Who says just because you’ve passed on to “the other side” that you can’t dine in luxury?
Join these legendary ladies of Hollywood’s most spine-tingling, edge-of-your-seat, wet-your-pants movies for a ghoulish yet stylish midnight supper. They’re just dying to have you for dinner…literally!!! Among the once shining stars on the guest list: Carrie White (Carrie, 1976), Regan Macneil (The Exorcist, 1973), Annie Wilkes (Misery, 1990), Kayako Saeki (The Grudge, 2004; The Grudge II, 2006 and The Grudge III, 2009), Baby Jane Hudson and Blanche Hudson (Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, 1962), Peyton Flanders (The Hand That Rocks the Cradle, 1992), Norma Desmond (Sunset Boulevard, 1950), and the elusive Mrs. Bates (Psycho, 1960).
No graveyard soiree for these former stars of stage and screen!
Because mystery men from their Hollywood heydays have fresh flowers delivered to their graves each week, there are plenty to decorate the table. Because I learned my lesson from the fiery centerpiece disaster on a windy night last month AND because the ladies get enough real fire in hell (we assume that’s where all these dastardly divas are spending eternity!), I used LED candles all around.
For each special lady, a black napkin folded into the shape of a clutch bag with a carnation embellishment. Of course, nothing but silver and our best crystal will do!
Creepy crawly friends check out the table arrangements.
Two gnarled branches of a manzanita tree grace the center of the table with gleaming silver candlesticks, cut crystal votive holders, and an array of cut crystal vases filled with pink carnations and roses.
Oh, no! There’s a big bloodsucking bat coming toward you and a snake in the branches!!! A couple of the ladies must have brought their agents along!
Ooooh! And there’s a sneaky spider. Another lady must have brought her publicist! The mouse is surely her long-suffering but faithful assistant!
Carrie is present in the form of a skull, still wearing her prized prom queen tiara. The bloody “brains & spinal tissue” oozing from her neck is fashioned from fresh red cockscomb (celosia argentea, also often referred to as Brain Celosia.)
Hey! How did this guy from “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids” crash the party???
The view from Carrie’s seat of all the candles in pitch darkness.
The view looking up from hell. 🙂 See the eerie full moon above?
Other creepy tablescapes on this site:
Serpents & Skullduggery
Ravenous Raven Graveyard Feast
I always knew this “Eiffel Tower” would come in handy for something! As my globetrotting friends set out on yet another wonderful cross-Atlantic adventure, we said goodbye with a dinner featuring tidbits of decor and cuisine they will likely encounter in “gay Paree!”
This night was a little warm, and that just brought the sweet smell of these pretty posies to the fore. Wonderful! I chose roses and carnations because they are so pretty together, and the variation in the depth of pink in the roses was interesting. Both were clipped within an inch of their little lives to create the mounding effect at the bottom of the tower and to float in the clear oyster votive cups. Stray rose petals helped to fill out the look.
To add just a bit of height and visual interest on the outside of the tower, I arranged the roses and carnations in clear vessels with a just a teensy bit of greenery.
Let me explain/confess something. (Uh-oh…this takes me back about 45 years!) My mother had the entire set with coffee & tea pots, cups, saucers, dessert plates, and ashtrays! (Don’t give me that look! Smoking was perfectly acceptable…even encouraged…by some of Hollywood’s biggest stars “back in the day.”) As a child, much like now, I loved to play house. Despite many admonitions, I decided one day to play with Mom’s Dresden set. The result: the clumsy hands of a 6-year-old were no match for the delicate china. I irreparably broke several pieces of the set, and other pieces – like the pot above – were chipped. When my Mom gave me this fractured but nonetheless loved set a couple of years ago for my own collection, we had a good laugh…quite contrary to her reaction when I ruined it 46 years ago!!!
Tablescapes at Table /Twenty-One 