STAR
DELI

“…one of America’s finest
carryout-only delicatessens!
Star’s reputation
has never wavered!”

arts&life

— Danny Raskin

COMPARE OUR LOW PRICES WITH ANY DELICATESSEN IN TOWN!

MEAT TRAY

DAIRY TRAY

SALAD TRAY

$11.99 per
person

person
$22.99 per

$12.99 per
person

SALAD TRAY W/ LOX & CREAM CHEESE

$16.99

per
person

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)0634.0/4"5".1.t46/".1.

24555 W. 12 MILE ROAD

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248-352-7377

www.stardeli.net

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$ 5

continued from page 41

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On Star’s beautiful already
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Expires 5/17/18. One Per Order. Not Good Holidays.
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42

May 10 • 2018

jn

that song,” she says. “I had a friend
who played piano, and we wrote it
down together.”
She soon had a handful of her
own songs, which she showed to
her boss — who then took them
to producer Clive Davis. She got a
deal and put out her only album,
Childstar, which featured the first
10 songs she ever wrote, and which
she sang on.
Bette Midler was a fan of the
album and did a song for her own
show. Willis happened to meet
Bonnie Raitt in a studio, who asked
Willis to write a song for her.
“That’s when I realized I liked
being in the background,” Willis
says. “And that what I really loved
was writing.”
She moved to L.A., wrote some
songs for Patti LaBelle, worked with
Herbie Hancock, which then led to
Earth, Wind & Fire. “I had a friend
who was sleeping with one of the
members of the band,” she says.
“Then the whole thing exploded.
In the beginning of 1978, I was on
food stamps and by the end I’d sold
10 million records,” she says. “I was
still on food stamps because the
money hadn’t actually come in yet.
But it feels very different being on
food stamps knowing you’ve sold 10
million records.
“It all happened very fast for me,”
Willis says. “And I began to feel like
I was writing the same song over
and over.
“I really do feel it’s up to you to
make the life you want to live, given
you have your health,” she says. “If
you want to change it, get up off
you’re a— and change it.”
To express other aspects of her
multi-leveled creativity, Willis
began to paint, create sets, even

direct videos. She had begun col-
lecting discarded furniture years
earlier, which eventually trans-
formed her Valley Village, Calif.,
home into what’s become known as
the Museum of Kitsch — a brightly
colored palace containing an explo-
sion of items she thinks an artist
created with a vision, but might not
have been appreciated by others,
like a transistor radio in the shape
of an owl, Farrah Fawcett Shampoo,
a Mr. T bobblehead and unopened
Afro combs.
It also includes Jewish memo-
rabilia — though she dropped out
of Hebrew school, her grandfather
was an Orthodox rabbi in Detroit,
named Solomon Shulman. And, she
says, “I can understand some things
in Yiddish. I feel Jewish. I talk about
being Jewish. It’s part of who I am.”
Willis spent years, pre-Facebook
and eBay, working to build an
online social-media community
with online stores, with then-CEO
of her prototype, Mark Cuban.
And she began to throw parties.
David Cassidy, Paul “Pee Wee
Herman” Reubens, Buck Henry and
longtime friend Lesley Ann Warren
were regulars. James Brown sang an
impromptu tribute to her dog, Orbit.
“Throwing parties is what I con-
sider my No. 1 skill,” Willis says.
“I’m a multi-media artist — I use
all areas of art. And the only place
I can express them all in one space
is a party. It became a means of
expression.
“I’d design invitations, build
sets. I’d be on the mic the whole
time, narrating one conversation
for people on the other side of the
room. I’d tell people they are enter-
ing Willis Wonderland.”
But Detroit still had hold of her