(The gal next to me in the costume contest wore a suggestively arranged latex bacon-and-eggs costume.) But it was definitely FUN. Was it too trashy/politically incorrect/dare I say, naughty? Perhaps? I don't know. I, myself, did a sort of robot costume for that event. Made mostly from cardboard, reflectors, and hardware store supplies! (Won the costume contest, btw.) One of my all-favorites was a Robot Vampire Dracula costume from a 2011 Halloween event I attended. You can be an amped up version of your true self (see: brassy wrestler Brooke Adams as "sexy "), an opposite version of your true self (see: retro-pale burlesque star Dita Von Teese as blonde, super-tanned "normal girl"), something noble, something gory, something Gorey, something to merely get by at a party, or something quite transformative. Heck, even the broad swath of middling costumes are fun, because we're all off on some flight of fancy for this one evening. I, for one, delight in being alternately appalled at costume disasters or delighted at the mad skillz of some costumers. Whatever it is, you get to re-imagine yourself as something or someone else, and it's actually acceptable to walk around in that ridiculous get-up just about anywhere-in broad daylight, at night, on a train, on a plane, in a house, with a mouse. Even a costume-averse frat boy can be a campy prisoner for one night.
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It's perhaps the one day of the year when everyone-not just the cosplayers or the goths or the fetishists or pick-your-subculture-gets a free pass to dress up in an insane get-up, purely for fun. And UK supermarket chains Asda and Tesco have just yanked a grotesquely deranged "mental patient" costume that supposedly disparaged the mentally ill.īut I think all the easily offended critics out there fail to appreciate Halloween as a sort of one-off, wildly fantastic carnival. Just last week, Walmart pulled off the shelf a (disappointingly tame) "Naughty Leopard" costume for little girls just because the word "naughty" (not the costume itself) was deemed too sexualized. We now have rending public debates about costumes that are too risqué, trashy, insinuating, or politically incorrect. Somehow, Halloween has become controversial. If you pre-order the book and email me your info at (be sure to use this address not my DeepGlamour address), I'll send you a signed book plate.īooks, Automobiles, Escape, Future, Retro Glamour, Comic Books, Transportation The Carnival Of Halloween (See this Bloomberg View column for more on the nature of Star Trek's glamour.)Īll photos and quotes are from The Power of Glamour, to be published November 5 by Simon & Schuster. No discussion of futuristic glamour and escapism is complete without a little Star Trek. In the 1950s and ’60s, glamorous visions of transportation technology offered a more speculative version of “futuristic” escape that still sparks longings today. I argue in chapter seven that, in fact, glamour provided a way for people to figure out what modernity meant and how they felt about it. In the 20th century, particularly during the period between the World Wars, glamour, escape, speed, modernity, and “the future” were all connected in the public imagination. The connection between glamour and escape is one reason transportation vehicles figure so prominently in its iconography. The promise of escape and transformation is an essential element of glamour and the subject of chapter three of my book. Sampling The Power Of Glamour: More From The Pinterest BoardĪs introduced in this earlier post, I've set up a Pinterest board for my forthcoming book The Power of Glamour, combining photos and quotes from the book.