Lawn-mower haircuts and J. C. Penney polos are to Glenn O’Brien what Haiti is to Sean Penn. They provoke in him a kind of heroic passion that makes him want to save untold thousands from fashion disaster, or at least from the creeping sadness of the Gap.

O’Brien has been a downtown Zelig for more years than he’s willing to reveal: one of Warhol’s Factory workers, an editor and art director of Interview magazine, host of the pre-MTV public-access new-wave show TV Party, creative director at Barney’s. Now he’s GQ’s Style Guy columnist and a freelance something-or-other to the fabulous. Husband,