The Price Of Beauty

The Price of Beauty hosted by Jessica Simpson explores the standards of beauty around the world, and the heavy price some women pay to attain the right look. As a singer, actress and reality show star, Simpson has been the target of much commentary on her looks and brings a unique understanding of the pressures women face to be beautiful. For her world travels, she brings along her best friend Cacee Cobb and Ken Paves, her hair stylist, make-up artist and fashion advisor. The VH1 channel half-hour program combines the friends' adventures in exotic locations with interviews with local women to better understand their personal struggles and experiences.

In the first episode, the trio travel to Thailand, and meet Panya, a young woman who has caused permanent damage by bleaching her skin, and visit the Karen Hill tribe where women don ring necks. In Paris, they meet fashion models who describe the rigors of their seemingly glamorous life, including a recovering anorexic that almost died when her weight plummeted to 80 pounds. Indian ayurvedic spa treatments require Jessica and her friends to snort water with a netti-pot and drink cow urine. In Japan, Jessica and CaCee attend geisha school and speak to a woman who wants to look more western with eyelid surgery. Other locations in the eight-part series include Morocco, Uganda and Rio de Janiero, where Simpson and her fellow travelers experience cultural highlights as well as beauty regimens.

For the finale, the show returns to their hometown of Los Angeles, where Simpson uses her own fashion line show to display an international array of beauties from her travels. The cast also reflects on what they discovered abroad, as well as at home, on how women learn to display themselves as objects of beauty before any of their other valuable qualities.