Victor Arnautoff, Esther Bruton, and the 1936 Parilia Ball

Revelers at the 1938 Parilia Ball
OpenSFHistory / wnp14.3134.jpg
www.opensfhistory.org

The Parilia Ball was one of the most fascinating San Francisco social events of the 1930s. Held for the first time in 1927, it was brought back in 1934 (after the repeal of Prohibition) and celebrated annually until 1939. The ball, which got its name from a pagan spring festival originally celebrated in ancient Rome, was a fundraiser for the San Francisco Art Association. Part pageant and part bacchanalia, the Parilia was one of the wildest and most extravagant parties of the year, incorporating elaborate props, lavish sets, and quirky entertainment. A theme was selected for each year, along with a king and queen to preside over the festivities. On average, hundreds participated in the pageant and thousands attended the event, for which costumes were mandatory. The party started at 9:00 pm, the pageant commenced at 11:00 pm, and dinner was served at 12:30 am. At 5:00 am, the exhausted partiers called it a night and headed for home.

The costumes worn to the Parilia were creative, exotic, and in many cases risque. Newspaper accounts frequently commented on the “bizarre and scanty” outfits worn by attendees.[1] In a 1938 backlash, the organizers insisted that the Parilia was “going in for more modesty, less nudity this year,” although party-goers didn’t get the message and were just as scantily clad as in previous years.[2] With the repeal of Prohibition, the overconsumption of alcohol was inevitable, and the parties frequently got out of control; the day after the 1934 Parilia, the cleanup crew had to “remove a few dozen ‘bodies’ from beneath boxes, behind curtains, and from under tangled decorations.”[3] The 1937 event made the front page of the San Francisco Examiner, when a headline announced “13 injured, 15 jailed in Parilia.”[4] In their defense, party goers complained that the auditorium drinking fountains had been turned off so that the liquor concessions could do more business.[5] The following year, the newspaper reported further debauchery with the headline, “Parilia tame, only 21 drunks land in jail.”[6]

Parilia Ball Feb 25, 1938

Social elite in costume, Palace Hotel

OpenSFHistory / wnp14.3126.jpg

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Esther Bruton had her moment in the sun at the 1936 Cambodian-themed Parilia Ball, which was held in the San Francisco Civic Auditorium. Timothy Pflueger was in charge of the event; having just worked with Esther on the enormously successful Cirque Room (to be discussed in a future blog post), it is no surprise that he selected her as his “Queen Naga.” Pflueger chose another of his favorite artists, Victor Arnautoff, to be king. The San Francisco Examiner managed to misspell both artists’ names when it announced that “Esther Brunton” and “V. Arnatoff” would be the King and Queen of the 1936 Parilia.[7] The error was corrected the following day when the paper printed a photograph of Bruton and Arnautoff in costume.

San Francisco Examiner, 1 Jan. 1936, p. 38.

The 1936 Parilia depicted the “Fall of Angkor Vat” and was perhaps even more elaborate than in previous years. Bruton and Arnautoff rode into the pageant on a life-sized white elephant mannequin and sat on thrones before an enormous green Buddha sculpted by Robert Howard. A cast of more than 800 danced, marched, and performed mysterious ceremonies in front of nearly 9,000 spectators on a stage as wide as a city block.[8] Art critic Junius Cravens called it “one of the most resplendent pageants that has been staged anywhere in our time… adjectives seem inadequate in attempting to describe it.”[9] The costumes were as racy as ever; one reporter quipped that “a twentieth century tourist, unfamiliar with the legends of Indo-China a thousand years ago, might have thought he discovered a Cambodian nudist colony.”[10] Yet the party was one of the biggest society events of the season, attended by San Francisco’s elite as well as minor royalty; Lady Mendl (the former Elsie de Wolfe) and Prince Valdemar of Denmark were both in attendance.

Victor Arnautoff and Esther Bruton, 1936
San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library

The final Parilia was held in 1939. Its theme, “Fantasia Pacifica,” was likely chosen to compliment the “Pageant of the Pacific” theme of the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition (see my blog post about the Fair). The Bruton sisters attended several of the Parilias, and Helen Bruton remembered that they were “one of the most interesting goings on of that decade… they were terrific… The trouble is that they got so rowdy toward the end.”[11] Yet the Parilias of the 1930s were the perfect antidote to a society recently released from Prohibition, yet still struggling through the deprivations of the Depression. What better way to forget your troubles, at least for one night, than to don a racy costume, drink heavily, and escape into an elaborate fantasy world.

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^[1]San Francisco Examiner, 17 Jan. 1936, p. 17.

^[2]San Francisco Examiner, 16 Feb. 1938, p. 34.

^[3]San Francisco Examiner, 21 Jan. 1934, p. 19.

^[4]San Francisco Examiner, 7 Feb. 1937, p. 1.

^[5]San Francisco Examiner, 7 Feb. 1937, p. 3.

^[6]San Francisco Examiner, 27 Feb. 1938, p. 18.

^[7]San Francisco Examiner, 31 Dec. 1935, p. 15.

^[8]“Cambodian Pageant: Artists Ball Colorful and Resplendent.” Architect and Engineer, Feb. 1936, p. 33-35.

^[9]Quoted in “Cambodian Pageant: Artists Ball Colorful and Resplendent.” Architect and Engineer, Feb. 1936, p. 35.

^[10]San Francisco Examiner, 18 Jan. 1936, p. 11.

^[11]Interview, 26 Feb. 1975, p. 16.