![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
A Youtube spiral lead me to Jennifer Lopez and Lin-Manuel Miranda's live performance of Love Make The World Go Round on the Today Show in response to the Orlando shooting. It's a great song:
But as I was watching it, I thought to myself, "Self, that outfit she's wearing looks awfully familiar."
A quick google later, and yup, I was right. The "white bra+skintight white pants" look was originated by Selena. It was one of her iconic looks:
For those of you who don't know, Selena was one of the biggest Mexican-American stars of the 80s and 90s, possibly of the entire 20th Century. She was an innovative musician who took traditional Tejano music, mixed it with mainstream pop elements, and sang the fuck out of it. And became a HUGE star. Mostly known in the Latinx community, but she was starting to break out more into the mainstream US market when she was murdered at age 23 in 1995. I'm not Latina, but I went to a school with a large Latina presence, and she was HUGE. She was also a fashion designer.
And, oh, by the way: JLo's first starting role? The first thing that got her noticed and on the road to her own stardom? Was playing Selena in the biopic. For YEARS, Jennifer Lopez was "that girl who played Selena" to me.
Some thoughts:
I'm thrilled at the homage, and saddened because there are a fuckton of people (probably even some younger Latinx people) who completely missed it.
I can't believe it's been over twenty years since Selena died, and I wonder (again, as I always do when I think of her) what she might have become had she not been murdered so young. She had talent, drive, intelligence, and star quality. She came so far in such a short time, and I have no doubt she would have continued to climb.
I leave you with two things: Selena singing one of her most popular songs, and a scene from JLo playing her in the biopic.
This is how big she was:
But as I was watching it, I thought to myself, "Self, that outfit she's wearing looks awfully familiar."
A quick google later, and yup, I was right. The "white bra+skintight white pants" look was originated by Selena. It was one of her iconic looks:
For those of you who don't know, Selena was one of the biggest Mexican-American stars of the 80s and 90s, possibly of the entire 20th Century. She was an innovative musician who took traditional Tejano music, mixed it with mainstream pop elements, and sang the fuck out of it. And became a HUGE star. Mostly known in the Latinx community, but she was starting to break out more into the mainstream US market when she was murdered at age 23 in 1995. I'm not Latina, but I went to a school with a large Latina presence, and she was HUGE. She was also a fashion designer.
And, oh, by the way: JLo's first starting role? The first thing that got her noticed and on the road to her own stardom? Was playing Selena in the biopic. For YEARS, Jennifer Lopez was "that girl who played Selena" to me.
Some thoughts:
I'm thrilled at the homage, and saddened because there are a fuckton of people (probably even some younger Latinx people) who completely missed it.
I can't believe it's been over twenty years since Selena died, and I wonder (again, as I always do when I think of her) what she might have become had she not been murdered so young. She had talent, drive, intelligence, and star quality. She came so far in such a short time, and I have no doubt she would have continued to climb.
I leave you with two things: Selena singing one of her most popular songs, and a scene from JLo playing her in the biopic.
This is how big she was:
