EINFACH KOMPLIZIERT
Love Camel and I went to Potsdamer 88 the Forum Expanded site to see the new film installation Blind by Swedish artist Annika Larsson that explores the facility around vision and sightlessness that shows a group of blind footballers on the pitch. This is a challenging piece for me in that blindness is something that i dred.
Later caught up with Baby Diaper Joel Gibb of the Hidden Cameras and grabbed a quick bite to eat at this little Asian fusion place at Potsdamer Platz next door to pasta chain Vapianos. Besides being a talented musician and young man possessing great beauty, the Baby Diaperr can really spin a great yarn and was very compelling in telling us about how a certain cinematographer whose film is in the Panorama Section of the Berlinale had a major freakout or quasi nervous breakdown, became disruptive in the Berlinale offices and his director basically had to get him to thee nunnery fast----as on a quick flight back home. Such is the pressures associated with modern filmmaking. Both Joel Gibb and Lovel Camel seemed to think that the film Bullhead written and directed by Flemish director Michael R. Roskam was compelling, but not as much as its handsome lead actor Mattias Schoenaerts an easy breezy piece of humpy eye candy supreme. I didn’t see this film, but wanted to just because of a picture of its central character with his shirt open displaying an impressive rack and a very large, strong shnozola.
On a side note now that digital filmmaking is the norm can all these technology whizes do something about the numerous gaffes and glitches adherent to the screening of digi helmers? Sorry, vier haben keiner zimmer fur auslander---I was only asking.
Mr. Gibb also enjoyed Miranda July’s sophomore film effort The Future.I was surprised that I liked her debut feature Me and You and Everyone We Know. Ms. July had performed at my 90s club/performance space Sucker at the Garage-the punk rock Sunday afternooon beer bust and t-dance. I'm sorry to relate that a pic featuring a talking kitty cat didn’t really peak my Lesbianic interest so I had to pass on her latest quirkster offering.Tomorrow is a Forum screening of the Argentine film Ausente by Marco Berger whose last feature Plan B was very well received. I’ve heard Mr. Berger’s latest flicker has some nubile young men in it, so of course its going to register well with the Vagimule doll.
But what really had me gushing tears was Marie Losier’s feature film collaboration with Genesis P. Orridge and Lady Jaye called the Ballad of Genesis & Lady Jaye. Only someone with such a playful approach to film and video as Ms. Losier could have produced such thrilling and captivating results. The Pandrogynous couple Genesis and Lady J. Breyer’s very existence was one of whimsy and unshackled exploration. Seeing footage from House of Domination at Jackie 60 of Lady Jaye echoed to me how deep is the loss of such a beguilingly gracious, charming and multifaceted young woman, someone of my generation who made New York such a thrilling place in the 1980s and 90s, and who was part of a scene of fascinating powerful women artists. I’ll never forget how much fun we all had being a part of the Womanizer exhibition at Deitch Projects in Jan, 2007 that was curated by another powerhouse goddess Kembra of the Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black.
I had moved to Berlin In the fall of 2006, and Lady Jaye’s sad passing was Autumnal 2007.
I see a new renaissance for Genesis and Lady J. with this film project.There was such a pre buzz about the film before the Berlinale and now that its been screened I can see a majesty of events unfolding and swirling around those complex and wonderous super beings that are Genesis and Lady Jaye.
All the underground royals were present at the screening with a SRO crowd too numerous and varied to elaborate upon here. Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus of Forum Expanded did an amazing job as moderator of a Q&A after the the screening and in the Arsenal Foyer was a sophisticated champagne reception that not only celebrated Genesis and Lady Jaye but Marie Losier and Irish filmmaking studkin Paul Rowley’s birthday. It was so nice to have some quiet moments with Genesis Breyer P., Miss Stefanie,Trixie Cordua, Nanna Heidenreich, Tim &kJohnny Blue,Uli Ziemons, Daniel”The Muslim” Hendrickson,Morrison Edley of Psychic TV(who was going to be DJing later in the evening at CCCP Club on Rosenthaler Str. Last time I saw Mr. Edley was when he was with Miss Guy and Toilet Boys when they played my ClubSucker at the Garage in Silverlake back in 1997) and film historian Marc Siegel who was the facilitator of a discussion with Genesis after the screening of Ghosts#9 which features footage shot in and around the Beat Hotel in Paris and other Beat Films of Burroughs and Bryan Gysin that film director Derek Jarman helped Gen to identify and Catalogue back in 1980. Later in the festival Gen Breyer P.Orridge, Morrison Edley and Tony Conrad do a concert at the Hebbel Theatre as part of Forum Expanded Stage Saturday Feb 19th at 10pm
Monday, February 14, 2011
SCHAFKRANKHEIT
Running around the Berlinale with Love Camel is riotous. I didn’t know that Camel aka Andrea Novarin has written three books on cinema. Its because of these books that he got hired to work at the British Film Institute. His Dictionary of Italian Cinema 1970-79 in two volumes A-L and M-Z is a must have as well as his other tome Russ Meyers Un Erotomane Incallito, and also a small press edition of a series of essays on Gay Cinema that he edited.
We went to the Delphi to see a color and wide screen offering from Japanese Director Shibuya Minoru-- The Days of Bad Women 1958 which is just hilarious with its Kento appropriation of Hollywood Regency décor. The actor playing the teenage nephew of the male lead is like a Japanese version of John Gavin---- he is just that handsome and hunky. Let me tell you I wanted to rip his clothes off when he makes his appearance halfway through the film.
E-Love is an uber French film directed by Anne Villaceque that benefits from a sterling starring role by lovely Anne Consigny, the sexiest 50 year old ever to grace the screen. Her dalliance with a handsome African man is smoldering, but the love scenes with the Arab Muslim came off as a tad racist and disturbing. Being a woman of a certain age myself I can certainly relate to the main character’s journey of desire and longing.
I had almost forgotten that I am in a documentary about Bruce La Bruce in the Panorama section of the Berlinale called An Advocate for Fagdom by the beautiful French woman Ange’lique Bosio.I share screen time with Susanne Sachsse, Gus Van Sant, John Waters, Harmony Korine, Bruce Benderson, Glenn Belverio, Richard Kern,LA film critic Ernest Hardy and a host of others in this talking heads PBS style documentary film. The After Party at Schwuz was also for Mario Losier who has a documentary that debuts tomorrow called The Ballad of Genesis and Lady J.
Tante Judy LaBruce was DJing at the soiree and I saw a rash of folks having a wonderous time like German experimental film god Wilhelm Hein and his art photog girlfriend Annette Frick, Matt Johnstone who is now a movie publicist, Little Matt changes occupations every quarter, Gian Paolo Marzi of the Milan Gay & Lesbian Festival who has aged so much I didn’t even recognize him, Michael Bryntrup, longtime LaBruce producer Jurgen Brunning, Claudia of the Milan Festival, ‘Fucking Different’ Kiki Peterson, Art Forum writer Travis Jeppeson, Cyril Duval of Idem,Idem, Anna Muelter of HAU, and big peniled Jay Crisfar the star of Otto-Up With Dead People. Sorry if I forgot anyones names but i am writing this at 4:30am and I’m about to pass out on my laptop computer.
Before heading out to the party I saw my favorite Spanish actress Carmen Maura in the French film Service Entrance, the title in the press kit but on screen it was called The Women of the 6th Floor directed by Philippe Le Guay that is set in 1962 and features a nice ensemble cast headed by La Maura who was present at the screening and looked enchanting.
No major gossip this time out at Berlinale, just the same old talk about festival head Deiter Koslick being an out of touch socialite who knows nothing about cinema but got the job because it was thought that he would bring more corporate sponsorships, but actually with him on board the festival has lost sponsors. I am also quite amazed how the various sections of the festival hate each other and don’t cooperate with the Competition area thinking that the festival is all about them and the clout of big name stars they bring to the table, and that the other parts of the Berlinale Festival are just coasting on the Competitions shiny coattails. Pray tell me your opinions on the subject.
Running around the Berlinale with Love Camel is riotous. I didn’t know that Camel aka Andrea Novarin has written three books on cinema. Its because of these books that he got hired to work at the British Film Institute. His Dictionary of Italian Cinema 1970-79 in two volumes A-L and M-Z is a must have as well as his other tome Russ Meyers Un Erotomane Incallito, and also a small press edition of a series of essays on Gay Cinema that he edited.
We went to the Delphi to see a color and wide screen offering from Japanese Director Shibuya Minoru-- The Days of Bad Women 1958 which is just hilarious with its Kento appropriation of Hollywood Regency décor. The actor playing the teenage nephew of the male lead is like a Japanese version of John Gavin---- he is just that handsome and hunky. Let me tell you I wanted to rip his clothes off when he makes his appearance halfway through the film.
E-Love is an uber French film directed by Anne Villaceque that benefits from a sterling starring role by lovely Anne Consigny, the sexiest 50 year old ever to grace the screen. Her dalliance with a handsome African man is smoldering, but the love scenes with the Arab Muslim came off as a tad racist and disturbing. Being a woman of a certain age myself I can certainly relate to the main character’s journey of desire and longing.
