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Step right up for Trailer Trash Barbie, and more

Web posted December 30, 1996

By Jeordan Legon
Knight-Ridder Newspapers

SAN FRANCISCO - Trailer Trash Barbie, with a baby straddling her hip and a cigarette dangling from her lips, didn't unseat her more sedate sibling this Christmas as the best-selling doll in America.

But watch out.

This trashy mutant and a bevy of other bizarre ``Anti-Barbies'' are still selling so fast, the store owner who's turned them into a quirky cottage industry can't keep them in stock.

What is it, you may ask, that makes customers from as far away as London, Australia and South Africa call a little shop in San Francisco to order nose-pierced Big Dyke Barbie, Drag Queen Barbie (Ken in wig and gown) and Hooker Barbie complete with negligee and condom?

Bill Tull, owner of the In-jean-ious store on Castro Street, believes it's rebellion.

``Barbie has always been a symbol of oppression,'' Tull said. ``People find it hilarious to poke fun at this perfect American icon.''

Not everyone finds it all that funny. Not Mattel - the ``real'' Barbie's parent company. Not the Barbie Hall of Fame in Palo Alto, Calif., a Mecca for all those hopelessly devoted to the foot-tall curvy hunk of plastic.

The folks at Mattel, in fact, have sent Tull a written warning asking him to stop selling the dolls in their original boxes, which are retouched with the fake corporate logo ``Motel.'' The company headquarters are closed for the holidays, so nobody at Mattel was around to comment further on the picaresque playthings.

Tull thinks he may still be able to sell the Barbies as long as he takes them out of the boxes. He started carrying the $65 ``anti-Barbies'' in November when a computer graphics designer brought them to his store. That designer, by the way, has been hiding his creative light under a bushel for fear of being sued.

But since Tull began hawking the dolls, the BBC, People magazine and television news stations across the United States have done stories on the naughty symbols of counterculture.

Tull has gotten almost 1,000 orders.

Trailer Trash Barbie, with a quote bubble that says, ``My Daddy Swears I'm the Best Kisser in the County`` and platinum hair showing dark roots, is by far the most popular model.

``The phones haven't stopped ringing,'' he said. ``If I could have filled all of these requests, I would have had a very Barbie Christmas.''

But, down at the Barbie Hall of Fame, Evelyn Burkhalter shudders at the thought of having to explain Carrie Barbie, inspired by Stephen King's thriller, to a child. The doll's prom dress is drenched in blood.

``It's too close to Christmas,'' she said. ``Children are receiving Barbies and for them, she is a wonderful role model.''

Burkhalter, who owns more than 20,000 Barbies, said the alternative dolls will hurt serious collectors by tarnishing the toy's sparkling image.

``It's not what Barbie stands for,'' she said. ``The average household doesn't do the kind of thing that these people have dressed up Barbie to do.''

But other collectors say that the tacky trend is fun.

``A little playful irreverence is good,'' said Sheila Wilding, of Los Gatos, who founded the Barbie Club of San Jose and admits to being ``quite addicted to her.''

Let's keep things in perspective, she adds.

``We get too sensitive,'' says Wilding. ``She is, after all, a toy.''

Wilding's collection of more than 6,000 dolls includes ``Dykes on Bikes'' Barbies, wearing leather chaps, butch haircuts and riding Harley motorcycles. She bought them at a doll show this year.

``They're bad to the bone,'' she said. ``They even have nipples painted on.''

Now, the ``Anti-Barbie'' concept is not exactly new.

Steven Pim - who is in no way connected with Tull - has been playing his own peculiar Barbie dress-up game for about three years. He's even got his own variation on the Trailer Trash Barbie theme (this one's pregnant with a snaggle-toothed Ken doll in tow). His dolls go for about $75 a pop at his Polk Street beauty supply shop, Skin Deep.

At Pim's store, Diane Rees inspected a male doll adorned with a feather boa, pink pumps and tiny falsies to fill out his fabulous blue dress. She said she wouldn't mind if her 8-year-old granddaughter saw what Pim dubs the ``Kendra'' doll.

``It would be good for her, because they reflect real life,'' she said.

Pim's Christmas window depicts a holiday gala in which same-sex and heterosexual couples - portrayed by Ken and Barbie dolls - frolic on the dance floor together. Gumps' window was never like this.

Neighbors and tourists stop by the Polk Street shop regularly to see Pim's elaborate displays, which have included ``Barbassic Park,'' a mini-melodrama in which fierce, sharped-toothed plastic dinosaurs threatened to have Ken and Barbie for lunch.

Pim, a one-time theater major and full-time Barbie enthusiast, said the dolls allow his imagination to run wild. He said gay men and heterosexual women are the biggest customers of his reworked models, which come in drag, with pierced nipples, in leather outfits and pregnant.

``I think a lot of people are sick of the wholesome image of Barbie,'' he said. ``I just want my dolls to represent other aspects of society.''