维多利亚的秘密意义在哪里（天使和恶魔揭露）

翻译整理：兰桂姬语言文化，不同颜色对应不同关键词

The current resurgence of Y2k fashions has prompted recent documentary reappraisals of that era’s biggest brand names, from Von Dutch to Abercrombie & Fitch. Now the mother of them all receives the docuseries treatment with Victoria’s Secret: Angels and Demons, a three-parter about fashion, sex, power, money and misconduct that’s sure to titillate when it premieres this week.

目前 Y2k 时尚的复苏促使近期纪录片重新评估了那个时代最知名的品牌，从 Von Dutch 到 Abercrombie & Fitch。现在，她们的母亲都通过《维多利亚的秘密：天使与恶魔》纪录片获得了治疗，这是一部关于时尚、性、权力、金钱和不当行为的三部曲，本周首映时肯定会挑动观众的神经。

After all, the multibillion-dollar lingerie juggernaut was an inescapable cultural phenomenon in the late 1990s and early 2000s, known for high-octane fashion shows, suggestive mail-order catalogues, impossibly leggy spokeswomen dubbed Angels, and lacquered stores (and signature pink-striped shoppers bags) ubiquitous in shopping malls and the broader American fashion landscape. But behind the glitz and glitter touting female empowerment through in-your-face sexuality lay allegations of bullying and harassment of employees and models; executives dismissive of casting more diverse and inclusive models; and former billionaire CEO Les Wexner’s disconcertingly close ties to convicted sex offender and disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.

毕竟，价值数十亿美元的内衣巨头在 1990 年代末和 2000 年代初是一种不可避免的文化现象，以高强度时装秀、暗示性邮购目录、不可思议的大长腿女天使和漆面商店（以及标志性的粉红色-条纹购物袋）在购物中心和广泛的美国时尚界无处不在。但在扑面而来的性感来宣传女权的浮华背后，隐藏着对员工和模特的欺凌和骚扰的指控；高管们对打造更加多样化和包容性的模式不屑一顾；以及前亿万富翁首席执行官莱斯·韦克斯纳（Les Wexner）与被定罪的性犯罪者和不光彩的金融家杰弗里·爱泼斯坦（Jeffrey Epstein）有着令人不安的密切关系。

The series traces the rise and fall of the megabrand, telling the story both from the inside (courtesy of two former CEOs, other key employees, damning never-before-seen internal videos, and a few Angels themselves) and out: the late-90s, post-Clinton/Lewinsky, Sex and the City–era cultural shifts that ignited the brand’s particular brand of aggressive sexuality and those that portended its decline decades later in the wake of #MeToo.该系列追溯了大品牌的兴衰，从内部（由两位前任首席执行官、其他关键员工、该死的从未见过的内部视频和一些天使本人提供）和外部讲述了故事：90 年代晚期、后克林顿/莱温斯基、欲望都市时代的文化转变点燃了该品牌特有的侵略性，以及在 #MeToo 之后数十年预示着其衰落的那些文化转变。

That’s around when the controversies encircling the brand appeared on the radar of director Matt Tyrnauer. “In a meeting I had with a fashion company in 2019, it came up that some Victoria’s Secret models were rebelling against the brand on social media,” he told the Guardian. Prior to that, he admits, “I hadn’t really paid any attention to the brand.” (He didn’t even know about the Angels until he began research on this film: “My first reaction was, ‘This is the worst, dumbest, most insulting, retrograde, backward-looking marketing idea I’ve ever seen.’ And yet it worked to a degree that maybe no other fashion marketing campaign has ever worked.”)

就在那时，围绕该品牌的争议出现在导演 Matt Tyrnauer 的雷达上。 “在 2019 年我与一家时装公司的一次会议上，发现一些维多利亚的秘密模特在社交媒体上抗议该品牌，”他告诉卫报。在此之前，他承认，“我并没有真正关注过这个品牌。” （在他开始研究这部电影之前，他甚至不知道维密天使：“我的第一反应是，‘这是我见过的最糟糕、最愚蠢、最侮辱、倒退、落后的营销理念。’而且但它的效果可能是其他时尚营销活动从未奏效过的。”）

Indeed, Tyrnauer, a former longtime Vanity Fair editor who previously directed documentaries on Studio 54, Roy Cohn, and the high-fashion designer Valentino, tends to operate in more rarefied circles. But, “this seemed to me to be an example of yet another crack in the foundation of the top-down old fashion establishment, where the models, who used to be completely controlled by the brands, were in effect biting the hand that had fed them”, he says. “I like to make stories about closed worlds and systems, and I thought, There’s something here.”

事实上，曾长期担任《名利场》杂志编辑、曾在 Studio 54、罗伊·科恩 (Roy Cohn) 和高级时装设计师华伦天奴 (Valentino) 导演过纪录片的 Tyrnauer 倾向于在更稀有的圈子中运作。但是，“在我看来，这似乎是在自上而下的旧时尚机构的基础上再次出现裂缝的一个例子，过去完全由品牌控制的模特实际上是在恩将仇报”，他说。 “我喜欢写关于封闭世界和系统的故事，我想，这里有些东西。”

Many of the more lurid details were still yet to be revealed, including that Wexner, now 84, enabled Epstein’s access to wealth and women by granting the financier broad powers over the corporate titan’s finances, philanthropy, and private life. Epstein even posed as a talent scout for Victoria’s Secret in 1997, luring a model to a Santa Monica hotel room where he groped and manhandled her. As the series lays out in detail, Epstein’s long and close relationship with Wexner facilitated the purchase of his townhouse (where he sexually abused underage girls) and private jet used to traffic his victims, known infamously in the media as the Lolita Express. (Wexner, who stepped down from the company last year, declined the series’ interview requests but denied knowledge of Epstein’s sexual misconduct while under his employ. The former chairman has acknowledged that on one occasion he was informed that Epstein was claiming an association with the company and that he forbade Epstein from doing it again. Wexner maintains that he severed ties with Epstein in 2008.)