I had almost forgotten that I am in a documentary about Bruce La Bruce in the Panorama section of the Berlinale called An Advocate for Fagdom by the beautiful French woman Ange’lique Bosio.I share screen time with Susanne Sachsse, Gus Van Sant, John Waters, Harmony Korine, Bruce Benderson, Glenn Belverio, Richard Kern,LA film critic Ernest Hardy and a host of others in this talking heads PBS style documentary film. The After Party at Schwuz was also for Mario Losier who has a documentary that debuts tomorrow called The Ballad of Genesis and Lady J.
Tante Judy LaBruce was DJing at the soiree and I saw a rash of folks having a wonderous time like German experimental film god Wilhelm Hein and his art photog girlfriend Annette Frick, Matt Johnstone who is now a movie publicist, Little Matt changes occupations every quarter, Gian Paolo Marzi of the Milan Gay & Lesbian Festival who has aged so much I didn’t even recognize him, Michael Bryntrup, longtime LaBruce producer Jurgen Brunning, Claudia of the Milan Festival, ‘Fucking Different’ Kiki Peterson, Art Forum writer Travis Jeppeson, Cyril Duval of Idem,Idem, Anna Muelter of HAU, and big peniled Jay Crisfar the star of Otto-Up With Dead People. Sorry if I forgot anyones names but i am writing this at 4:30am and I’m about to pass out on my laptop computer.
Before heading out to the party I saw my favorite Spanish actress Carmen Maura in the French film Service Entrance, the title in the press kit but on screen it was called The Women of the 6th Floor directed by Philippe Le Guay that is set in 1962 and features a nice ensemble cast headed by La Maura who was present at the screening and looked enchanting.
No major gossip this time out at Berlinale, just the same old talk about festival head Deiter Koslick being an out of touch socialite who knows nothing about cinema but got the job because it was thought that he would bring more corporate sponsorships, but actually with him on board the festival has lost sponsors. I am also quite amazed how the various sections of the festival hate each other and don’t cooperate with the Competition area thinking that the festival is all about them and the clout of big name stars they bring to the table, and that the other parts of the Berlinale Festival are just coasting on the Competitions shiny coattails. Pray tell me your opinions on the subject.
LE SACRE DU PRINTEMPS
The Vagimule Davis doll just may be in love. Yes can you imagine it? The boy is named Kai Fabian, and he is just the cutest little German thing born in 1984. I don’t want to jinx it so I won’t say anything more, but yesterday after seeing the press screening of Wm Wender’s Pina I spent most of the day and evening with him canoodling. I got so carried away with this young boy who I met through Martin Kaymer that I almost forgot about poor Love Camel coming to stay with me during the Berlinale Film Festival. Kai Fabian drove me back home to the Cheese Endique Trifecta just in time as Camel was arriving.
Now back to Pina. As most of you know, Ms. Bausch in the late 1990s approached me in LA when she was doing a new piece at UCLA Live! And we spent quite some time together with her filming me performing at Club Sucker and just observing my way of moving and gesture. She was a very sweet woman and very calming to be around. I took her to a bunch of latino drag clubs which she delighted in. I never saw the finished product as I was in Europe when it premiered at UCLA but I am sure it was divine in seeing this film. Ms. Bausch died in 2009 and she and Wm Wenders who were pals had always wanted to make a dance film together, so he did it with the cooperation of her company Wuppertal Dance Theatre. The film is in Digital 3D and is as epic as her work is profound. The film musical and dance is the perfect conduit for 3D. The only 3D musical was the 1953 MGM hit Kiss Me Kate, and it’s a wonder that no one else has explored that territory till now.
The Vagimule Davis doll just may be in love. Yes can you imagine it? The boy is named Kai Fabian, and he is just the cutest little German thing born in 1984. I don’t want to jinx it so I won’t say anything more, but yesterday after seeing the press screening of Wm Wender’s Pina I spent most of the day and evening with him canoodling. I got so carried away with this young boy who I met through Martin Kaymer that I almost forgot about poor Love Camel coming to stay with me during the Berlinale Film Festival. Kai Fabian drove me back home to the Cheese Endique Trifecta just in time as Camel was arriving.
Now back to Pina. As most of you know, Ms. Bausch in the late 1990s approached me in LA when she was doing a new piece at UCLA Live! And we spent quite some time together with her filming me performing at Club Sucker and just observing my way of moving and gesture. She was a very sweet woman and very calming to be around. I took her to a bunch of latino drag clubs which she delighted in. I never saw the finished product as I was in Europe when it premiered at UCLA but I am sure it was divine in seeing this film. Ms. Bausch died in 2009 and she and Wm Wenders who were pals had always wanted to make a dance film together, so he did it with the cooperation of her company Wuppertal Dance Theatre. The film is in Digital 3D and is as epic as her work is profound. The film musical and dance is the perfect conduit for 3D. The only 3D musical was the 1953 MGM hit Kiss Me Kate, and it’s a wonder that no one else has explored that territory till now.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
SEHENSWUERDIGKEITEN
Today at the Berlinale I saw Ingmar Berman’s film version of The Magic Flute (Trollflojten)from 1975 which features the Swedish pepperpot opera star Haekan Hagegard as Papageno and a handsome Josef Koestlinger as Tamino. Of course I couldn't wait for the appearance of the Queen of the Night and she doesn’t disappoint. I first saw Mozart’s The Magic Flute on stage while still in primary school in the 4th grade at the gorgeous Shrine Auditorium across from USC. It was through the MGM(Mentally Gifted Minors Program)of the LA Unified School District that I was able to attend free matinee performances of all the classic operas. Its what influenced my already blossoming theatricality. I wouldn’t say I was a hardcore opera queen in the Klaus Nomi mode, but I sure come close with my fetish for the perfected opera surface in singers like Grace Moore, Katharine Greyson,Jeannete McDonald, Jane Powell and Deanna Durbin. In the audience sitting near at the Cinemaxx Theatre was actors Hamish Linkletter who stars in Miranda July’s new film The Future and German male ingénue Alexander Fehling. Are they lovers? After that screening I had to rush across town on the Ubahn to see the second film in the daily Forum tribute to the great Japanese director Shibuya Minoru at the Delphi with 1953s Modern People about a government official involved in a collegues corrupt activities which leads to a maelstrom of violence and crime. I ended the days movie going pleasures by seeing young humpy Aussie studkin Ryan Kwanten from the hit cable show True Blood playing totally against type as a nebbish masquerading as a vigilante superhero. Was hoping to catch a glimpse of Mr. Kwanten during the Q&A with ganymede director Ryan Ford and the female lead the pretty Maeve Dermody but Ryan had to whisk back to Hollywood.Sitting next to me was one of my Weimar/UDk expat students Miss Darce with her cute posse---all fans of True Blood.Earlier in the day I ran into kJohnny Blue of the world famous Blue Brothers. Caught a glimpse of his big dick older brother Tim yesterday in the Arsenal foyer.
Received a few emugs from my old friend from the 1980s Jean Pierre Boccara who use to run the old Lhasa Club performance space on Hudson & Santa Monica Blvd in Hollywood which also shared space with the late homo celebrity photog Herb Ritts whose studio was above them. Jean Pierre and Anna also ran a large space at the Musicians Union Hall on Vine Street & Melrose called LhasaLand that I performed at with the Afro Sisters and Devo as well as the Café Largo on Fairfax Avenue and a performance venue in the old Studio One/RoseTatoo Backlot space on Robertson Blvd. Jean Pierre doesn’t live full time in LA anymore content to traveling the known and unknown world making art in a relaxed atmosphere. He promises to look me up next time he is in Berlin, and I can’t wait to see him.
Today at the Berlinale I saw Ingmar Berman’s film version of The Magic Flute (Trollflojten)from 1975 which features the Swedish pepperpot opera star Haekan Hagegard as Papageno and a handsome Josef Koestlinger as Tamino. Of course I couldn't wait for the appearance of the Queen of the Night and she doesn’t disappoint. I first saw Mozart’s The Magic Flute on stage while still in primary school in the 4th grade at the gorgeous Shrine Auditorium across from USC. It was through the MGM(Mentally Gifted Minors Program)of the LA Unified School District that I was able to attend free matinee performances of all the classic operas. Its what influenced my already blossoming theatricality. I wouldn’t say I was a hardcore opera queen in the Klaus Nomi mode, but I sure come close with my fetish for the perfected opera surface in singers like Grace Moore, Katharine Greyson,Jeannete McDonald, Jane Powell and Deanna Durbin. In the audience sitting near at the Cinemaxx Theatre was actors Hamish Linkletter who stars in Miranda July’s new film The Future and German male ingénue Alexander Fehling. Are they lovers? After that screening I had to rush across town on the Ubahn to see the second film in the daily Forum tribute to the great Japanese director Shibuya Minoru at the Delphi with 1953s Modern People about a government official involved in a collegues corrupt activities which leads to a maelstrom of violence and crime. I ended the days movie going pleasures by seeing young humpy Aussie studkin Ryan Kwanten from the hit cable show True Blood playing totally against type as a nebbish masquerading as a vigilante superhero. Was hoping to catch a glimpse of Mr. Kwanten during the Q&A with ganymede director Ryan Ford and the female lead the pretty Maeve Dermody but Ryan had to whisk back to Hollywood.Sitting next to me was one of my Weimar/UDk expat students Miss Darce with her cute posse---all fans of True Blood.Earlier in the day I ran into kJohnny Blue of the world famous Blue Brothers. Caught a glimpse of his big dick older brother Tim yesterday in the Arsenal foyer.
