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Anniversary Party

Celebrating 20 years of Alice Cooper's Christmas Pudding — and one couple's passion for helping teens.

Legendary shock rocker Alice Cooper — you know, the one who uses electric chairs and guillotines as props and once famously threw a chicken off the stage — isn't the most likely host of a beloved, family-friendly Christmas show.

But likely or not, Alice Cooper's Christmas Pudding, the holiday-themed variety show created by the longtime Valley resident and his wife, Sheryl, is celebrating its 20th anniversary, marking two decades of bringing top-tier talent to town for a good cause.

This year, the sold-out show on Saturday, December 3 at Celebrity Theatre boasts its typical all-star lineup, including Sammy Hagar, Rob Zombie, Wally Palmar of The Romantics, the Gin Blossoms, Sixwire (who Cooper will perform with), and comedian Jim Breuer. Also on the bill are the winners of Cooper's American Idol-esque youth talent competition, Proof Is in the Pudding. singer Eleeza, band The Darn Kids, and dance troupe Fierce & Fabulous.

The Mission

There's music and fun and merriment for all, but beneath the lighthearted exterior is a serious mission. Proceeds from the Christmas Pudding benefit the work that the Coopers do through their Solid Rock Teen Centers, two facilities in north Phoenix and Mesa that provide free arts programming and safe spaces for young people ages 12 to 20.

The Coopers' interest in helping teens began, as Alice tells it, when he saw "a really awkward drug deal go down with these two 16-year-old kids. I'm sitting in the car and I'm looking over and I'm thinking, how does that kid not know that he might be the best guitar player in town? And the other kid might be the best drummer?"

The couple began the nonprofit Solid Rock Foundation in 1995 with their friend Chuck Savale. The stated mission is to "make an everlasting difference in the lives of teens." At Solid Rock, that happens through music, dance, and art training, talks by people in the entertainment industry, and a place where all are welcome.

The centers give teens a chance to discover what they're good at, Alice says.

"They might try guitar and say, 'eh, I can't do that.' And then they try bass and they can't do that. But all of a sudden, they realize they're a drummer, and they're there every day at 3 o'clock. And once they find what they want to do, they blossom," Cooper adds.

Entertainment professionals drop by to tell the kids what they do, answer questions, and show them ways to break into the industry, from musician to makeup artist and DJ to photographer.

Sheryl says that the musicians who stop (including Rob Halford of Judas Priest, Brian Welch of Korn, and many more) are "forever changed. They've said, 'I had no idea this is what it was. I thought it was just a room. I had no idea it was almost like a mini-Julliard.' They say, 'Count me in anytime you want me.'"

The Coopers are Christians, but are quick to specify that the atmosphere is nonreligious and welcoming to all.

"We said from the very beginning: This has to be free. And it has to be open to every teenager," Alice says. "We don't care if you're Taliban. We don't care who you are. We don't care what your gender is. You are welcome here. We're a Christian nonprofit, but we're not a church. We're just Christian people that say our doors are open to everybody. No one has to learn Bible verses. It's a rock teen center."

About 50 to 100 people visit the center each day from all walks of life. The problems the teenagers face transcend racial or financial categories, Sheryl says.

"There is no such thing as a teen who's not at risk," she says. "I don't care if you come from the wealthiest home in Paradise Valley or you're involved in gang life. There are a lot of really sketchy things out there, and a lot of choices that could result in life-or-death situations."

Alice adds, "It's a much more dangerous world now than it was when I was a teenager... We got busted for beer, we didn't get busted for heroin."

And the stories that they hear are enough to break your heart.

Alice recounts the time a young girl who had been coming to the center for a while wanted to show him a piece of paper. It was her to-do list from a year ago, on a day when her plan was to get up, eat breakfast, go to school, then go to the park to commit suicide. But on her way to the park, she got stopped by a group of kids who invited her to the teen center.

From then on, "she was there every day at 3 o'clock," Alice says. "I said to the board, if 20 years of work results in just Tess not killing herself, this was worth it.

"We're not psychologists," he says. "We don't ask why. We just give them an alternative."

The Show

Because Solid Rock's programs are free to the youth, raising funds is an important part of the Coopers' work.

In 2002, Sheryl says, they decided to put on a Christmas show as a new way to raise money.

"It all started at our kitchen table," she says. "We were flying by the seat of our pants, but between the two of us, we have 80 years of show business experience, and we had done a children's variety show, so we knew how to do a timeline, call cues, technically produce it and call the cues ourselves, and that's what we did."

At its heart, Christmas Pudding is "just a Christmas party," Alice says. "If you had a Christmas party at your house and a piano was there, or you if had amps around, and a lot of musicians were there, they'd all get up and play. Everybody would do something... With this thing here, we said, 'Why don't we put together a variety show, a true variety show?'"

Over the years, huge stars have donated their time and effort to the show, including Styx, The Doors' Robby Krieger, Dee Snider, '"Weird Al" Yankovic, Lita Ford, Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers, Cheech Marin, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, Sebastian Bach, Hollywood Vampires (Cooper's supergroup with Johnny Depp and Joe Perry), and more.

The Coopers delight in putting what may seem like illogical combinations of acts on the bill — Rob Zombie and Pat Boone. Ted Nugent and Glen Campbell.

"I like to put people together that don't belong together. People you'll never see together again. And that's what makes it so unique," Alice says.

The Christmas Pudding shows initially took in about $40,000 per year. Last year's proceeds totaled about $900,000, the best year ever, Alice says. The average is about $450,000 to $500,000, much of it brought in by the silent auction during the event.

Alice Cooper performs at the show with backing band Sixwire, but Sheryl has a different role, he says: The Enforcer, tasked with keeping a bunch of dirty rock 'n' rollers family-friendly.

"Before each show, Sheryl goes in and she says, 'This is a family show, isn't it? It's a Christmas show, it's a family show, so we're not going to drop the F-bomb at all, are we?' And they look at her and go, 'No, Mrs. Cooper.' And it's really kind of cute. They're all these tough guys, but they're like 6-year old kids because The Enforcer is there."

One year, Motley Crue singer Vince Neil was on the bill. "After the concert was over, Vince came running to find me and said, 'I didn't swear once!'" Sheryl says. "It just shows you that they want to be a part of it and they understand that it's not a normal rock concert where you can say anything you want," Alice says. "For one night, you don't have to drop the F-bomb 400 times."

And when the money comes in from the show (and other events such as charity golf tournaments), it allows the Coopers to keep pursuing their passion of making a difference in the lives of teens — even if those youngsters aren't familiar with their benefactor, the Godfather of Shock Rock.

"Every once in a while, I'll come in there on a Wednesday night [for the weekly open mic]," Cooper says. "And the funny thing is, most of these kids have never heard of me. Most of them are sitting there going, 'Who is this guy?' And then they find out, they Google it, and they're like, 'oh cool.'

"They're not coming in because of my name. They're coming in because they've never had an opportunity like this."

(Originally published in Phoenix New Times, December 1st - December 7th, 2022; Volume 53, Number 48)