I was recently re-watching this over the weekend, and one of ED Wood's friends who was interviewed stated he took him home one night while Ed was passed out drunk in the passenger seat wearing a Shirley outfit and dirty white shoes. I've never heard of a Shirley outfit before, and also couldn't find it on a Google search, LOL!! No wonder the two young girls ran away.
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"Shirley" was the name of Ed Wood's "drag" alter ego. So a "Shirley outfit" is whatever he put on when he felt like being "Shirley" for a while.
shareActually, the friend says, "A Shirley outfit is a horrible silver lame' dress like from the '50s or '40s." Apparently, it was an actual outfit but I was unable to find a picture of what it may have looked like on the Internet.
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I think you misinterpreted Ed's friend. I believe what he meant was that for Ed Wood a "Shirley outfit" was a horrible silver lamé dress (because that's what he liked to wear when he was being "Shirley"). It is not a generic nickname for a silver lamé dress; it was Ed's friend's nickname for what Ed was wearing as his drag alter ego. Read Rudolph Gray's Ed Wood bio Nightmare of Ecstasy some time.
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