Received a few emugs from my old friend from the 1980s Jean Pierre Boccara who use to run the old Lhasa Club performance space on Hudson & Santa Monica Blvd in Hollywood which also shared space with the late homo celebrity photog Herb Ritts whose studio was above them. Jean Pierre and Anna also ran a large space at the Musicians Union Hall on Vine Street & Melrose called LhasaLand that I performed at with the Afro Sisters and Devo as well as the Café Largo on Fairfax Avenue and a performance venue in the old Studio One/RoseTatoo Backlot space on Robertson Blvd. Jean Pierre doesn’t live full time in LA anymore content to traveling the known and unknown world making art in a relaxed atmosphere. He promises to look me up next time he is in Berlin, and I can’t wait to see him.
Friday, February 11, 2011
A SCENSIEUR POUR L’ECHAFAUD
My first day of the 61st Berlinale Film Festival begins with a nice brunch at the Schwartzer Kafe with Jewish Muslim Daniel Hendrickson and his lover Piero Bellomo. It felt great to fortify oneself with food. Then we were off an running to the beautiful Delphi Theatre in the Old West to see Doctor’s Day Off the first film in a Forum tribute to director Shibuya Minoru of the famed Shochiku Studios, the Paramount Pictures of Japan. Joining us was Canadian baby diaper Joel Gibb of the Hidden Cameras. What a way to start the cine day, with this exquisite film from the early 1950’s. Being the grifter of attractive men that I am it was natural for me to swoon over hunky Mikuni Rentaro playing a mentally handicapped war veteran. Grabbing another bite to eat in Potsdamer Platz Joel and I visited Assaf Hochman who is working in the Berlinale Press Suite at the Hyatt Hotel to see what gossip and intrigues were afloat. To early for that,but I did share a brief flirtation with young blondine teutonic actor August Diehl and later at the opening of Forum Expandeds Guy Maddin Hauntings I(Fragments) at the Embassy of Canada’s Marshall McLuhan Salon I really dug my trenches into the lovesexy MGM president of their motion picture group Jonathan Glickman while watching lovely images of my old LA pal Udo Kier on the video monitor. During this time I wanted to see if Mr. Glickman had the big hoved feet of Satan worthy of shrimping like in Satanas Part 3: Revolution. Chittle chatted with lovely Ela of bbooks collective who will be working in sunny California at USC very soon I am sure, as well as hanging with New York legendina Jon Heys whose 6 minute short in Panarama Section Why Madame Why? Stars the illustrious award winning sexxtress Zazi De Paris. Couldn’t stay to see Mr. Maddin and Isabella Rosselini who were coming to the exhibition later but at the Arsenal foyer which this year is designed by Canadian artist Kika Thorne with the Princess Garden and features stalwarts bbooks kollective. I also ran into the divine grande dame of queer experimental cinema Barbara Hammer and her young collaborator Gina Carducci who are in Forum Expanded with Generations. The lovely Ms. Hammer also has her new film Maya Deren’s Sink showing. Ms Hammer’s posse included the MIX Festival gang. Bumped into Germany’s experimental film guru Wilhelm Hein whose significant other the art photog Annette Frick has a her documentary on Herbert Tobias in the Panorama Section.
In the big Arsenal 1 screening room I saw the incredible Quebecois film En terrains connus by Stephane LaFleur who also is in an indie rock band and looks the part with his scruffy charms. The sound in this film was the driving force for all the action and visuals which were quietly stunning, with the performances of Francis LaHaye and Fanny Mallette as a brother & sister transporting.
By 10:30pm when I went into the screening of Zbigniew Bzymek’s Utopians I was completely knackered, but stayed for almost an hour though I was not enamored of the performance by the films lead Jim Fletcher.
My first day of the 61st Berlinale Film Festival begins with a nice brunch at the Schwartzer Kafe with Jewish Muslim Daniel Hendrickson and his lover Piero Bellomo. It felt great to fortify oneself with food. Then we were off an running to the beautiful Delphi Theatre in the Old West to see Doctor’s Day Off the first film in a Forum tribute to director Shibuya Minoru of the famed Shochiku Studios, the Paramount Pictures of Japan. Joining us was Canadian baby diaper Joel Gibb of the Hidden Cameras. What a way to start the cine day, with this exquisite film from the early 1950’s. Being the grifter of attractive men that I am it was natural for me to swoon over hunky Mikuni Rentaro playing a mentally handicapped war veteran. Grabbing another bite to eat in Potsdamer Platz Joel and I visited Assaf Hochman who is working in the Berlinale Press Suite at the Hyatt Hotel to see what gossip and intrigues were afloat. To early for that,but I did share a brief flirtation with young blondine teutonic actor August Diehl and later at the opening of Forum Expandeds Guy Maddin Hauntings I(Fragments) at the Embassy of Canada’s Marshall McLuhan Salon I really dug my trenches into the lovesexy MGM president of their motion picture group Jonathan Glickman while watching lovely images of my old LA pal Udo Kier on the video monitor. During this time I wanted to see if Mr. Glickman had the big hoved feet of Satan worthy of shrimping like in Satanas Part 3: Revolution. Chittle chatted with lovely Ela of bbooks collective who will be working in sunny California at USC very soon I am sure, as well as hanging with New York legendina Jon Heys whose 6 minute short in Panarama Section Why Madame Why? Stars the illustrious award winning sexxtress Zazi De Paris. Couldn’t stay to see Mr. Maddin and Isabella Rosselini who were coming to the exhibition later but at the Arsenal foyer which this year is designed by Canadian artist Kika Thorne with the Princess Garden and features stalwarts bbooks kollective. I also ran into the divine grande dame of queer experimental cinema Barbara Hammer and her young collaborator Gina Carducci who are in Forum Expanded with Generations. The lovely Ms. Hammer also has her new film Maya Deren’s Sink showing. Ms Hammer’s posse included the MIX Festival gang. Bumped into Germany’s experimental film guru Wilhelm Hein whose significant other the art photog Annette Frick has a her documentary on Herbert Tobias in the Panorama Section.
In the big Arsenal 1 screening room I saw the incredible Quebecois film En terrains connus by Stephane LaFleur who also is in an indie rock band and looks the part with his scruffy charms. The sound in this film was the driving force for all the action and visuals which were quietly stunning, with the performances of Francis LaHaye and Fanny Mallette as a brother & sister transporting.
By 10:30pm when I went into the screening of Zbigniew Bzymek’s Utopians I was completely knackered, but stayed for almost an hour though I was not enamored of the performance by the films lead Jim Fletcher.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
ASCENSIEUR POUR L’ECHAFAUD
Went to a pre-Berlinale Forum Expanded opening last night called Parallel Worlds at Salon Populaire’s Kunstaele at Buwlowstr 90 just down the street from me in Shoneberg. My companion was Daniel Hendrickson, the Jewish Muslim translator to the academic shtars. As we were arriving Eunice Martin the gifted musician and composer who plays klavier regularly at Rising Stars,Falling Stars was leaving. Chatted with Arsenal Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus who has proclaimed that my area of town town is becoming the new hot happening place in Berlin. It does seem that a lot of new art activity is taking place off of the Hauptstr, on my street in Rote Insel and on Postsdamer Str. Of course in the late 70s and 80s this neck of the woods was teaming with jetset shenanigans. David Bowie,IggyPop, Lou Reed, Romy Haag, and Nick Cave all lived here. Blixa Bargeld still keeps a residence nearby as does Hamburg born & bred singer Billy Ray Martin,who lived in my building for a short spell after returning to Berlin from years in London.
I think Miss Stefanie is correct and things are returning to Schoneberg, as KreuzKoelln is getting way too expensive and trendy. Also seen the Hebbel am Ufer triumvirant of perky Anna Muelter, the beautiful and lovesexy Katrin Dodd and HAU big boss Mattias Lienthal, Arsenal Experimentals Nanna Heidenreich looking luscious along with sexy gal pal Djane Olga Damnitz, junior curator Uli Ziemons with his bromantic partner in hetero love Guillaume, Chocolate Grinder Film Kollective boys Little Alex, Tasty Tim and recently married Julian Radelmeier, and rangy filmmaking Frenchman Michel Belague. The crowd seemed mesmerized by James Benning’s 2 channel video installation and Iraeli art star Yael Bartana’s 16milimeter black&white loop. My fav piece was The Story of Milk and Honey by Lebanese video artist Basma Alsharif. Hadn’t eaten since breakfast so I had to cut our early to find some grubb and settled on the late night pizza joint in Nollendorf area that has the most delectable blondine boy tossing the dough. Since there was no flirting going on at the opening, I had to get my eye candy elsewhere.
Oh and tonight at Potsdamer 88 is the first official Forum Expanded Berlinale exhibition opening Blind. from 6pm-9pm.
