“HAIL, EMPRESS!!”
The Throne Room scene from Vegas in Space is a tour dé force of CHEEP GLAMA! Plastic sheets are transformed into crystal alien splendor with Robin Clark’s creative, saturated color lighting. A couple of lava lamps, and a gilded chair on a fun fur stage? Done. Fabulous.
Because the Empress never stands up in the scene, it’s not clear whether the circular piece behind her head is part of her costume or part of the chair. Well, it’ is actually a costume piece…that’s been repurposed as the backrest of the throne.
The piece is the back side of the original cape with a silver foil disc that Ginger wore to the VIS party. There’s a good view of it from the Salmagundi party pictures.
In the film, Ginger’s costume is updated to a darker gown, and with a shoulder piece similar to the Space Force collars. The corners are decorated with rings of green hair matching her headpiece. The metal “breasts” from the original costume are retained.
It’s really a rich and luxurious scene made from almost literally nothing.
I was very excited to see the photos Robin Clark took of the set with the actors posed together. They didn’t turn out well enough to use for publicity, so we hadn’t seen them before.
One of my frustrations is there are not a LOT of great photos of Doris Fish in Vegas in Space, beyond the iconic image seen on the poster and the publicity portraits. The truth is, Doris was so incredibly busy working on every aspect of the film she there doesn’t seem to have been much time or presence of mind to take more photos. There may be more discovered, here’s hoping!
