"Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next. Delicious Ambiguity." ~ Gilda Radner

Thursday, June 21, 2012

THE HEART HAS NO WRINKLES

Confession: My search for writing inspiration Wednesday night resulted not in putting my cyber pen to blog post, but combing through video snippets of some of my all-time favorite romantic comedies instead.

When Harry Met Sally. Sleepless in Seattle. You've Got Mail.


All fantastic Meg Ryan movies from back in the day before adorable, affable, cute-as-a-button Meg -- my once-upon-a-time Hollywood twin (so people told me) -- decided that she just wasn't adorable enough as she aged.

So she had some "work" done, and now, as all Meg fans know and mourn, she has duck lips.

When Harry Met Sally
Sorry, Meg, but you know you do.

You were blessed with an awesome, ageless face.


And you chose to poison it. Why?


Another Botox injection gone awry. Hollywood is full of them.  But seriously?  Meg, darling, what the hell were you thinking? I just thought you had a deeper, healthier sense of self...


Then again, I thought Jessica Lange was friendly and sweet after seeing Tootsie. Until I, as news reporter, actually was on the set of "Country" when it was originally filmed near Waterloo, IA., and realized, "Wow. What a snob!"


But I digress.


Anyway, Meg, I get that an aging Tom Hanks, for example, with a few extra pounds and some gray at his temples, will most  likely be in movie demand forever, or at least longer than most any aging actress with slight wrinkling or thinning lips. That's just how Hollywood rolls.


Or, as Jane Fonda once said, "Women are not forgiven for aging. Robert Redford's lines of distinction are my old age wrinkles."

But Botox, Meg? It's poison. Ack.

Heavy sigh.
Of course, I still love you, Meg. You will always be one of my all-time most fave actresses.

And I will always love the unforgettable and funny die-hard romantic characters you portrayed in When Harry Met Sally, Sleepless in Seattle, and You've Got Mail.

Indeed, you gave Sally, Annie and Kathleen (ShopGirl) each a pretty, girl-next-door face. But more important, and more lasting, you played those parts with such heart.

And the heart, my dear Meg, has no wrinkles.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

This is a lovely tribute to one of my favourite actresses Annie.
Like you I've got so many wonderful memories of Meg Ryan and her movies and like you I've often wondered why?

Meg is, was, and always will be the most appealing person I've ever seen on a movie screen and it's inexplicable to me that she would feel the need to do anything to such a wonderful face.
Although I must say in her defence that from pictures I've seen recently, she seems to have given up on the Botox and lip fillers, now that she's out of the Hollywood rat-race.

Whatever the future holds for Meg, in my mind she'll always be the beautiful, funny and charming woman that won my heart back in the late 80s.

I love all the rom-coms you mention, but I also admire the other, lesser known films from her ouvre, especially Flesh and Bone which never fails to leave me open-mouthed and teary-eyed.

I can't think of many other actors who have ever had that effect on me!