***
Billy Miller is coming back to Berlin, and I personally can’t wait to see the impish dreamcake. His Bob Mizer exhibit at the new Exile Gallery is going to be the talk of the town. Here is the info that he sent me so you can mark it on your calendaria:
BOB MIZER
Select Private Works 1942—1992
February 19 through March 19, 2011
Exile Gallery
Köpenicker Str 39, Berlin
Curated by Christian Siekmeier and Billy Miller
Opening Reception February 19, 7-10 pm
Music by the Pet Shop Bears
For opening times and info on specific artworks, please
contact Exile Gallery at info@thisisexile.com
http://www.thisisexile.com/project_bobmizer.html
http://www.BobMizer.org
Went to a pre-Berlinale Forum Expanded opening last night called Parallel Worlds at Salon Populaire’s Kunstaele at Buwlowstr 90 just down the street from me in Shoneberg. My companion was Daniel Hendrickson, the Jewish Muslim translator to the academic shtars. As we were arriving Eunice Martin the gifted musician and composer who plays klavier regularly at Rising Stars,Falling Stars was leaving. Chatted with Arsenal Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus who has proclaimed that my area of town town is becoming the new hot happening place in Berlin. It does seem that a lot of new art activity is taking place off of the Hauptstr, on my street in Rote Insel and on Postsdamer Str. Of course in the late 70s and 80s this neck of the woods was teaming with jetset shenanigans. David Bowie,IggyPop, Lou Reed, Romy Haag, and Nick Cave all lived here. Blixa Bargeld still keeps a residence nearby as does Hamburg born & bred singer Billy Ray Martin,who lived in my building for a short spell after returning to Berlin from years in London.
I think Miss Stefanie is correct and things are returning to Schoneberg, as KreuzKoelln is getting way too expensive and trendy. Also seen the Hebbel am Ufer triumvirant of perky Anna Muelter, the beautiful and lovesexy Katrin Dodd and HAU big boss Mattias Lienthal, Arsenal Experimentals Nanna Heidenreich looking luscious along with sexy gal pal Djane Olga Damnitz, junior curator Uli Ziemons with his bromantic partner in hetero love Guillaume, Chocolate Grinder Film Kollective boys Little Alex, Tasty Tim and recently married Julian Radelmeier, and rangy filmmaking Frenchman Michel Belague. The crowd seemed mesmerized by James Benning’s 2 channel video installation and Iraeli art star Yael Bartana’s 16milimeter black&white loop. My fav piece was The Story of Milk and Honey by Lebanese video artist Basma Alsharif. Hadn’t eaten since breakfast so I had to cut our early to find some grubb and settled on the late night pizza joint in Nollendorf area that has the most delectable blondine boy tossing the dough. Since there was no flirting going on at the opening, I had to get my eye candy elsewhere.
Oh and tonight at Potsdamer 88 is the first official Forum Expanded Berlinale exhibition opening Blind. from 6pm-9pm.
***
Billy Miller is coming back to Berlin, and I personally can’t wait to see the impish dreamcake. His Bob Mizer exhibit at the new Exile Gallery is going to be the talk of the town. Here is the info that he sent me so you can mark it on your calendaria:
BOB MIZER
Select Private Works 1942—1992
February 19 through March 19, 2011
Exile Gallery
Köpenicker Str 39, Berlin
Curated by Christian Siekmeier and Billy Miller
Opening Reception February 19, 7-10 pm
Music by the Pet Shop Bears
For opening times and info on specific artworks, please
contact Exile Gallery at info@thisisexile.com
http://www.thisisexile.com/project_bobmizer.html
http://www.BobMizer.org
Wednesday, February 09, 2011
AMOUREUSE-LIEBE ZU DRITT
Last night baby diaper Joel Gibb of the Hidden Cameras came by the Cheese Endique Trifecta and we drank some sect and played catchup.He was back in Canada for ages and also took a spirited holiday to the rainforests of Costa Rica with his juicy East German beau Enrico Dallman.
Monday Damon Young the lanky queer Aussie Phd student from UC Berkley who is in Berlina for two years took the Vagimule doll to Santa Maria on Oranianstr for some Mexy food and Margaritas.We got nicely tipsy and were joined by Jewish Muslim Daniel Hendrickson and his handsome ItaloGerman lover Piero Bellomo.
The gorgeous ZacKary Drucker my young LA based gender daughterina is going to be part of what looks like a hot event in New York this Friday along with her mentor Mother Flawless Sabrina of the legendary drag documentary The Queen.Here are the details for all of you Man!hattanites:
The Queen: Then & Now
February 11, 2011
TIME?
Admission: FREE!
LGBT Center
208 West 13th Street
The Queen: Then & Now unreels a full range of perspective surrounding the landmark 1968 documentary The Queen for an evening of screenings, memories, and reflections on the current state of gender subversion in art and culture. Long before Paris is Burning, The Queen is a remarkable pre-Stonewall documentary that captured a raucous drag pageant at New York City’s Town Hall in 1967. Rarely seen The Queen will be screened along with Zackary Drucker’s At least you know you exist and Joe E. Jeffreys’ The Queen: After Party Outtakes.
The screenings will be followed by a public conversation among The Queen’s star Flawless Sabrina (aka Jack Doroshow) and Drucker moderated by Jeffreys along with an audience q&a.
Presented as a part of the exhibition, Living Live, curated by David Fierman and RJ Supa.
About the films:
The Queen (1968, 68 minutes, directed by Frank Simon) was one of the first documentaries to present a mainstream audience with a non-pathologized view of drag and homosexuality. Director Frank Simon’s impressionistic verite film was widely praised by the press, set box office records and screened internationally. The New York Times praised the film as “funny—an inspired—extraordinary” and the East Village Other dubbed The Queen “a stone gas!”
At least you know you exist (2011,15 minutes, Zackary Drucker with Flawless Sabrina) Created inside an archeology of the Uptown apartment that legendary queen Mother Flawless Sabrina has inhabited since 1967, At least you know you exist is a site-specific exploration of a fixed space where everything is in a state of change. In this 16mm film, totemic mystical objects act as a collection of mysterious sculptures in different states of mutation, and rich layers of feverish history interface with a new vision of transgender performativity. Young artist Zackary Drucker weaves a fluid, parallel text of these two divergent lives, exploring a legacy being passed from a lost generation towards the future.
The Queen: After Party Outtakes (2010, 7 minutes) reveals recently discovered outtake footage from The Queen documenting the pageant’s star studded after party with cameos from pageant participants Harlow and International Chrysis as well as Edie Sedgwick, Larry Rivers and Terry Southern among others. Jack Doroshow provides commentary. Created by Joe E. Jeffreys for Drag Show Video Verite 2010 and made possible in part with funding from the Jerome Foundation.
About the people:
Jack Doroshow a.k.a. Flawless Sabrina, is a performer, muse, gender pioneer, tarot reader, and oracle. From 1959 to 1968 Sabrina organized and emceed 46 drag contests a year across the United States. Ms. Flawless' balls recruited the likes of Judy Garland, Truman Capote, Gloria Swanson, Eartha Kitt, and Andy Warhol, as celebrity judges; and legendary ladies, Monique, Dorian Corey, Crystal LaBeija, Mario Montez, Rachel Harlow and International Chrysis as contestants. Repressive masquerade laws, which stipulated that queens wear three pieces of male clothing, landed Sabrina and her girls in jails and escorted to many a state border. Doroshow has worked as a special advisor on such films as Myra Breckenridge, Midnight Cowboy, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Flawless has also worked on both the Hillary Clinton and Al Gore campaigns, and has established various children's programs in the five boroughs, pairing kids with artists.
Zackary Drucker is a misnomer, the birth-name alias of an artist who is actually a fishy bitch. Interested in obliterating language obstacles, pulverizing identity disorders and revealing dark subconscious layers of outsider agency, Drucker disarms audiences using live performance, voice, video installation, and photography. Keeping normative culture on the periphery, Drucker focuses instead on "reading"-- a sub-cultural dialect of resistance, online sexual exploitation vernacular, and uses her body to illicit desire, judgment, and voyeuristic shame from her viewer. Drucker's critical indecision to live above the radar, below definition, and beyond static representation, ultimately aims to teach you about yourself.
Joe E. Jeffreys is a drag historian. He teaches theatre studies at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts Department of Drama and produces Drag Show Video Verite. Jeffreys’ video shorts have screened internationally and his work on The Queen was awarded funding by the Jerome Foundation.
*This performance/variable media art work was made possible, in part, by the Franklin Furnace Fund supported by stimulus funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency and the Lambent Fund of Tides Foundation
Last night baby diaper Joel Gibb of the Hidden Cameras came by the Cheese Endique Trifecta and we drank some sect and played catchup.He was back in Canada for ages and also took a spirited holiday to the rainforests of Costa Rica with his juicy East German beau Enrico Dallman.
Monday Damon Young the lanky queer Aussie Phd student from UC Berkley who is in Berlina for two years took the Vagimule doll to Santa Maria on Oranianstr for some Mexy food and Margaritas.We got nicely tipsy and were joined by Jewish Muslim Daniel Hendrickson and his handsome ItaloGerman lover Piero Bellomo.
