March 31 is National Prom Day, because the internet says so. This year it must be observed with more poignancy than usual, as it seems highly unlikely that the current pandemic-required ban on large events will be lifted in time. So, with some trepidation, Etiquetteer took the Wayback Machine 40 years (!) to 1980, to the one night Etiquetteer attended a real prom. (This also means dropping the pose; this is Robert talking. And I’ll do my best to protect the identity of the other participants. Their stories are theirs to tell, not mine.)
Once prom was a lot more structured and formal, and involved more interaction with Actual Adults. This short film from 1960 will give you an idea.
Fast forward twenty years and you get something a bit more freewheeling. This was my high school sophomore year, which I spent at the hometown parochial school. Prom time came, and our small group of outsiders somehow ended up forming a group of three couples to attend: four graduating seniors, myself, and a freshman.
Many prom rituals remain the same: the emphasis on formal clothes, color-coordinated couples (knowing the color of the girl’s gown can make or break everything), dancing, and professional photographs.
What would I wear? Prom is often the first time a young man wears traditional evening clothes, meaning a tuxedo. The year 1980, unfortunately, was a bad moment for men’s fashion. At least the leisure suit had been supplanted by the three-piece suit thanks to John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever, but The Official Preppy Handbook had not been out long enough to kill polyester. Frills still appeared on tuxedo shirts. I knew my date’s gown would be white with touches of blue (coordinating with the girl’s gown remains a dominant concern to this day*). I waited too long to go to the tux rental place, and you can see what happened in the photo above. At least I was able to avoid a frilled shirt. Father was aghast that it wasn’t black; in any case, the same model turned up on many guys at the prom, in blue, green, tan, and maybe yellow - but not pink.
Notice also the enormous brown disco shoes of the period. This was how I found out that black is the only possibility for a gentleman’s evening clothes. Father was not amused! But at least he lent me some good cufflinks and shirt studs.
One of our group had a driver’s license and a car, and we were rounded up early to go to dinner before the prom. We’d reserved a table in advance at a very popular, happening restaurant in an old granite townhouse, surrounded by old oak trees. Our table was upstairs in what had once been a bedroom. And there we waited, and waited, and waited for our steak dinners. For three hours we waited, and the girls were becoming extremely anxious that we would miss the prom altogether. I know we spent time counting the fringes on someone’s shawl. Even so, I have vague memories of a lot of laughs until the Mideast bombs came.
I had not mentioned the Mideast bombs. The Iranian hostage crisis was dominating the news that year and influenced everything going on. The waiter, to try to make up for our three-hour wait, sent over three small snifters of flaming brandy. The freshman, in a disastrous demonstration of cool, tried to extinguish the flame by putting his palm over it. All he did was crack the snifter . . . all over his steak. Bon appétit!
We bolted through dinner, paid the check, and made it to school in record time. There, in a resplendent cafeteria, we joined a long line of couples waiting for their photos to be taken. Because the official photos are one of the most important prom rituals. The theme, as I recall, was “Stairway to Heaven,” because there was no other theme for a high school prom except “Stairway to Heaven.” I recall that the decor included a rather wobbly spiral staircase made of white cardboard and heavily draped with tinsel. It would have been dangerous to try to get anywhere on that, including Heaven.
Six dances later, and it was time to go. Wait, what?! When you’re traveling with a freshman in the pack, and the freshman’s dad insists he be home by midnight, one does what must be done. I feel sure some speed limits were broken, but after our freshman friend left us, we moved on to what was, for me, the best part of the night: midnight supper. At that time in my life, staying out past midnight was still an exciting rarity.
People in evening clothes eating in greasy spoons in the middle of the night is sort of a cliché left over from Prohibition-era nightclubbing. But the five of us squashing into a booth in our prom finery at the old P*** G**** diner for omelettes remains my happiest memory. That and the toothless crone in the next booth.
I had not mentioned the toothless crone. She was sitting in the next booth nursing a coffee and a cigarette while waiting for her husband the mall security guard to get off his shift at 3:00 AM. Our prom night out fascinated her, and she was eager to share memories of her own prom (I was too discreet to ask how long ago it had been) when she and several others had been arrested for skinnydipping in Lake Ponchartrain. I have vague memories of a lot of laughs, bad fluorescent lighting, greasy breakfast potatoes, and . . . and a lot of laughs. I think we did not stay until 3:00 AM to meet the husband of the toothless crone.
For most people (one hopes) prom night is a night to remember for all the right reasons. If you’re going to prom this year (virtually or in person), I wish you joy, safety (please have a designated driver), and happy memories.
*And speaking of which, young ladies, your prom gown should be chosen to help you stand out for the right reasons. The late Edith Head used to say “Fit the dress to the girl, not the girl to the dress!” Learn from the scarlet example of Oscar-winning actress Bette Davis, whose fiery Southern belle in Jezebel willfully wore a red dress to a ball at which all the girls were supposed to wear white. She was completely ostracized by everyone there.