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Monday, October 28, 2013

LACMA Muse Costume Ball 2013 Film Noir Memory


My night started like any other, my date was my job and to a lesser extent my photographer. I don't mean that literally, he ain't a damn. Nothing's wrong with that mind you, have fun at the West Hollywood Carnival with as many Batman and Robins as you like. Really, it's a lot of fun for everyone, we posted on it earlier.


For the birds
It was a cool Saturday evening on the 26th. I had just seen Carrie, a remake that needs to be remade, and just bumped into the local owner of the IAM8BIT Gallery on my way out of Arclight on Sunset. He questioned why I was dressed like a 1950's reporter minus my fedora hat and I gave him a quick spill about covering the night's affairs at the LACMA on Wilshire. Museum row was filled with museums and that night I'd be covering the one next to the tar pits. A good place to dump a body the tar pits, maybe Murder LA will cover how many they found over the years in a future article, but I don't write that section or care for the former felon writing it. Though the only prison he's ever been in is loneliness and a love for old people food.

I got in my car and headed past all the famous street names until I got onto 6th. Popped into LACMA put on my fedora with press on the side and waited to hear my date, my photographer mumbling about being hungry. We met in courtyard after he entered the LACMA Lot.

We walked past the Peterson to Johnny Rockets. My kind of place for my kind of costume.

The place looked deserted. We couldn't tell if the place was open until we entered, then we still couldn't cause the staff was almost about to play cars. I popped a nickel into the jukebox and had Monster Mash play for a bit.

He had the biggest burger on the menu. I had a chocolate banana shake. He ate his until he was satisfied, a term he didn't seem to understand and instead went with , "eighty percent full". I hated him for using that term instead of just saying he was satisfied with his meal, like a normal person.

We dropped our cash and headed back to the ball, it was just starting. Soon Princess Leia, spacemen and monsters were passing us by. I asked one of the costumes if LACMA was burning. They were just walking to another Halloween party in big numbers.

With that my "date" and I turned a corner and went down the red carpet to the LACMA Muse Costume Ball. Greeted by Bane, Catwoman, Posion Ivy and Scarecrow I was happy to see some old favorites. Wonder Woman was the odd man out of their team and later that night she'd trip on her high heels on some stairs, maybe she bumped into her invisible plane, maybe she had one too many.

Don't worry she wasn't hurt you caring $*#*.

This party was an eye sore I could enjoy. Costumes of all sorts dancing and drinking. FDR could walk again and every few seconds I was telling my "date" to take another photo.

For the best costumes of the night check out the gallery here
Here's LACMA's Facebook photo gallery of the event




Clairy Browne and the Bangin' Rackettes got on stage eventually and asked the audience questions about getting freaky and getting some before mentioning every time out of song how they were from Australia. For down under tourists they got people upright and on the dance floor. That night there music made the monsters dance and the men dressed as WWF wrestler go, "Oh, yeah".

I went inside to lose some of my shake. This was the only time I was allowed inside an exhibit so far that night and unless you like Duchamp's Fountain it wasn't your thing. Did come across the twins from The Shining on my way out. When your alone in art museum with Stephen King characters you get afraid. These two dames would later win the Halloween costume contest or a tier  of it. It was a bit jumbled this year. They should have been at the last Halloween Ball.



Facing the facts, last year's ball and the one before that had so much more terrifying themes and exhibits. You had Tim Burton in 2011 and Stanley Kubrick in 2012 in exhibit form. This year's exhibits weren't open until a little past 10pm and couldn't hold a flame to those other long gone exhibits and masters of film.

The judges might be high up costume designers, here's their quick resumes: Judianna Makovsky (The Hunger Games), Julie Weiss (Hitchcock), and Daniel Orlandi (Down With Love), but they didn't have much of a speaking role in that night's activities.

I'm remembering back to a year ago when the costume contest had some more room. The judges were on the floor looking up at the contestants and the host made some fun small talk for the evening. The host this night rushed through what might be have been entertaining event. The judges seemed to have been swayed by the audience and the award for "Best Ghost of Hollywood Past" went to a Jurassic Park number? There were many folks in costumes from old films and the guy who gets killed by a velociraptor in Jurassic Park who said, "Clever Girl", won for Hollywood Past? Sheesh.

You have a year to plan the Halloween night, plan it right. Get a host who can toast.



It was like someone was late to the party. The Stanley Kubrick Hal and Monolith were in fact late to the party. They might have won... if they could travel back in time to the ball from last year with a Stanley Kubrick motif, a monolith did win best costume last time.

After the costume contest ending? Did it even start? Costumes were allowed to wander. Riding an escalator with a monkey in front of you and and cowboy behind you made the evening stand out of strange things you might of done in your life. We made it up to the third floor where zombies and other weird miscreants courtesy of Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre squirmed around us. Theophilus London was DJing on some sort of a fortress square block art piece the rest of the night.
clever girl

We made our way to first floor, down the giant elevator used for moving big pieces. There were some real pieces, mind your business, in the elevator on the way down.

Before my "date" and my eyes was Metropolis II and I don't mean the exhibit on the work of Fritz Lang. This Metropolis was like if a toy store was robbed by another toy store, things got complicated and they both died at the scene, too much crammed into one little city. Was it a jab at modern society? In any case it took a lot of hot wheels to work.

The wheels were still spinning hot and DJ was still playing and the costumes were still partying when my "date" and I left the ball. It wasn't over for the costumes. It be night they remember or maybe not depending on how much they had.

my angel
Mario meets Wreck-It Ralph and Vanellope
What the Hell?

Got to give it up for live art costumes


cut her loose, man


Bioshock Infinite in a Metropolis

The menu of doom