Cate Blanchett Wears Two Givenchy Looks While Promoting Play in New York

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Cate Blanchett

Cate Blanchett is starring as Yelena in a new version of Anton Chekhov's Uncle Vanya that just opened at Lincoln Center in New York -- a production originally staged by the Sydney Theater Company, where her husband Andrew Upton serves as its director. In fact, he penned this adaption of the darkly romantic, almost maudlin Russian play, which also features another Australian star, Hugo Weaving. And at two different events for the play's opening, Blanchett, a fashion-risk-taker extraordinaire, wore two different looks by Riccard Tisci for Givenchy -- both from resort 2013.

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One major difference in Hollywood fashion today compared to several years ago is that resort and holiday collections -- which used to go fairly unnoticed except by wealthy ladies who travel a lot -- are now being worn by celebs, since ready-to-wear, once it's photographed, can't be repeated. There are lots of great options in resort collections; designers sometimes experiment much more with them, since they don't need to produce as many pieces, and the media doesn't cover them as much. 

Ever since she wore an edgy violet Givenchy couture to the Oscars a few years back, Blanchett has been wearing Tisci's looks. And she has a gift for choosing the edgiest, most interesting ones. For a long time before, she was wearing strictly Armani and Armani Prive, as she developed a close relationship with Giorgio Armani, and attended many of his fashion shows in Milan and Paris.

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But this last week, Blanchett showed up within a space of days in New York in two different looks from Givenchy resort 2013 -- a small collection based on Klimt-like patterns, tops that are cut on the bias so they look like cape-blouses, and color blocking on separates that are mismatched but worn together because they're within the same color family. We really haven't seen anybody else wearing pieces from this collection -- and we probably won't.

Only Blanchett could get away with looking so starkly chic in this dramatic collection. The reviews she's getting the fashion critics are as good as the ones she's accustomed to getting from  drama critics.