By The Plaid Adder

Comments: plaidder@mindspring.com

Here, in no particular order, are this season's winners and losers, culled primarily from the Grand Prix but also from the Four Continents competition:

MOST ANNOYING CULTURAL MISAPPROPRIATION: This mania everyone seems to have for cheesy knockoffs of Middle Eastern garb/music/choreography. Tatiana whatsername from Uzbekistan did a very nice program which deserved to win like it did, except for a cheezy turquoise Princess Jasmine-esque outfit and some gratuitous "walk like an Egyptian" arm-waving. However, other skaters were laid considerably more low by their unabashed Orientalism, most notably Alexander Apt (more on him later).

Honorable Mention: To the Russian ice-dancing pair who skated to what Dick Button kept reminding us was "modern African drums." I don't know who their design consultant is but basically they looked like they'd walked off the set of Cats and although the choreography was reaching not very subtly for "savage 'n' sensual" it was, clearly, straight outta Broadway.

LAETITIA HUPPERT MEMORIAL I CAN'T BEAR TO WATCH AWARD: To poor Yelena Berezhnaya, who was favored to win the pairs competition but skated a program that had the commentators wincing in agony almost from the get-go. She fell on her butt, she fell on her face, she fell out of a lift, and by the end of it the commentary was basically long stretches of pained silence broken by an occasional, "This is very sad." Evidently she was fighting the flu; well, she lost. It's all the more sad because she was one of the comeback storeis at the Nagano olympics--her previous skating partner had ended an abusive relationship by putting a skate through her head during practice a few years ago, and it had taken her serious therapy to get to the point where she could compete again. Because I liked her then and wanted her to win, it was pretty painful watching this. Four minutes can be world of hurt, especially when you fall in the first 30 seconds.

MOST HEINOUS FASHION CRIMINALS, NATIONAL CATEGORY: Russia. I don't know who dresses their men but whoever it is should be sent back to remedial design class along with the TNG costuming staff.I thought that now that Ilya "Vinyl Giraffe Suit" Kulik appears to have shot his bolt the view would improve in their bullpen, but no. No, no no no NO. A couple tips:

 1) The big sleeves need to go. If you're skating to a piece of romantic cheese, then the giant poet sleeves will only exacerbate the puke factor. If you're not, then the giant poet sleeves clash with the overall artistic concept. Either way, the windsock effect you get when you skate in 'em does not improve your look.

 2) For the love of Pyotr, guys, who talked you into the gold lame? Was there a sale on at the Novgorod Piece Goods Emporium? Don't you know that you can only put a certain amount of gold lame in motion before people in the audience start having seizures? Please, gentlemen. Next year remember that when you spell it without the diactrical marks, it's not "lah-MAY," it's just plain LAME.

As for the women…Marina, Irina, what is up with the cut-outs?

MOST HEINOUS FASHION CRIMINAL, INDIVIDUAL: Russia's Alexander Apt.

Oh. My. GOD.

I don't know if I can even describe this. It's like he was trying to be Conan the Barbarian, Spartacus, Madonna and M.C. Hammer all at the same time. From the giant baggy gold lame pants to the bare midriff to the faux-Byzantine weird crisscrossy crap that grievously marred most of his upper body, this was an outfit that even Lwaxana wouldn't try on. Never mind whatever he thought he was doing with the highlights in his hair. And, he fell on his shiny gold butt with great frequency. Maybe he was blinded by the glare. I know the judges weren't.

BIGGEST CHOREOGRAPHY MISTAKE: I'm afraid the palm leaf of victory has to go to...Elvis Stojko.

Sorry, Canadian contingent; sorry, Billie; I'm a fan of the guy too, but he gets a mandatory 5-tenths deduction for his "Merlin the Magician" shtick. First of all, if you don't recognize the music or the Welsh dragon on his costume, the only thing you can make of all that abracadabra pantomime stuff is to assume that maybe he suddenly spotted a friend in the audience to whom he desperately needed to communicate something and he decided to draw on his knowledge of American Sign Language. Second, even if you do know that he's supposed to be Merlin...well, that sense of grand majesty just wasn't there. Basically, I think there should be a moratorium on all gratuitous arm movement; it seems to be a problem mainly for the men, who in general are so hung up on the technical elements that they don't really do choreography with their whole bodies, instead relying on this arm-waving business to convince people tha tthey have an artistic concept.

JUMP THAT MOST NEEDS TO BE BANNED: The quadruple anything.

It's ruining men's skating. Normally I don't find myself agreeing with Dick Button but I am starting to realize the wisdom contained in his anti-jump rant of a couple years ago. It's like the arms race in there now: everyone feels like they have to have a quadruple jump to win on technical merit, but none of them can land the damn thing cleanly. Plus, it's such a production that it means that the men spend a lot of time just skating in straight lines real fast while they work up to it, so it ruins the presentation element. Go back to the damn triples, guys. Four revolutions is just too many.

MOST IN NEED OF A LONG VACATION: Dick Button.

 I used to make fun of Scott "Her Greatest Strength is her Lack Of Weaknesses" Hamilton's commentary for being repetitive and vapid. Scott, I take it all back now. I would rather listen to your one hundreth repetition of "...and when you're tilted in the air like that, there's just no way to hang on to that landing" then listen for one more GODDAMN SECOND to Dick Button bitching about how none of the skaters point their toes any more. He's just crabby, dammit. He hates everyone except for Michelle Kwan and Naomi Nari Nam (for those of you who missed US Nationals, NNN is ladies' figure skating's Next Big Thing...you could see Michelle Kwan looking at her going "I had that goddam gold medal all sewn up and now I'm going to be hosed by another 80-pound 14-year old again"), and basically once he starts talking it's just whine, whine whine...plus, he cannot stand not hearing himself talk for more than about 30 seconds. The worst was his commentary on the Lithuanian ice-dancing team, during which he obsessively repeated the fact that ice dancing music requires a beat and they had to "apply" a beat to portions of their music in order to bring it up to code. He kept saying, "Hear the beat? You hear it?" No, Dick, all I hear is the sound of a self-important asshole talking to himself...how Peggy Fleming puts up with him I do not understand.

BIGGEST MISCARRIAGE OF SKATING JUSTICE: The ice dancing competition.

Speaking of that Lithuanian couple...we both thought they were robbed. They did an original program with a lot more interesting choreography than most couples, and as far as the "ethnic drumbeat" thing went, I thought they were moving to the rhythm much more convincingly than the Russian pair. But ice dancing is all about being bought and paid for--the judges give the points to the ones who are supposed to win, and since one hardly ever sees a spectacular fall in ice dancing they are able to get away with it. It was a shame to see them lose--especially since the Russian couple, who won, are walking away with my next award:

THE I COULD HAVE DIED HAPPY WITHOUT SEEING THAT AWARD: To the Russian ice dancing champions, whose choreography involved way too much time during which his face was in or very near her crotch.