning to write, which had some boob jokes and so forth. I was looking at the images of Dr. Shar from "Too Cute" when it hit me that I had seen that strange face somewhere before. (Click on the triple image above to enlarge it.)

It is my belief that Dr. Shar was modeled on a real-life personality, the Swiss-American socialite named Jocelyn Wildenstein. Wikipedia provides some background information on this lady, who overindulged in cosmetic surgery to the point that her facial features became disturbing to look at. However, you need to see an actual photograph of her face to get the full impact. The parallels with Dr. Shar's appearance should be clear. (Use Google to get more images. I could stomach just the one.)

Not much can be told about Dr. Shar from the episode, though there are some tantalizing hints at what lies beneath her much-altered exterior. She has a strong Deep Southern accent, perhaps from Georgia. She is obviously wealthy and has an active business. She might have been previously cited for ethics violations by a professional society of cosmetic plastic surgeons, as her actions and comments make it clear she is out for money, not to spread beauty; she manipulates Quinn like a master, and Quinn (and the Fashion Club) are taken in hook, line, and sinker. Only Daria's influence (it seems) keeps Quinn out of Dr. Shar's clutches.

Dr. Shar's parting comment, reproduced as this blog entry's title, makes me wonder if there was once a girl named Shar who came from a backwoods Southern hick town, a girl who wanted more than anything else to be pretty. She didn't like how she looked, so she became a plastic surgeon, got rich, then had herself redone until she felt she had achieved her lifelong ambition to be beautiful, if only in her own eyes. Now she lives in Lawndale, feeding off the secret fears and insecurities of others that they, too, should be beautiful. Kind of like being a vampire that sucks money instead of blood, though there is some blood involved, too.

More thoughts in a few minutes. A storm moved in and I have to log off, alas.

1 comment:

E. A. Smith said...

No one who's really from the South talks like Shar. I think her accent is a put-on, assumed because she wants to project the uber-feminine image of a Southern Belle (seeing as she no doubt sees herself as the epitome of beauty and grace).