Barbie

New Orleans -- After hearing me talk for an hour, Alan Berg said, ''Enough already, namedrops keep falling on my head . . . Maybe you know famous poets but I had dinner with Barbie's lawyer!''I wasn't aware that Barbie was in court but that's just where she is. She went to court over a new doll called Miss America which is fashioned after Miss America. Arthur J. Levine, Barbie's lawyer, claims Miss America ripped off Barbie's head. Mattel, Barbie's manufacturer, says it copyrighted Barbie's QUOTE look compliant joy UNQUOTE.

Jessica Lea Mayfield has packed a lot of living into her 22 years. Though the sprightly singer/songwriter may only be a year past the legal drinking age, she's already released two albums and had one notable collaboration. As a child, Mayfield toured and played music with One Way Rider, her family's bluegrass band. Her first record, 2008's "With Blasphemy So Heartfelt," got critics buzzing — in part because Mayfield teamed up with Dan Auerbach, guitarist and singer for the Grammy-winning rock duo The Black Keys.

If your secret wish is to be Barbie, you now have a chance, but only if you are a little girl. Barbie, the doll, is now Barbie, the fashion designer. The plastic fashion plate now has Barbie for Girls, a moderately priced line of clothes sizes 4 to 6X and 7 to 14 hair accessories, home furnishings, handbags and beauty products that will be in stores in plenty of time for back-to-school shopping.The look is, of course, glittery, pink, playful and as glamorous as a girl can be. Just ask Mom to buy you a new Barbie doll because a 20-page Barbie for Girls catalog is included in new doll boxes.

When she was a little girl, if a bad dream would wake her up in the middle of the night, Julie Murn would pad down the hall of the silent house to her big sister's room. She'd crawl into Kathy's bed, grab hold of her nightgown and hold tight. "Just," she says, "to make sure she was there. " And she always was. The sisters have been together, one way or another, for as long as either one can remember. Born 18 months apart, they fill page after page of their family's worn albums with impish grins and exuberant poses — familiar pages they revisited recently, sitting knee to knee on Julie's living room sofa, giggling and groaning as steam curled from their coffee mugs.

Barbie, that multitalented, eternally youthful scamp, is at it again.This time, she's the heroine of a comic book. Make that two comic books, typical for an overachiever who has succeeded at every career from astronaut to ballerina.When is this babe going to start showing some age? She's worse than Dick Clark.Where does Barbie get off having enough energy and enthusiasm to stop the C. Ment Corp. from turning a park into a parking lot, teach us step-by-step how to "walk that Barbie walk" for exercise, dog-sit for one friend and help cure another pal's case of wallflower-itis?

I was 8 years old when I first met Barbie, and I wanted a life just like hers. She had a boyfriend, Ken; a best friend, Midge; and a lot of clothes. From Barbie, I learned a sartorial approach to existence: You need only to have the right outfit, and the life to go with it will appear. Buy a poofy dress and you get a date for the prom; plan a trousseau and marriage will follow; buy the right suit and a career would materialize. But today, Barbie turns 50, and I don't think she's prepared.

It's not enough that she has Ken, a convertible and a figure that even a plastic surgeon couldn't replicate. There's now another reason to envy Barbie: She's got designer clothes.After 35 years of wearing all the wrong outfits, America's 11 1/2 -inch ideal can finally leave the plastic mules, sailor suits and showgirl numbers in the dreamhouse.Tomorrow night, Calvin, Oscar and other Seventh Avenue stars are dressing her for Baltimore's first Barbie Ball, to benefit Lifesongs for AIDS Inc.Nearly 100 designer-garbed Barbies will be on exhibit -- and auctioned -- at the Baltimore Museum of Art during a social event that's expected to draw some 500 people and raise $50,000 for pediatric AIDS services.

She is, in a word, gorgeous. A real head-turner. From head to toe, she is perfect. Her hair, artfully coiffed in shining curls, flows past her shoulders. Her lips are plump and carefully hued with a warm pink that complements the toasted copper color of her skin. Her evening dress is a soft salmon-pink and apple-green chiffon halter. She's a real doll. Actually, she is a doll. She is a Barbie doll, created for the celebration of the 100th anniversary of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc. - the first college sorority founded by African-American women.

Mattel's recent recall of lead-tainted toys made in China reminded me of my childhood. As a Chinese-American girl growing up in the 1970s, I was fascinated by Barbie's rear end. Not only was it plump and round, like her prominent breasts, but my doll carried this inscription: "Made in Hong Kong." In the 1960s, long before outsourcing became rampant in other industries, Mattel and other toy manufacturers opened factories in Asia, employing thousands of poor, single women. My mother was one of them.

Ken's been getting an eyeful for some time now: Barbie spilling out of her halter top, Barbie showing off her abs of plastic, Barbie's long legs -- inch after inch of them -- stretching from her short shorts. Monica Garcia -- a new mom, longshoreman and Orthodox Jew -- gives a succinct fashion critique: "Some of these dolls are dressed like prostitutes." Garcia hopes to give a wardrobe makeover to Barbie and her bare-midriffed friends, dressing them less like Britney Spears and more like, ah, hmm ... that's the problem right there, isn't it?

