Phil Lerch '02 gets MTV makeover

Phil Lerch '02 spent his summer working for a hair salon in New York City, where he stood on street corners and convinced women — not so subtley — that it was high time they get a new 'do. But, as a somewhat preppy student from a small town in Pennsylvania, he never thought he would fall victim to a makeover himself.

But Lerch had to give in when MTV made him an offer he couldn't refuse.

Lerch spent the first few weeks of school filming with MTV's new "House of Style" spinoff, "Mission: Makeover" as he and his friend Joe Leone — who is a graduate of Skidmore College — received a makeover that involved a $700 hairdo, a spiffy wardrobe, a meeting with a supermodel and of course, 30 minutes of stardom.

Lerch said he and Leone spotted the MTV camera crew on the street while they were working. "What they do is they find people who want to get a new look, and you basically pitch an idea to MTV about what the new look is and why you want it," Lerch explained. "Neither of us really wanted a new look, but we definitely wanted to be on TV," he said.

With the cameras rolling, Lerch and Leone proposed that the show make them look like hair stylists. MTV liked the idea and contacted their boss in September, who called Lerch back to New York for a surprise.

As Lerch and Leone stood on Columbus Circle, promoting the hair salon, a camera crew arrived. "They basically ambushed us and said, 'All Right, now you're on Mission: Makeover. Let's go,' " Lerch said.

"And so, that's when the whole two-week odyssey of filming began," Lerch said of the filming for the 30-minute episode. "The first day was a lot of 'Oh my gosh, we're really excited' shots. At first, we really were and then they were kind of like, 'Pretend you still are,' " he said.

MTV then came to Princeton to interview some of Lerch's friends and to film his closet. "They want it to look like you're a real slob beforehand," Lerch said. "You have to be pretty disparaging about yourself. You've got to dress yourself down some and make yourself seem a little bit more pathetic."

The highlight of the experience began when MTV brought in the experts: a fashion consultant who has worked for Puff Daddy and Will Smith, a hair stylist who Kevin Bacon uses, a skin specialist and of course, a supermodel — Molly Sims — who interviewed them.

"For me they gave me a lot of Club Monaco and French Connection, a little bit of Banana Republic and Gucci Accessories," Lerch recalled. "If you see the show, it looks like I walked away with an amazing wardrobe of somewhat expensive clothes. But the only thing I really got to keep was the haircut, because they couldn't take that away."

During the filming — which is supposed to be only one day — Lerch said they were asked to do such things as change in front of the cameras. "You'll see me half-naked," he said."We spent hours and hours and hours standing in front of the camera shaking our asses."

Lerch said he's looking forward to watching his jaunt with MTV on Monday, when the episode is slated to air. "I'll stake my reputation on the fact that it will be an entertaining half hour of television," he said, explaining that the show usually chooses girls for the show who aren't as obnoxious as he and Leone were. "But then I haven't seen the final tape, so God only knows."