Season 1 · Episode 10
Drag goddess · Klaus Nomi's partner · Fiorucci stylist
Released 1 Nov 2021 · 1:10:36 as a podcast
Every name, club, book, song, night and look from the interview - 149 references and 514 mentions in this episode. Not a queen, a goddess! Joey goes from a teenage band on Capitol Records and the Groundlings in LA to New York in 1976: styling Jackie Onassis at Fiorucci, meeting Debbie Harry at CBGB and Klaus Nomi in his first week, and singing with David Bowie on Saturday Night Live. Then Club 57, the Andy and Edie show with Ann Magnuson at Danceteria, a movie date with Andy Warhol, dinner with Dalí and Gala, Billie Holiday at the Limelight, Bar d'O, Zumanity and Arias with a Twist - and a Joey bot for the 24th century. Wow!
A sleek black helmet bob with a shaved side, pale make-up and a red satin robe off the shoulders; a lightning-bolt tattoo on his hand
His dark home with art on the walls and bookshelves
Tinfoil and silver balloons
Tinfoil walls, silver balloons and TV monitors
Joey's soul brother from his first week in New York: coffee and cake, Callas and Elvis - then Saturday Night Live with Bowie. Joey looks after his legacy
FashionJoey's make-up made Klaus's high forehead alien
Heard as “Claus / Kaus / Klaus / Kyle's”
Joey arrived in 1976, kissed the sky and said 'New York City, I'm yours'
Heard as “New York / New York City”
Joey came to New York 'to meet God'. They met at Fiorucci, went to the movies (Andy slept through it), and Andy gave Joey one of his wigs
Heard as “Andy / Andy Wall / Andy Warhaw / Andy Warhol”
The guest: drag goddess, singer, performance artist and actor - Klaus Nomi's partner in crime, Bowie's backing singer on Saturday Night Live, Fiorucci's top stylist. Links to his Night Fever episode
Heard as “Hiarius / Joe / Joey / Joey Arias”
Met Joey and Klaus at the Mudd Club, wrote his number in eyeliner on toilet paper, and asked them to sing with him on Saturday Night Live
Heard as “Bowie / David”
Played Edie to Joey's Andy in their Andy and Edie show at Danceteria; booked Club 57's theme nights
Heard as “Ann / Anne”
Joey's 'home' - top stylist, live mannequins in the windows, Andy and Truman walking in
Heard as “Fi Ruchi / Fierucci / Fieruchi / Fioruchi”
Joey was one of the original sixteen
Heard as “Groundlings / Growlings / groundies / groundlings”
Where Joey grew up, sang in church choirs and joined the Groundlings
Heard as “LA / Los Angeles”
The film of his life in the works - opening with a baby stolen near Area 51
Heard as “documentary / film of my life”
Sold his scribbled cards on the street for $20 - Joey bought one eventually
Heard as “Bashki / Basky eye / Basquiat / Basquiet”
Joey's voice - first sung privately as a kid, then at the Limelight in 1986 and at Wigstock
Heard as “Billie Holiday / Billy Hardy / Billy Holiday / Billy Holliday”
Born at Andy Warhol's drag Halloween party - 'Justine, are you for real?'
