Update: added video of Leanna doing a Halloween jig below 11/2/08
It shouldn’t be surprising that Halloween is one of the Rebels of Romance’s favorite holidays. Finally a day when no one’s allowed to critcize the donning of wigs, thigh highs, and other costumey apparel. The one day of the year where we’re sure never to be called inappropriate by anyone.
Still, for those of us who cosplay on a regular basis, Halloween could be thought of as amateur night. Where those unindoctrinated into the world of costuming transform themselves into sexy “fill-in-the-blank”s which they pulled complete from a bag they purchased at Ricky’s or other such Halloween adventure shop. Sexy senoritas, naughty nymphs, cherry red riding hood, captain booty, and, simply, jailbait. If it’s sexy and comes in a bag, it’s fair game for Halloween.
There’s nothing wrong with this per say — in fact the costumes are usually pretty cute. But it’s also, in our opinion, kind of lazy. So we decided to create our own costumes. The theme for us and our friends this year?
Fairy Tales gone wrong.
Left to right: Little Dead Riding Hood/Marianne Mancusi, Little Miss Muffet (post spider attack)/Leanna Hieber, Geisha Goldilocks/Liz Maverick, and No-Longer-Sleeping-(Now Dead)-Beauty/Stacey Agdern.
Here’s how the night went down.
I arrived to work in the morning to find pirates and fairies milling about and quickly realized this was the one day of the year I could costume at work. So I changed into my zombie red riding hood outfit and put on my makeup. The purple eyeshadow from the Clarin’s jazz collection does a mean bruising effect.
My co-worker Sarah (pictured above) later painted herself green and added wings to this ensemble.
Leanna arrived near the end of the day and changed into her Little Miss Muffett outfit in my office.
For a reason unbeknownst to me, she added vampire fangs to complete the look. Maybe the spider’s venom turned her into a were-spider? You’d have to ask her… I do know it gave her a wicked lisp, which we kept laughing about all night.
After she’d changed, we headed over to Posner’s Books in Grand Central to pick up Dead Beauty and Geisha Goldilocks – aka Liz (Who omg had amazing glitter makeup on.) and Stacey
I gave Goldilocks/Liz a bear to steal porridge from, but she insisted it was actually a cat. The jury’s still out on that one. But in hindsight I guess a Geisha Goldilocks might very well carry a cat around. I mean, cat cafe anyone?
We left Grand Central and managed to snag the only available cab in NYC and rode down to Morgan’s where the party would take place later that night. There, we met up with Snow White, aka Hope Tarr.
We dropped off our stuff and headed down to the village parade where police and blocked roads thwarted our every move. You’d think they didn’t want us to watch the parade or something! We were subject to a lot of attention. As Riding Hood, I got a lot of wolf calls. I also got accosted by Freddy Kruger while crossing the street.
Freddy: Is your name Mary?
Me Thinking: Uh, do I know you?
Freddy: Cause my favorite drink is…BLOODY MARY!!!
Oh-kay then.
There were some…interesting…costumes.
And what Halloween could be complete without the Scream guy? He followed us for a while.
He even tried to kill Stacey… Or maybe that’s his way of flirting. Tough to say.
Even the dogs got into the fun!
We finally managed to snag a spot right outside the old Limelight church/nightclub. Leanna and I posed RIP style for the infamous club we’d never get a chance to patronize.
We waited for the parade. And waited. And waited. And…waited.
It was freezing.
In all, we waited an hour and a half for the seven pm parade. The floats didn’t start arriving until 8:20. You’d think a Zombie Red Riding Hood wouldn’t feel the chill. You’d be wrong.
But the parade, when it did finally arrive, was pretty darn cool. Which almost made up for it.
After seeing the major floats, we headed back to Morgan’s to party. (And get warm!)
