14th
![Midnight Showing @ The New Beverly Cinema - Showgirls
A friend of mine, Sofia Shinas (Actress [The Crow], Singer, and now Director) asked me if I would stop by and see what a friend of hers was up to. I believe she mentioned that it was a Midnight Showing of the 1995 Paul Verhoeven (Wikipedia/IMDb) / Joe Eszterhas (Wikipedia/IMDb) movie Showgirls, but I’m pretty sure it didn’t register at first. I told her I wasn’t sure if I could make it but that the event I was going to be at earlier in the evening was nearby and that I’d stop by if I could. It turned out that the event I was at was something I could get out of early so I decided to pull by the New Beverly Cinema, a revival theater in Hollywood, where the showing was taking place. I’m not quite sure what I expected to find, but when I got there I was thrilled to see a pretty packed house for a midnight showing of what I was later to find out was a movie that won 7 Golden Raspberry Awards, or Razzies as they are commonly called by aficionados of the genre (not a good thing, or at least that’s what I thought before I got there). When I finally settled into my seat (in the second row of the theater) and said my hellos to Sofia and another actor friend of hers, Manos Gavras, was that everyone was there to see Rena Riffel, the Special Guest Star of the evening. Rena, Sofia’s good friend, was one of the actors in Showgirls and was there to give her ‘behind the scenes’ views on the movie and to promote her latest project Trasherella. Rena held the audience captive as she smiled, took pictures with fans, and told stories of Paul Verhoeven. Everyone there was on the edge of their seats when she laughed and explained how easy her now infamous ‘nude crawl’ across stage turned out to be. Even more compelling, in a voyeuristic way, was when Mark Goldblatt, one of the movie’s film editors, came on stage to share his memories from the making of the film. It should also be pointed out that Rena is much more famous (or infamous as the case may be) than I was originally led to believe. Apparently, not only did she act and sing in Showgirls (Rena is credited with ‘Original Music’ for the movie along with Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics fame), but she is the only actor to ever win ‘Back-to-Back’ Razzies (for Showgirls ‘1995’ and Striptease ‘1996’ respectively), ever! Quite the accomplishment. In the end, I had a wonderful time and got to know much more than I ever thought I’d care to know about a movie that most people will never see, but that whose fans will always remember fondly. A pretty good night and fun was had by all.
See the entire photo set on:
Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/5dfw2u
or
Flickr: http://tinyurl.com/6mfuss
Post Script: It’s funny how small the world is these days. Just 3 days earlier, I photographed Demi Moore (Wikipedia/IMDb) with her husband, Ashton Kutcher (Wikipedia/IMDb), who was launching his newest venture, BlahGirls.com at TechCrunch50 in San Francisco. Had I known that both Rena and Demi had a history (they were both in the Razzie Award winning movie Striptease), I would have mentioned it to Rena or Demi. Who knows, I may yet have the chance. Rena, Demi, let’s see if we can arrange a photo. I’m sure we’ll all have a great time.](http://30.media.tumblr.com/z5qK4k60udwfkb2vWghRdrgho1_400.jpg)
Midnight Showing @ The New Beverly Cinema - Showgirls
A friend of mine, Sofia Shinas (Actress [The Crow], Singer, and now Director) asked me if I would stop by and see what a friend of hers was up to. I believe she mentioned that it was a Midnight Showing of the 1995 Paul Verhoeven (Wikipedia/IMDb) / Joe Eszterhas (Wikipedia/IMDb) movie Showgirls, but I’m pretty sure it didn’t register at first. I told her I wasn’t sure if I could make it but that the event I was going to be at earlier in the evening was nearby and that I’d stop by if I could. It turned out that the event I was at was something I could get out of early so I decided to pull by the New Beverly Cinema, a revival theater in Hollywood, where the showing was taking place. I’m not quite sure what I expected to find, but when I got there I was thrilled to see a pretty packed house for a midnight showing of what I was later to find out was a movie that won 7 Golden Raspberry Awards, or Razzies as they are commonly called by aficionados of the genre (not a good thing, or at least that’s what I thought before I got there). When I finally settled into my seat (in the second row of the theater) and said my hellos to Sofia and another actor friend of hers, Manos Gavras, was that everyone was there to see Rena Riffel, the Special Guest Star of the evening. Rena, Sofia’s good friend, was one of the actors in Showgirls and was there to give her ‘behind the scenes’ views on the movie and to promote her latest project Trasherella. Rena held the audience captive as she smiled, took pictures with fans, and told stories of Paul Verhoeven. Everyone there was on the edge of their seats when she laughed and explained how easy her now infamous ‘nude crawl’ across stage turned out to be. Even more compelling, in a voyeuristic way, was when Mark Goldblatt, one of the movie’s film editors, came on stage to share his memories from the making of the film. It should also be pointed out that Rena is much more famous (or infamous as the case may be) than I was originally led to believe. Apparently, not only did she act and sing in Showgirls (Rena is credited with ‘Original Music’ for the movie along with Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics fame), but she is the only actor to ever win ‘Back-to-Back’ Razzies (for Showgirls ‘1995’ and Striptease ‘1996’ respectively), ever! Quite the accomplishment. In the end, I had a wonderful time and got to know much more than I ever thought I’d care to know about a movie that most people will never see, but that whose fans will always remember fondly. A pretty good night and fun was had by all.
See the entire photo set on:
Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/5dfw2u
or
Flickr: http://tinyurl.com/6mfuss
Post Script: It’s funny how small the world is these days. Just 3 days earlier, I photographed Demi Moore (Wikipedia/IMDb) with her husband, Ashton Kutcher (Wikipedia/IMDb), who was launching his newest venture, BlahGirls.com at TechCrunch50 in San Francisco. Had I known that both Rena and Demi had a history (they were both in the Razzie Award winning movie Striptease), I would have mentioned it to Rena or Demi. Who knows, I may yet have the chance. Rena, Demi, let’s see if we can arrange a photo. I’m sure we’ll all have a great time.
