When, at the close of a recent Monday night show, Arsenio Hall invited his audience ”next door to `The Party Machine,` ” the star-hostess of that new late-night dance party was nowhere to be found.
”I was in my pajamas, eating popcorn in front of the TV,” says Nia Peeples. There was no glitzy ”Party Machine” premiere party for the leggy brunette who, for almost a year up to and including New Year`s Eve, had hosted an MTV ”Friday Night Street Party” in practically every city in the country. She gave it up, she says, because ”I wanted to concentrate on `The Party Machine.` We`re shooting 26 weeks of shows, six a week. We`ve put the `Street Party` on hiatus, and after March, we`ll see how things look.
”I`ve had a relationship, a good relationship, with MTV for a long time, and I`d like to maintain that.”
She and Hall had been little more than nodding acquaintances-”I think I`d met him one time; my husband (recording artist Howard Hewett) knew him better than I,” she says-before Hall approached her with the idea for the syndicated ”Party Machine” (2:15 a.m. weeknights, WBBM-Ch. 2).
”I was so impressed with the research he had done, just impressed with him as a businessman. He had a TV commitment from Paramount and an idea of something he wanted to do,” namely an after-party for his nightly show.
And despite comparisons to everything from ”Club MTV” to ”Soul Train” to ”American Bandstand,” ”The Party Machine,” Peeples says, is different enough to stand out among what seem to be growing numbers of such shows.
”I`m really more involved than I think other hosts are who are set apart from the guests and just read cue cards and introduce videos.
”I hang out with the kids and have a good time with the guests and the dancers. And judging from the segments we`ve taped so far, the guests are enjoying it, too.”
And the dancers are more than hired help. Says Peeples: ”We go out to the clubs and actually hand out invitations to people who look like they`re having a good time. They come to `The Party Machine` to dance because they love to dance.
”Boy, do they love to dance,” she says.
And like its progenitors, ”Party Machine” is a cultural event, a place to be seen, a veritable showcase of street couture.
”The people I`ve seen are teaching me things,” Peeples says. ”I`ve seen everything from guys with green hair and things that look like they`re branded into the sides of their heads to women wearing G-strings.
”This past weekend,” she says, ”we had more than 300 people on the set. All of them were dancing, and it got incredibly hot in there.”
Nevertheless, the ”cast,” perfectly turned out in bomber jackets and caps, danced with every inch of leather in place. ”They wouldn`t have dreamed of taking it off,” Peeples says.
She can understand that kind of image consciousness.
”When I was younger, before I was married and had children, I really was nit-picky, a perfectionist. I was very much into different people`s approval. I had too much time on my hands, I think.
”When you`re mothering a 1 1/2-year-old boy and two stepdaughters (9 and 11 years old), you have to be at peace with yourself,” she says.
”Whatever happens-for instance, an interview that got all twisted around and everyone was up in arms-I just try to put it in perspective.
”I mean, in a couple of weeks, everyone would have forgotten about that story, but these kids are forever, and I`m affecting their lives.
”I knew that I always wanted a family, but I can honestly say that it`s nothing like I imagined it would be,” she says.
”I have a friend who does everything, travels all over the world, goes everywhere, and he says that no matter where in the world he`s been, it never gets any better than having a child.
”I like that.”
