This was an early costume for us when I was still in college at WMU and the Saturday Night Live crew came up with the “Coneheads.” We built papier-mache heads starting with oversized balloons, then layered newspaper over them, coming to a point on top, then bursting the balloon once they were formed.
We bought matching pajamas at Winkleman’s in the ladies department,Extra-Extra Large (they had feet too), finishing them off with orange zebra capes. We used morticians wax to adhere the cones to our foreheads and had a hell of a time asking morticians for cans of the wax in explaining what we were creating. We smoothed the wrinkles in the cones with the wax, matching the color of our skin all the way up. This beer was the first of our “massive consumption” for the night where we had to drive from contest to contest with our heads pointing out of my Grand Prix’s sunroof. We won all the contests!
We then went on to become Miss Piggy and Kermit, filling my 100 lb. wife with pantyhose stuffed with foam filling to give her another 200 lbs of bulk; while I was green from head to toe, so enraged at my hideousness that I sped home, stopping for a cop, who couldn’t stop laughing, explaining I was rushing to get out of green tights and the ridiculous costume to avoid further humiliation, while my wife, still, somehow, looked glamorous. I never got the ticket.
Our next choice was Popeye and Olive Oil because I’d found this big plastic butt to hang out my pants. The best part was my corncob pipe filled all night with, well, not tobacco!
Another one around this time, that I wish I’d had pictures of, was our first new house party where I was “Conan” and my wife was a very hot “Shena” in a leopard print dress that was less “Flintstones” and more “Queen of The Jungle.” We moved in in September and to our dismay, never being tested, the floor drains backed up with a shoulder to shoulder gathering, upstairs and down, which characteristically didn’t water the party down a bit.
This was one of my favorites. Her hair was to the back of her knees in actual length. The coloring was easy, but to get it to spike out we used numerous cans of hairspray that we kept repeating all night. I think I liked it most because all I had to do was grunt all night, agreeing or disagreeing. (And avoid fire, especially with all that hair spray!)
Here we are, the King and Queen of Hearts, completely decked out (ha, ha…) Both outfits were really pretty easy to put together with clothes we’d had around the house. A friend did the outstanding makeup job on us both and again it was a hoot as we were a hit wherever we went.
This one was inspired by the “Scary Monsters” – David Bowie album, and if you know its songs, you know the connection. It was also a little bit “Shattered,” I’m not sure. Oh, weren’t the 80’s great?
Not quite Robert Redford, or DiCaprio, but who didn’t want to believe in the mystery of Gatsby, especially as a writer. This was WAY more civilized to prove how one mellows with age. Daisy was still as beautiful as ever though. That’s the Wolfman serving us!
Another one missing was a last minute dress up for a neighborhood party where we went as Ozzy and Sharon Osborn. She had the magenta wig, and I had a long black wig, hunched over, with my one word refrain for the night, “…uck, uck, uck…”
Then we did a classic one for a classic movie, “Pulp Fiction”, which everyone will remember for a long time, (at least in my generation), as a “classic film.”
Whatever your plans are for this Halloween, it’s always more fun to plan and construct the outfits, then execute the persona to the end, than to wear “whatever” and slip on a rubber mask or paper eyeshade. Enveloping a character is where the fun is, and what makes it necessary to pull off the costume. Have fun, because it is…
…and we’ll finish with the proverbial lens-closing-effect….
Scary, but amazing production. But it looks like it was a lot of fun.