Soap icon Susan Lucci commanded the runway at Dennis Basso’s fashion show on Park Avenue, closing out the collection with an elegant sashay in front of guests including Fern Mallis, socialite Fe Fendi, Kelly Bensimon and power publicist Susan Magrino.
Lucci, who played Erica Kane on “All My Children” from 1970 to 2011, tells us when it came to her catwalk stride, they had a rehearsal in the morning and she practiced in her dressing room.
“Dennis said just be yourself, smile and have fun,” she told us.
She said she was nervous after taking a tumble in a huge ball gown at 2019’s Red Dress Collection show for the American Heart Association.
“When I got out on the runway and I reached the end, between the music and the crowd, I was spinning a little too much and the ballgown took on a life of its own at that point and I caught my heel and went down like a Raggedy Ann doll,” she recalled. “I prayed to the runway gods to let me pop back up and I did.”
Lucci and Basso have been friends for years and she says she loves his designs because “his work is wearable and elevated at the same time.”
“It is very feminine and elegant and alluring and timeless and timely,” Lucci, who walked in a custom look, told us.
Basso said he just called her up and asked her to be in the show.
“When you ask someone to finale and it’s not just a celebrity that is paid, it is different when you do it with someone who is your friend,” he said. “You have a personal connection.”
Basso celebrated “generational dressing,” this season, casting the show with women from ages 22-82 and mixing in his looks from both his collection and those from his QVC line.
He says he told Lucci when he called to ask her to participate, “I am celebrating generational dressing and women of a certain age and you are so gorgeous and I would like you on the runway.”
“She shows you can be any age and be attractive,” Basso said.
