Memories Of Halloween Past: An Apache Dancer, Jackie-O, a Geisha and Edie Sedgwick
It’s been ages since I dressed up for Halloween. The last time I did was ’96 when my then roommate and I threw a Halloween party at our new Hells Kitchen digs. (Note: To non-NYC folks, Hells Kitchen is a Manhattan midtown neighborhood that’s located on the Westside.) It was truly a free-for-all. We invited everyone in the apartment building and basically anyone with whom we had the vaguest of contact at that time. Anyone with a pulse who didn’t look like a serial killer.
Overall, the party was a rousing and rambunctious success. Lots of people attended. Of course, this included many people we didn’t know or perhaps we didn’t recognize–but we didn’t care. Come on in–enjoy the party! Even our two actor neighbors, whom we didn’t know at all except for their constant blaring at ear-deafening decibels the most grating music all day and all night, happily attended (probably for the free booze and food).
Before the party, I had no costume prepared. And I had no inclination or rather no imagination to create one from scratch. I thought maybe I could just conjure up something piecemeal and desperate from my wardrobe. I looked into my closet and was stumped. Sigh. What was I going to do? The last time I dressed up for the holiday, I was in my early 20s.
Speaking to my father on the phone, I asked him if he had any ideas. Knowing that I had a lot of black and white striped blouses and short black skirts in my closet and always had a black beret (a trademark New York City head gear), he suggested a French apache dancer.
“Huh?” I responded. “What’s that?”
He explained to me that it was an aggressive Parisian female street dancer and then described what this character often looked like, at least in the old movies he used to watch.
Hmm, I thought. Well, why not? So I put on my favorite black and white striped shirt, a short black skirt, black fishnets and threw a black scarf around my neck and was ready. (The featured photo is from that party).
Not a groundbreaking costume that would win any awards mind you–but hell, at least I was trying to dress for the occasion.
It certainly wasn’t as imaginative or as whimsical as my previous Halloween costumes. For my junior year at NYU, I also was stumped as to what would be a fitting Halloween get-up for a dorm party. So I looked into my closet and saw a lot of black. Hey, I’ll go as a punk! Yes, very lame. I know.
My effort in that area was laughable. My clothes were not ripped or torn–in fact, they were largely bland and conservative (this was right before my manic-clubgoing phase). I remember putting on a plain black blouse, a plain black skirt, black pantyhose, threw a black scarf (sound familiar, right?) around my long dark hair (I’m not a natural redhead–shocking) and tossed on black shades. I knew I didn’t look punked out one iota–hell, I looked more like an uptown matron–but—what can you do? I wanted to go to that party. Oh well, at least, I’d have fun participating in the revelry and observing my peers and classmates decked out in bizarre attire.
Before I sashayed into the dorm subcellar for that shindig, I ran into a friend who was also going to that party. I don’t remember what her costume was but I do vividly recall her looking at me quizzically and asking: “Who are you supposed to be? Jackie O?”
OMG! Voila! That’s right. That’s who I’ll tell people I’m going as! Jackie O! You’re brilliant, I told my friend who shrugged.
And everyone loved it! Okay, there were these two guys at the party who insisted I looked more like Patti Smith, then dubbed “the priestess of punk” by downtown publications. I had no issue with that. (By the way, for months on afterwards, every time I would see those two guys in the dorm, they would teasingly yell “Patti! Patti” at me and start singing one of her songs.) That was fine too.
The next year, my senior year, I went to a party on St. Marks Place in the East Village as a Japanese geisha. I borrowed a faux-Japanese robe from my cousin, slathered my face with lots of white baby power and created exaggerated bee-stung red lips courtesy of some cheap dimestore lipstick I bought earlier that day. Unfortunately, everyone at that party, including the group of friends I was with, was clad in S & M leather gear. I was odd geisha out.
Then the following year, a few months after I graduated from college, I was invited to a party on Waverly and 6th Avenue (also in the Village to folks who are reading this and don’t have a clue where that is). Having read a book on Edie Sedgwick, a rich heiress turned Andy Warhol superstar who had a meteoric rise in the mid-1960s only to crash and burn a few years later due to drug addiction, I decided I’d go as her in her “Youthquake days.” I bought this silver hair dye spray to use on my hair, put on a black leotard, black tights and huge hoop earrings.
It got an okay reception. Mostly everyone recognized who I was supposed to be. I remember there was someone dressed as Miss America, complete with a scepter and a crown on her head and an obligatory Captain Kirk. I also remember that it took me WEEKS to get that silver dye out of my hair. But that was it.
After that, I had my fill of Halloween or maybe I was jaded. The next time I did dress up was years later at the party my roommate and I threw in Hells Kitchen. And that’s it.
Happy Halloween to everyone, whether you get dressed up or not.
