The last luau: Remembering a special lady, Morristown’s Chef Melody

 

By Kevin Coughlin

Chef Melody loved throwing parties.

And so a few of us headed into an ice storm last week, to throw one last party for her.

Melody McGinley Whitelaw was in a hospice room, unconscious. For 16 months she had fought to recover from a crippling stroke. Now, a second one had laid her low. Life support had been removed.

The end finally came on Tuesday morning at St. Barnabas.  Chef Melody, WOR radio personality and “Caterer to the Stars” at the Main Event in Morristown, was in her late 60s.

One of Morristown’s unique and unforgettable characters, she was a cherished member of the MorristownGreen.com family and a dear friend to me.

Melody seemed to know everyone: The Tea Blender for the Queen of England, Hollywood heart-throbs from her L.A. youth, heroes and villains spanning decades at town hall. She sprinkled names as freely as herbs on one of her Thanksgiving turkeys.

In her heyday, she catered lavish soirees for CEOs, and made special appearances at Macy’s Herald Square and Bloomingdale’s. Every March, she had a booth at A Taste of Morristown.

Melody’s homemade mint-chocolate brownies were hits at countless charity functions. She organized local fundraisers for the St. Baldrick’s Foundation, to fight childhood cancers, and brought free goodies to benefit concerts for Africa Surgery at Assumption Church.

For years, she volunteered on the Morris County St. Patrick’s Parade committee.  She co-founded the Morristown Women in Business shortly before her illness.

‘GOOD, GOOD, GOOD!’

My first impression of Chef Melody was a curious one.

The occasion was an Earth Day celebration at the Thomas Jefferson School in 2008, just months after this website was launched. She rattled off her celebrity-studded résumé, a carefully polished rite of introduction that would bring a smile upon repeated tellings.

From that point forward, no MG gathering felt complete without her.

Cupcake tray in hand, she was there for “Flip-Cam Madness,” a library gala that launched the first of our annual film festivals. Chef Melody attended all six of them, along with our poetry nights, concerts, and arts festivals at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church.

A proud woman, Melody could be short with people who did not accord her the respect she felt was her due.

Once, while hosting a scripting session for MG filmmakers, she upbraided an unsuspecting young director who failed to acknowledge her suggestions: “I’ve been in the film business for 50 years!”

But then, Melody truly was a popcorn-popper of ideas. (She even brought a popcorn machine to the MG Film Fest.)  She loved to brainstorm, and was forever pitching ideas for this website, and ways to promote each other.

“Good, good, good!”  Melody exclaimed when something resonated.

Maybe she sensed a kindred spirit. MG launched just as the economy tanked.  Advertising dollars and swanky catering both dried up.

Over waffles in Melody’s kitchen, we plotted a video series about healthy eating for kids. Our pilot episode was a blast. Melody whipped up a giant salad to teach children: Eat Your Colors.

Video: Salad Days with Chef Melody

Privately, Melody was candid and unsparing in her opinions. More often than not, they were on the mark. She greatly missed her husband, Bob Whitelaw, who died in January 2013 from stroke complications that eerily presaged her own. She adored her son, Shay Sowden, from a previous marriage.

Kind-hearted and generous, Melody inspired loyalty among her intimates.

When a stroke sidelined her in October 2013 — just weeks before a huge Super Bowl party, which she had hoped would kick off better times — friends rallied to cater the affair for her.

Melody was a great comfort to me after my mother died in 2012. At a ceremony to accept an arts award, I headed to the podium doubtful of getting through my speech. Melody–who often spoke fondly of her UCLA cheerleading days– led a cheering section from the back of the hall, whooping and hollering encouragement.

In such moments, I saw flashes of my late grandmother, gregarious and young-at-heart, rooting unabashedly at my youth hockey games.

Even as the universe conspired against her — with partial paralysis, and a bleak odyssey through two hospitals, one rehab center and three nursing homes  — Melody  always inquired how my father was doing without mom.

And she never lost her wit. After last year’s St. Patrick’s parade, she regaled a roomful of visitors to her nursing home with an off-color joke — just to show she still was sharp.

But her parties at the Yellow House stand out most.

Remembering Melody: Please click icon below for captions.

HAWAIIAN SHORES

The Yellow House, which was sold last December, is a barn of a place on Washington Street that had been home to Melody’s Main Event catering business.

Years ago, unbeknownst to her at the time, tenants operated their own catering service. Authorities shut down ladies suspected of selling more than vitamins to men who came knocking.

Party guests never tired of hearing that story at the Yellow House, a magnet for offbeat stories and personalities.

“What an eccentric bunch of friends we have!” Melody, self-styled “hostess with the most-est,” observed with glee after one holiday gathering. (Present company was included in the equation.)

At the Yellow House you might find rabbis playing Christmas carols on flutes, and pastors debating atheism with Russian artists.

There were guys in kilts crooning cowboy tunes… karaoke tributes to Davy Jones… champion bird whistlers… people in authentic Colonial garb and cheesy George Washington costumes… employees laid off by the unemployment office…  the UCLA fight song…gossip from Tinseltown.

The list goes on. Until…

…a wintry night in February 2015.

We sidled near Melody’s hospital bed, to sing with all the off-key gusto we could muster.

Our costumes were bright yellow tee shirts from the 2013 MG Film Fest. Melody had choreographed that Hawaiian-themed evening, right down to the leis and beach umbrellas.

Video: Melody choreographs our indoor beach party

Out came my ukulele, and we butchered a couple of Hawaiian tunes. Melody would have cackled in sunnier times.

We closed more solemnly, with Amazing Grace, all eight verses, with harmonica at the end.

And then something remarkable happened. Melody’s glassy eyes flickered open.

As we drew closer, her eyes followed each of us as we said goodbye.

Chef Melody was a battler, a brave lady with an incredibly strong will to live. For 16 painful months, she kept going by dreaming that one day she would recover, and retire to Hawaii.

She promised to invite us for the most gloriously eccentric party of all time.

Count me in, Mel. We’ll get those songs right.

Aloha Oe.

NOTE: We will share funeral details as they become available.

MORE ABOUT CHEF MELODY