On Project Runway, team challenges can sometimes result in some inspired looks, as the team of Jillian Lewis, Rami Kashou and Kevin Christiana proved last episode. However, the mish mash of styles and clash of personalities can also end up in some serious messes.
Despite the unpredictable nature of the fashion, though, there’s one sure bet when team challenges are featured on the show: there will be some drama. This past episode of Project Runway wasn’t quite the usual hotbed of tension, but the animosity between Ricky Lizalde and Victorya Hong proved that you can always count on someone not getting along.
The designers recently answered some “Burning Questions” about the episode, including some dish on that inter-designer tension.
What did the third team member, Elisa Jimenez, think of the internal strift? While she couches her answer in her usual wonderfully moonchild style, she clearly wants to stay the heck out of this fight.
She said of the team dynamic, “Interestingly enough, when we all came together, I assumed to relinquish all of my true Alpha nature and to simply try and be a directed and hopefully well utilized Beta. That being said, I ignored the conflict and removed myself.”
When it comes to Ricky’s take on the conflict between Victorya and him, he doesn’t spare any words. “I was the team leader but I don’t think that Victorya gave a sh#@!”
Victorya, on the other hand, had a lot of words to spare. She said the conflict “had more to do with what’s expected of a team leader, which seems pretty obvious. To lead, right? Ricky did not provide any leadership. He could hardly come up with design ideas. (The one I distinctly recall him suggesting was fluorescent lace…the thought still makes me shudder.) So if he wasn’t contributing as a team player, how could he lead?”
But that’s not all she had to say about it. She continued, “When you have a team leader who doesn’t, or can’t, lead, what do you do? Sit back and watch the tower fall? That’s not me. I’m a creative person for goodness’ sake, I have ideas. What’s funny—or scary, depending on how you look at it—is that Ricky was constantly asking for my or Elisa’s counsel. He could not make a single decision on his own. It was only after I voiced my grievances to him that it conveniently became a situation where I was imposing my ideas, even though he had actively sought them. I guess Ricky would say, and rather crudely, that I didn’t have the so-called balls to want to be team leader (again.) But I hope he knows that it takes more than “cojones” to actually lead.”
But Ricky needn’t feel bad about Victorya’s negative assessment of him, it appears she didn’t have a lot of positives to say about another contestant as well. While most of the other designers saw Chris March off with kind words about his personality and potential, she seemed to, as they say, damn with faint praise.
Victorya said of Chris, “I didn’t entirely connect with [him], personally or aesthetically. I can see that he has a certain sense of humor, but I knew early on that it’s not one that I particularly relate to either. I can say, however, that he does know how to sew.”
– Leslie Seaton, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
Source: Bravo
(Image courtesy of Bravo)
Staff Columnist, BuddyTV
