INSIDE NEW YORK
Cyndi Lauper Weds, Has Fun
by Linda Stasi

Nobody ever accused Cyndi Lauper of doing things the traditional way - yet most girls who just want to have fun, also just want things to be beautiful when they get married.

 

And at 3 o'clock yesterday at the 205-year-old Friends Meeting House at 15th St. and Rutherford Place on Stuyvesant Square, singer Lauper, 38, not only had fun getting married to actor David Thornton, she had a ball.

 

The Friends Meeting House, a Quaker house of worship, has been the scene for many non-traditional wedding ceremonies. Lauper mixed the traditional with the outrageous, the touching and the hilarious.

 

Little Richard, who at one time gave up rock 'n roll to become a minister - and still is one - performed the ceremony. Patti LaBelle sang "A Whiter Shade of Pale," and Cyndi's grandma served as the maid of honor. The vows, written by Lauper, Thornton and the Little Big Man - a/k/a the Rev. Penniman - were quite beautiful, touching and yes, still fun.

 

After the ceremony, which was closed to the news media, the wedding party and guests loaded into a double-decker bus parked outside, then headed downtown to an Italian restaurant on the Lower East Side to, well, have fun.

 

Didn't the neighbors get suspicious seeing a double-decker parked outside the Quaker Meeting house? Hardly - the Meeting House is attached to the Friends Seminary School and buses are a common sight, bringing students back and forth on school trips.

 

Unlike the media circus created by the Liz Taylor/Larry Fortensky wedding, this one was dignified and quiet, with both the guest list and the location kept under wraps. Guests included Pee-wee Herman (Paul Reubens) and "Barton Fink" star John Turturro. The bride chose not to wear a Cyndi kind of outfit, but something more traditional - a white satin bustier party dress in which she looked astonishingly beautiful. Groom Thornton wore a traditional tuxedo.

 

The couple met about two years ago while filming a movie, "Off And Running," that hasn't been released yet. And they certainly were.