- published: 22 Oct 2015
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James St. James (born James Clark August 1, 1966) is an American television personality, author, celebutante and former Club Kid of the Manhattan club scene in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
James St. James was notorious for a lifestyle of excess that included heavy drug use, partying, and bizarre costumes that first brought him to national attention as the subject of Club Kids television appearances and interviews. He wrote Disco Bloodbath (now published under the title Party Monster) that was later made into the feature film Party Monster starring Macaulay Culkin as Michael Alig and Seth Green as St. James. His life was the subject of the 1998 documentary Party Monster: The Shockumentary.
James grew up in a "well-to-do" family in Saginaw, Michigan where he lived with his mother after his parents divorced. In the summer he would stay with his father in Fort Lauderdale, Florida until he moved to Fort Lauderdale for high school. After reading Andy Warhol’s book, Popism: The Warhol Sixties St. James moved to New York in 1984, where he studied performance art at New York University for two years before being absorbed into New York's club scene. St. James lived a celebutante lifestyle after becoming a close friend of nightlife icon and columnist Michael Musto.