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Frequenting parties at Stoudemire’s West Village penthouse, Anavim met art collectors and celebrities — new clients. Before long he had stopped his graphic design work to focus solely on mixed-media art. The dozens of paintings on Anavim’s apartment walls convey the Jojo worldview. Blond women blow pink chewing gum into gleaming juicy bubbles. A rainbow-colored astronaut floats above the Paramount Pictures logo. Coca-Cola bottles, Marlboro cigarette packages and Marilyn Monroe are recurring images.
In 2012, he hired Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin impersonators for a party to celebrate the Clippers' playoff berth. The Marilyn impersonator tried and failed to coax Blake Griffin and Chris Paul up on stage with her before seductively serenading then-coach Vinny Del Negro while everyone in the room watched. "It was awkward, to put it nicely," Griffin says. "Vinny ended up biting the bullet for us there."
Again, you have to remember the context: Attitudes toward homosexuality, in particular, have come a long way in 16 years, and back then the notion that a mainstream athlete such as Rodman would roll up to gay bars and share tables with transvestites and transsexuals (including a particularly hot Marilyn Monroe lookalike named Mimi with whom I once danced at Chicago’s Manhole) and proclaim that, “if I ever did love another man, I’d find one just like me and love the [expletive] out of him; it’d be like two bulls going at it, bro, I’ll tell you that” was considered unthinkable until the Worm broke the mold. And guess what? The “freaks” treated him like royalty. Gay men adored him like he was the love child of Judy Garland and Barbra Streisand. And the women – oh, my. So many ladies brought out their freaky sides in his presence that he literally turned down more kinky activities than most celebrities partake in (and no, Charlie Sheen, I’m not counting you). Yes, that sometimes made Rodman happy. But what brought him the most pleasure, I believe, were the people who came up to him and said, sometimes tearfully, “I was afraid to show people the real me, until you inspired me.”
The Lakers star and five-time champion will become the first athlete to have his hand and foot imprinted at Grauman's Chinese Theater on Feb. 19, it was announced Thursday. "To be a part of such elite company is a tremendous honor. I'm proud to be the first athlete to be recognized," Bryant said in a statement. Bryant will join actors Marilyn Monroe, Brad Pitt, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Will Smith, Harrison Ford and John Wayne on Hollywood Boulevard.
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