Heard as “Justine”
A shitty Polish hall under a church that became everyone's hangout - the start of the East Village art explosion
Heard as “Cliff to 7 / Club 57 / club 57 / club seven”
Joey's Bettie Page wig at Bar d'O became a whole look; he met her in LA
FashionJoey's Bettie Page wig (see Mood)
Heard as “Benny Page / Betty Page”
The first one on 38th Street (busted, no liquor licence) and the second on 21st - 'the playground for all of us'
Heard as “Danceteria / Deficitaria”
Co-host
Heard as “Barbado / Brandy / Randy”
Fenton and Randy's company
Heard as “World of Wonder / world of wonder”
Fiorucci's artistic director who put live mannequins in the windows; an art director for Studio 54's opening, Joey says
Heard as “Antonio”
Puppeteer behind Arias with a Twist - Joey had long wanted to be in one of his shows
Heard as “Basel / Basil”
Joey says he never trusted him - and stood up to him when Leigh Bowery was put in a side room
Heard as “Michael Alec / Michael Allen / Michael Dadman / Michael Eilig”
Joey as Andy, Ann as Edie, a Sonny and Cher-style show singing 'I Got You Babe' - Andy said it was better than Broadway
Heard as “Andy Edie Show / Andy Edie show / Andy and Edie show”
Joey thought they were wild kids trying to prove something - then became friends with some
Heard as “club kids”
Joey's six-plus years in Cirque du Soleil's Las Vegas show
Heard as “Cirque d / Zoomanity”
Joey wrote four songs for Zumanity
Heard as “Cirque / Sir Soleil / Soleil”
Future co-founder of Paper; she and Joey drove cross-country to New York in her 'covered wagon' of a truck
Heard as “Kim / Kim Hostrater”
Joey was its first door person; where he and Klaus met Bowie
Heard as “the Mud / the mud”
Doing poetry at Club 57; at Andy's drag party
Heard as “Harrowing / Keith”
With Andy when Joey met him at Fiorucci - both signed autographs to 'Red'
Heard as “Capote / Shuma Capoti / Truman”
Joey had dinner with him and Gala - Dalí broke his grasshopper cocktail with his cane, as Joey tells it
Heard as “Dali / Dottie”
At the Dalí dinner, cutting a man's moustache with big scissors, Joey remembers
Heard as “Gala”
Joey walked in with the Fiorucci crowd on opening night - 'like the Palace of Versailles' - then went three or four times a week
Heard as “54 / Studio 54”
Host; asks about Club 57, Danceteria and Bardot
Heard as “JC James / James St. James”
Co-host
Heard as “Fenton”
The Groundlings told Joey he was 'the new Joey' - with a character called Pee-wee
Heard as “Paul Rubens / Pee Wee”
Six years of Zumanity; and the cross-country stop with Kim
Joey and Basil Twist's show - alien abduction, an acid trip and a Busby Berkeley finale
Heard as “Aries of the Twist / Aries with a twist / puppet show”
Signed Joey's teenage band around 1970
Heard as “Capital Records / Capitol Records”
An art kid who popped into Fiorucci
Joey and Klaus sang backing for Bowie
Heard as “Saturday Night Live / Saturday live”
First lined up for Bowie's Saturday Night Live, before Joey got the call
Heard as “Tony Basel / Tony Basil / Tony Baslow”
Came out of Club 57; also dressed as Andy
Heard as “John Sex / John Sick”
Where the Gen Z kids dress up now
Andy's assistant, the drag queen Ming Vauze - Joey called his number and got Andy
Heard as “Benjamin and Louis / Ming Boss / Ming Vaz”
'Madonna, eat your heart out', as Joey remembers the New York Times line
The song Joey always sings
Heard as “Good May Audi / good morning heartache / good morning hearty”
Where Joey and Ann did the Andy and Edie show in tinfoil and silver balloons
Heard as “Congo Bill”
Tinfoil walls, silver balloons and TV monitors
FashionTinfoil and silver balloons
Heard as “tin foil / tinfoil”
Elvira - Joey knew her when she was the coffee girl at Fiorucci
Heard as “Cassandra / Elvira”
Joey's mentor in LA, who introduced him to Kim and toured New York's clubs with him
Heard as “Bo / Bo Allen”
Joey was cast - then let go on set for not fitting in as a high-school kid
Heard as “in Cary”
Joey sold her stretch jeans at Fiorucci - months later came her own, he says
Heard as “Gloria Vander”
Antonio Lopez put Pat Cleveland and Jerry Hall in the windows to model the look
FashionLive window models
Heard as “New Maticus / live mannequins”
One of the clubs Joey and Bo toured in 1976
Heard as “The toilet / the toilet”
