28Feb 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – “Styled In Hollywood” Tootsie Palette

28Feb 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – “Styled In Hollywood” Tootsie Palette

This Tootsie Palette is one of the first things I found in a thrift shop after moving to Hollywood in 1976. I was so excited I could finally have feet like the stars!

Well, at least toes like the stars if I ever got it together to slide my tootsies into this awkward little gadget with the adjustable toe dividers.

Thank you to the as-requested-unnamed foot model for this little demonstration:

As the package says, you can even romp around in your Tootsie Palettes while your little tootsies are drying.

But that means you have to slip into the “portable” Tootsie Palettes also included.

And that means only half of your foot is given support should you choose to change locations while your little piggies are drying. But not to worry as the instructions make it clear they won’t fall off your feet because the black velvet ties “Hold With a Single Turn…NO KNOTS Necessary.”

For anything to demand that many capital letters I would expect a revolutionary, newly patented fastening method. But as you can see from the rhinestones and their quite normal backings, if you don’t knot the straps not only will you get blisters on the bottom of your feet from the half-only palette but also risk skin burn when you rip the tape off your feet you’ll need to hold these things on.

But despite straps that are barely long enough to knot and a piece of hard plastic that causes arch pain if worn long enough, it’s hard not to get excited about a foot beauty product that’s this excited about itself:


Although I love the little Toosie Palette logo, the shape could have easily been adapted into both a palette and a foot. From this…

…to this:

But aside from whatever deficiencies it might have, I think the “Styled In Hollywood” Tootsie Palette is about as great a Hollywood inspired kitsch product as there is.  Why aspire to be great, to be gifted in the creative arts, to win an Oscar, to rise above all the obstacles in your path to achieve greatness when you can just have beautifully polished toes?

02Feb 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Vintage Harlem Nightclub Shaker and My Weekend at Vitello’s

02Feb 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Vintage Harlem Nightclub Shaker and My Weekend at Vitello’s

Anyone who knows me knows that I’m not an avid club-goer. It used to be that I wanted to hear every detail of a record under headphones and didn’t want anyone standing up in front of me or humming along next to me when I went to hear someone sing. But now that MP3s and YouTube have become ubiquitous with fidelity crushed down to the size of an ant I don’t care as much about such things. So this weekend I hit one club for two acts. My only regret is that I didn’t bring my vintage noisemaker shakers along to rattle in front of my talented friends who were up on stage.

It would have been most appropriate to bring my Ubangi Club clapper Saturday night when I went to see Alan Paul, member of Manhattan Transfer, all members of which I’ve known for a trillion years and co-wrote “SHAKER SONG” for.

Here’s the other side of the Ubangi Club SHAKER:

There are a zillion versions of “SHAKER SONG” on YouTube but, sadly, none by the Transfer, the group that made it famous. Here’s a version by Jazzanova Band that features a fancy little cha-cha by the lead singer:

But back to the Transfer’s Alan Paul and the excellent SHAKING he did Saturday night upstairs at Vitellos, a restaurant infamous for the Robert Blake shooting extravaganza and now equally as known for the nightclub that sits upstairs above the plates of still-on-the-menu Fusilli Minestra alla Robert Blake and the kitschy murals of Italy that coat the walls below.

Here I am at Vitello’s with Alan and  Bob Garrett, who I’ve known since 1974 when I worked at Reno Sweeney’s, a cabaret in Manhattan where the Transfer often appeared, and who Alan has known since he originated the part of Teen Angel in Grease on Broadway, a role Bob took over after Alan left.

Tim Hauser and Cheryl Bentyne of Manhattan Transfer were also at the show.

I think I’d only seen Tim once since my Borscht Belt Birthday party in 1985 to celebrate my being named one of the most subversive people living in the United States by Pravda, the official newspaper of the Communist party. Here we are at the party with Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, two of the most prolific songwriters in history.

All four of us have used many SHAKERS in our songs. Here’s another one from my collection:

And the flipside:

Sunday night I was back at Vitello’s to see my friend, Maxine Lapiduss‘s hysterical comedy act, “Mackie’s Back In Town”.

