From: trayburn@Dekalb.Net
Date: Sat, 05 Apr 1997 09:37:26 -0600
Subject: Night Of A Thousand Stars

STELLAR QUEER EVENT IN RURAL TENNESSEE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
For More Information:  Contact IDA 615-597-4409  P.O. Box 874
Smithville, TN 37166   trayburn@dekalb.net

Send in the gowns.  Night Of A Thousand Stars, a multimedia event of
stars real and imagined, will take place under the the stars at IDA (a
queer arts commune in Tennessee) on May 10, 1997.  Night Of A Thousand
Stars is a celebration of arts to promote AIDS awareness in rural
communities.   The gayla event benefits IDA and Circle of Friends, a
local AIDS support group.

Night Of A Thousand Stars is a feast of culinary delights from IDA's
organic gardens.  Night Of A Thousand Stars is a game where the
partygoers are the stars and the stars are the game pieces.  The
gigantic game board spans a few acres of forest, flowers, and faerie
funhouses.  Night Of A Thousand Stars is a film in progress where
partygoers will dress up and shine in IDA's homo hollow for celluloid
immortality.

IDA--Idyll Dandy Arts--is the 243 acre home of the annual Artland
festival of queer creativity and the Eggplant Faerie Players theatre
troupe.  IDA is also the home of SPREE--a star livid with AIDS.  Night
Of A Thousand Stars fulfills SPREE's dream to affirm a community's
creative responses to AIDS/HIV.  On the eve of the anniversary of
SPREE's hospitalization, Night Of A Thousand Stars is SPREE's gift of a
stellar party raising above the not-so-shiny buckle of the bible belt. 
In addition, the party is SPREE's thank you for all the support he's
received in an area where glamorous AIDS attention and services have not
yet penetrated.

Partygoers will attend as the stars they are or dress as their favorite
star.  The festivities begin at 4:00 p.m. on May 10.  The public is
invited to camp out for the weekend in a tent or a barn at IDA.  Grab
your outfits and accessories; go two spaces forward to IDA's new and
improved otherworldly Barbie runway; go five squares to the right past
the pottery pole in the croquet field; stop at the pink bathtub full of
flowers and get your checkbook out.  Give as much as you can.  No one
will be turned away for lack of funds.
        
For more information, directions, and reservations, call IDA (615)
597-4409, or write IDA, PO Box 874, Smithville, TN, 37166, or e-mail
trayburn@dekalb.net.  

______________________________________________________________________________

The media is invited to observe and take part in the festivities. 
Please call MaxZine at IDA if you need a press kit and press pass.