The gorgeous ZacKary Drucker my young LA based gender daughterina is going to be part of what looks like a hot event in New York this Friday along with her mentor Mother Flawless Sabrina of the legendary drag documentary The Queen.Here are the details for all of you Man!hattanites:
The Queen: Then & Now
February 11, 2011
TIME?
Admission: FREE!
LGBT Center
208 West 13th Street
The Queen: Then & Now unreels a full range of perspective surrounding the landmark 1968 documentary The Queen for an evening of screenings, memories, and reflections on the current state of gender subversion in art and culture. Long before Paris is Burning, The Queen is a remarkable pre-Stonewall documentary that captured a raucous drag pageant at New York City’s Town Hall in 1967. Rarely seen The Queen will be screened along with Zackary Drucker’s At least you know you exist and Joe E. Jeffreys’ The Queen: After Party Outtakes.
The screenings will be followed by a public conversation among The Queen’s star Flawless Sabrina (aka Jack Doroshow) and Drucker moderated by Jeffreys along with an audience q&a.
Presented as a part of the exhibition, Living Live, curated by David Fierman and RJ Supa.
About the films:
The Queen (1968, 68 minutes, directed by Frank Simon) was one of the first documentaries to present a mainstream audience with a non-pathologized view of drag and homosexuality. Director Frank Simon’s impressionistic verite film was widely praised by the press, set box office records and screened internationally. The New York Times praised the film as “funny—an inspired—extraordinary” and the East Village Other dubbed The Queen “a stone gas!”
At least you know you exist (2011,15 minutes, Zackary Drucker with Flawless Sabrina) Created inside an archeology of the Uptown apartment that legendary queen Mother Flawless Sabrina has inhabited since 1967, At least you know you exist is a site-specific exploration of a fixed space where everything is in a state of change. In this 16mm film, totemic mystical objects act as a collection of mysterious sculptures in different states of mutation, and rich layers of feverish history interface with a new vision of transgender performativity. Young artist Zackary Drucker weaves a fluid, parallel text of these two divergent lives, exploring a legacy being passed from a lost generation towards the future.
The Queen: After Party Outtakes (2010, 7 minutes) reveals recently discovered outtake footage from The Queen documenting the pageant’s star studded after party with cameos from pageant participants Harlow and International Chrysis as well as Edie Sedgwick, Larry Rivers and Terry Southern among others. Jack Doroshow provides commentary. Created by Joe E. Jeffreys for Drag Show Video Verite 2010 and made possible in part with funding from the Jerome Foundation.
About the people:
Jack Doroshow a.k.a. Flawless Sabrina, is a performer, muse, gender pioneer, tarot reader, and oracle. From 1959 to 1968 Sabrina organized and emceed 46 drag contests a year across the United States. Ms. Flawless' balls recruited the likes of Judy Garland, Truman Capote, Gloria Swanson, Eartha Kitt, and Andy Warhol, as celebrity judges; and legendary ladies, Monique, Dorian Corey, Crystal LaBeija, Mario Montez, Rachel Harlow and International Chrysis as contestants. Repressive masquerade laws, which stipulated that queens wear three pieces of male clothing, landed Sabrina and her girls in jails and escorted to many a state border. Doroshow has worked as a special advisor on such films as Myra Breckenridge, Midnight Cowboy, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Flawless has also worked on both the Hillary Clinton and Al Gore campaigns, and has established various children's programs in the five boroughs, pairing kids with artists.
Zackary Drucker is a misnomer, the birth-name alias of an artist who is actually a fishy bitch. Interested in obliterating language obstacles, pulverizing identity disorders and revealing dark subconscious layers of outsider agency, Drucker disarms audiences using live performance, voice, video installation, and photography. Keeping normative culture on the periphery, Drucker focuses instead on "reading"-- a sub-cultural dialect of resistance, online sexual exploitation vernacular, and uses her body to illicit desire, judgment, and voyeuristic shame from her viewer. Drucker's critical indecision to live above the radar, below definition, and beyond static representation, ultimately aims to teach you about yourself.
Joe E. Jeffreys is a drag historian. He teaches theatre studies at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts Department of Drama and produces Drag Show Video Verite. Jeffreys’ video shorts have screened internationally and his work on The Queen was awarded funding by the Jerome Foundation.
*This performance/variable media art work was made possible, in part, by the Franklin Furnace Fund supported by stimulus funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency and the Lambent Fund of Tides Foundation
Monday, February 07, 2011
LEBEN UND STERBEN IN LA
My body is back in Berlin,but my pussy is still in Lost Angeles.Had a great time in my old city of birth. Wonderous seeing so many old friends and collaborating with new comrades on the piece dejecta/protecta which was a huge hit at the museum of contemporary art in Los Angeles (MoCa). Now I am gearing up for the Berlinale and London to celebrate my womanly birthday with Dominic Johnson, Ron Athey, Love Camel and the rest of my British rocksteady crew.Just found out that actress Maria Schneider, who was so lovely in Last Tango in Paris and The Passenger with Jack Nicholson died age 58.Hung out with her in the late 70s in LA and she was very feisty. She told me a bunch of great gossip of how Marlon Brando was always cruising young guys and how much he loved to digest gobs of semen.
Also the legendary Tura Satana of Faster Pussycat, Kill, Kill, Kill also passed. Will never forget being on the same bill with her in a Velvet Hammer Burlesque show in LA at the old Mayan Theatre in downtown Los Angeles.She was still able to wow a decidedly jaded crowd.
Piero Bellomo of the Piero Kolleczione cooked a scrumptious return home meal for the doll at her Lutzoplatz compound. We were joined by Daniel Hendrickson the Jewish Muslim, and Piero gifted Ms. Davis a beautiful winter white blouse and also la Kolleczione’s new line of giant caucasion dildos that go under the name of Very Viking. I am now the proud owner of Gerth and Derth and these monster appendages will be greatly prized.
My body is back in Berlin,but my pussy is still in Lost Angeles.Had a great time in my old city of birth. Wonderous seeing so many old friends and collaborating with new comrades on the piece dejecta/protecta which was a huge hit at the museum of contemporary art in Los Angeles (MoCa). Now I am gearing up for the Berlinale and London to celebrate my womanly birthday with Dominic Johnson, Ron Athey, Love Camel and the rest of my British rocksteady crew.Just found out that actress Maria Schneider, who was so lovely in Last Tango in Paris and The Passenger with Jack Nicholson died age 58.Hung out with her in the late 70s in LA and she was very feisty. She told me a bunch of great gossip of how Marlon Brando was always cruising young guys and how much he loved to digest gobs of semen.
Also the legendary Tura Satana of Faster Pussycat, Kill, Kill, Kill also passed. Will never forget being on the same bill with her in a Velvet Hammer Burlesque show in LA at the old Mayan Theatre in downtown Los Angeles.She was still able to wow a decidedly jaded crowd.
Piero Bellomo of the Piero Kolleczione cooked a scrumptious return home meal for the doll at her Lutzoplatz compound. We were joined by Daniel Hendrickson the Jewish Muslim, and Piero gifted Ms. Davis a beautiful winter white blouse and also la Kolleczione’s new line of giant caucasion dildos that go under the name of Very Viking. I am now the proud owner of Gerth and Derth and these monster appendages will be greatly prized.
Thursday, February 03, 2011
DREAMLESS POTASIUM GIRLS
My favorite neighborhood in Los Angeles is this tiny area of Hollywood close to Little Armenia called Melrose Hill. Its just about a block and a half radius of modest single family homes built around 1909-1926 off of Western and Melrose Avenues that are just radiant. Every time I get a chance I have someone drive by this area so I can revel in its beauty. Jason El Norte, the lanky South Dakotan who use to be one of my spastic Bricktop’s at the Parlour Club taxi dancers not only drove me to Melrose Hill but we actually got out of the car and took a leisure stroll of the Hill as he took pictures of some of the houses with his mobile phone. If I could get a sugar daddy to buy me a house in this tiny enclave I might consider living in the southland again. Jason who grew up in subfreezing winterlandia is quite enamored of Los Angeles. He has been making quite a career for himself as a philanthropist of the courtesanic kind, which is not an easy profession as Los Ang can be a bitter hard knock town. He lives frugally and is not ostentatious in the least, but I fear that he is registering a bit of concu fatigue, strain and burnout that is only a natural part of the intimate service industry.
Tuesday night Meesh Mills took me out for a scrumptious feast and Margarita’s at Casita Del Campo in Silverlake. It was great catching up with this beautiful lady who is so kind, smart and generous. We closed the joint down with our gab fest and then Meesh drove me around Hollywood as we reminisced about all our old haunts. Earlier in the day the major Ms. Gorgeous artist Karen Lofgren with her new beau and ex husband Cyril Kuhn came to take me to lunch at the Fisherman’s Market on Central and 6th. This is one of my alltime fav old timey LA eateries. Of course I ordered the giant shrimp on the grill and woofed it down in less then a minute. Karen & Cyril are in new relationships but remain very close and their art practise has gone through a lot of amazing and very exciting changes. Cyril is doing large scale paintings that are very heroic, and Karen has expanded on her sculptural installation work and is engulfed in creating a new feminine cosmos.
