With a New Face...
by Shelly Schoeneshoefer

Every year at the Berlinale, the sponsors present interesting ideas in order to sell their products. The cosmetic company L’Oreal had a wonderfully modern, golden booth at Potsdammer Platz where they offered makeovers for the stars and for the public. In this one week alone, these self-employed cosmeticians had over 800 appointments.

My cosmetician said it is a lot of work, but she comes away with wonderful stories. Her job includes using new products, discussing needs and tips for the clients and, naturally, selling products. The cosmetician laughed as she explained that she felt funny trying to tell Jane Fonda what to do to improve her skin since Fonda clearly had it under control. She also found it interesting that young people who have gorgeous skin are wearing so much unnecessary make-up, while people like me should be using more due to my age. She also told me that they often get strange people hanging around, waiting to see the stars and hoping to get an autograph.

So, next year, if you are interested, make sure you sign up for an appointment on the first two days of the festival or there will be nothing available later.  I signed up on Friday morning and my appointment was set for Tuesday afternoon. The Shooting Stars had already blocked out Monday since they had their award ceremony that night at the Berlinale Palast. At the end you get a nice little bag of goodies, a scarf and good ideas on how to look like a star. You might even get lucky and have a cream with actual gold flecks applied to your skin like I had. Everyone I ran into that afternoon said I definitely looked younger!