After 17 years of being on the road, the party is finally coming to an end. Dixie Longate, the friendly Tupperware lady who hosts get-togethers to tout the well-known food storage necessity, is offering Houstonians one last hurrah during her hilarious show, Dixie’s Tupperware Party, before she bids adieu to the production.
Written and performed by Kris Andersson (Dixie Longgate is a stage name) and directed by Patrick Richwood, the comedy runs through April 20 at The Gordy at Stages.
While most people associate Tupperware parties as a woman’s activity, Longate says that is not so.
“A lot of people look at it, they might think it’s a party that’s for ladies, but it’s not,” she said. “The show is for everybody who wants to giggle, everybody who wants to be lifted up a little bit and everybody who wants to walk out of the theater having a big old smile on their faces. That’s who it’s for.”
Her parties contain a motivating message of empowerment, with a sprinkling of crowd interaction.
“It’s a Tupperware party on stage with games and prizes, and I get people up to help me and everything, but it’s got a real nice underlying message about empowerment, seeing yourself as better than you are and recognizing the strengths that you have in yourself,” Longate said. “It lifts everybody up. You walk out of the show saying, ‘Oh, I had fun, and I was giggling, but at the same time, I kind of feel like I can take on the world.’ So that’s the whole message behind it.”
Part of that empowerment message comes from Tupperware’s origin story, which Dixie knows by chapter and verse.
“There’s a man named Earl Tupper who created Tupperware [in the 1940s.] That’s where the brand name comes from,” she said. “He made it and put it on store shelves, and it was the first plastic bowl, so nobody really knew what it was. Nobody really understood how that airtight, liquid-tight seal worked.”
It was a whole new concept back then, but once a woman named Brownie Wise entered the scene, the plot thickened. She was the one who found it sold at the local store, and inspiration struck when she thought about demonstrating the products so people would understand what they are.
“She came up with the idea of directly demonstrating them by taking into people’s homes and showing them what the products can do,” Longate said. “They were selling so much. She was literally getting them from the store and reselling them. Because of that, the manufacturer wanted to know why all these bowls in this small, little area of Michigan were selling so well.”
The response they found was that Wise kept selling them individually during her demonstrations, so the company brought her in to explain her secret to success. Thankfully for Tupperware, Wise agreed.
“She’s said, ‘Well, this is the party plan. This is what I’m putting together, and I think this is really what you need to do to sell it.’ They ended up making her the vice president of Tupperware, and she created the entire party system,” Longate said.
During all the years of hosting parties, Dixie learned a lot of creative uses for everyone’s favorite plastic kitchenware.
“I have this great little thing that people use to take cakes and cupcakes places,” she said. “I put jello shots right on inside of it, and on a Sunday morning, I will take my jello shots into church with me and serve them up for Jesus and for everybody else. It’s always nice, you know? It just makes the sermon go a little bit faster.”
She’s also witnessed the versatility of the products.
“One of my favorite things ever — there was a bowl called the fix and mix bowl that has been around forever. Everybody recognizes it. Everybody had it when they were kids,” she said. “People will say to me all the time, ‘Oh, that was a bowl we used to throw up in every time we would get sick. Mama would go and get the throw up bowl and put it in front of us, because it was big enough to catch the throw up.”
Toss your cookies, clean the bowl, and then later on toss a salad — all with one item!
Dixie’s familiarity with the ins-and-outs of Tupperware began long before she launched Dixie’s Tupperware Party.
“I’ve been selling Tupperware since 2001, so the first year that I went to the Jubilee, which is our big convention, I saw these people being recognized, getting up on stage and being celebrated for who they are and all they’re doing,” she said. “I wanted to do that. I want to be on stage. I want to be recognized. So, I really put my weight behind it, and I did as many parties as I could, and I really came up the ranks. I ended up being the No. 1 seller of Tupperware in the United States and Canada.”
She compares the Jubilee to the Academy Awards of plastics, but there is nothing plastic about Dixie’s heart. She genuinely enjoys the audiences and sticks around after the show to greet guests.
She said, “I’ll be out in the lobby at the end of the show, so come give me a hug!”
Stages presents Dixie’s Tupperware Party at 7 :30 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday; and 2:30 p.m. Thursday, Saturday and Sunday on the Sterling Stage at The Gordy, 800 Rosine. For more information, call 713-527-0123 or visit stageshouston.com. $39-$109.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2025.
