the take

‘Life in the Fab Lane’: We Want to Be Kimora Lee Simmons

Photo: Getty Images



We were completely prepared to hate Life in the Fab Lane, Baby Phat designer Kimora Lee Simmons’s reality show, premiering this Sunday on the Style Network. Our hearts are already full with Brett Michaels and Scott Baio! Surely, no other B-list celebrity could warm us so.

How wrong we were. We don’t merely love Kimora. We want to be her. From the opening sequence, in which she makes an employee cry, to her endearing views of motherhood (“I want to be a soccer mom,” she says, agreeing to a carpool, only to back out later, pointing out “We have a driver”) to her very own Barbie doll (but with a rounder face and trashier clothing), we worship the bitch. We wish we could live life with no filter on our mouth the way Kimora does; alas, unlike Kimora, we don’t have several mansions, a doting (if frustrated) staff, and millions of dollars from marrying a rap mogul — and, okay, founding a clothing label. (Russell Simmons came off about as senile and doddering as our dear old dad.)

Granted, parts of the show we tuned out (the whole Russian-photo-shoot thing was a snore), but when Kimora threw down, we were rapt. Already we’re using Kimora-isms with our friends. “You guys are not going to handle me, you’re going to be handled,” she tells her incompetent assistants. “Don’t make me bust out a nail file on you,” she yells at another. “Notice I’m not paying attention to you,” she snaps to her Baby Phat ad director. God, we think we’re in love.

Hey Kimmy, call us, mmkay? We can play with our new KLS Barbie! —Amina Akhtar

‘Life in the Fab Lane’: We Want to Be Kimora Lee Simmons