Charles Phoenix is Grand Marshal of the 32nd Pasadena Doo Dah Parade
Friday, 5 December, 2008 - Doo Dah staff
(Photo credit: Cathy of California)
Entertainer, author and pop-culture expert Charles Phoenix has been known for his live, hilarious Retro Slide Show performances, fun-filled School Bus Field Trip Tours, crazy kitchen experiments and colorful coffee table books. Now he will be known for leading the notorious Doo Dah Parade, alter-ego to the Tournament of Roses, as its 2009 Grand Marshal. The parade will make its way down Colorado Boulevard in the historic Old Pasadena District on Sunday, January 18th, stepping off at 11:30am.
Fans across the nation know Charles Phoenix for his hip and highly original take on kitschy and classic American culture, which is characterized by an infectious enthusiasm and keen eye for oddball details. Charles is a recurring correspondent for NPR’s Day to Day and guest on The Martha Stewart Show. LA WEEKLY chose Charles for the cover of its 2008 People issue, calling him the "Kodachrome King."
Parade organizers feel that Phoenix is a perfect match for an event that’s widely known as a send-up of convention and social norms. Doo Dah head Tom Coston says, “Charles is simply hilarious, graciously wicked and a truly artistic spirit—that spells Doo Dah.” The Grand Marshal’s entourage will also be pure Charles Phoenix. He will be traveling the parade route standing on the tailgate of a 1964 Ford station wagon that was special ordered by the Templton, California Fire Department. It's fire engine red, complete with a siren on top and will be towing a vintage matching travel trailer trailed by dozens of champion roller skaters. The spectacle is everything!
“I’m thrilled to be the Doo Dah Grand Marshal this year, “ says Phoenix with his usual verve. “I nearly collapsed with joy when the call came because it puts me that much closer to my biggest goal in life – to be the Grand Marshal of the grandest parade on the planet - the Rose Parade. The Doo Dah is just a stepping stone for me."
The 32nd Occasional Doo Dah Parade will celebrate the post-holiday season in its typically loud, irreverent style. Once a grassroots event begun in 1978, Doo Dah soon gained national recognition as the twisted sister to Pasadena’s ‘other parade’, featuring a woolly range of mischiefs, grounded superheroes, political pundits, homegrown satirists, art car inventors, and other bohemian frolickers. This year’s Grand Marshal follows in the footsteps of anti-consumer evangelist Reverend Billy, performing artists Culture Clash, rock-a-billy king Ray Campi, novelty DJ Dr. Demento, singer-songwriter Ian Whitcomb and Doo Dah’s signature Synchronized Briefcase Marching Drill Team.
A native of Ontario, California, Charles is very proud to have been educated at the Used Car Lot School of Style; Disneyland School of Design; and Shopping Mall School of Sociology. As a teen he discovered thrift shops as museums of merchandise: the perfect place to study the underbelly of our mass consumerism culture.
While working as a fashion designer in Los Angeles, Charles stumbled upon a shoebox full of someone's old Kodachome travel slides in a Pasadena thrift shop. The box was marked “Trip Across the United States 1957.” He knew he’d found a treasure but had no idea that these slides would change the course of his life. Soon, collecting orphaned slides became an addiction that inspired his first Retro Slide Show performance, "The Retro Vacation Tour of the USA." Charles, thus, transformed the classic living room slide show into a high-octane celebration of mid-century American culture.
For more information: www.pasadenadoodahparade.info
BREAKING NEWS: PHOTOGRAPHER, JULIE KLIMA, SELECTED QUEEN
OF THE 32ND OCCASIONAL
PASADENA DOO DAH PARADE!
24-year old, Julie Klima (aka “Skittles”), with her signature pink doll-like hair, won over judges’ hearts on Sunday afternoon at the Pasadena Doo Dah Parade Queen Tryouts. The eclectic event was held at the American Legion Hall in east Pasadena. A current resident of Glendale, Klima, confesses she hardly remembers her presentation. “It was very noisy,” she said, “and people loved that I love colors and dress colorfully.” An Art Center Photography Graduate (2006), she brought camera and props, and spent most of the afternoon playing with the judges who posed for her pictures. She also schlepped their beers. A freelance photographer, Queen Julie will be taking her own self-portrait as queen, and is starting a series of Official Royal Portraits of the Doo Dah Queens. She also plans “show some love” to the people camping out the night before the Rose Parade, where she also plans to “have a fun party that everyone’s invited to.”
More about the Tryouts: As anticipated, individuals of all genders, shapes, ages, and persuasions tested their fate to become queen. Twenty one contestants were outnumbered by equally-costumed judges, including many former queens, and another hundred or so parade entrants, tryout supporters, Legion members, and the curious public. The town-hall setting with long tables in beer-fest style, crock pot chili, and legendary Doo Dah House Band, Snotty Scotty and the Hankies on stage, set the mood for the lively caucus. Among those who tried out were, Count Smokula, Santa’s Bad Elf, belly dancer, Narayana, a smoking Amy Winehouse, Queen Mother Teresa Kennedy, the Swami from El Monte, Sabrina the Stimulus Package, Second-Hand Rose Queen, Crystal, Gopher Girl, Buffy the Dog, Ms. Laurel, Pinball Lizard, Mama “J”, and Miss Boy Frances. 1st Runner up and second place went to bass guitarist, Eric(a) Valentine, also of Glendale. 2nd Runner up was a tie between
Roobie Breastnut, former burlesque star, as Sarah Palin, and Crystal Lightner, local diva of Altadena.
Even More Info: Organizers staged the first public tryouts in 1998 at a Gothic house on stilts. It then moved to the famed Zorthian Ranch, in Altadena. This and other parodies of Pasadena’s ‘Other Parade’ have fueled Doo Dah’s colorful and controversial life on Colorado Boulevard. The 32nd Occasional Pasadena Doo Dah Parade will be held on Sunday, January 18th stepping off at 11:30am on the streets of historic Old Pasadena. To enter the parade simply go to the website and fill out a form, or call for more information (626) 205-4029.
PHOTOS, courtesy of Terry Miller.
www.pasadenadoodahparade.info
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You must act fast - Operators are standing by. Or at least, thinking about it. A LOT. This is not a subliminal message. BUY SHIRTS BUY SHIRTS BUY SHIRTS. This is not a subliminal message. Time to scratch your cheek. BUY BUY BUY!!! When you awaken, you will remember nothing of this conversation, except BUY BUY BUY a DOO DAH SHIRT!!! And in 3...2...1...(poof!)
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