Miss Congeniality: Jeannie Mai of E! Style network’s How Do I Look? is making a name for herself, one look at a time.
ISSUE: Summer 2010
DEPT: Personalities
STORY: Anne H. Kim
Jeannie Mai is probably the only person who gets paid to rummage through people’s closets and toss out anything that doesn’t meet the rules of good dressing. It can get ugly (and we don’t mean just the clothes). The dressing-impaired who appear on E! Style network’s How Do I Look? have been known to break down in tears, plead their case in a desperate attempt to get just a bit more mileage out of a tired college sweatshirt, and just plain get defensive. It’s a delicate operation to say the least. But as the show’s newest host (Mai took over for Finola Hughes), Mai deals out her fashion judgment with such a sunny and bubbly disposition that those who (grudgingly) appear on the show are won over soon enough. Mai’s happy-go-lucky attitude doesn’t seem to know boundaries either. Besides boosting up the self-esteem of her Look guests, she also reports on fashion and entertainment on Extra with Mario Lopez and chums it up with Natalie Morales as the resident fashion expert on Today. Mai is quickly building a brand as a congenial host with plenty of personality. She’s even adding a fresh dose of high energy into Avon as the iconic beauty company’s resident fashion expert.
