In my earliest memory of a costume, I was probably around 7 or 8. My parents had only been in the country around 10 years, and dad was still working as a house painter. So my first costume was…a house painter. Easy enough, my dad is not a tall guy and by 8 I was already closing in on his height. I imagine I would have preferred to have been Gigantor or Kimba the White Lion or something like that, but even a crappy mask and a bit of fabric was beyond the reach of my fairly broke immigrant parents at the time. But one thing I loved: back then in the early 70’s you got lots of candy. Every house was giving it out. It was a good time to grow up by the 80’s, because by then it seemed like only one or two houses on a block were giving out treats.
By the time the folks had money, I was a teen and responsible for my own costumes. For a lot of my mid to late teens I worked up some half-assed outfits based on this or that D&D character, especially my first character, a ranger name Arcturus Grimm. I even remember running a couple of games on Halloweens, ones where we all made ourselves up like our characters. At around 17, my girlfriend at the time did herself up as her drow MU, with black skin and white hair and all. She was tall and thin with somewhat Mediterranean features , and it just looked great. After gaming a couple of hours, we all went to Westwood Village near UCLA to hang out and go to a screening of The Road Warrior. I ran into some girls from work ( a Walden Books in Santa Monica) at that theater, and they were blown away by my black-skinned, ivory-haired sweetie.
But by 18 I was no longer really interested in D&D dress-up. I had gone with friends to a convention dressed like the Clockwork Orange Droogies, and we were so popular there I liked to wear that outfit whenever I could. It always tripped people out (by the early 90’s droog costumes had been done to death). I went with some other friends in recent years, around 2002, to a Loscon in Los Angeles, and not only where three of us Droogs, but the girl with us got a red jump suit and worked it as the gang rape victim from the home invasion in Clockwork Orange (but in this incarnation she liked it). Clever idea, but it seemed to freak people out more than trip them out.
Back in my early 20’s I started working at a couple of Renaissance Faires during the year, and all that weekend dress-up kind of satisfied my desire to be in costume. For the longest time, a couple of decades in fact, I rarely went in costume to parties. When I did, it was usually as easy a costume to put together as possible. But in recent years I have gotten an interest in doing decent costumes, especially at Fools Guild parties. FG is an organization of Hollywood people, ex- Ren Faire folk, costumers, and general nutsos in Southern California. Every year they elect a King or Queen out of their ranks, and this regent organizes several parties a year for The Guild. My old friend and current player Terry is heavily involved in decorating these shindigs (I’m sure she is on the fast track for Queen status one year soon), usually held at rented venues in Glendale or Pasadena. As you can guess, there are some damn great costumes at these parties. Last year for Halloween I went to a FG party as a Satanic Bagpiper. Basically just my kilt with a black shirt, red tie, and red devil horns. Easy enough. And for their big April Fools party this year I did a pretty decent Hunter Thompson. At 6’2” and a bit under 300 lbs, I for sure don’t have Dr. Thompson’s body type, but people still knew who I was (although one drunk dude thought I was Jackie Gleason from some old go-go film from the 70’s called “Skidoo”).
For this weekend’s parties, I’m going as a Tap Out Ultimate Fighter (Tap Out boxing trunks and t-shirt, hand wraps and Everlast gloves, a black knit cap with a crucifix on it, fake arm tattoo sleeve, etc), and my date is going to be a ring card hoochie girl for me. As I already have some boxing gear and the Tap Out shirt, I really don’t need to buy anything, except maybe black grease to blacken an eye. Easy peasy.
I actually originally wanted to be Braveheart, but I could not find a wig that I was satisfied with. You see, this party is going to have a heroes and villains theme, and I thought I could be both. Am I Scottish hero William Wallace, or am I evil, sugar-tit loving alcoholic racist and sexist pig Mel Gibson dressed up like Braveheart? Great concept, but the damn wigs killed it. My date for Saturday is an actress who’s agent is throwing a client party at the Hard Rock in Hollywood Sunday night, so if I mind my P’s and Q’s maybe I’ll get to go to that to, and maybe bite the bullet and be Braveheart there if I feel like a different costume in order.
So, what you gonna be for Halloween, and if not you what are the kiddies going as this year? What are the hot costumes for adults and kiddies? Chilean Miners? California candidate Jerry Brown? Prez Obama? The blue dog people from Avatar?