I co-wrote a song for the show, “Scared About Life Without Oprah”, with Max, Mark Waldrop,and Michael Orland, who also led Max’s band. Here we are at the moment of conception:

And here I am with Oprah, though not at Max’s show, but my show, The Color Purple, which Oprah produced.

Here are are Michael and I Sunday night at Max’s show:

As Max is a bongo freak, our Oprah song contains many SHAKERS. I won’t let this one leave Willis Wonderland  but I believe it’s on our demo:

And the flipside:

Also at Max’s gig was my good friend, Tim Bagley.

I actually liked this photo of me and Tim better but can we discuss THE AMOUNT OF LIPSTICK ON MY TEETH?? I don’t remember sucking the tube but something of that magnitude obviously happened:

Also present were perennial Match Game panelists and comedy greats, Mitzi McCall and Charlie Brill.

As you can see, the lipstick is still on my teeth but has disintegrated into a more tasteful stripe. This is the good thing about being me. Even when something as hideously embarrassing as walking around with a tube of lipstick smeared on your front teeth happens people think it’s intentional. At least it matches my glasses well.

Thankfully, by the time I said goodnight to Max along with Prudence Fenton, the lipstick had left the building and my teeth returned to their normal sparkly (yellowish) white selves.

Max is doing her show twice more in March. For tickets go here. And check the mirror before you take any photos. And please bring your SHAKER!!

17Jan 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – A Real Brady In The Bunch

17Jan 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – A Real Brady In The Bunch

As a collector of kitsch for decades now with a particular love for popular television shows, there’s nothing better than having the real thing who made the real thing in your presence. Such was the case when Susan Olsen, a.k.a. Cindy Brady, the youngest, cutest, blondest Brady in the Bunch, walked into Willis Wonderland last Friday afternoon. And she came bearing one of her signature Christmas cakes, which is how we came to know each other in the first place as she posted her kulinary kitsch koncoction in The Allee Willis Museum Of Kitsch over Christmas.

Susan spent over a month (extra kitsch point #1) making these rum soaked (extra kitsch point #2) fruit cakes (extra kitsch point #3). And her description of them was hysterical too. It was an even better sign when I saw the way she prepped her photos. In the land of kitsch, detail insets are most impressive:

I got especially excited when I saw all the snowy peach fuzz that surrounded Susan’s elves:

But the elves on the cake she brought me needed no such extra set decoration as they got down to enough business on their own:

I was actually introduced to Susan by my Facebook friend and most dedicated aKitschionado at The Allee Willis Museum Of Kitsch, Denny McClain. We made sure to give him his props before we did anything else:

Our hooking up was also facilitated by another Facebook friend, Steven Wishnoff, who accompanied Susan to Willis Wonderland. I immediately offered them a snack as I had something amazingly fitting for this most kitschous of occasions:

Any of you smart and dedicated enough to subscribe to my blog will recognize that we’re holding a piece of King’s Hawaiian Bakery Rainbow Bread that I bought a loaf of last weekend on my Sunday drive with Charles Phoenix. This is possibly my favorite food discovery of the century so far.

It was perfect as Susan actually came dressed matching the bread:

We were all most anxious to see what happened to the color swirls when the bread was toasted, hoping they would get even brighter with a little bit of heat. We were sorely disappointed:

But that didn’t stop us from slopping on some peanut butter and jelly and enjoying a delicious grill stripped rainbow mini meal.

We spent a lot of time walking around Willis Wonderland as Susan and Steven had an excellent sense of kitsch.

I had much Brady Bunch memorabilia out…

…but I stupidly forgot to ask Susan to autograph anything. Luckily, before we met she mailed me a copy of a book she co-wrote about the making of one of the most exquisitely cheesy television specials ever made, The Brady Bunch Variety Hour.

If you’ve never seen it, RUN to YouTube now!!

Thank God, Susan autographed the book so I didn’t feel tooooo bad about the missed opportunities for my aforementioned Brady treasures.

