When I ask him his verdict on the recent somewhat controversial Marc Jacobs show at New York Fashion Week (the controversy was as much to do with Jacobs' angry reaction to complaints about the show's late start as his decision to begin it backwards, with his own bow), Roberts assumes a characteristically quizzical gaze. 'It was kind of a nothing, frankly,' he says, in a tone that swoops between a laconic upper-class English drawl and more emphatic transatlantic vowels. 'I think he's getting a little bit spoilt. No one is above criticism... What is worrying with Marc is that he used to be very iconoclastic - he wasn't afraid of speaking his mind or frightened of the establishment when he was doing grunge - so for him to do this whole thing, saying, "You can't criticise me," it's too bizarre.

[pic via Vanity Fair]

"I'm European. I come from London, I lived in Paris, and I just find it extraordinary that this has been blown up like this," he told WWD...

"The whole kiddie porn prurient angle seems to be worryingly sour grapes from other magazines that didn't get a picture like this...teenagers can be seen on TV and in the cinema in the most prurient ways, and then a photograph which is for all intents and purposes innocent is blown out of portion and condemned as some ridiculous apotheosis. It's a joke to me. But it's not a joke because I don't find it funny. I find it offensive. I'm deemed as being party to some kind of subversive picture of this girl, that she was cajoled. That we literally manhandled her into stripping is completely not true."

We bestow a cookie upon Mr. Roberts for his valiant effort not to "literally manhandle" Miley Cyrus into stripping. Make that the apotheosis of a cookie.

"This is a girl caught up in a gigantic enterprise where many people's fortunes are riding on her future. If it was fine then, I don't see why suddenly it's not fine."

Roberts suggested one rationale for the change of heart: "Maybe Vanity Fair is a far too sophisticated media outlet for her. Maybe she's better off in those teen magazines. We don't do cheesy teen pictures. We do chic pictures and pictures that are beautiful portraits by probably the leading portrait photographer of our age."

Well then. America stands corrected.

[Bonus great Roberts quote from last year: 'The thing about Vanity Fair is that they always want the stars naked,' he says. 'But I'm trying to persuade them to put the clothes on.' Ha. For more on Roberts' general bitchiness, see here]

I just saw a comical little occurrence. A town car pulled up on the south side of 42nd Street and a small army of interns rushed from the Cond Nast Building, retrieving from it about half a dozen huge (nearly as large as the aforementioned interns) Chanel boxes with big white bows. Upon closer (surreptitious) inspection, the boxes each had an envelope affixed to it. For instance, one read "Monsieur Michael Roberts" and another "Madame Anna Wintour." One can only wonder what enchantments — no doubt gratis — awaited the giftees.

While visions of tweeds and quilted lambskin danced in their heads. God bless that non-policy gift policy!