The Premiere of "Apocalypse Now Redux" (clockwise from top left): Candice Bergen, original film stars Dennis Hopper, and Robert Duvall and director and former Woodside resident Francis Ford Coppola.

photos:  Steve Azzara

Models Of Queens
Bahama Mama

Sherilee has been modeling for 10 years.  That’s why she helped start Shades, an agency that caters to models and actors.

“It’s been a passion to work for myself,” said Sherilee.  She wants to share the knowledge that she has picked up from the entertainment, fashion and music industry, “so that my clients don’t go the through pitfalls I went through.”

Before donning the persona of a president of her own company, Sherilee does personal training at Bally’s in the morning.  Stacked with a six-pack, she is trying to get her toned body down to 10 percent body fat to compete in the Fitness and Figure Championship in August.  Some of her past competitions were held at Queens College.

Sherilee trains every weekday morning from 5:30 to 9 a.m. and likes using free weights.  Although she maintains a strict diet of high protein and low carbs, she admits, “I have my cheating times” and does so with an occasional Hershey’s Kiss. 

So the big question is, can she kick her boyfriends’ asses?

“I can, but I don’t admit that to them,” said Sherilee.

In 1999, Sherilee became Miss Black World NY State. “I wasn’t expecting it. I was pleasantly shocked,” said Sherilee.  The honor gave her career a boost and she also became a spokesman for troubled teens.

At 15, Sherilee moved to the Bronx from the Bahamas when her mother remarried an American.  She didn’t enjoy her first few years because she got teased a lot for her accent.

Her first modeling gigs were at Marist College in Poughkeepsie for student fashion shows. After school, she moved to St. Albans and instantly took a liking to the Caribbean-based community.

“I like the area. It’s quiet. There’s no hustling and bustling like in Manhattan.  It’s a refuge,” said Sherilee. 

She enjoys the #1 Sun restaurant in St. Albans because she can eat healthy there and she works out at the Bally’s on Union Tpke. in Forest Hills.

Sherilee still has a lot to learn about Queens though.  “I went to Flushing Meadows-Corona Park once to meet a friend, but I got lost,” said Sherilee with a giggle.

All In A Name

Operators of the sparkling-new mini-mall that opened recently at the site of the Wendy’s massacre are determined to erase the stigma associated with the site to draw customers at 40-12 Main St. in Flushing.

Operators of individual businesses at the mall told interviewers on opening day that they are certain “people will forget” what happened at the site and that business will increase in short time.

But, based on our own observations, it doesn’t appear likely that people will forget. In fact, a QConfidential reporter on Main Street overheard shoppers on the strip refer to the business as the “Wendy’s Mall.”

The Pony Express Rides Again

    The Pony Express, the memorable mail service to come out of the 1860 American West, boasted the likes of Buffalo Bill Cody and Calamity Jane.  Its primary mission was to deliver mail and news between Missouri and California.

    And now, they have come to Queens! But the Queens postal posse wanted to do something more than just deliver the mail. 

    So, on their two-wheel power-operated ponies, they set out to bring joy to the children.

    Gus Pappaeliou, president of the New York Chapter Pony Express Motorcycle Club, who’s been biking for 20 years, works at the Post Office’s Queens Distribution Center on 20th Avenue.  Although the postal workers club is widespread nationally, Gus is one of the eight members in Queens.

    Their bunkhouse is filled with Christmas toys-for-tots and Thanksgiving turkeys they deliver to St. Mary’s Children’s Hospital in Bayside. They also join with bikers in all 50 states, raising money for missing children. The tally from Queens residents was recently $1,100.

    On March 2 of this year, Pappaeliou and four of his partners said, “Howdy,” when they showed up at the Daytona Beach, Fla. post office with a letter from Flushing.  Then, they took a letter from Daytona Beach back to Flushing. 

            There wasn’t much time for the motor ponies to cool down during the four-day round trip, but the posse did pay tribute to their old friends.

Queens Funnymen Beware

As previously reported in QConfidential, the Stand-Up NY Comedy Club in Manhattan held its annual “Funniest Person in Queens” contest several months ago. This year’s was no different except there was only problem – no one showed up. All but one competitor pulled out.

The one standout standup with  enough courage to face the crowd was the Tribune’s own Richard Schack who took the stage and shamelessly proclaimed himself “The Funniest Person in Queens.” He challenged anyone in the crowd that night to come up to the stage and take him on, but no one did. Until now, that is.

Months after the first contest while he is still basking in the afterglow of his triumph, Schack’s title will be on the line. Stand Up NY will be holding another “Funniest Person in Queens” contest on August 15, and Schack will be taking on all comers.

“They want a piece of me? Well they got it!” exclaimed Schack upon hearing the news of another contest. “Just remember,” he warned. “The last batch of competitors were so afraid of me they withdrew from the contest!”

Somebody, please beat the kid, so we don't have to hear it anymore.

Bannon

Convicted cop killer Patrick Bannon is wrangling his way through the federal court system in a last-ditch effort to overturn his 1993 life sentence in the murder of Housing cop Paul Heidelberger.

Sources close to the case told QConfidential that a federal judge was been asked to rewrite his decision refusing to grant Bannon an appeal.

It seems that Appellate judges in the Second Circuit who read the decision asked for the rewrite – because they felt the judge had not written a lengthy-enough response to Bannon’s request.

The Bell Boulevard murder of Heidelberger and a second man by Bannon, an Elmhurst resident, was dubbed one of the “bloodiest” crimes ever committed on the popular night strip.

Bannon is serving his time at the upstate Clintonville Correctional Facility.

Confidentially New York . . .

E-MAIL your items to: conf@queenstribune.com

Queens NYConfidential is edited by: Michael Schenkler and Tamara Hartman.
Contributors:	Nick Abadjian, Uzo Akujuo, Tom Allon, Steve Azzara, David Colby, Ira Cohen, Marcia Moxam Comrie, Barbara Jarvie, Stephen McGuire, Mike Nussbaum, Dee Richard and Richard Schack.