Why is it so hard to talk about fashion in TV series? "Made in Italy" and the limits of stories about fashion seen on TV

«Welcome, Irene, to the wonderful world of fashion. Beware, once inside, it's going to be impossible to get out of it», says Walter Albini with a theatrical gesture, just before a slideshow of photos that portray the real Albini with a voice-over dialogue with ludicrous lines like «But Rita, so he's an innovator?» «We can safely declare that he is the father of prêt-à-porter at least in Italy», followed by a dream: «In short, he was very important». 

In this short exchange of lines hide all the perplexities that Made in Italy arouses. It's a tv show that Prime Video produced in 2019 but arrived only recently on Canale 5, and is the Italian response, one would say, to Emily In Paris with in addition a certain historical-documentary approach. Both series decide to tell fashion not from the point of view of designers but from that of publishing, with female protagonists who find themselves working in important newsrooms that become the privileged point of view to observe the fashion scene and its fauna. But the representation of fashion that often comes out of it always remains something didactic or too over the top. 

Talking about fashion on TV is difficult because fashion is something that defies conventions (or should). To quote the same Made In Italy: «To really provoke, one must go the distance». And a TV series about fashion should know how to provoke exactly how fashion does, have depth and perspective, tell the world not with the eyes of the intern of good hopes, but with the "internal" gaze of a photographer, a model or a designer; talk about its subcultures and describe an aesthetic that is closer to reality (see, the outfits of the protagonist of We Are Who We Are, the Luca Guadagnino series), but also deepen and contextualize its role in a significant way and not with the hastiness of a press release. Waiting for that moment, you have to settle for the fashion of Made In Italy: scholastic but at least heart-warming and full of good intentions.