Wise Guy Entertainment

Fashion show raises money for Red Cross, local youth

By Jacob Jackson, Mustang Daily Staff Writer

Putting on a collaborative arts fashion show for course credit may sound daunting to the typical college student. But Sunday, speech communication juniors Ryan Miller, Michelle Kraus, Nicole Mitilsky and Jessica Briggs pulled the feat off with ease.

The foursome used magic, music, comedy, prizes, caricatures and a fashion show to entertain a small audience in Chumash Auditorium and raise about $300 for the American Red Cross and local youth programs in San Luis Obispo County.

Kara Fiess, a speech communications junior, was among those entertained.

“I had to support my fellow speech commies,” she said afterward. “They did a great job. And winning cool prizes didn’t hurt either.”

Fiess won a Kona’s gift certificate and an American flag tank top in a raffle following the show.

The show itself was kick-started by the creative antics of Miller, the show’s master of ceremonies. He opened the event with a magic routine and continued entertaining the audience during intermissions while the fashion show models changed.

“I love entertaining people,” said Miller, who has been doing magic shows for nine years. “We’ve spent over a month putting this together, and it’s been really stressful, but to finally see us pull it off has been very rewarding.”

The show wasn’t the only thing Miller pulled off. The magician’s most impressive trick of the day involved two ropes tied around his neck and a pair of volunteers from the audience. Miller had them stand on either side of him. Each volunteer pulled a rope as hard as they could. The rope appeared to go through Miller’s neck and become one rope out in front of him as the audience cheered.

After Miller finished, the fashion show put on by Krause gave the audience even more to cheer about.

The fashion show was broken down into Cal Poly casual clothing, business attire and “out on the town” fashion.

“It’s three different facets of a Caly Poly student,” Krause said. “The casual clothing ties in Cal Poly gear with a relaxed style that students will feel comfortable wearing. The business attire represents what students will wear when they graduate and go out into the working world. And the ‘out on the town’ fashion is an example of what students wear when they go out on weekends.”

Some of the casual clothing ensembles were a navy Cal Poly sweatshirt with rolled jeans for women and blue jeans with a red Structure shirt and matching red Cal Poly hat for men.

Brian McNary led off the business attire decked out in blue. He modeled navy blue slacks with matching suspenders and a powder blue shirt, along with a checkered blue tie. Afterward, he said he enjoyed the experience.

“Ryan is a friend of mine, and he’s a great guy,” McNary said. “When I heard he was doing this, and that the proceeds were going to charity, I wanted to help out any way I could.”

McNary, like many of the models in the show, is a member of Alpha Kappa Psi, the Cal Poly business fraternity that supports theater on campus.

After the fashion show, the event was concluded by a performance by Cal Poly’s improv group, Smile and Nod. The group entertained the audience with several skits reminiscent of those seen on the TV show “Whose Line is it Anyway?”

“I thought it was really well done,” said Carrie Schwartz, a speech communications sophomore. “But the best thing that comes of all this is it benefits some people in the community who need help the most.”