Move over, Elsa. The hottest entertainers at L.A. kid parties are 'KPop Demon Hunters'

This is read by an automated voice.Please report any issues or inconsistencies here.

For her 6th birthday party in January, Amy Tzagournis’ daughter Hazel wanted special guests: the characters from “KPop Demon Hunters.” Six months prior, while Tzagournis was out of town, her daughter and 4-year-old son had become obsessed.“I came back and all of a sudden they knew every word to the songs,” she says with disbelief.“I was like, ‘Where did this come from?’ It was literally out of nowhere.”So Tzagournis, of Redondo Beach, hired Funky Divas & Dudes, one of the many characters-for-hire companies in the Los Angeles area that had started to offer “KPop Demon Hunters”-inspired performers.

At her birthday party, Hazel and her friends danced to songs from the movie, including “Golden” and “Soda Pop,” alongside the entertainers.“We’ve pretty much been doing nothing but ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ parties,” Dana Marie Lazzareschi, one of the co-owners of Funky Divas & Dudes, says.“Every party we’re doing has been ‘KPop.’ It’s insane.

We’ve had one party that was Broadway-themed and another that was tropical-themed, but other than that, it’s all been ‘KPop’ every single weekend.Sometimes we have five ‘KPop’ parties in one day.” Awards “KPop Demon Hunters” made Oscars history.

The movie’s smash hit, “Golden” became the first kpop song to win original song.Released last June, “KPop Demon Hunters” is a bona fide global sensation, a status that not even Netflix, its distributor, anticipated.By August, when Tzagournis’ daughter first saw it at a friend’s house, the movie about three glamorous K-pop stars doubling as brave warriors to defeat nefarious demons had become Netflix’s most-watched movie ever.

And in March, the musical picked up two Academy Awards, one for best animated feature and another for best original song for “Golden,” an empowering anthem turned chart-topping hit.Nearly hal...