In The Nudes -- Champagne In The Locker Rooms Might Pacify The Clothes-Minded

Naked truths and bald-faced lies.

What a wonderful news month this has been. The government shuts down because it is supposedly broke, and the president locks up all of the national parks and federal monuments - except Camp David, to which he retreats in deep sulk.

The Mideast invasion has settled in to a stare-down in the sand, an I-dare-you of the dunes; the only invasion in our history moved off the front pages by its own lethargy. GIs' mail is delayed by Saudi searches for porn and booze, which may offend them while we are defending them.

And the National Football League's ongoing drama gives us each day our daily dose of petulant prose over pendent genitalia.

Pish, tush, decry editorial sages over the NFL locker-room flap. Let us get all the nonsense behind us and ignore this silly story that deserves to go away.

Well, I for one am convinced it won't go away for weeks, maybe months. How can it? Why should it?

Lily waver threatens suit. Shyster invokes lie detector. Offended reporter flees country. Modest coach hangs curtains. League slaps $30,000 fine. Millionaire razor tycoon introduces Christmas shaver called Une Chienne Classique.

Let us, so to speak, face it. The search for egalitarian coverage of locker-room nudes is a far bigger story than the rest of the National Football League's activities to date.

And it is a better story.

I spent the last two and a half weeks as a substitute radio

talk-show host. People wanted to talk about locker-room etiquette (and deviations therefrom) more than anything else. The budget, the deficit, the shutting down of the government, war and peace? Nah.

We are a repressed society.

We are the only animal on Earth that believes it needs clothing, and will spend small fortunes for it.

We are the only animal on Earth that may come to adulthood without ever seeing the act of our own species' furtive reproduction.

And to paraphrase Mr. Twain: Man is the only animal that blushes. Or needs to.

Therefore, when males and females of a certain age come together in a social-occupational situation where one sex is clothed and the other is naked, that situation is either a strip show (fraught with legal consequences) or a post-game NFL news conference.

The question has been raised in this debate:

In what sport do clothed males routinely interview naked women? And what would the female response be to such a journalistic intrusion?

I have the answers:

The sport is called a Parisian fashion show. I was there.

The female response was uncertain.

A few years ago, The Times sent me to Paris to cover the Pret a Porter, an eight-day display of more than 55 shows of ready-to-wear fall women's' clothing (it takes place in early spring, mostly in the Louvre).

Tickets are hard to get, even with press credentials. Tickets for some shows (such as Yves St. Laurent) are almost impossible.

Even if invited, you may have no reserved seat. Without a reserved seat, you will not be admitted. You may end up, as I did, with a ``photo'' pass. This means you can fight your way into the photo pits along the runways, if the guards think you are a photographer, and if there is room.

Since I was new to fashion reporting (having little knowledge and fewer credentials), I lacked tickets to get into shows I had to write about - even if only to lampoon the whole event.

I was lamenting this to a female photographer from a German magazine one cold and drizzly afternoon.

``Cover it from backstage,'' she said. ``I do. You get a close-up view of the fabrics. I can get you in. Bring a camera.''

I did and she did. I got a close-up view of a lot of fabrics.

And skin.

I learned a great deal about the French fashion industry while covering two of the shows (Ungaro and YSL) that afternoon.

One: There is usually a Champagne table off in one corner of the dressing rooms. The Champagne is free. It is meant to quiet the nerves. My nerves upon entering were a wreck.

Two: In order for a model to change from one set of clothes to another - and she does this four or five times in the course of an hourlong show - she must first disrobe.

Three: This is done on the dead run. The model strips down as rapidly as possible; earrings, accessories, blouses, pants, skirts, shoes and panty hose go flying.

Four: Some models wear loose, seamless underpants. Some do not.

Five: It is an intense, frantic work space. Despite all of the money, the gowns, the beautiful young bodies, it is not really erotic.

Six: If you are not a photographer, but instead someone who stands around smiling appreciatively and taking notes, you can get thrown out.

So, after half an hour of amusing, detailed notes and canny observations, I was asked to leave (politely) St. Laurent's backstage. By that time, however, my notes were made and my nerves were calm.

If I had taken dirty pictures, I would still be there.

In retrospect, my tenure in two women's locker rooms was instructive.

Human bodies can be lovely. Young athletic humans are pretty. They can run fast and work hard and get upset and have emotions on edge.

A body is never just a body - any more than a job is just a job.

One obvious solution would be to have free Champagne in NFL locker rooms. But every time they do, the idiots spray it on each other.

The French would be appalled.

John Hinterberger's column appears Sunday in Arts & Entertainment and Wednesday in the Scene section of The Times. His restaurant reviews appear Friday in Tempo.