'Twin Peaks' burlesque, and yes, the pun is intended
Host Schäffer the Darklord as Agent Cole
11:50 am Jan. 31, 2012
If Twin Peaks is remembered for anything, it’s the strangeness. David Lynch's early 1990s cult hit was loaded with peculiar scenes, oddball characters, backwards talking, and of course a lady who adored a log. It also had its share of boundary-pushing naughtiness (strange-naughty, to be sure), mostly centered on One Eyed Jack's, the casino/brothel where lots of the sexiest and creepiest scenes took place. Yet where early-'90s ABC sensibilities left the scope of the sexiness rather limited, latter-day Lynchians are free to turn up the raunch as high as they like.
That was possibly why a line led from the back of the Parkside Lounge, through the bar, and out to East Houston Street on Saturday night. The “Miss Twin Peaks” pageant is part of the Pink Room series put on by the producer, known by her stage name, Franny Fluffer. Her effort brought a cabinet of New York’s emerging neo-burlesque performers to reinterpret the show with bare-bodied dance routines.
Shortly before midnight, host and rapper Schäffer the Darklord (or S.T.D.) walked on stage wearing headphones and a suit—he was dressed as Agent Cole, the tonelessly loud character played by David Lynch on the series. The crowd had already wolfed down the free donuts and watched stage kitten Dr. Flux dance for 25 minutes. But before the night got fully underway, Schäffer, a veteran of the nerdcore hip-hop scene, laid down the rules to the crowd.
“If one of these sexy and talented young girls from a northwestern rainy nightmare town comes out to your stage, your job is to shower them with enthusiasm, applause, hoots and hollers, animals noises, et cetera, that indicate your approval,” he said (to applause).
Kicking off the night, he also rapped a song over the Twin Peaks theme, which directly referenced the show and name checked Lynchian tropes:
“Half of that which happens seems absurd, motifs in the imagery taunting me like fire" and "I am not an animal, Pabst Blue Ribbon/ There’s a man in back of this place. His face is all rotten/ We’ve got a fresh pot of coffee, we’ve got Kyle MacLachlan.”
But the stars were the burlesque performers played by dancers with names like Foxy Vermouth, Victoria Privates, and Gemini Rising. One-by-one each of the eight performers jumped into numbers ranging from atmosphericly creepy to wildly animated, each with a style that befit their name.
Iris Explosion played Diane, the disembodied women for whom Agent Cooper always leaves records notes. She began by slowly pulling a microcassette from a manila envelope as “Please Mr. Postman” played. Soon though, she was dancing around the stage, half-naked, to Katy Perry. Another performer, Amelia Bareparts, emulated the Log Lady. She cozied up with a log, telling short non-sequiturs and later on, jumping into a routine which had her placing the log in several suggestive places.
“She’s gonna get splinters,” said one concerned audience member to her friend.
Fluffer played a role too, as a masked version of Annie Blackburn, Agent Cooper’s doomed love interest. Wearing a mask, she danced on the stage lit by a flashlight in one of the night’s more haunting routines.
Audrey Horne at Twin Peaks Burlesque from Dan Rosenblum on Vimeo.
There were other offerings. To celebrate Lynch’s other creative outlets, there were raffle prizes which included a copy of his book, Catching the Big Fish, and a pound of Lynch's signature coffee.
With his atmospheric tension and visceral drama, Lynch’s work is perfect for reinterpretation. Others have hosted Twin Peaks TV parties and last year, an entire Parisian nightclub opened based on a six-minute scene from Mulholland Drive. London and Los Angeles, too, have their own semi-regular Lynchian burlesque shows. But the recent resurgence of burlesque in New York follows a recent critical appreciation of Twin Peaks and opens New York to the scene.
The day after the performance, Fluffer talked about the inspiration of the show and the crossover appeal of the log lady.
She said the Lynch inspiration began two years ago, when she was just leaving the New York School of Burlesque. There, she found friends who thought the idea clicked.
“The things that I love about David Lynch’s work are very close to the reasons I love burlesque,” Fluffer said. “And it’s the quirky, campy humor combined with this kind of femme fatale that he has in there, and this sexuality. But also it can go to a very dark, kind of disturbing side sometimes, too, a very challenging sexuality in some ways.”
Because she spreads the shows across Lynch’s creations, including Blue Velvet, Young at Heart, Mulholland Drive, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, Fluffer uses a rotating cast of characters from the city’s burlesque scene. Next month she’s planning a Lost Highway show on Feb. 21. Eventually, Fluffer predicted a wider Lynch revue format.
Though it’s produced by Fluffer, each performer writes his or her own material, based on how they interpret the characters.
“It’s like a culmination of really funny stuff, really creepy stuff and then backstage it’s all support each other and that’s rewarding,” she said.
The popularity of last weekend’s show seemed to stretch the limits of the Parkside Lounge’s 75-person capacity, both because it was on Saturday instead of the usual Tuesday and because the show had garnered a feature in Time Out New York. More than two dozen people were turned away at the door. Still, Fluffer said she’s loyal to the venue.
“We can pretty do whatever we want and it’s fantastic and they’re really supportive,” she said. “Certainly what we might have to do after last night either do two shows a night or perhaps at some point move to another venue, depending on what’s going on.”
She said when they started the Lynch-inspired events, many people in the crowd tended to be Lynch fans. But now more people come to see the burlesque aspect. With such a varied crowd, she said they to make sure the jokes come across.
“They may not understand why the log lady is holding a log, but to be perfectly honest, not many people who watch Twin Peaks fully understand it either,” she said.