All in all, we had a most Brady day!

I’m hoping next time we get together Susan will make me one of her signature Flufftinis.

Afterall, there’s SO MUCH we see eye to eye on.

02Jan 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Happy Fake Jan Day!! Celebrate With A Wonderful Cheese Ball!

02Jan 2011

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Happy Fake Jan Day!! Celebrate With A Wonderful Cheese Ball!

We are blessed here at The Allee Willis Museum Of Kitsch at AWMOK.com to have an actual Brady in our Bunch and, as such, “Fake Jan Day” is now one of our National Kitsch Holidays! If you don’t know what “Fake Jan Day” is, Cindy Brady will explain it to you here.

Should you not decide to celebrate Fake Jan Day by dressing as a fake Jan I would suggest you simply acknowledge this most precious Kitsch National Holiday by ingesting the traditional “Fake Jan Day” food, the beloved sculptural culinary wonder known as the Cheese Ball. As far as I’m concerned, any day one has an official excuse to make a Cheese Ball is a holiday worth celebrating!

Oops, I didn’t mean those Cheese Balls.

I know the Christmas decorations are finally packed away but squirting cream cheese out of a frosting cone to enhance your Cheese Ball means that Santa gets one more closeup here at AWMOK.

It takes hardly any prodding at all to get me into the kitchen and in artistic mode to begin crafting a Cheese Ball. Were I not so lazy and overextended from holiday parties I might have even made it to the supermarket to construct one of my own so that it might serve as a veritable religious icon in the celebration of  Fake Jan Day. However, YouTube proved to be a loyal assistant here, and finding enough cheese balls, both gastronomic and human, proved an easy task.  So, if the holy fromage spirit inspires you to celebrate Fake Jan Day, wash your hands now and get ready to roll!

“Deep Fried Cheese Ball” – There seems to be a few steps missing here:

“Cheese Ball” – And now for the silent treatment:

“Corn Of Plenty Mini Cheese Ball recipe” – Don’t any of these people have heads?

“How To Make A Cheesy Spider Cheese Ball” – This is for Halloween but I’m sure it will keep til then:

“How To Make A Cheese Ball” – If the energy were any lower here I’d bottle it and take it to get to sleep every night:

“Pineapple Cheese Ball – Happy New Year”  I’m not sure if Pineapple Cheese Ball is the name of the dish or our sparkling hostess:

I never made a cheese ball of the magnitude of the following but I did make quite an impressive mashed potato ball once:

I sculpted the ball out of mashed potatoes, hit it with red food coloring, and stuck olives, gherkins and miniature corns in for a satellite effect and then fit it on top of my 1950’s Saturn shaped coffee urn for maximum presentational effect. You can see it and other impressive food ideas in my 1991 tiny short film, “Foxy’s Tips On Love – The Road To A Man’s Stomach Is Color-Coordinated”.

Whether you make your balls out of cheese, mashed potatoes or whatever ball material you choose I hope you have a very festive Fake Jan Day today!

15Dec 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Kitschtastic Mansion and the Folks Inside

15Dec 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Kitschtastic Mansion and the Folks Inside


I always love this time of year in LA because the Christmas parties really kick into high gear. There aren’t as many of them this year because all pennies are being pinched but there was a killer one last night at a house RuPaul is renting for the month for just such holiday festivities. The added bonus last night was that it was our mutual friend, Tom Trujillo’s, birthday.

There’s nothing especially kitschy about all of us – except me I guess – but we all embrace our vast love of kitsch in the way we live and entertain. In Ru’s case, the house he rented takes appreciation of the genre to staggering heights.

First, some of the attendees and then, more photos of the kitschtacular edifice itself.  Here’s a closer shot of Ru, me, birthday boy Tom, and Prudence Fenton.

Here I am with Santino Rice, of Project Runway and RuPaul’s Drag Race fame:

I love my soul sistas and sisters in real life, Scherrie Payne, formerly of The Supremes, and Freda “Band Of Gold”, “Bring The Boys Home” Payne.

