The supermarket chain, like so many of us, weighed in

The last organisation we’d imagine to join the commentary on the fashions of Star Awards is Fairprice. Who’d guess that straight-laced NTUC—as many still prefer to call it—could be this visually tongue-in-cheek. On Facebook and Instagram, they compared the outfits worn by Elvin Ng (黄俊雄), Chantelle Ng ( (黄暄婷, unrelated), and Joel Choo (朱哲伟) to foods—dessert, pastry, and beverage respectively. Totally palatable humour for mass consumption, as opposed to the snarky comments appearing on social media, such as the annual bashing by former supervising editor at Channel News Asia Phin Wong, whose followers gleefully praise, “always gets it right” (his post seemed to have been deleted), and “always hungry, always bitchy” Dennis Lim whose Fashun Armageddon 2021 album (wittily called 红星大讲 or star talk) on Facebook gave the Star Awards a flaming roast.

For Elvin Ng, being compared to a raspberry parfait probably allowed him to sigh in relief after others distastefully linked his Alexander McQueen suit to a tampon. Chantelle Ng’s confection of a gown by bridal wear designer Jessicacindy was predisposed to be a food meme, so she, too, must have been delighted that her dress was likened to what Krispy Kreme offers, rather than considered inspiration for ex-Mediacorp radio darlings Daniel Ong and Jamie Yeo’s former bake shop Twelve Cupcakes. The colour of Joel Choo’s ultra-relaxed Zegna suit was seen to be similar to teh C peng (iced milk tea) instead of teh kor underpants, as trended. So happy he was with the association that the son of veteran actor Zhu Houren asked Fairprice on FB, “please send over 1 month’s supply of kopi peng!” You guessed it: crowd pleaser Fairprice cleverly obliged.

Screen grab: NTUC Fairprice/Facebook