• September 18, 2000
• Vol. 54
• No. 12

Renée Zellweger

• 

From PEOPLE Magazine

RENEE ZELLWEGER CLEARLY knows what she's doing in front of a camera. In 1996 she hit stardom with a little Tom Cruise vehicle called Jerry Maguire. And this summer, in Me, Myself & Irene, she earned easy laughs alongside new love Jim Carrey, 38. But in front of the mirror, our judges agree, the 31-year-old actress needs Me, Myself and a Well-Paid Fashion Consultant. "I hope she doesn't take offense," says singer Sisqó, "but this girl does not know how to dress at all." The problem, say our judges, is that the 5'5" Zellweger can look sadly frumpy one day, embarrassingly vampy the next. "She has a lot of different styles going on," says designer Dana Buchman. "She should wear simpler, more unadorned pieces." Model Mia Tyler laments what she calls Zellweger's "what's on top of the pile today?" style–but holds out hope. "I'd like her to dress more classic," says Tyler. "She can do it!"

Zellweger turned heads in a Versace mini at the MTV Video Music Awards in Manhattan last September–but for the wrong reasons. "The dress is way too short," says Dana Buchman, "and that's all you see. It doesn't look modern and it doesn't look attractive." Exclaims Sisqó: "She's got the wrong dress on!"

"She looks like Aunt Jemima!" exclaims Sisqó of Zellweger's ensemble at the Nurse Betty premiere at Cannes in May. "She's like, 'Pancakes, anyone?'" Designer Elie Tahari says the actress could have easily avoided her "waitress in a Scandinavian restaurant" look: "A tight black top with this would have been fine."

"She should be wearing roller-skates and bringing food to my car," says Mia Tyler of the outfit Zellweger wore while out and about in Manhattan last June. No, counters Elie Tahari: "She's dressed like a stuffy schoolteacher." Either way, Sisqó feels bad for the kid: "She doesn't look comfortable."