Here’s me and five-time Grammy-winning composer, producer, conductor, arranger, and songwriter, Mervin Warren.

(L-R) Mito Aviles, Prudence, me, ChadMichael Morrisette and RuPaul.

Now onto the co-star of the evening, the house, mansion, palace or whatever you want to call it. First of all, it was massive. From the street it just looks like a long bush but from the back, if you put the following three photos side-by-side, it’s a hunka hunk o’ burnin’ living space:

The entire outside of the house is distressed so you constantly felt like you were whizzing through Europe.

There are three floors that I know of, possibly more, but we had already walked so much I was going to have to hire a car to take more of the tour. Most of the ceilings look something like this:

Many of the ceilings twinkled:

Most of the walls gave lots of time to the women:

The walls that weren’t giving props to the ladies had screens embedded in them with moving images of exotic places:

All of the staircases are very rustic yet ornate:

There are tons of little seating areas like these:

And lots of statues everywhere:

That statue overlooks the pool which overlooks the city of LA…

… and leads to a disco complete with a stripper pole downstairs:

I don’t know what I was thinking not taking a photo of the unbelievable pole dancer from Jumbo’s Clown Room who came to entertain Tom. I guess I was too busy running around taking photos of myself next to all the statues.

Pound for pound, it was a wonderful night with wonderful friends inside a wonderful wheel of brie house. I’m sure I’ll be back before Ru’s rental is up…

14Dec 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – What The Kitschiest House In LA Looks Like At Christmas

14Dec 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – What The Kitschiest House In LA Looks Like At Christmas

Anyone who’s ever driven past Norwood Young’s house in LA knows that it’s a prime candidate for a Kitschmas smorgasbord unlike all others. Depending on who you talk to, known affectionately or despicably as the House of Davids, it has enough wrought iron to circle the White House, all of which protects the 21 statues of David that line the driveway upon which usually sits Norwood’s jewel encrusted Rolls Royce. Here’s what Youngwood Court, as it’s officially known, looks like all year except December:

I, of course, worship at the altar of this edifice and landscaping that depict a victory for self expression through statuary that has driven many of Norwood’s neighbors crazy ever since he moved in umpteen years ago.

After years of religiously driving past the corner of Third and S. Muirfield if I was even remotely in the area I finally went to a party at Norwood’s about 10 years ago. As luck would have it, he was a songwriter and a fan of my songs so in years to come I got to enter the palace many times.

Unfortunately, that shot was taken at Patti LaBelle’s birthday party this year, which was NOT held at Youngwood Court which looks much more like this on the inside:

But this post is all about the outside and celebrating the Christmas spirit in a way that only Norwood can.

Sunday night I made my yearly pilgrimage to his place for the turning on the lights ceremony, complete with performances by the man himself and real snow that somehow managed to stay frozen despite the 80° weather that day.

Norwood had on a fabulous red velvet suit. I, unfortunately, had on the same outfit I wore to Patti’s birthday party:

Despite my fashion faux pas, I documented the fabulous insanity on the front lawn as I have in all years past.

So, in no particular order, here’s a sample of Christmas 2010 at Youngwood Court.  Mind you, the Christmas models are all nude statues of David.

My eyeballs thank Norwood for this most merry Christmas tableau! I hope the neighbors appreciate their luck being this close to the West pole.

28Nov 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Cher Perfume and Burlesque, A Very Bland Thanksgiving Turkey!

28Nov 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Cher Perfume and Burlesque, A Very Bland Thanksgiving Turkey!

