Sebastian Stan also attended the Met Gala, and stop saying he didn’t dress to the theme in head-to-toe PINK (from Valentino), because he ABSOLUTELY did.
This is a brilliant homage to Pepto Bismol, a remedy with its roots in the turn of the 20th century drug marketing free-for-all that the total lack of regulations on either the financial markets or medicinal testing bolstered. This is the era of REAL Coca-Cola, the kind with cocaine in it, and Bismosal, a tummy settler aimed at infants. Nothing says “Gilded Age” like a tribute to patent medicines.
It’s especially on point because we are living in a second Gilded Age, and our own obsession with wellness and its lack of regulation echoes the patent medicine craze of the late 1800s. With this look, Sebastian Stan is telling us that everything old is new again, that if we don’t learn from the past we are doomed to make its mistakes, he’s commenting on the power of marketing and the commercialization of health in a for-profit wellness industry. Wow, this look is truly doing so much. That, or he just didn’t rate Valentino’s best look of the night.
