Mademoiselle, the Great American Fashion Magazine, may turn its entire staff over to the editors of the Lampoon, the Great American Humor Magazine, for an upcoming issue. "It's just going to be incredible," Ibis Michael Frith '63 chirped last night, "we can't afford not to do a good job."
"It's the first time anything like this has ever happened to any college humor magazine," added ex-Ibis John L. Berendt '61. With a circulation of almost 600,000 for the Mademoiselle issue, the Lampoon in she's clothing will be read by more people than any college magazine in history, and double the total number of people who have ever read the 'Poon, he predicted.
Public response to the recent parody of the Saturday Review had been very favorable, Frith said. One day Mademoiselle saw it and decided to ask the 'Poon to do an issue. According to present arrangements, which are not yet final, about six editors will spend their spring vacation in New York working with the Mademoiselle staff.
"We are going to provide the literature, art, and makeup," Frith continued, "and they the models, clothes, and photographers--all facilities." The only restraining stipulation Mademoiselle has thus far imposed is that the Lampoon must use "real models and clothes that fit, in ads that are paid for." "But we can really mess around with the fake ads," Berendt said.
Each Lampoon subscriber will receive the fashion magazine as the last issue of this term. "We'll be having stories poems, and cartoons, like always," Frith promised.
In past years, the Lampoon has always had permission from the magazines it has parodied, but never has it had the opportunity to become another publication. In 1940, for example, its contribution was Lampy's Home Journal, which featured "What Do the Women of America Think About Sex" by Dr. Gustaf Stodge, M.D.
For alleged unpatriotism (a cover depicting the Father of Our Country crossing the Delaware), the 1925 parody of Literary Digest was removed from the newsstands and banned by the Post Office. It eventually sold under the counter for eight dollars a copy.
Elmer Green, janitor of the Bow Street castle, has appeared on the cover of many parodies--Newsweek, Saturday Review, and even Lampy's Home Journal. Whether his kindly but aged face will meet the approval of America's fashion leaders remains to be seen.
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