Friday, April 06, 2012

GQ April 2012 Issue: Pitbull / Dave Franco / Brunello Cucinelli styling Michael Paterniti

There were a few interesting pieces from the latest issue of GQ Magazine... with one unfortunately not currently available online.

One of the features from the issue was the profile "Doggy Style" on rapper Pitbull by Kent Russell. It was solid writing that followed a convention I've seen in a number of other GQ pieces with the author including himself or herself in the story. In this case, Russell spent time hanging out with Pitbull and sought to ask and answer the question of whether he'd become a sellout with all the corporate shilling done on and off stage. To this point, Pitbull is likely best known to non-rap fans as the Bud Light ad guy... and he incorporated into the concert Russell attended endorsements of both energy strips and Zumba fitness. It's an entertaining read on the successful artist and in terms of whether he's a sell out, Pitbull asserts that he's showing people what they can become. Whether that's a flimsy answer or not, he's entertaining people and being well paid to do so... probably nothing terribly wrong there.

Also from this issue was the short "On the Cover: Dave Franco" by Lauren Bans. What stood out with this piece was mention of the 21 Jump Street and final season of Scrubs actor being the brother of Academy Award nominated actor James Franco. Pretty remarkable family (that grew up in Palo Alto, CA)... with the third brother being an artist and mother Betsy Franco an author.

Another feature from this issue that I enjoyed tremendously was "How I learned to look, act, eat and think like an Italian gentleman in just three days." It's written by Michael Paterniti and chronicles his time spent with leading fashion designer and mogul Brunello Cucinelli. Paterniti also wrote for GQ "The Man Who Sailed His House" and this latest piece shows his style makeover at the hands of Cucinelli (yep, another GQ "writer as part of story" approach done well).