Love hurts....
Go Go’ers, if you have plans for this week, cancel them immediately. If you were heading out of town, unpack now. And Ms. Go Go will wait while you set the DVR to record a week’s worth of every TV show you watch.
You won’t be sorry.
Simply put, there is more high-octane entertainment in Los Angeles this week than Ms. Go Go has seen in recent memory and — lucky you — it’s all just in time to offer a solution to that pesky Val-Day prezzie conundrum (or meet next year’s Love Day recipient of same!)
Here’s the strategy for max Go Go fun: move quickly to get going-fast tix and make those costumes count.
Ms. Go Go has absolute faith in your ability to rock the week.
Lucha is for Lovers
You won’t need a costume for Lucha Va Voom; in fact, most of the performers won’t be wearing very much at all.
Now that Ms. Go Go has your attention….
Mexican Masked Wrestling and Saucy Striptease are Lucha Va Voom’s stock in trade and they promise to bring the “Sexo y Violencia” back to the Mayan Theater for three mid-week nights of twist and shout, “Sixties cinema style”.
Interpretation: “larger-than-life everything”.
This go-round in and out of the ring is billed as Lucha is for Lovers — one lucky couple is even getting a Val-Day wedding Lucha Va Voom style – so while buxoticas like Michelle L’Amour and Peekaboo Pointe may be shaking the pasties and luchadores like lucha Super-Estrella Sicodelico will rock the wrestler masks and adult onesies, you may want to dress to impress on the off chance you meet that special someone ringside.
Word of advice: choose wrinkle resistant glamour in case the L’il Chicken lands in your lap and wants a peck on the lips.
(LUCHA VA VOOM/Lucha Is For Lovers – Feb 14-16 @ 8pm (7pm door); $35-$65/21+ – Mayan Theater, 1038 So Hill St, DTLA, 90015)
Tix online @ ticketweb.com and in person at:
Wacko, 4633 Hollywood Blvd
BRAT, 1938 14th St, Santa Monica
Garage Pizza, 100 1/2 West 7th Street, Downtown LA
For when you absolutely have to have fairy dust overnight....
The Sensuous Wood Sprite and You
The Lucent Dossier Experience describes itself as a “playground for the innovative genius child in all of us”and based on their all-ages, neotribal-meets-electronica spectacle, their Inner Kids are pretty innovative indeed.
Also, you, know…pretty pretty.
This weekend, the L.A.-based collective of the otherworldly and the scantily dressed debut their newest experience When Lucent Found Herakut and will transform the Palace Theater into a little vortex of interactive vision and creativity with the help of German, large-scale street art duo Herakut. Expect wild children, odd animals, and strange hats.
And that’s just the audience.
There are pre-shows, there are after-parties, there are DJs, fire artists, fortune tellers, gypsies, magic, tattoos, and elves.
It’s been ages since your weekend included an elf.
(THE LUCENT DOSSIER EXPERIENCE/When Lucent Found Herakut — Fri, Feb 17 and Sat, Feb 18; Show @ 9pm; Doors @ 7:30pm; All ages/$30-$120 — Palace Theatre, 630 S Broadway, DTLA 90014; For tix go to http://beticketing.com/lucentpalace17)
Gorey be....
Gorey, Gorey Hallelujah
Go Go’ers, do you yearn for a more elegant era? Does the modern day pale next to turn-of-the-(last)-century gentility? Do you love sinister landscapes, lurking urns, and endangered children?
Well, really, who doesn’t?
Monday’s a holiday — yay — so turn out your top hats and fluff up your finest fin de siecle frippery for this Sunday’s Edwardian Ball – a not-to-be-missed event celebrating the Edwards Gorey and King E VII.
Not that you needed a reason to pull out your high-button shoes.
A twelve-year tradition in the City by the Bay (and the third year in L.A.), the Ball offers spectacle, revelry, steampunk, dancing, cirque, whimsy, music, costumes and finery galore, and yummy, yummy absinthe cocktails all anchored by this year’s theatrical adaptation of Gorey’s The Iron Tonic by the Vau de Vire Society: the Edwardian Ball co-presenters along with founders Rosin Coven. (Read Ms. Go Go’s interview with the oh-so-charming producers Justin Katz and Mike Gaines.)
The Edwardian enthusiasts will be taking over the spectacular and spacious Belasco Theater, which has a ballroom, two outside patios (so two words: fur muff), and plenty of corners and crevices for the popular Vendors Bazaar (think corsets, cutaways, and cravats for sale), the Edwardian portrait booth (the better to capture your ghoulish, Gorey-inspired glamour for posterity), and strange oddities and artifacts from the new-this-year Museum of Wonders.
If you see a giant preying mantis dance by, don’t say Ms. Go Go didn’t warn you.
(THE EDWARDIAN BALL — Sun, Feb 19; Doors & show 7pm-2am; full dinner menu available; GA $42; VIP $75-$80 [$45 & $90 at door]; 21+ w/ ID — The Belasco Theater, 1050 S Hill St, DTLA, 90015; 213-746-5670)
For tix: http://www.ticketfly.com/purchase/event/72283
For info: http://edwardianball.com/about
Ready? U Know U Want 2 Go Go….
The Edwardian Ball Producers: Justin Katz (Paradox Media) and Mike Gaines (Vau de Vire Society) Photo by Neil Girling @ theblight.net
Ordinarily, it would be shocking to hear two men enthuse over a child drowned in an icy pond.
In this case, however, the men are the producers of the Edwardian Ball: a celebration of illustrator/poet Edward Gorey and the Edwardian era he brought to gleefully ghastly life. The “drowned child” is actually a sartorial representation of ”W is for Winnie embedded in ice” from The Gashlycrumb Tinies: the alphabet Gorey illustrated with images of children dying untimely deaths.
