Opinion

If you have to cry, go outside

Everyone thinks they know fashion PR powerhouse Kelly Cutrone from her appearances as the terrifying boss of People’s Revolution, featured on “The Hills”: the black-clad workaholic feels no remorse firing interns, or delivering rapid-fire verbal smackdowns that leave underlings stunned.

But Cutrone was just a working-class kid from Syracuse when she moved to New York City. Within a year of her arrival, she was hanging out with with Vanity Fair art critic and notorious raconteur Anthony Haden-Guest, who took her under his wing and let her stay at his Upper East Side apartment. Tired of working for the “sexist and domineering” Bob Gucionne at Spin, Cutrone impulsively decided to start her own PR firm at age 23.

An early divorce to much-older painter Ronnie Cutrone prompted a “profound spiritual awakening.” Washed out and jobless in a Los Angeles motel room, a meth-withdrawal-induced hallucination turned her towards the teachings of an Indian guru known as “Mother.” The event gave her life focus.

Cutrone gives blunt, how-to advice on how to be a “power bitch,” including tips on finding a birth coach, “should you find yourself alone and pregnant” (by a hot younger Italian man.)

It’s an old-fashioned guide to succeeding in both life and work (phone, not e-mail, you Gen Y-ers!), with a dash of self-styled spirituality and, of course, all dressed up in Balenciaga.

If You Have to Cry, Go Outside

And Other Things Your Mother Never Told You

by Kelly Cutrone and Meredith Bryan

HarperOne