I forgot to mention that the other day I got together with art historian Robert Summers and his lovesexy Otis students--- hairy, hot & humpy Argentinian Jonathan, bubble butt Iranian beauty Rashad who were in my MoCa piece dejecta/protecta and sweatie pie Ethan. We drank weiss wine shorle at the Doyle Compound and later zipped around the corner to Deltas Tacos for cheap homemade Mexican food. As you can tell I can’t get enough of Mexican food on this trip, and have been eating it almost every day.
Hector Martinez's mom Mrs. Silvia Martinez cooked me an incredible Mexican feast of tamales and enchilades at their comfy home in South Gate. Mrs. Martinez is a very lovely woman with sparkling mischieveous eyes and a smile that can light a room. She speaks softly but carries a great amount of authority and confidence. Both Hector’s parents are the kind of Angelinos who you don’t see that much of anymore and who really make the city special. All of the Martinez children are successful and prosperous, the baby of the family Danny Martinez is married with a pretty wife who is getting her masters degree at Loyola Marymount while Danny is in the PhD program at UCLA but teaches disadvantaged kids at Jourdan Down High School in Watts which is just a train track away from his parents home in South Gate. Hector and his lover Ericla surprised me with an early birthday cake baked by his gay cholo cousin Victor aka: Chewy, the Enforcer. Being that I grew up as a Jehovah’s Witness I realized that this is my first ever birthday cake. My actual birthday is coming up Feb 20th – Piecien for all you hippy dippy astrological types---so here is your subtle reminder to bestow the doll with plenty of gifts, lunches, breakfasts and din dins. My official age is now 29 ½ having been 24 for several decades.
My favorite neighborhood in Los Angeles is this tiny area of Hollywood close to Little Armenia called Melrose Hill. Its just about a block and a half radius of modest single family homes built around 1909-1926 off of Western and Melrose Avenues that are just radiant. Every time I get a chance I have someone drive by this area so I can revel in its beauty. Jason El Norte, the lanky South Dakotan who use to be one of my spastic Bricktop’s at the Parlour Club taxi dancers not only drove me to Melrose Hill but we actually got out of the car and took a leisure stroll of the Hill as he took pictures of some of the houses with his mobile phone. If I could get a sugar daddy to buy me a house in this tiny enclave I might consider living in the southland again. Jason who grew up in subfreezing winterlandia is quite enamored of Los Angeles. He has been making quite a career for himself as a philanthropist of the courtesanic kind, which is not an easy profession as Los Ang can be a bitter hard knock town. He lives frugally and is not ostentatious in the least, but I fear that he is registering a bit of concu fatigue, strain and burnout that is only a natural part of the intimate service industry.
Tuesday night Meesh Mills took me out for a scrumptious feast and Margarita’s at Casita Del Campo in Silverlake. It was great catching up with this beautiful lady who is so kind, smart and generous. We closed the joint down with our gab fest and then Meesh drove me around Hollywood as we reminisced about all our old haunts. Earlier in the day the major Ms. Gorgeous artist Karen Lofgren with her new beau and ex husband Cyril Kuhn came to take me to lunch at the Fisherman’s Market on Central and 6th. This is one of my alltime fav old timey LA eateries. Of course I ordered the giant shrimp on the grill and woofed it down in less then a minute. Karen & Cyril are in new relationships but remain very close and their art practise has gone through a lot of amazing and very exciting changes. Cyril is doing large scale paintings that are very heroic, and Karen has expanded on her sculptural installation work and is engulfed in creating a new feminine cosmos.
I forgot to mention that the other day I got together with art historian Robert Summers and his lovesexy Otis students--- hairy, hot & humpy Argentinian Jonathan, bubble butt Iranian beauty Rashad who were in my MoCa piece dejecta/protecta and sweatie pie Ethan. We drank weiss wine shorle at the Doyle Compound and later zipped around the corner to Deltas Tacos for cheap homemade Mexican food. As you can tell I can’t get enough of Mexican food on this trip, and have been eating it almost every day.
Hector Martinez's mom Mrs. Silvia Martinez cooked me an incredible Mexican feast of tamales and enchilades at their comfy home in South Gate. Mrs. Martinez is a very lovely woman with sparkling mischieveous eyes and a smile that can light a room. She speaks softly but carries a great amount of authority and confidence. Both Hector’s parents are the kind of Angelinos who you don’t see that much of anymore and who really make the city special. All of the Martinez children are successful and prosperous, the baby of the family Danny Martinez is married with a pretty wife who is getting her masters degree at Loyola Marymount while Danny is in the PhD program at UCLA but teaches disadvantaged kids at Jourdan Down High School in Watts which is just a train track away from his parents home in South Gate. Hector and his lover Ericla surprised me with an early birthday cake baked by his gay cholo cousin Victor aka: Chewy, the Enforcer. Being that I grew up as a Jehovah’s Witness I realized that this is my first ever birthday cake. My actual birthday is coming up Feb 20th – Piecien for all you hippy dippy astrological types---so here is your subtle reminder to bestow the doll with plenty of gifts, lunches, breakfasts and din dins. My official age is now 29 ½ having been 24 for several decades.
Tuesday, February 01, 2011
EVIL DEAD CAULIFLOWERS
Jason Bryne the cute blondine boy who attended Cal Arts and lived next door to Dr. Doyle came by and visited me and we drank some weiss wine shorle. Jason is leaving Silverlake for good to return to Africa where he has been working for the last three years as an audio visual archivist for the United Nations Criminal Tribunal for Rawanda located in Arusha, Tanzania. It’s a good paying gig and I can understand the allure of being in some exotic location when you are also a filmmaker, but Africa is one problematic continent. With all their colonial baggage that will never go away and political corruption and strife, that is the last place on earth I would ever want to go. Jason was telling me about the icky Dutch Flower Farmers, the EAC which is like the African version of the EU, and the South African Boer big game hunters. Also there is always a very real threat of constant violence and upheaval. I worry about Jason. He is just a little cute dorky boy with a big penis, and something tells me he is getting into something way beyond his control that can easily spell trouble. Just this woman’s opinion.
Picked up my sister Teresa Ray from her job at the County Housing Authority over near Westlake/MacArthur Park. The weather was breathtaking as the short rainstorm on Sunday made everything crystalline clear. My poor family and their woes. I took my sister to eat lunch at Mama’s Hot Tamales on 7th Street and Alvarado and we tried to hash out what can be done to help my older sister who is dying of cancer but the cancer seems to be progressing slower then was previously thought. This is mainly due I believe to mind over matter as my older sister Gracie Lee is able to just via sheer will keep it somewhat at bay and from entering her vital organs. Its in her bones, so she is in a lot of pain and discomfort but like my mother she has a high tolerance for pain, and now she is distracted by the illness of her son and daughter. Gracie Lee looks horrible when you see her with the skin just falling off her bones and no piece of clothing in the world seems to fit her, but perhaps she can delay the inevitable by her complete deluse adaise.
Jeffrey Hilbert came by to fetch me and bring the doll to dinner at my old Club Sucker partner Frank Rodriguez’s new house in Glassel Park that he shares with his hot fiery ginger lover, the extremely gifted artist and photographer Patrick Lee. Their home in the foothills was built in 1960 and use to be owned by a famous songwriter who wrote pop hits for Frank Sinatra and others in the 1950s and 1960s. The place is simply gorgeous with a large deck and a 1970s style hot tub that the pair uses for seduction purposes and retro photoshoots. The din din was delicious middle eastern style grilling that made my belly inflate to epic proportions. Frank Rodriguez and Jeffrey are business partners with Kustom Creative in Silverlake at the Junction, and the pair use to work together at Sony Pictures. It was so sweet attending a masculine dinner party with three of LA’s most humpiest sex gods. One of these days I will have to write in this very blog about all the sex that Frank had during the five years we did Club Sucker together at the Garage on Santa Monica Blvd at Virgil in Virgil Village. Frank has this masculine edge about him that all the alt fag and indie rock boys just could not resist.
Jason Bryne the cute blondine boy who attended Cal Arts and lived next door to Dr. Doyle came by and visited me and we drank some weiss wine shorle. Jason is leaving Silverlake for good to return to Africa where he has been working for the last three years as an audio visual archivist for the United Nations Criminal Tribunal for Rawanda located in Arusha, Tanzania. It’s a good paying gig and I can understand the allure of being in some exotic location when you are also a filmmaker, but Africa is one problematic continent. With all their colonial baggage that will never go away and political corruption and strife, that is the last place on earth I would ever want to go. Jason was telling me about the icky Dutch Flower Farmers, the EAC which is like the African version of the EU, and the South African Boer big game hunters. Also there is always a very real threat of constant violence and upheaval. I worry about Jason. He is just a little cute dorky boy with a big penis, and something tells me he is getting into something way beyond his control that can easily spell trouble. Just this woman’s opinion.
