Wednesday, August 13, 2008


ANGELYNE IS LA

My friend Bitsy in New York sent me this picture of iconic LA gal Angelyne out shopping. For the three of you who are unawares, Angelyne is a local celebrity and has been one since the early 80's when her billboards popped up all over Hollywood. She drives a hot pink Corvette (the latest one apparently an ad trade from a Hollywood Chevy dealer; she's no dummy, that Angelyne), has masses of blonde hair and a girly, breathy little voice and has managed to pop up in the credits to the TV show "Moonlighting" and movies "Earth Girls are Easy" (as a customer at a gas station) and "The Day After Tomorrow" (Look closely, the billboard that pastes the obnoxious TV reporter is her). She lists her age as 44 according to voter records. I am changing mine to 16 then. No visit to LA is really complete without an Angelyne sighting: keep your Britneys and whomever-from-"The Hills", she's the real deal.

I love her, really, she's the quintessence of everything that I love about LA. The frank inability or desire to let age, decorum or even gravity dictate your look. She's all dressed up and ready to fall in love, to quote Divine, and she makes my day go that much faster for that fact. You go, girl!

BTW- Paris Hilton, meet your future self. If your lucky.

Photo: Bitsy

5 comments:

Billy D said...

Hey Tom, I hate to muddle your perfume life with your secular blog life, but I have to tell you that I just tried Borneo 1834 for the first time. Wow.

I'm scared that it has more personality than I do. I don't think I can pull it off--it feels like it's wearing me. However, I know you love it, and it makes me want to meet you even more to experience, in person, the type of man that this is right for. The drydown is actually really lovely, but to get there...wow. And it strikes me as more French than anything else, despite the exotic connotations.

Post script: I also sampled Tubereuse Criminelle and Carnal Flower for the first time. Yes, my life will be incomplete if I do not have a bell jar of the former. Like you, I never thought there would be such a thing as a tuberose I could do, and yet here it is, decked out in rubber and smoking a cigarette. HOT.

Carnal Flower smells like (really expensive) shampoo and suntan lotion to me. It's also quite light, and a little boring. Meh. I expected a lot more.

I think my next non-export trials will be Santal de Mysore and Bois de Violette.

And now, on topic, Angelyne: I remember seeing a mini-documentary on her in the mid nineties, I think on eccentric characters of LA (that guy who played the wacky guitar was in it as well?) and it said she paid for all her billboards by being independently wealthy. I wonder what pays the bills these days...

tmp00 said...

billy- I think I can write that you can pull Borneo off. It's one however that I personally wear in colder weather.

I, in turn would love to get a whiff of TC on you. I find that I don't get enough of the S&M opening and overamp the tuberose.

Carnal Flower was a meh for me, ans sadly was Musc Ravageur. Santal de Mysore is lovely as is the Bois series- I don't remember where you live but if you're near NYC BdeV was I think one of the ones that Bergdorfs had an exclusive on.

Just sayin'

As for what's paying Angelyne's bills, I don't think I want to examine that terribly closely...

Billy D said...

Re: TC

I wish the S&M lasted a lot longer too, but I love how drastically it changes. From rubber to gasoline to bright white tuberose and then gradually into nothing. The greeness of Carnal Flower makes it a little more unisex, but that quickly fades to blah. TC fades to illicit tuberose, and then it just sort of disappears into nothingness, having done it's dance and left you with blue....well, whatever, it left me wanting a bell jar:-)

Can you tell how much I miss the things that smell of Perfume?

tmp00 said...

on me that tuberose is persistent and cutting and lasts well over 24 hours

Always In Style said...

Oh my -- Angelyne is one of things that I really miss about living in L.A.!

Thanks for the blast from the past!