Mon 16 Jul 2007
Princess Bride Theme Party
Posted by Erin under Arts and Culture
[10] Comments
It’s the 20th anniversary of the Princess Bride and you can check out how the cast has aged on ABC News. For previously mentioned reasons, I’m not having people over, but if I were, it would be a good time for a Princess Bride movie-watching theme party.
Decorations: Leading up to the front door, stake a sign that says “fire swamp.” Then line the walk with tiki torches, pools of sand, and fake rats. Inside, small vases of yellow flowers the color of buttercups, after princess buttercup. If you want to get fancy, go for a mix of pirate plates and plates with flowers on them. The tablecloth could be butcher paper or vinyl on which you draw a simple map of the kingdom, including the castle, the Pit of Despair, the forest, the fire swamp, the cliffs of insanity, the sea where the Dread Pirate Roberts roams, and the farm.
Food: Serve Iocane Powder Punch in plastic goblets. Any punch mix will do; it’s the name that makes it. It might be fun, depending on the crowd, to selectively add food coloring to some of the goblets’ contents so a few people with stained mouths turn up “poisoned.” Then you’d also have to have “Ressurection” Chocolate Truffles, round ones that look like the medicine Miracle Max used to revive the mostly-dead Westley. Also, since it’s movie time, popcorn, but maybe do something out of the ordinary with it. Add bowls of peanuts scattered around with signs that say, “No more rhymes now, I mean it! Anybody want a peanut?” Some salted, some candied, some otherwise flavored. If you want more substantial food, add items from the wedding feast (in the room where Inigo Montoya confronts the six-fingered man), including roasted chicken, grapes, and a wedding cake.
Activities: Watch the movie, of course. If your friends are diehard fans, you could turn the sound off for specific scenes and have a contest to see who can quote it best. “Spot the goofs” could be fun too. You could also do a Princess Bride Trivia Quiz, with a T-Shirt or Messenger Bag as a prize. You could optionally make it a costume party, though I find that most guests resent being asked to go to the trouble of finding costumes. But maybe that’s just my group of friends.
Man, it’s too bad you’re not having parties for the aforementioned reasons – I’d totally go to this one.
Y’know, if I lived in AZ.
Geeez, Erin. As usual, you are too awesome. I am honored to know you.
I don’t think I’d need the sound on at all, actually. Scary. We could just assign ourselves parts and act it all out.
Not to one-up you or anything, but I actually had a party like this in 2002. I made banners and hung them all over the house with PB quotes on them (my personal favorite: “Life is pain, Highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something.”) My guests all wore costumes (we had an ROUS, a Dread Pirate Roberts, a Westley, a Miracle Max, a Buttercup, an albino and someone dressed up like the Fred Savage character, among others).
We turned the movie into a Rocky Horror-style audience participation activity. Examples: during the Andre the Giant boulder fight, we threw popcorn balls at each other. During sword fighting scenes, we all held up toothpicks and yelled “on guard!” During the rolling down the hill scene, we all had pieces of bubble wrap which we popped for bone-popping sound effects. It was FUN!
Viva La Princess Bride!
This is so a chick thing…lol.
heather, YOU could have that party, and maybe I would come.
kate, i think I accidentally steal my best party ideas (see sarah’s comment and my reply)
sarah, now that you mention it, i remember your talking about that party. my other big theme party, the Bridesmaids Dress party,was also accidentally stolen from another friend.
john, you must take into account that 96.7% of the people who post comments on my blog are women, regardless of topic. What manly man would NOT want to drink out of a scary-looking goblet?
Good night, good work, sleep well. I’ll most likely kill you in the morning.
Oh, wow!! What fun that would be. If I didn’t have to wear a costume, that is.
You’re right…. must be your group of friends.
I have *loved* this movie for the whole 20 years. I first saw it the summer of ’87, when I turned 14, and I was babysitting my two younger cousins. They both hated it. I was enraptured. I have seen the movie countless times (more than 50). Like Kate, I could probably play any role from memory.
My sister thought I named my youngest son based on my love for TPB, and I told her, “No, that Westley has a ‘t’ in his name.” She didn’t believe me at first, then couldn’t believe that I would know how his name was spelled. Credits, dear sis. Or IMDB.com
Nice blog. I really enjoy reading it.
That’s awesome. Almost inspires me to get off my plain and get moving too.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, for this advice!! My graduation part is themed as this movie. And I really needed Ideas. They were GREAT
Wendy, congrats on your graduation! Have fun at your party!