许多更骇人听闻的细节仍有待披露，包括现年 84 岁的韦克斯纳通过授予金融家对企业巨头的财务、慈善事业和私人生活的广泛权力，使爱泼斯坦能够获得财富和女性。爱泼斯坦甚至在 1997 年冒充维多利亚的秘密的星探，将一名模特引诱到圣莫尼卡酒店房间，在那里他动手动脚和粗暴对待她。正如该系列详细介绍的那样，爱泼斯坦与韦克斯纳的长期密切关系促成了他购买联排别墅（他在那里对未成年女孩进行X-ing虐待）和用于贩卖受害者的私人飞机，这在媒体上被称为洛丽塔快车。 （去年从公司辞职的韦克斯纳拒绝了该系列的采访请求，但否认了解爱泼斯坦在受雇期间的不当行为。这位前董事长承认，有一次他被告知爱泼斯坦声称与并且他禁止爱泼斯坦再次这样做。韦克斯纳坚称他在 2008 年与爱泼斯坦断绝了关系。）

“New York’s a town where you fake it till you make it, and Epstein is the poster child of our time for that,” says Tyrnauer, who previously oversaw Vanity Fair’s annual New Establishment list. “There was clearly nothing there of valuable substance and yet the New York media world and what passes for society –– which is just basically a money culture, which I think at its core is very corrupt –– seemed to either embrace him or just turn a blind eye. The more we examine that culture, which is basically a money and power and publicity culture, and the more that that facade is stripped away, the better.”“

纽约是一个越假越容易成功的地方，爱泼斯坦是我们这个时代的典型代表，”曾负责《名利场》年度新机构名单的泰尔瑙尔说。 “显然那里没有任何有价值的物质，但纽约媒体世界和社会的过去——基本上是一种金钱文化，我认为它的核心是非常腐败的——似乎要么接受他，要么拥抱它要么对它翻白眼。我们越多地研究这种文化，越发现这基本上就是一种金钱、权力和宣传文化，越是抽丝剥茧，就越是能更好地去观察这种文化。”

On the surface, he argues, “this series about this shallower than shallow pop brand that is the most basic, low-brow consumer thing imaginable. But that’s just marketing. When you look behind it, it goes to the core of the establishment.”从表面上看，他认为，“比这个系列的肤浅品牌更肤浅的是这些可以想象的最基本、低俗的消费者。但这就是市场。当你回过头再去看的时候你就会看到整个事情建立内核。”

Yet the brand had been struggling even before Wexner’s association with Epstein came under scrutiny, straining to find relevance in a world that was viewing its brand of airbrushed-perfect bodies and male-gaze sexuality as increasingly out of touch. The company hawked “a woman born perfect and made better with push-ups and padding,” as former VS exec Sharleen Ernster says in the series, images that instilled body dysmorphia into a generation of people around the world.

然而，在韦克斯纳与爱泼斯坦的关系受到审查之前，该品牌就一直在苦苦挣扎，努力在一个将其品牌的完美身材和男性凝视的性感和这个世界之间寻找一些关联性同时让彼此间不产生关联。正如前 VS 执行官 Sharleen Ernster 在该系列中所说，该公司兜售“一个天生完美、通过俯卧撑和乳垫变得更好的女性”，这些图像将身体畸形灌输给世界各地的人。

As the company takes pains to reinvent itself to fend off its downward spiral, the question remains: Can the brand change its stripes? Last summer it announced a major rebrand, with a diverse slate of spokespeople including Megan Rapinoe and Priyanka Chopra Jonas. “It talks about female empowerment from a more current perspective,” Tyrnauer notes –– a pivot perhaps not so different from its original rebrand in the 1990s.随着公司煞费苦心地重塑自我以抵御下滑趋势，问题仍然存在：品牌能否改变现状？去年夏天，它宣布将进行一个重大的品牌重塑，包括梅根·拉皮诺和普里扬卡·乔普拉·乔纳斯在内的多位发言人。 “它从更现代的角度谈论女性赋权，”Tyrnauer 指出——这可能与 1990 年代最初的品牌重塑没有太大区别。

Ultimately the director hopes the series reveals the machinations behind the business of enticing us to buy, particularly in the most successful cases. “The facades of marketing sometimes hide ugly truths,” Tyrnauer says. “To try to understand why we’re so seduced by these things is a very important thing to look at.”最终，导演希望该系列能够揭示诱使我们购买的业务背后的阴谋，尤其是在最成功的案例中。 “营销的表面有时隐藏着丑陋的事实，”蒂尔瑙尔说。 “试图理解为什么我们会被这些东西如此诱惑，这是一件非常重要的事情。”

来源：Angels and demons: exposing the dark side of Victoria’s Secret | Documentary | The Guardian