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ROME —
I should be drinking in the vivacity of the Trevi Fountain. Or maybe the ruby-hued bottle of Chianti
I liberated from the hotel minibar? No, instead I’m sitting in the back seat of
a coupe — a four-door coupe — trying to wrap my brain around the very idea that
such an animal exists.
Now, two-door sedans are a reality. Pretty much every
BMW 3-Series two-door still qualifies as a sedan, by EPA measurements. But
anything with four doors is plainly a sedan. Right?
Not by the yardstick applied by a growing number of car
companies, who can identify those of you who still want four-door practicality
but the sleeker silhouette of a vehicle with fewer orifices. Audi’s new A6 is
one of these animals, but possibly the most hotly intent on selling the idea is
Mercedes-Benz via its new CLS.
The CLS, Mercedes vows, offers up the “elegance and
dynamism of a coupé with the comfort and practicality of a saloon.” Translation:
you don’t lose the room or trunk space of a typical four-door, even though the
body is styled to look more like a coupe. And in the case of the CLS, which
shares roughly 35 percent of its body structure with the conventional E-Class
four-door, most of the functional goodness is retained beneath an intriguing new
skin.
The very
Gaul
You’ll look
twice or even thrice at the CLS’s glam new shape, a gamine and slightly tawdry
take on the E’s rather upright demeanor. (In
Atlanta, a white E-Class is a hallmark of
“Buckhead Betty” status, which wins you a lifetime of valet parking at Lenox
Mall along with other ladies who lunch.) The CLS a hussy all right, with more
voluptuous fender swells, a tighter rear end and a youthful cleft from nose to
tail. If we can indulge in a cultural stereotype for a brief moment, our French
ancestors would characterize the CLS as the mistress to the E-Class’ wifely
duty.