Party-Goers Find Asylum to Relive the Warhol Years

The Scene: West Coast premiere and party for “Superstar: The Life and Times of Andy Warhol,” a new Chuck Workman documentary about the enigmatic artist and pop culture guru. Former Warhol-ites, artists and industry types saw the film at the Music Hall in Beverly Hills, then commuted to Asylum, the latest in upscale restaurant/lounge/nightclubs. It benefited the Hollywood Policy Center’s Freedom of Expression Project, combating censorship in the arts and media.

The Buzz: Seeing Warhol’s life and times on celluloid prompted talk about the old days of the various Warhol decades.

Quoted: Said actor David Keith, who spent quality time with the Warhol crowd, “When I watched the movie I felt like, ‘This is what I wasted my time on?’ I came out nauseous because I felt like I just wiped out 20 years of my life by just having a great, blind good time. Then 30 minutes after I had that feeling, I said, ‘That was the best time anybody ever had in their lives .’ So now I feel better. It’s a great dichotomy.”

Who Was There: The Warhol contingent included Holly Woodlawn, Sally Kirkland, Joan Quinn, Shelly Winters and Joe D’Allesandro. Also on hand were director Chuck Workman, exec producer Marilyn Lewis with husband Harry Lewis, co-exec producer Peter Nelson, artist Andre Miripolsky and actors Dana Ashbrook, Justine Bateman, Bud Cort, Donovan Leitch and Ione Skye.

Dress Mode: Pucci-esque minis, vinyl skirts and caterpillar-thick false eyelashes. A few men opted for all-out drag. Mix in some gray suits and you have a crowd that looked like refugees from Central Casting.

Entertainment: A live band played Velvet Underground tunes while male and female go-go dancers worked themselves into a nice sweat in a back room. Faux Andy Warhols wandered the party in a studied daze, wearing white wigs, white makeup, black turtlenecks and Polaroid cameras. Behind a large window the long-gone days of the Factory were acted out in a bizarre tableau. These elements, set in a beautiful new sophisticated club, gave the party an atmosphere of disinfected decadence.