LizNote: On the way, we shot this video of Leanna. I know that Leanna claims she went as Miss Muffett. Frankly, I think with that fang overbite and the jig she did in this video, she actually went as Miss Muffett’s “slow” sister, Bernice. Just sayin’
We made it to Morgan’s and met up with the rest of our peeps.
Jacob aka David Bowie from Labyrinth.
Kat aka Hockey Mom Sarah Palin. (The devil horns are not random!)
Chris, a prince of a guy.
Our hostess Morgan, a beautiful butterfly.
And Nick the builder.
We played Celebrity and a bros against hoes trivia game. Sadly the three bros kicked we hoes asses. Not sure how that happened!
By the end of the night, everyone for some reason HAD to try on the Bowie wig. With…various results.
All in all, it was a great Halloween!
Zombie Red out.
Filed under: Out & About in NY | Tagged: gothic, Gothic Lolita, Halloween, Hope Tarr, leanna hieber, Liz Maverick, lolita, Marianne Mancusi, Rebels of Romance, stacy agdern, walita
Look at that eye makeup, Marianne. WOW!! A real work of art. Very cool. A Goldilocks Geisha. Hooray, and you two match colors. A costume from a bag’s so easy. Making up an idea and reproducing it on the body canvas…tough stuff! Love how Leanne’s tights even match her spidery theme. And that Bowie wig was made for Keeslar’s costume.
Keira, isn’t that amazing? She just does that makeup stuff on the fly. I, on the other hand, have to go watch makeup videos on youtube, and they still don’t come out looking professional.
Leanna was hilarious. The fangs gave her total overbite.
Thanks Keira! It was easy really. Basically just do a purple version of the smoky eye – I used Clarin’s Jazzy Fall Colors collection.
Basically I lined my eyes with thick black eyeliner (their limited edition Exotic Eyeliner in Black Magic) and then smudged them up. I traced the lines with Liquid Eyeliner in Blue Shimmer. Then I took the purple eyeshadow and dabbed it all around my eyes. It took a lot of purple to make the bruising look good as it kept evaporating into my skin when I smudged it in. But I just kept layering it on until it had that uneven bruising effect I was going for. Add a lot of mascara and then some droplets of glitter blood which I bought off the Internet and that was it!
I kept my lips paleish to keep the attention on the eyes, by the way.
Liz and I have been talking about doing some makeup videos – so maybe I’ll recreate this look for that!
Marianne
How many timeth mutht I tell you that itth BerEnithe with another E in the mithle. Geeth.
Geeth? *giggle* My sincerest apologies. BerEnice. Liz
It looks like a bear, at least in the photo. May look different in facetime.
Have a lovely day!
I cannot TELL you how many ’sexy_fillintheblanks’ I saw on Friday. Mostly teenagers.
Tez, well if it LOOKS like a bear…it’s a bear.
Liz
Megan, I know. Gross.
Speaking of bears…
Where is the bear/cat?
Since I come from Cincinnati, I thought I should mention that there is indeed something called a Bearcat, they’re the University of Cincinnati mascot, see here. http://gobearcats.cstv.com/ However, that doesn’t mean I have any idea what one IS, just that they exist… somehow… in a strange, Ohio universe…
There is such a thing as a Bearcat. It’s the University of Cincinnati mascot. Evidence of the elusive and mythical Bearcat can be found here:
http://gobearcats.cstv.com/sports
– I come from Ohio but don’t ask me to explain Ohio.
BearCat will be joining Boots in bag for Election Night trip.
Liz
Those were awesome costumes, girls! Loved the Red Riding Hood make-up. Everyone looked fantastic! Wish I was in New York for Halloween–seeing you girls, Stacey, Chris, etc., make me miss my costume parties
Addendum – oops- sorry that double posted about the Bearcats. And while I can’t always explain Ohio, at least my home state has been redeemed… and went a beautiful shade of blue!
Marianne, just reading it was making my mind whirl. One of these days, the stars will align, and I’ll in the same town as you when something important is going on, and then I’ll request an hour of your time to do me up, head to toe.