Picked up my sister Teresa Ray from her job at the County Housing Authority over near Westlake/MacArthur Park. The weather was breathtaking as the short rainstorm on Sunday made everything crystalline clear. My poor family and their woes. I took my sister to eat lunch at Mama’s Hot Tamales on 7th Street and Alvarado and we tried to hash out what can be done to help my older sister who is dying of cancer but the cancer seems to be progressing slower then was previously thought. This is mainly due I believe to mind over matter as my older sister Gracie Lee is able to just via sheer will keep it somewhat at bay and from entering her vital organs. Its in her bones, so she is in a lot of pain and discomfort but like my mother she has a high tolerance for pain, and now she is distracted by the illness of her son and daughter. Gracie Lee looks horrible when you see her with the skin just falling off her bones and no piece of clothing in the world seems to fit her, but perhaps she can delay the inevitable by her complete deluse adaise.
Jeffrey Hilbert came by to fetch me and bring the doll to dinner at my old Club Sucker partner Frank Rodriguez’s new house in Glassel Park that he shares with his hot fiery ginger lover, the extremely gifted artist and photographer Patrick Lee. Their home in the foothills was built in 1960 and use to be owned by a famous songwriter who wrote pop hits for Frank Sinatra and others in the 1950s and 1960s. The place is simply gorgeous with a large deck and a 1970s style hot tub that the pair uses for seduction purposes and retro photoshoots. The din din was delicious middle eastern style grilling that made my belly inflate to epic proportions. Frank Rodriguez and Jeffrey are business partners with Kustom Creative in Silverlake at the Junction, and the pair use to work together at Sony Pictures. It was so sweet attending a masculine dinner party with three of LA’s most humpiest sex gods. One of these days I will have to write in this very blog about all the sex that Frank had during the five years we did Club Sucker together at the Garage on Santa Monica Blvd at Virgil in Virgil Village. Frank has this masculine edge about him that all the alt fag and indie rock boys just could not resist.
Monday, January 31, 2011
CHARLOTTING THE CAVITICUS
Friday night I visited Stella of Stray Pop, KXLU’s longest running radio program. Andrew Gould my partner with Bricktops drove me to the Loyola Marymount Campus in Westchester through the fog that was frightening me because of the low visibility. Hanging out with Miss Stella was kinky humpy dork Ethan Port of the band Savage Republic. Ethan actually looked good, and hadn’t aged badly. He’s married with a teenage daughter who is a lesbiana. I adore Stella who is a true LA treasure and radiant oddball. On the drive back to the eastside Andrew treated his doll to some tacos from an amazing taco truck parked in Echo Park that wasn't surrounded with bearded Silverlake hipsters. The beard look has now replaced the goatee with the twentysomething male set.
Earlier in the day I ran around with my old pal Craig Roose aka: Billy Wisdom of Billy Wisdom and the HeShees, aka: Jacqueline Essex of Britpop band Stupor and cable access TV hostessa Summer Caprice who can do a mean Billy Holiday impersonation. Craig is one of LA’s most underrated performer/personalities and a true genius of the subversive. I really love him and we go back over 30 years of punk rock foolery. He took me to a bunch of thrift stores in the Valley, and it was just marvelous hanging with him in a part of Los Angeles I know very little about.Craig grew up in the valley.
Early in the morn I had breaky at Astro Family off of Fletcher Drive in Silverlake with young art star and beauty goddess Ms. ZacKary Drucker. I love the new generation of gender children like ZacKary and Wu Ingrid Tsang who are doing really interesting work and taking the place of us elder spokeswomen.
Met with Jeffrey Hilbert at his advertising agency Kustom Creative and we went to visit the ailing yet still brilliant Mrs. Michael Glass who suffered from two strokes in the last few years leaving him bed ridden in a rest home off of Temple Street near Historic Filipino Town. Mrs. Glass is the one responsible for the success in the 90s of Amok Books and its famed Dispatch series. Jeffrey Hilbert and Gary Stella are complete angels for coming to help a friend in need when others in Silverlake were only fair weather companions to the troubled Mrs. Glass. Both Mrs. Glass and I come from the same poor background of Watts and South Central Los Angeles, and we escaped to become celebrated artists. Mrs Glass has a MFA from Cal Arts and her work was a highlight of the celebrated queer exhibition from the late 80s Against Nature that was curated by Dennis Cooper at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions(LACE).
On Thursday Jeffrey Hilbert and Miss Morgan Rhodes of Sony Pictures took me to Aleggria in Silverlake for a wonderful Mexican dinner. The food at this little bistro is incredible, and they give you great service and are really nice and friendly.
Cesar Vega who works in commercial TV and film production also took me to Allegria on Saturday evening for din din. There was an eastside hipster couple eating across from us and the man was drop dead gorgeous. I couldnt keep my eyes off of him, and Cesar who is straight was macking on the handsome dudes female companion.
After supper Cesar to me for a visit to his luxury Hollywood office and post production facility. The financial meltdown isn't affecting Cesar's business. He is doing better then ever. Later we wound up having drinks at The Spotlight with my favorite bartender Jerry making me the stiffest vodka gimlets imagineable. There were a few lumpy gogo boys on parade which Cesar wasn’t featuring so we left and he took me to Goldiggers on Santa Monica Blvd at Wilton Place, which is the 20 cent strip joint which is owned and run by Vietnamese sex workers ruled over by a no nonsense dragon lady of a madame. The place was fun and sleazy, but I was glad we didn’t spend that much time there. In the late 80s the club featured Latina pepperpot strippers.
Sunday morning was taken to Hollywood Farmers Market on Ivar by the beautiful black novelist Lisa Teasley. Lisa has remarried to a handsome naturalist health professional and is teaching at UC Riverside creative writing and a poetry course. Her gorgeous daughter is now 14 years old and in her first relationship. Ms. Teasley is the most positive woman in the world, and knows how to get her needs met. I have to learn to pattern my life after her. While at the marketa we ran in to Jason Byrne who lives in the courtyard apartment complex where Dr. Doyle use to reside on Edgecliffe. He has been working in Africa and making experimental documentary films. I didn’t recognize him at first with his short cropped hair, but he looks beautiful with those blondine locks and full pillow lips of vermillion. I bet he is a white boy packing some major USDA grade.
Also bumped into silver foxx Joseph Louise Brooks, the birdwatcher and former Hollywood trendy club kingpin, and his riche lover. Mr. Brooks married well, and he and his partner live in a fabulous compound that is Hancock Park adjacent. God love the discrete charm of the bougieousie. Pardon me for not spelling the word correctly. Exiting the market we dropped by the Hollywood World News Stand to holler at Diz McNally the official Countess of the Cahuenga Corridor. I love me my Diz! who use to be known as the most fired waitress in Hollywood.
Later in the evening my oldest friend in the world Marlou de Luna who I have known since 3rd grage and her husband Hal Marinas took me to dinner at the little boite Reservoir which use to be Netty’s that sits across from Spaceland at Dreams. The food was great, but I wasn’t featuring the staff. They were trying to be nice, but I could tell they weren’t having us. Silverlake has really changed and restaurants like this are a sad reminder of that fact.
Monday morning one of my lovesexy dejecta/protecta Rock Hudson boy beauties---Robbie Acklen the juicy ginger with the beard and constant erection came by to visit me and cooked the lady a delicious vegan amulet omeleta. How sweet of him to drive all the way from the Claremont Colleges to spend time with the lady. I really adore my hot children of high art. Robbie gave me a lift to the subway so I could meet with my older sister Teresa Ray so we could deal with all the issues facing my oldest sister Gracie Lee who is dying of breast cancer, and my nephew who is now in the hospital because of two strokes. Things are just escalating for my poor relatives. My sister Teresa Ray is also a hoarder whose dingbat apartment in Hollywood is filled to the roof with so much junk that no one can even enter it.
Friday night I visited Stella of Stray Pop, KXLU’s longest running radio program. Andrew Gould my partner with Bricktops drove me to the Loyola Marymount Campus in Westchester through the fog that was frightening me because of the low visibility. Hanging out with Miss Stella was kinky humpy dork Ethan Port of the band Savage Republic. Ethan actually looked good, and hadn’t aged badly. He’s married with a teenage daughter who is a lesbiana. I adore Stella who is a true LA treasure and radiant oddball. On the drive back to the eastside Andrew treated his doll to some tacos from an amazing taco truck parked in Echo Park that wasn't surrounded with bearded Silverlake hipsters. The beard look has now replaced the goatee with the twentysomething male set.
Earlier in the day I ran around with my old pal Craig Roose aka: Billy Wisdom of Billy Wisdom and the HeShees, aka: Jacqueline Essex of Britpop band Stupor and cable access TV hostessa Summer Caprice who can do a mean Billy Holiday impersonation. Craig is one of LA’s most underrated performer/personalities and a true genius of the subversive. I really love him and we go back over 30 years of punk rock foolery. He took me to a bunch of thrift stores in the Valley, and it was just marvelous hanging with him in a part of Los Angeles I know very little about.Craig grew up in the valley.
Early in the morn I had breaky at Astro Family off of Fletcher Drive in Silverlake with young art star and beauty goddess Ms. ZacKary Drucker. I love the new generation of gender children like ZacKary and Wu Ingrid Tsang who are doing really interesting work and taking the place of us elder spokeswomen.
