There were plenty of messages flying around at the Oscars, but the award for Subtle Messaging went to Natalie Portman’s cape. The actress wore a Dior cape embroidered with the names of eight female directors who failed to receive nominations. This we had to take on trust, since the names were written in Liliputian script inside the edge of the cape – though naturally that was intentional. Portman could have delivered her message by wearing a cape embroidered with the life-size heads and torsos of her snubbed sisters, but that would not have been Subtle Messaging, which is all about the person doing the messaging getting across their point in a discreet manner. (Also, this way the cape still looked like a cool black cape). Here are some other examples of Subtle Messaging:  Justin Bieber’s tache. Subtle Message: “I’m not just a pretty face.” You may know Bieber has grown a ratty moustache, which does him no favours and is not popular with wife Hailey, but Bieber wants to prove he’s OK with looking horrible because he is a regular bloke, not just a shiny celebrity toy. See also Brad Pitt’s many scripted jokes in recent weeks. Subtle Message: “I’m not just cute Brad the stoner, I am smart enough to win an Oscar.”  Saying the word “vagina” (which no one used to say and now everyone seems to be competing for the number of times they can use it in a sentence). Subtle Message: “I’m 100 per cent feminist and comfortable with sex and, if male, the opposite of an incel”. Vagina vagina vagina. It’s one of those words, like “misogynist”, that everyone’s gone mad for because they think it sends the SM that they are a fully evolved, amazing person.  Giving your partner a gym membership. Subtle Message: “Time to get fit, fatso”. For the past few Christmases and birthdays, some of us have been given a bicycle, a starter set of tennis lessons and a gym membership instead of, say, a pair of Gucci clogs, a box of choccies and a TV-watching fleecy blanket (all of which were on our lists).  Gisele Bündchen’s re-wearing jeans policy. Subtle Message: “I am super eco-aware, like Greta Thunberg”. Last week, Gisele told the world that she is the sort of make-do-and-mend type who has three-year-old jeans in her wardrobe. Correct. That particular Subtle Message misfired and now we all think Gisele is a hilarious caricature of a supermodel, if we didn’t already, and crack up whenever we think of her. (See also Oscar-winner Joaquin Phoenix sticking to just the one tuxedo during the awards season, as if that were like committing to never getting in a car and living off insects and your own urine).  “Let’s meet up on Monday and go to the cinema”. Subtle Message: ‘I feel guilty about not having met up, but don’t want to see that much of you’. “We’ll bring the drink”. Subtle Message: “…to ensure there is some alcohol that isn’t so rough it makes you blind”.