From flash mobs to creative costumes, the Beaux Arts Ball Saturday night danced its way into history.
Where else but Provincetown would a Happy Meal hook up with Frida Kahlo and Dolly Parton slide by Superman? Where else would a guy who spent summers on the Lower Cape throw a party that links old Provincetown to new Provincetown?
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"Thank Robert Duffy," event planner Bryan Rafanelli said about the president of Marc Jacobs International and underwriter of a costume ball for 900-plus guests in Provincetown's elegant town hall. Rafanelli planned Chelsea Clinton's wedding.
Some say the party cost exceeded $100,000, considering the special concert by Deborah Harry of Blondie, open bars, free appetizers, music with live disc jockeys, including one imported from New York City, and a coat check on a rainy night.
It also included an equally mobbed children's party in a tent earlier in the day. The ball's tickets, just $25 each, sold out in minutes Oct. 1 and 3, to sponsors' surprise and the disappointment of many.
"This is so cool," guest after guest said, eyeing the hawser-draped banisters and balconies, the frosty blue light spotlights in the ballroom, the intimate draped tables and candlelit lanterns everywhere.
Two flash mobs performing to Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and "Boogie Nights" delighted early arrivals in front of town hall. Screaming ghouls of "Thriller" did a reprise on the dance floor. "Fun, fun, fun is what tonight is about," said "Boogie Nights" mob producer Kathy Cote of Provincetown.
Her sister, Barbara Matera, choreographed the flash mob on Commercial Street performed by about 70 volunteers covered with plastic raincoats in the driving rain and wind.
Many didn't have tickets but watched and cheered as guests arrived.
Singer Harry, dressed in a red skirt and black cutaway, thrilled the audience with the classic "One Way or Another," and "Mother" from her new album, "Panic of Girls."
"This is fantastic," Jason Tranchida of Providence, R.I., said, dressed as a French courtesan for the evening. "This space is amazing and it's amazing when people dress up for costume parties."
The costume ball celebrated the recently completed renovation of the 1886 town hall. Once a dilapidated white building with an interior balcony too dangerous to use, the elegant building was restored over two years to its former glory and is now used for town offices, meetings and concerts.
A 1916 photo of a costume ball helped architects discover the auditorium's original features, such as its chandelier.
The photo also inspired Town Manager Sharon Lynn to bring the town's historical roots into this century by reviving the town's traditions of costume balls in the auditorium. A matching photo will record the 2011 costume ball, said Rafanelli, dressed as a Portuguese fisherman.
From 1915 into the early 1950s, costume balls featured the creativity and artistry of many of its residents and visitors. Americana painter Norman Rockwell was a judge of costumes in 1947.
This year's ball promised to explode into an unforgettable cultural moment with Duffy's backing. Commercial Street was blocked off around Town Hall. Rental trucks were parked everywhere in town.
"These things may happen in L.A., New York or Boston, but in Provincetown?" Rafanelli said, himself a part-time Provincetown resident. "This is historic, that's what it is."
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