Unfortunately, my bottle of Cher perfume, given to me as a birthday present one year by Elvira, is long empty. Just like Burlesque, the film that opened this week that Cher and her once great face that no longer moves stars in. But in the case of Burlesque, I wasn’t expecting emptiness so much as a big fat Thanksgiving turkey gloriously stuffed with kitsch. I’d been whetting my lips for a year and a half since the insanely done-to-death-27,000-times-over storyline was revealed to me when I, along with God knows how many other songwriters, was asked to submit a song for the film. My co-writer dropped the ball and never handed in any of the three we did  – I’ve yet to even hear a mix…..Earth to Steve…..but often when my songs haven’t made it into a film it saved me from being stuffed into too many cinematic turkeys. Unless, of course, you count Howard The Duck, which I co-wrote five songs for with Thomas Dolby. But that was just about writing with Dolby and George Clinton as, despite being excited about being in a George Lucas produced film, I knew it was headed for the turkey farm my first time on the set when Howard, a little person stuffed into a costume that looked like a pillowcase with feathers glued on, ran in.

I was so excited to see Burlesque that I even organized the first public outing of my film club, L’Chien Du Cinema, The Dog Cinema, to leave my living room and see a film at an actual theater for the first time since 1983 when we were lucky enough to have two turkeys in the same season, Pia Zadora’s monumental Lonely Lady and Dolly Parton and Sylvester Stallone’s immortal Rhinestone.

But, alas, Burlesque isn’t so much a turkey as one big, long, never-ending lump of white, packaged mashed potatoes. No gravy, no cranberry sauce, not even any turkey; just constant servings of the same bad blue lighting on Cher, the one forlorn look from Christina Aguilera, the same numbing beat of predictable songs and we’ve-seen-it-before-Pussycat-Dolls-with-a-hit-of-Flashdance choreography, a story as predictable as jelly slopped on top of peanut butter, and all of it hitting with such regularity that your eyeballs go numb. An endless, bombastic pile of nothing. At least my empty bottle of Cher perfume has enough in it you can still smell some brilliance of what once was.

Which is a shame as all the bad film faithfuls that came to see it with me had high hopes Burlesque would be a contemporary classic of Showgirls proportion. I even got out the old the ol’ doggie bags and filled them with gold sprayed Milk-Bones, as the tradition of L’Chien is for everyone to throw down their bones and rate the films, a 5-boner being the biggest dog and a 1-boner not even worth the price of the ticket.

Here I am walking in with RuPaul:

And here I am at dinner after the film with more of the party faithfuls where we discussed and rated the noisy pile of mush we’d just seen. (Clockwise: Christian Capobianco, Craig Fisse, Michael Patrick King, Gail Zappa, Diva Zappa, LaLa Sloatman, Bob Garrett, Charles Phoenix, me, Prudence Fenton and Pat Loud, the matriarch of the first reality show family ever.)

It was a sad night for Burlesque as far as our boner ratings went:

Out of a possible 55 bones from the eleven of us, Burlesque only got 9 and 1/32nd. It would have been 9 and 1/64th but a 32nd was the smallest bit of Milk-Bone any of us could break off.

Back to my Cher perfume, the silver paint on the cap has curdled away:

I guess that’s what Cher thought was happening to her face when she started shooting it full of whatever she shoots it full of to be left with a face that’s as immobile as a rock. It may look pretty but the only real emotion you could detect from her in Burlesque is when her eyes teared up. Twice. But I don’t want to be mean to Cher. I love Cher. It’s just that you can’t feel anything from something human that doesn’t move. And when you throw that into a movie that’s all surface/no heart or soul and shakes at the exact same frequency for two hours straight it makes you want to check your cell phone or do whatever else you can do trapped in your seat until the slop ends. My friend Diva always brings her knitting with her in case of just that.  Here’s how much she got done during Burlesque:

Even this bottle of Cher perfume has a little actual something in it:

It may all be stuck in the spritzer thing but at least it’s there and you can still smell it. I was hoping Burlesque reeked with kitsch classicism, bursting with so much flavor of self-importance that I’d never be able to get the stench out of my nose. Instead it was nothing, just a big plastic inflatable turkey:

Big budget movies offend me to begin with. And one that throws so much in your face and you don’t even feel the splat really bums me out. What a nothing experience. And, by the way, how do you put Cher and Christina Aquilera in a movie together and not have a duet?! What a waste of Cher.

But I’m not here to give a movie review. I’m just here to show you a bottle of perfume.