Note: no children were harmed in the making of this Ball.
The Edwardian Ball has been a San Francisco institution for a dozen years, growing from a tiny club night to a multi-faceted event featuring music, dance, oddities, and cirque and always anchored by a theatrical adaptation of one of Gorey’s books: this year, The Iron Tonic.
Sunday, February 19th, Edwardian Ball founder Justin Katz of Paradox Media/Rosin Coven and co-presenter Mike Gaines of the Vau de Vire Society will bring The Edwardian Ball to Los Angeles for the third year. Originally booked into The Music Box, which closed its doors abruptly due to an internal business kerfuffle, the Edwardian Ball has landed at the gorgeous Belasco Theater in downtown Los Angeles and the producers are ready to welcome Edwardian enthusiasts of all persuasions.
Given the producers’ challenge to mount the production at a new venue, Ms. Go Go is pleased to have snagged an interview via email with the very gracious Messrs. Katz and Gaines.
Ms. Go Go: Gentlemen, thank you for offering L.A.’s Edwardian enthusiasts and Gorey aficionados an advance chance to fan themselves with excitement over the oh-so-imminent Third Annual Edwardian Ball in Los Angeles! What prompted the expansion to Los Angeles in the first place?
Justin Katz/Mike Gaines: Simply put, the demand for it! We started getting calls for the event starting in about 2006, when enough people were traveling up from LA to want this in their hometown as well.
MGG: Why do you think the Edwardian era and Edward Gorey continue to hold such appeal in this oh-so-modern day and age?
"W is for Winnie embedded in ice" (Photo by dav1d)
JK/MG: I appreciate the opportunity to make the distinction between the Edwards, as they hold a very different place but co-mingled place in the culture of the event. Edward Gorey’s work brings a whimsical narrative to costume and character – absurdity, talking insects, children meeting ill-timed fates, dark humor. King Edward’s era, in contrast, brings an elegance, decadence, and worldliness, as did the decade of his rule. Put it all together and you have a wonderfully broad canvas in which everyone creates their own reality.
MGG: Do you think interest in the Edwardian era has increased since Rosin Coven and Vau de Vire Society have been producing the Edwardian Ball? Or do you think the Edwardian Ball has provided an outlet for Edwardian enthusiasts to explore their submerged and simmering passion for the era…and Gorey?
JK/MG: I think nostalgia for an elegant past, or for an imagined version of that past, is increasing as modern times become more challenging, fractured, and chaotic. People yearn for an environment that is civil and peaceful, yet exciting, where people are at their best, and on best behavior. That being said, I think our event has boosted the usage of the term “Edwardian” in a certain sense. I think our reach is farther than we even know!
Vau de Vire Society in Edward Gorey's "The Iron Tonic" - Edwardian Ball, SF 2012
MGG: It’s tres unusual for an extravaganza of this type to feature a literary component such as the yearly dramatic adaptation of one of Gorey’s literary offerings. How do you approach the material? And can you talk a little about why and how Gorey has been an inspiration?
JK/MG: Gorey’s work is intriguing and inviting. He shows you nothing, but implies everything. This is a great perspective to start with, for dramatic and stage interpretation. I love that Gorey’s work is at the heart of our event. In that sense it keeps it from being a period-recreation event, and thus open to more interpretation and creativity. He is dark but hilarious, he illustrates the energy of life by nearly removing it from his work, leaving it up to the reader to surmise why.
MGG: Can the two of you talk about your respective backgrounds, how the partnership came about, and what each producing entity brings to the event?
JK/MG: My [Katz's] background is in live music and event production. As the bassist and a founding member of Rosin Coven, my role in the band and production has grown over time along with this event. I don’t recall exactly how it happened, but our group invited Vau de Vire to take over the staging and dramatic presentation of the annual Gorey story in our fifth year, 2005, our last year at the Cat Club. It’s been a delightful and runaway partnership since then.
MGG: The Edwardian Ball has grown from an intime lounge event with slides shown of Gorey’s work to — in San Francisco — a weekend-long extravaganza with multiple events. Despite the curveballs thrown at you by L.A. venues (!), do you foresee expanding the Los Angeles event in the same fashion?
JK/MG: We’ll see how it goes with this year, the biggest curveball to date. But I don’t see why not.
MGG: In addition to the Edwardian Ball extravaganza, do you produce other events during the year in San Francisco (and, hint, hint) Los Angeles?
Vau de Vire gets Gorey at the Edwardian Ball 2011
JK/MG: As well as creating commissioned circus/variety shows for a range of high profile clients/events, the Vau de Vire Society produces festival environments and hosts live-performance stages at music festivals far and wide.
MGG: What can Edwardian Ball attendees look forward to in terms of liquid refreshment?
JK/MG: We are very fortunate to have St. George Spirits, creators of St. George Absinthe Verte, as partners in this year’s Edwardian Ball events. We will be featuring several absinthe cocktails in addition to traditional serving – my favorite is “The Root of All Evil”, absinthe and root beer. It’s delicious!
Thank you, Justin and Mike, and cheers!
Tickets for The Edwardian Ball can be purchased online at the link below:
The Edwardian Ball Los Angeles – Friday February 19th at The Belasco Theater, 1050 S. Hill Street, Los Angeles
Or in person at:
S&G CLOTHING
7414 Melrose Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90046
(323) 655-0105
www.sandgclothing.com
Hours: 1-8pm every day
$1/ticket fee
Edwardian Ball recommended Costume Resources in L.A.: http://edwardianball.com/resources
Ready? U Know U Want 2 Go Go….
