Never Too Many Chances to Wear a 3-Piece Suit.

Huzzah! Another chance to dust off my moth eaten 3-piece pinstripe suit and pork-pie hat; this past weekend there was a Victorian/20's-40's era "ThreePenny Opera" party at a beautiful Victorian mansion in Brooklyn called the Montauk Club. The idea was to dress either in the style of Bertold Brecht's ThreePenny Opera, 1880-1900, or in the style of the era in which the play was written, the 1930's.

The venue itself was beautiful, a lovingly restored and maintained mansion just by Grand Army Plaza, but the crowd was fantastic. The guests had gone all out - gorgeous Victorian-era gowns, women in vintage flapper attire and avant-guard latex-gothic hybrids were all on display, and gentlemen in long coats, tuxedos and three piece suits were enjoying the conversation-friendly atmosphere as a 6-piece jazz band, Grandpa Musselman and his Syncopaters, played a wonderful assortment of period music, from the Charleston to waltzes.

I simply donned my getup from the film noir derbytaunte party I attended several weeks ago and headed on out to join my friends, who were similarly decked out in 30's clothing. Thanks to Dances of Vice who put on the event. Their next soirée is in August (so far!) and if I'm not in Mexico, I'll definitely be going.

(Me and some dame...)

So There Was This Dame, See...

A whole group of dames, come to think of it. They're called the Gotham Girls Roller Derby, and this past Sunday I went to their Derbytaunte Ball fundraiser to celebrate the induction of their rookie derby girls, one of which was my roommate Luke's girlfriend, Carly (aka: Straight Razor). Luke is on the left there looking very Joe Friday-ish.

The theme of the event, if you haven't guessed from our getups, was "Film Noir." Right up our alley. While we were getting ready, Luke cranked up the soundtrack from Orson Welles' "Touch of Evil," and we enjoyed gussying ourselves up in our Sunday best. I'm always happy to make use of my vintage (and unfortunately moth eaten) wool pin-stripe three-piece suit that I found for $25 in a thrift store in Pittsburgh 17 years ago (::gasp::).

When we got to the Park Slope bar Southpaw for the event, we walked into a sea of fedoras and suits. Fantastic. The music was, unfortunately, clubby - it would have been great if they had been blasting period tunes like we had back at the apartment, but such are the pitfalls of hipster happenings. No Peter Gunn theme for us, alas. At least Night of the Hunter was playing on a big screen on the dance floor.

There were free pickles and relish, and Chipotle was kind enough to provide free burritos (2 hours late), and my other roommate Danaher and I won a trivia contest prize for identifying a line from Maltese Falcon (Danny had just been talking about the line on the train there, coincidentally enough).

"When you're slapped, you'll take it and like it."

Ah yes. I've had entire relationships based on that line. Good times.

So finally the time came for the inductions of the "Fresh Meat." We cheered as Carly was brought on stage, officially dubbed Straight Razor and given her team assignment: The Manhattan Mayhem. Team captain Sweet Cherry Pie clapped her in hand cuffs and shoved her into line with the rest of the new Mayhem inducties. Manhattan has the most new rookie recruits this season due to a mass exodus after last season (Oh WHY did you leave us, Tankerbelle, WHY?), so I'm expecting a Cinderella season from them. No excuses!

So swing your razor wide, Straight Razor! GO MANHATTAN MAYHEM!

(Luke, Carly and my other roommie Rick.)