An put-of-town friend visited this weekend, so we did all that touristy stuff, including a visit to Madame Tussaud’s in Times Square (wax museums are a guilty pleasure of mine, though I generally enjoy the really bad ones more than the really good ones). For the $20 entry fee, they should let you have your way with the mannequin of your choice!
Some of the statues were creepily lifelike, you really have to admire the workmanship (I guess it’s not really “artistry,” as the sculptor has no room for artistic expression). I’ve met four of the people who are on display (Cybill Shepherd, Fergie, Andy Warhol and Quentin Crisp), and found the Andy Warhol mannequin was much more lifelike than Andy himself was. I had to be held back from kicking the Arafat, Pope John Paul II and Henry Ford figures on the shins—and I was horrified to see they had JFK wearing brown shoes with a gray suit!! Jackie never would have let him leave the house like that.
We only did one photo op—me on a settee chatting with Dorothy Parker. I saw a lot of dumpy, badly dressed women having their photos taken with Marilyn Monroe and Princes Di—bad idea. If you want to look glam, have your photo taken next to Eleanor Roosevelt or Golda Meir.
We used to have one in Montréal. It’s been gone for about 20 years now. If you like cheesy wax museums, you would have loved that one. No celebrity, only biblical scenes and historical scenes, all of them over the top. I especially liked the Christain martyrs one, all praying in their cell, while in the background the lions were feeding on their fellows.
A few years ago, my (ex)girlfriend and I went to the Madam Tussaud’s in Amsterdam. The best photo-op was her with Luciano Pavorotti. He’s got his right arm curled out in front of him, like he’s pulling the note out of the air. Perfect height for a little butt grabbage.
Excuse all the typos, I am having Computer Trauma today (they are updating all our systems, just to throw us into tizzies).
My favorite bad wax museum is the one in New Orleans, which seems to consist of dust-covered department-store dummies. The “theater” tableau shows Sarah Bernhardt and John Wilkes Booth performing for Jenny Lind and Enrico Caruso. One of Madame Sarah’s arms has fallen off and is lying on the floor, and her head is dangling percariously.
Sounds like fun. TheLadyLion and myself were at the Vegas Tussaud’s just yesterday. Heavy on entertainers and glitterati of couse but fun. I was suprised how short Satchmo was and it was all I could do to keep from swiping Elizabeth Taylor. As a souvenif or course.
If’n ya love wax museums, Clifton Hill and the other street (Victoria Ave?) in Niagara Falls, Ontario, would put you in hog heaven. Last I remember, there was a Madame Tussauds, a Michael Jackson wax museum, several chamber of horrors wax museum, and a movie star one, to boot.
When I was in London a few years ago, I went to the Madame Ts there. I found it fun, but the thing that was so creepy, to me at least, was that I half expected to see Vincent Price being pushed around in a wheelchair by Charles Bronson.
I didn’t think that old film had made any impact on me but I couldn’t look at any of the figures without thinking what they would look like melting a la The House of Wax.
A number of years ago when I was working near L.A., I enjoyed an evening visit to the Hollywood Wax Museum. I don’t think it exists any longer. I really enjoyed the room set aside for the silent stars. The Charlston and black bottom playing in the background, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D.W. Griffith comparing notes. Charlie Chase, Buster Keaton and Harry Langdon visiting, looking like they were about to return to the set. Francis X. Bushman was in his chariot and Tom Mix was on Tony. Elmo Lincoln even looked out from some jungle.
Perhaps the most memorable, though, was Fatty Arbuckle sitting alone on a curb with his chin resting on his fist. It was as if all the rest of the wax figures had rejected him because of the scandal. Of course in real life Keaton hadn’t, and I wanted to move Keaton over nearer to Arbuckle because of that.
I went to Madame Tussaud’s in Vegas and had a blast. We took lots of pictures with different “people”. I liked how they let you touch the figures and stuff. My favorite picture was one of me boxing Muhammed Ali. Overall, I think it was worth the price.
It’s true though, some are better made than others. Some look fake, and others look more real than the actual people themselves.
I always loved Movieland Wax Museum growing up as a kid–I remember being only 8 or so and rolling my eyes when the attendant told me I could see The Fonz. :rolleyes: Who cares? Show me The African Queen!
I’ll also remember that museum because I was there the first weekend they added a horror movie component (it was called the Black Box or something). It started with tableaus from Halloween and Altered States (ooohh, a monkey!), but the really scary one was Alien: You were walking down a corridor of the spaceship with smoke and flashing lights and this loud banging of the alien. There were also some wax figures of dead bodies lying in the path. Except one of those dead bodies grabbed the ankle of the girl in front of me. Absolutely freaked everybody out (turns out it was an employee made up)
I visited Madame Tussaud’s in London and was bitterly disappointed. Some of the reproductions looked fine, but some looked quite bad. I was suprised you could get up really close because at Movieland, they were in these stage dioramas that you looked at but were mostly too far away. Also, I was struck by how much royalty there were–not just from the UK but other European countries (“Boy, they did a great job with the king of Sweden–he looks exactly like that!”). Probably the biggest disappointment was that it was one of the most expensive museums I visited in London–way too pricey for what I actually got.
There used a be a great cheesy chamber of horrors wax museum in Panama City Beach, Florida when I was a kid. Pure tourist trap, the building was even shaped like a haunted castle with a moat. Not very scary from the outside. “Ooo, look a haunted castle, right next to the putt-putt golf course.”
Inside, to my young mind, terrifying: black walls, blind turns, very dark lighting, lots of echoes. Fairly graphic chamber of horrors displays, Grand Guignol-type stuff: people on bloody hooks, iron maidens, the rack, etc. The looks of agony on the dummies’ faces was intense; blood was copious and bright, drive-in movie red. The Spanish Inquisition at work, Jack The Ripper caught in the act, the Universal monsters in scenes more suited to 1970’s Euro-horror. A light touch - the Incredible Hulk wearing ballet slippers.
It burned in the early 80s, no idea if they ever rebuilt it. I would have loved to have seen some of the displays post-fire. It could have been a nice Vincent Price moment.
I could never grasp the idea of wax museums. Persephone and I stayed next door to the Madame Tussaud’s in TImes Square.
She kinda wanted to go, but I couldn’t see the point in paying money to see a lot of REALLY BIG candles. Now if they had wicks, and you could blow 'em out on your birthday, I’d be there!
I remember going on a school trip when I was about 8 - we went to a wax museum in Victoria [might have been in Echuca]. Actually, it was a horror wax museum with wax figures being tortured and stuff like that. I had nightmares for months and months after that trip. Good fun…yeah.
I have a complete phobia of statues, particularly wax ones. But even the cheesy shop dummy type completely freak me out. This phobia stems from a time when I was just a girl and my family visited Madame Tussaud’s in London. They had a display telling the story of Sleeping Beauty. Twas all well and good – tableaux of the baptism, the spinning wheel, etc. But then I came across the tableau of the princess asleep – and, to my horror, she was actually breathing! (I imagine they’d fitted some kind of pump in her chest.) Ever since I’ve never been able to get close to a statue for fear it might come alive or – eek! – its chest might rise and fall in the eerie way hers did.
Anybody see the original version of this flick…THE MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSEUM, with Fay Wray and Lionel Atwill, 1932?
That film had a MUCH more grisly “wax figures melting down into grotesque misshapen horrors” scene. The Vincent Price version, they just looked like they were all sweaty.