A Bowie costume Joey kept for years
FashionBowie coat
Heard as “keyhole”
Where Joey met Andy for their movie date - Andy's wig peeking over a banana ice-cream sculpture
Heard as “serendipity”
Joey's band at the first Danceteria
Heard as “Strange Party / strange party”
Joey's first Billie Holiday in 1986; and the Club Kids era
Heard as “limelight”
A chiffon gown and a big gardenia, hair pulled back like Lady in Satin
FashionChiffon gown, gardenia
Heard as “chiffon gown / gardenia”
Asked Joey to do 'the Billie Holiday thing' at Wigstock
Heard as “Bunny”
Where Bunny's crowd made Joey love watching drag - and where he saw the Pop Tarts
Heard as “Pyramid / pyramid”
Joey's friend for years; 'the godfather, the saint' of that world
Heard as “Ali Bari / Lee Bowery”
Shopped at Fiorucci
Heard as “Steve Rubel / Steve Rubell”
Joey walked in with the Fiorucci crowd
Heard as “part of the opening / when 54”
Bought Joey's archive - Klaus's childhood art and photos now live there
Heard as “Harvard”
He and Joey were 'ground zero' of Zumanity
Heard as “Mugler”
World of Wonder's film about him - Fenton offers to send Joey a link
Heard as “Vojnorovich”
James: 'Open the pod bay doors, Joey'
Heard as “2001 space / pod bay doors”
One of Joey's films
Fenton calls Joey the Ann Miller of drag - wind him up and watch him go
Where Joey is originally from
The New York girl Joey's early-70s single was about - the first to breakdance on counters, stools and cars, as he tells it
Heard as “Courtney Armel”
Founder of the Groundlings and a friend of Joey's - told him to quit the band and start classes the next day
Joined the Groundlings while Joey was there
People came to see it, the World Trade Center - and Fiorucci, Joey says
Heard as “Empire Stab”
Same
Came into Fiorucci to see what the hip jeans were
Modelled live in Fiorucci's windows
Modelled live in Fiorucci's windows
Blondie filming for German TV in Joey's first week
Heard as “CBG”
Not signed yet when Joey met them
A fedora, aviator sunglasses, a pinstripe Brooks Brothers shirt, chinos and brown loafers
FashionFedora, aviators, pinstripe shirt, chinos
Heard as “pinstripe”
Bowie had just got back from Berlin, where everyone was talking about Klaus
Painting at Club 57
Heard as “Kenny Sharp”
Fenton remembers Andy meeting Basquiat selling postcards in SoHo
Heard as “Warhol's diaries”
Burgundy hair and a striped top - 'Hi, Red'
FashionBurgundy hair, striped top
Heard as “burgundy hair”
Where Joey had dinner with Dalí and Gala
Heard as “palm courtroom”
Joey wants him as artistic director of his documentary
Raved on his episode about Joey's Dalí and Gala and Andy and Edie shows
Heard as “Rudolph”
Joey was one of ten Andys - 'you look more like me than anybody else'
Heard as “for his birthday”
His friend Tony told him to pull his hair back and be elegant, like on this album
Heard as “lady in satin”
Everyone came in drag - the night Justine was born
Heard as “Halloween party”
A Bettie Page wig over his short haircut at Bar d'O
FashionBettie Page wig
Heard as “Betty Page wig”
Joey ended up in it
Heard as “Betty Page's book”
One of the Club Kids Joey became friends with
Heard as “rich eat rich”
Would pop into the Limelight
Heard as “Suzanne”
Joey compares watching the Club Kids to a trip there
Heard as “Natural History Museum”
Where a lot of new nightlife comes from
Part of the East Village community Fenton remembers
Heard as “Sister Dimension”
Studio 54 on opening night
Klaus wanted his life story to open like a Disney fairy-tale pop-up book
Where Joey memorised songs and cried before Arias with a Twist
Its two-page review of Arias with a Twist sold the show out for a year
Heard as “New York Times”
Joey has known Fenton and Randy since they were the Pop Tarts at the Pyramid
Heard as “pop-tarts”
His dark home with art on the walls and bookshelves
FashionA sleek black helmet bob with a shaved side, pale make-up and a red satin robe off the shoulders; a lightning-bolt tattoo on his hand
His home library, with a Buster Crabbe poster
FashionA pink zebra-print shirt over a white T-shirt and teal glasses
His room with 70s sunflower wallpaper and striped curtains
FashionA pink-and-blue striped Breton T-shirt and multicoloured glasses
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