Take an old - but renovated - 1920s speakeasy, with a large bar, erotic art gallery, performance space and TV studio. Add several hundred partygoers representing the adult industry, the Internet adult community, and various hangers-on and friends of friends who heard about it during Erotica LA at the Convention Center around the corner. Mix well and stand back.
That was the recipe for the CyberStars of the New Millennium party at Dr. Susan Block's speakeasy/studio/salon on Hope Street in downtown Los Angeles. While Dr. Block conducted interviews in her well-lighted bed in the TV studio area, the party was blasting away with people lined up three deep at the open bar, noshing on finger foods in the erotic art gallery, and hopping onto the elevated bed in the performance space to be Webcast right next to the two-turntable DJ setup. Two women jumped at the chance to be in dildo artist Ray Cirino's outsize cello, one sitting high at the top, one suspended upside-down at the bottom, both with their backsides poking through holes in the front, penetrated by ebony-tone dildos connected to the cello strings that were bowed by concertmaster Cirino as they made beautiful music together.
The party was a celebration of Web Power's iFriends Internet site, represented by Ira Weston and his wife Marsha, formally clad in tuxedo and evening gown but not out of place among the more-casually-dressed partygoers.
Contacted later by E-mail, Dr. Block called the evening "... an exciting mix of artists and exhibitionists, voyeurs and connoisseurs, porn stars and professors, cybersexpots and computer technoids - all celebrating, merrymaking and sharing their talents in art, music, dance, theater, fashion, conversation and sex. Our CyberStars of the New Millennium event really illustrated the fusion of these three potent arenas in one spectacular Saturday night."
Rumor had it that the wait was two hours to get in at one point, but nobody dared go outside to check. Among those who did get in were Julian St. Jox, Valentino, Eric Price and Jill Kelly (all cooling their heels in line with Your Faithful Correspondent on the Hope Street sidewalk before we got in at 11:15), Mark Zane, Jacklyn Lick, Erotica LA impresario Ron Miller and galpal Brooke Hunter, Mickey G., Nancy Vee, Amia Moré, and about 500 other people whose names I didn't get.
