The Bride of Lanchester

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Have any of you read the autobiography of the actress Elsa Lanchester? She's best known for donning the iconic fright wig of the Bride of Frankenstein, but she had a long and rich career - she's in Mary Poppins and Bell Book and Candle and Murder By Death and Witness For The Prosecution, amongst many many others. She was nominated twice for Best Supporting Actress, too. And she was married to Charles Laughton, who was really quite gay. So she's got some stories to tell, and she tells them with marvelous skill and wit in her book, I really do highly recommend it. She is tremendously funny and very very smart - if half the actresses today in Hollywood were half this interesting we'd be overcome with awesomeness.

I bring it up because MNPP friend Tom is devoting the next round of his "Meet the Lady" show here in NYC (Remember that time I saw Beth Grant in the flesh? Or Louise Lasser? Or Amy effing Sedaris? Yeah that was this.) to the lady Lanchester and I am super-psyched to see what he and his band of merry ne'er-do-wells comes up with this go-round. If you're in town on January 25th, you should come! Buy tickets here.

Elsa's book is out of print (although you can get used copies on Amazon) and that's also on Tom's list - he's started a campaign to get the book reprinted, which I fully support. This woman should be remembered for much more than just that magnificent electric beehive.

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