Amy Winehouse is profiled in the November issue of Harper’s Bazaar magazine. Her intent, I think, was to promote her new clothing line for the existing line Fred Perry. But as with all things Winehouse, sh-t gets complicated. It’s been a while since I’ve read a proper Winehouse interview, and I always forget how funny she is. She’s not always intending to be funny, but whatever. She’s already guzzling wine and seems extremely out of it by the time the interview begins. The full Bazaar piece is here, and here are some of the highlights:

On the photo shoot with Bryan Adams: Today she’s modeling the clothes for rock star turned photographer Bryan Adams. They are partway through the shoot when I arrive; Adams has taken a break to eat some food. He’s trying to convince Winehouse to eat too by offering her vegan rice balls. “No, Bryan!” she says grandly. She is very loud and very theatrical. “I need protein, Bryan!” She dispatches a member of her not-inconsiderable entourage to track down a Pret A Manger crayfish salad. Also: “A cucumber, so I can hit Bryan with it.”

Things go downhill when Amy starts guzzling wine: Just before Winehouse goes to change for the next shot, I see her gulping down a big glass of wine. “Not,” she says aloud, “that I’m a rock-star alkie.” I have no idea what prompted this, but I can say that 45 minutes later, she is changed. She is physically unstable, wobbly in high block heels. Soon, she begins a chorus-girl routine for the camera—complete with cha-chas and pirouettes. “Hurry up, Bryan!” she shouts. “This is like a three-hour-long blood extraction!” She hikes her black-and-white-checked miniskirt up and shakes her hips. The shoot wraps, and Winehouse walks unsteadily from the set. I find her sitting on the edge of a white-quilted bed in her dressing room, slurping noisily from a pot of soup. One of her representatives tells me that she will sit in on our interview.

The interview begins: I want to ask Winehouse many things. Is she happy? Healthy? Working on new material? In love? How is her relationship with her father, the outspoken London taxicab driver, Mitch? Does she miss Blake? Does she want marriage? Children? But, I quickly realize, I am unlikely to get any answers. She is just not … present. She is distracted and vague. My most straightforward questions confuse her. How are you? I ask. She slurps more soup. “I’m all right. How are you?” Her voice is breathier, girlier now; her syntax is childish. She either pronounces words with great care or slurs them into one barely intelligible syllable.

On the fun, easy time she had working on her clothing line: “Ve’y much so. Ve’y much so. And that’s been the whole thing. We’ve pretty much done like up to autumn/winter 2012, and I’m like, ‘Have we?’ Yeah!” It was easy? “Mmm-hmmm. Yeah, yeah, it was not hard at all, not hard at all, because, like …” Someone hands her a crayfish salad and removes the empty soup pot from her hands. “Thank you, baby!” she says to the provider of the salad. She turns back to me. “I knew exactly what I wanted. And I love Fred Perry so much. I was honored that they would even, like, ‘Do you want to come and do a line?’ Me? Like, me?” She stabs a finger into her chest. “Yeah!” she adds.

Amy is AWARE: “I’m aware I’m being recorded,” Winehouse says. “Just so you know. I am aware of that.”

Do you consider yourself a style icon? “A style, like, what?” A style icon, I repeat. “Style, like … ?” Icon! “No, of course not!”

Amy on her style: “Uh-huh. I don’t think that’s true. I just dress like … I’m an old black man. Sorry!” she says. “Like I’m an old Jewish black man. I just dress like it’s still the ’50s.”

On inspirations: “What are my inspirations … ? Elizabeth Taylor.” You want to look like Taylor? “Not really. She had purple eyes. That’s weird. Um …” She pauses, then warms to a line of thought: “Thelonious Monk. Charlie Mingus. Miles Davis … Thelonious Monk again, and then rappers that are around right now, like Nas, um, um, Busta Rhymes, and Mos Def.” Any style inspirations? “I don’t know.” She seems exasperated. “I like …” She reaches around for a fashion reference. She finds one. “Chanel.”

Amy, are you happy? She squints suspiciously at me. “About what?” About life. “I’m happy about this salad.”

And do you have any unfulfilled ambitions? “Nope!” she says. “If I died tomorrow, I would be a happy girl.”

[From Harper’s Bazaar]

I mean… come on. Yes, it’s partly sad because Amy couldn’t even be cognizant enough to go through what seemed like a breezy, short, nice little interview. It’s also funny because I wish more celebrities consented to being interviewed whilst guzzling soup from a pan and naming Thelonious Monk as their style icon. God bless Amy. She’s going to need it.

Photos courtesy of Harper’s Bazaar.