Victoria’s Secret: Angels And Demons is a three-part docuseries, directed by Matt Tyrnauer, is about how the lingerie brand rose in prominence during the 1980s and 1990s after being purchased by Les Wexner, a retail magnate who founded The Limited and whose companies incorporated many of the brands that dominated malls in the ’90s.
Opening Shot: Behind the scenes shots from the last Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show, which was taped in 2018.
The Gist: The first episode, through archival footage and news clippings, as well as interviews with many former Victoria’s Secret executives and some of the women who became superstar models for the brand, talks about how Wexner took the company from a sleepy mail-order operation to a multimedia mall powerhouse. He acquired the company in 1981, after making The Limited into a major retail success; Limited Brands soon became a mall powerhouse, with brands that dominated the space in the ’80s and ’90s. He helped remake Victoria’s Secret by selling a story about a British woman named Victoria and giving women an environment that would enable them to feel good about themselves and what they were buying.
Of course, there’s always a dark side to docuseries like this, and not only are there hints about how the models were treated, but of course there’s are also hints at how the image of Victoria’s Secret, with its rail-thin models who strutted the runways wearing angel wings, didn’t wear well as the 2010s progressed.
But the most ominous factor as the episode closes is the entrance of Jeffrey Epstein (yes, that Jeffrey Epstein) into the picture, who somehow managed to wheedle his way into Wexner’s inner circle to the point where Wexner gave him power of attorney over the company’s financial affairs. But then there start to be stories about how Epstein was recruiting young women to be “Victoria’s Secret models”, when he was really luring them into his sex trafficking ring.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Victoria’s Secret: Angels And Demons has elements of the rise and fall retail story you see in White Hot: The Rise and Fall of Abercrombie & Fitch (A&F was also a Limited Brands company until it was spun off) with elements of Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich.
Our Take: In the first episode of Victoria’s Secret: Angels and Demons, Tyrnauer does his best to set up the retailer’s amazing success, and examine the great ideas Wexner had that led to that success. He put great people around him, created an almost cult-like atmosphere around the company that led employees to buy into its business model, and sold its wares in ways that were bold and unique.
Let’s remember that, for much of the late-’80s through the mid-’10s, you couldn’t avoid Victoria’s Secret. The catalogs came in a torrent to your house; the ads were all over TV; the annual Fashion Show was a television event that often outdrew award shows and sporting events. Yes, the brand was giving women everywhere terrible body image problems, the models likely lived on saltines and cigarettes, and Jeffrey Freaking Epstein was controlling its purse strings while recruiting girls for his demented pleasure. But until the brand fell on hard times, it was a huge success story for Wexner and the company’s shareholders.
But it’s telling that Wexner himself did not want to be interviewed for the docuseries. That association with Epstein is going to be explored in-depth in the subsequent two episodes, especially episode 2, and it seems like that is what is going to dominate, more than even the usual vagaries of the fast fashion world that Wexner helped pioneer.
We’re sure we’ll see parts about manufacturing clothes for pennies in China and other developing areas, about the exploitation of the models and the overall dim image of women the company likely had. But none of those demons come close to Epstein, and we’re concerned that the series will devolve into the umpteenth examination of him that we’ve gotten in the years since his arrest and death.
Sex and Skin: Well, there’s lots of skin, of course, with much of the naughty parts covered by Victoria’s Secret’s products.
Parting Shot: Model Alicia Arden explains that she filed a sexual battery lawsuit against Epstein in 1997, who told her at the time that he worked for Victoria’s Secret. “That’s what he told me,” she said.
Sleeper Star: Cindy Fedus-Fields, the former CEO of Victoria’s Secret Direct, still sounds like she wishes she worked for Wexner during the company’s heyday. But, even with her almost scripted-sounding responses, she was pretty blunt about how the company marketed and its association with Epstein.
Most Pilot-y Line: More than one person said they “drank the Kool-Aid” based on how Wexner built the story around the company. We don’t think people realize what the origin of that phrase is anymore. Either way, Tyrnauer left that phrase in at least one too many times.
Our Call: STREAM IT. We’re always fascinated with retail rise and fall stories, and Victoria’s Secret provides quite a compelling one, even if Epstein wasn’t part of it. Let’s hope Victoria’s Secret: Angels And Demons explores the retail part as much or more than the Epstein part.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.