I was 8 years old when I first met Barbie, and I wanted a life just like hers. She had a boyfriend, Ken; a best friend, Midge; and a lot of clothes. From Barbie, I learned a sartorial approach to existence: You need only to have the right outfit, and the life to go with it will appear. Buy a poofy dress and you get a date for the prom; plan a trousseau and marriage will follow; buy the right suit and a career would materialize. But today, Barbie turns 50, and I don't think she's prepared.

She is, in a word, gorgeous. A real head-turner. From head to toe, she is perfect. Her hair, artfully coiffed in shining curls, flows past her shoulders. Her lips are plump and carefully hued with a warm pink that complements the toasted copper color of her skin. Her evening dress is a soft salmon-pink and apple-green chiffon halter. She's a real doll. Actually, she is a doll. She is a Barbie doll, created for the celebration of the 100th anniversary of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc. - the first college sorority founded by African-American women.

If little girls in and around Baltimore want a doll that looks like Mommy, they're in luck, no matter if she shops all day at Cross Keys, gets lost on Columbia cul-de-sacs, works a street corner in the 'hood or lives with another mommy in Mount Vernon. "Mattel recently announced the release of limited-edition Barbie Dolls for Greater Baltimore market," reads the e-mail that came to me the other day. The "Baltimore Barbies" line - a spoof created by some anonymous Internet yukster - boasts 11 imaginary models, enough to offend every imaginable demographic.

Every Fourth of July, my folks had a bash at their home in Massachusetts. It was one of the few times of the year that family and friends from all over would come together. I remember Grandma would have on a dress and hose, my hippie Uncle Skip wore a crazy hat he would dig up for the occasion, and Aunt Alice, who could make you laugh with just a glance, sat out on the lawn in one of those brightly colored, aluminum-framed lawn chairs. Dad would organize croquet matches, my brothers would set off drugstore fireworks, and Mom took charge of everything else.

Is there a place in the world for cute? There is if you don't have to put up with too much of it. The cuteness in question today is embodied in a toy called My Little Pony, which this year celebrates its 25th birthday, having now occupied a full generation's worth of girls' imaginations worldwide, while simultaneously alarming a generation of parents worried about excessive exposure to saccharine. But is artificial sweetener really so dangerous? Today's young women seem to have their heads screwed on straight - which is more than can be said for the Barbies they took up after leaving My Little Pony bereft and unwanted in the back of the closet.

Mattel's recent recall of lead-tainted toys made in China reminded me of my childhood. As a Chinese-American girl growing up in the 1970s, I was fascinated by Barbie's rear end. Not only was it plump and round, like her prominent breasts, but my doll carried this inscription: "Made in Hong Kong." In the 1960s, long before outsourcing became rampant in other industries, Mattel and other toy manufacturers opened factories in Asia, employing thousands of poor, single women. My mother was one of them.

What I do, first thing every morning, is play with dolls. The dolls belong to my 15-month-old daughter, Sophie, who likes to start the day by giving her dolls a toy bottle. She has a strong nurturing instinct, although it is not matched by her hand-eye coordination, so often she sticks the bottle into a doll's eye. The dolls don't mind. They're always happy. They talk in perky, squeaky doll voices. "Hi, Sophie!" say the dolls. "Cough cough cough!" The dolls cough a lot, because I provide their voices, and it is not easy to sound perky and squeaky when you're a 53-year-old man and it is 7 a.m. and you have not had your coffee.

Los Angeles -- If Barbie were a song, what would she sound like? The question sat in Tena Clark's mind as she drove through downtown Los Angeles last fall. The answer was no small matter. With Barbie's sales sagging, toy maker Mattel Inc. had turned to Clark, a pioneer in the emerging field of "sonic branding," to give the icon of American beauty a marketing face-lift. Recent scientific research had suggested that distinct combinations of a few musical notes - known in the advertising world as a "sonic brand" - could have more influence on consumers than the longer, frequently changing jingles Mattel had used for years.

Los Angeles -- If Barbie were a song, what would she sound like? The question sat in Tena Clark's mind as she drove through downtown Los Angeles last fall. The answer was no small matter. With Barbie's sales sagging, toy maker Mattel Inc. had turned to Clark, a pioneer in the emerging field of "sonic branding," to give the icon of American beauty a marketing face-lift. Recent scientific research had suggested that distinct combinations of a few musical notes - known in the advertising world as a "sonic brand" - could have more influence on consumers than the longer, frequently changing jingles Mattel had used for years.

Theater `Barbie Live' Barbie makes her way to the big stage, starring in Barbie Live in Fairytopia, a stage show run ning tonight through Sunday for eight performances at the Hip podrome Theatre at the Fran ce-Merrick Performing Arts Center. Based on the direct-to-video film Barbie Fairytopia, the family show features Barbie in the role of Elina. Show times vary. The Hippodrome is at 12 N. Eutaw St. Tickets are $18-$42. Call 410-547-SEAT or go to broadwayacross america.com. FYI The weekly Nielsen TV ratings do not appear today because of the Memorial Day holiday.