Inside Style by Annmarie O'Connor - as featured in The Dubliner magazine - October 28th My mother emailed me a photo the other day. The attachment included a Polaroid taken at my kindergarten Halloween play. I was a cat – but no ordinary moggy I can assure you. The performance may have been called ‘The Little Red Hen’ but ‘Annmarie the Fashionable Feline’ should have lit those bright lights in my estimation. After all, I was the real star. Let me explain.
As life decisions go my juvenile refusal to play the lead role on account of the naff chicken costume was a defining one. Even at five years old, I could sense the looming sartorial smear that would beset me. These were no Margiela feathers but rather those of the Foghorn Leghorn variety. I valued my playground status too much to be coerced into holding such a poisoned chalice.
Instead I chose style over fame and joined the kitty litter. It was my pal Patricia who gave me the inside scoop. Her mother was the wardrobe mistress and by all accounts the cat costumes were fierce. Not only did we get to wear toffee-coloured hot pants and knee socks but we had cute velvet ears and long tails to swing in our duet.
It wasn’t all glamour however. Our parts involved a refusal to assist the plumed protagonist in planting the infamous grain of wheat. I personally think we were scapegoats. Those bitter pigs and cows didn’t even get a look in; never mind that shady duck. Then again, had they networked with the production crew, they too may have found themselves sporting a more flattering costume. But I digress.
Despite being singled out for a refusal to engage in manual labour, our characters held the fashionable upper hand. All eyes were on us; which may have accounted for our unfazed reaction at being refused the hen’s reward of bread. Puh-leez. As if carbs would have cut it in those outfits! Some things don’t change.
As for the girl who usurped me as Little Red, her star may have shone brightly on stage but that papier-mâché headgear dims my estimation of her still. It’s bad enough, having to play a moralistic matriarch but making fashion out of poultry is a crime most fowl. And that pun my friends is the reason why I haven’t tread the boards since.
Image: Goodhousekeeping.com