Now the only question is what do I do with all the Milk-Bones?

14Nov 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – My Seriously Kitschy Birthday Gifts

14Nov 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – My Seriously Kitschy Birthday Gifts

I wasn’t going to do anything for my birthday this year. Too overworked and no extra coinage to throw around. But word leaked out and spread and all of a sudden these people, most of whom I’ve spent every birthday and momentous occasion with for umpteen years, showed up at my house:

Bottom row (L-R):  Diva Zappa, Lisa Loeb, me, Prudence Fenton and Michael Patrick King.
Middle row (L-R):  Jane Wagner, Lesley Ann Warren, Bob Garrett, Lily Tomlin, Pamela Des Barres, Karen Levitas, Gai Gherardi, Gail Zappa, Nancye Ferguson, Stan Zimmerman and Jim Burns. Top row (L-R): Ben Bove, RuPaul, Tom Trujillo, Roey Herschovitz, Jimmy Quill, Charles Phoenix, Sonny Ruscha Bjornson, Mark Blackwell and Jack Nesbit.

Though all of my friends may not practice kitsch like the religion I do, their lives and occupations are consumed with pop culture and they all bring unique individual style and vision to everything they do. None of us are color-in-the-lines people. Which means that when it comes to birthday presents, it’s fantasyland overload as their sensibilities collide with mine in harmonious gift wrapped chaos! For example, here I am with perennially great gift givers Nancye Ferguson and Jim Burns:

Jim is looking very happy because the video game he stars in, Call Of Duty Black Ops, was released the day before and set the opening day record for ANY type of entertainment,Is he is grossing $320,000,000 by the time he reached my house. Maybe that’s why they got me 14 gifts. Though Nancye and Jim are always reliable for a smorgasbord of age-inappropriate-unless-you-happen-to-be-me offerings like this magnificent 1950’s mother of pearl poodle pocket mirror/pill box:

… and this convenient land line phone ear piece for my iPhone:

They also gave me this wonderfully famous Enid Collins owl box purse…

…and this fantastic 50’s fold up wallet with plastic coin holder inside like the Good Humor ice cream man used to wear on his belt to give people change:

They also threw in this 1960’s Wilma Flintstone bathing cap.

Here I am with Pamela Des Barres, the world’s most famous groupie, and Diva and Gail Zappa, who came straight to my place from the airport after being honored at a Frank Zappa festival in London.

Pamela is a fabulous writer and also travels a lot for her work. Which is lucky for me and the rest of her friends as she hits thrift shops wherever she goes and picks up stuff for us all year round. She makes these finds for pennies and stacks them up so she can arrive like Santa Claus on any given occasion. These “On The Wagon’ coaster and snack trays she gave me are just about my favorite bar accessory ever!

I love when snacks are referred to as ‘Tid Bits’, especially when what is normally a single word is broken up into two separate words as stamped into the belly of the wagon.

This nightshirt could be the heaviest gift of the evening. It’s hard to see all the 1960’s pop culture graphics and slogans in this photo and I’m not sure who the characters on it are but there were more than a few vintage clotheshorses at the party, certainly including myself, and we all agree that Pamela’s $2 purchase would easily go for $500 in the right store.

Then there’s this early 60’s Make-Up Mask that you pull over your bouffant to protect the Max Factor from rubbing off your face when you pull your angora sweater over it:

Pamela graciously modeled it for us throughout the evening.

Her excellent gift giving instincts have definitely rubbed off on the other Des Barres in attendance, Michael, who reliably gives me fantastic African swag.

At one point there was a girl’s conference in the bedroom.  Here I am with (L-R) Lily Tomlin,Prudence Fenton, and Jane Wagner:

Prudence not only cooked an incredible dinner for everyone but made the excellent “Crackerature” portrait of me that’s between our heads in the photo above.

Lily and Jane gave me the most ridiculous-in-the-best-kitsch-sense-of-the-word-ridiculous gift of the night:

He’s only about 3″ high, his little arms are made out of bobby pins and his body is some kind of overcooked Sculpy or baking soda concoction. The card that accompanied him was just as kitschy.

The Diller is Phyllis Diller, which adds a few pounds on the kitsch scale for this gift. The note Jane and Lily wrote me make the cheese wheel even weightier:

Joining Lily and I here is Stan Zimmerman. We all grew up in Detroit.

Stan added a little class to my gifts with this 1950’s signed Sasha Brastoff ashtray.

Here’s Lily and I with RuPaul. Both of them have added greatly to the kitsch cache of my alter-ego, Bubbles the artist, as they are the #1 and #2 collectors of her art, each owning over 20 pieces.

Michael Patrick King, seen here with Pamela Des Barres’ lovely feet, brought me some of my most Americanized presents.

He brought my gifts back from Dubai when he was there filming Sex and the City II. First, this green shopping bag featuring a carefree Michelle Obama:

And then this brain-numbing Muslim Barbie shoulder bag:

I got one more bag, actually a Kitsch Emergency Kit, from Karen Levitas.

It’s nice when your friends give you a healthy snack of sardines to enjoy while you read cheesy poetry from the 70’s:

Here I am with Mark Blackwell, who’s also a November 10th birthday baby, and Sonny Ruscha Bjornson, Lisa Loeb and Roey Hershkovitz:

Lisa and Roey gave me some quality reading material:

Maybe I will learn to make beautiful cakes like this one on page 110:

But when it comes to baking, there’s only one Supreme Master and I’m pictured with him here:

Just a few days before my party Charles Phoenix was featured on the front page of the Wall Street Journal with his signature “Cherpumple” cake, one of which he baked for me.

A Cherpumple is three Sara Lee cherry, pumpkin and apple pies stuffed inside three Betty Crocker cakes and frosted as one happy stack of sugary ecstasy:

Here’s my friend, Lesley Ann Warren, indulging in some. Perennially skinny and always eating healthy, she hit the Cherpumple as an extreme gesture of kitsch on my birthday.

Lesley was my first friend when I moved to Hollywood in 1976. She was also the first person ever to sing one of my songs on TV when she did the third song I ever wrote, “Childstar”, on Johnny Carson.

Some people went back for seconds of Cherpumple. Each plate weighs 2 lbs.

Gai Gherardi and Rhonda Saboff shared their Cherpumple:

They gave me an excellent pair of glasses from LA Eyeworks, which Gai co-owns and where I’ve bought all of my eye coverings for the last three decades.

When RuPaul arrived he brought me another birthday cake.

It was delicious but everyone had already gorged on too much Cherpumple.

Which means that everyone went home in sugar shock, the condition they’ve had much practice existing in as they’ve all been over to my house a trillion times before.

I didn’t have far to go as my bed was only feet away from the remains of the Cherpumple. I went to sleep with my crown on and had sugar sweet dreams anticipating a very good year to come indeed!

More party photos can be seen here.

24Oct 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Xavier Cugat Cork

24Oct 2010

Allee Willis’ Kitsch O’ The Day – Xavier Cugat Cork

Revered as much for his marriage to cuchi-cuchi girl, Charo, as for his spreading the gospel of bouncy  Latin music and rhythm, Xavier Cugat led the band at New York’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel and toney resorts around the world with his signature batons, one of which was real and the other of which was his pet Chihuahua. Cugat was a multimedia artist before his time, a musician, painter, cartoonist, movie star, business man and ladies man, husband of five steamy women, including the lead singer of his orchestra at its height, Abbe Lane.

Legendary enough to be mentioned in the third scene of A Streetcar Named Desire, his name frequently sprinkled throughout I Love Lucy, and even a Ben & Jerry’s ice cream flavor named after him in an episode of The Simpsons, “Xavier Nougat”, Cugat  brought such exuberance and flair to a performance that his signature Tango, Rhumba and Merenge rhythms will forever be recognized, as will his self portrait caricatures.

You gotta love a guy who leads a band with a Chihuahua…

… and marries this:

Cugat was a happy man.

And I’m toasting him today.