Met with Jeffrey Hilbert at his advertising agency Kustom Creative and we went to visit the ailing yet still brilliant Mrs. Michael Glass who suffered from two strokes in the last few years leaving him bed ridden in a rest home off of Temple Street near Historic Filipino Town. Mrs. Glass is the one responsible for the success in the 90s of Amok Books and its famed Dispatch series. Jeffrey Hilbert and Gary Stella are complete angels for coming to help a friend in need when others in Silverlake were only fair weather companions to the troubled Mrs. Glass. Both Mrs. Glass and I come from the same poor background of Watts and South Central Los Angeles, and we escaped to become celebrated artists. Mrs Glass has a MFA from Cal Arts and her work was a highlight of the celebrated queer exhibition from the late 80s Against Nature that was curated by Dennis Cooper at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions(LACE).
On Thursday Jeffrey Hilbert and Miss Morgan Rhodes of Sony Pictures took me to Aleggria in Silverlake for a wonderful Mexican dinner. The food at this little bistro is incredible, and they give you great service and are really nice and friendly.
Cesar Vega who works in commercial TV and film production also took me to Allegria on Saturday evening for din din. There was an eastside hipster couple eating across from us and the man was drop dead gorgeous. I couldnt keep my eyes off of him, and Cesar who is straight was macking on the handsome dudes female companion.
After supper Cesar to me for a visit to his luxury Hollywood office and post production facility. The financial meltdown isn't affecting Cesar's business. He is doing better then ever. Later we wound up having drinks at The Spotlight with my favorite bartender Jerry making me the stiffest vodka gimlets imagineable. There were a few lumpy gogo boys on parade which Cesar wasn’t featuring so we left and he took me to Goldiggers on Santa Monica Blvd at Wilton Place, which is the 20 cent strip joint which is owned and run by Vietnamese sex workers ruled over by a no nonsense dragon lady of a madame. The place was fun and sleazy, but I was glad we didn’t spend that much time there. In the late 80s the club featured Latina pepperpot strippers.
Sunday morning was taken to Hollywood Farmers Market on Ivar by the beautiful black novelist Lisa Teasley. Lisa has remarried to a handsome naturalist health professional and is teaching at UC Riverside creative writing and a poetry course. Her gorgeous daughter is now 14 years old and in her first relationship. Ms. Teasley is the most positive woman in the world, and knows how to get her needs met. I have to learn to pattern my life after her. While at the marketa we ran in to Jason Byrne who lives in the courtyard apartment complex where Dr. Doyle use to reside on Edgecliffe. He has been working in Africa and making experimental documentary films. I didn’t recognize him at first with his short cropped hair, but he looks beautiful with those blondine locks and full pillow lips of vermillion. I bet he is a white boy packing some major USDA grade.
Also bumped into silver foxx Joseph Louise Brooks, the birdwatcher and former Hollywood trendy club kingpin, and his riche lover. Mr. Brooks married well, and he and his partner live in a fabulous compound that is Hancock Park adjacent. God love the discrete charm of the bougieousie. Pardon me for not spelling the word correctly. Exiting the market we dropped by the Hollywood World News Stand to holler at Diz McNally the official Countess of the Cahuenga Corridor. I love me my Diz! who use to be known as the most fired waitress in Hollywood.
Later in the evening my oldest friend in the world Marlou de Luna who I have known since 3rd grage and her husband Hal Marinas took me to dinner at the little boite Reservoir which use to be Netty’s that sits across from Spaceland at Dreams. The food was great, but I wasn’t featuring the staff. They were trying to be nice, but I could tell they weren’t having us. Silverlake has really changed and restaurants like this are a sad reminder of that fact.
Monday morning one of my lovesexy dejecta/protecta Rock Hudson boy beauties---Robbie Acklen the juicy ginger with the beard and constant erection came by to visit me and cooked the lady a delicious vegan amulet omeleta. How sweet of him to drive all the way from the Claremont Colleges to spend time with the lady. I really adore my hot children of high art. Robbie gave me a lift to the subway so I could meet with my older sister Teresa Ray so we could deal with all the issues facing my oldest sister Gracie Lee who is dying of breast cancer, and my nephew who is now in the hospital because of two strokes. Things are just escalating for my poor relatives. My sister Teresa Ray is also a hoarder whose dingbat apartment in Hollywood is filled to the roof with so much junk that no one can even enter it.
Thursday, January 27, 2011
HAPPINESS IN RICH PROTEINS
Went to din din at Tender Greens last night with two of my oldest girlfriends Glen Meadmore and Dora from Ventura. I go way back with these tall drink of water ladies. Dora has owned a punky store up in Ventura for the last 24 years, and travels the globe to exotic locations looking for giant cock-a-doodle-do. When I first met Miss Dora she was a shy undergrad at Loyola Marymount and looked like a boy straight out of an early 60s film like Bye Bye Birdie. She and Bouffant St. Marie ruled a clique of young queens and admirers in Ventura’s small gay community. Dora would frequent LA and became a part of The Amoeba Records & Filmworks kollective that was headed by Gomorrah Wednesday and Quasi O’Shea out of Hollywood. She had her own club on Hollywood Blvd called Sissy USA. It was a blast catching up with her misadventures that included a stop at the old Flex Sauna where she shared a shag with James Frankenstone of Club F*ck and Sinamatic fame. Dora knew who he was, but he didn’t recognize Dora in a her masculine persona. I go way back with Frankenstone, and remember when he was a simple but trendy suburban lad from Arcadia who was straight with a girlfriend,but the minute he took his first whiff of Hollywood underground nitelife he was transformed. Seems like his penis is also going through some major transformations of the pumped kind. I’m not one to gossip so you know you didn’t hear it from me. I wonder what ever became of James’s black lover who was going to law school that we all referred to as Huggy Bear? James also had at one point a humpy negro beau who was a professional ice skater with Icecapades. One time James modeled for me in a fashion show I did at the old Lhasa Club on Hudson and Santa Monica Blvd in Hollywood. He has always had a great physique but he was so stiff and uncomfortable on the catwalk-it was hilarious.
Met with Emi Fontana Tuesday of West of Rome. She took me to the Coffee Table for luncheon and we talked about her Pacific Standard project that’s in conjunction with the Getty next year at this time. Emi and I are born on the same day in the same year so its like we are twin sisters from different mothers. Her last West of Rome project featured Marnie Webber. So I guess I will be making a return engagement to Los Angeles sometime this year for research and development.
Wednesday Emi came over and we did more brainstorming for our project. It was really wonderful going over ideas and suggesting site specific locations that we might use for this piece. I am really interested in perhaps doing something at the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library in the West Adams District or the former house of Mary Pickford on the private gated street Fremont Place between Olympic and Wilshire Blvd. This mansion was built in 1916 and in the 1970s Muhammed Ali lived there and I was invited to a reception given for top graduates from Los Angeles High School, which is my alma mata. The food was amazing and there was a chamber music quartet playing. I also think that the One Institute would be an interesting location as well, and using their archive like I did in Platinum Oasis would add to the gravita of the project.
Emi surprised me with a visit by artist Marnie Webber who I haven’t seen in many years. The last time I saw her was at a party of Tommy Gear’s for his ex lover Lyle Ashton Harris. Marnie is a big art star now. She gave me a copy of her catalogue Magasin. Emi gave me a copy of the book Insurgent Muse-Life and Art at the Woman’s Building by Terry Wolverton. The Woman’s building will feature heavily in the new piece I create for West of Rome. I’d also like to involve Phranc, The Jewish Lesbian Folk Singer who was one of the founding mack mamas of the Woman’s Building. The famous portrait that Cathie Opie took of me with the green hair was taken at the Woman’s Building. Later in the evening the massage therapist and performer Rage who lives in the duplex next door to Ron Athey’s heard my loud voice and came by to visit as Emi & I were brainstorming together. Rage is a hoot, and I’ve missed her.
Later Emi took me to dinner at Café Stella where there were lots of trendoids and celebutants like Eva Longoria with this dark haired man that the waitress told me was Penelope Cruz’s brother, also Hayden Christiansen the Canadian Star Wars star was looking chunky but funky with some funny looking but well dressed young woman, and a way too skinny and brittle looking Halle Berry with handsome French hotskin Olivier Martinez. There was some uncomfy scrambling when Halle’s ex Gabriel Aubry also showed up with a date.
Andre Balazs the boutique hotel god said hi to me as I was leaving. Mr. Balazs is quite a stud, and was with some stringy haired fugly blondine haired lady when he should have been asking me out on a date. The food at Café Stella’s is sumptuous. I ordered the lentil soup and Emi and I tore open our yummy pork chops and mash potatoes.
***
Received a lot of emugs from people who saw dejecta wanting a copy of the text read by Dr. Robert Summers. So here it is in all its glory:
Judy Garland Modalities and the Everlasting Lanconian Beauty of ‘Faghagotry’
It’s a well-known fact—it almost goes without saying—that Ms. Judy Garland was and still is (if only in a spectral form and force) the Grande Dame of the modern-day fag hag. Now, there were proto-fag hags: Helen of Troy, Cleopatra, the Virgin Mary, and the Non-Virgin Mary Magdalene, Marie Antoinette, which is to name only a few of the dozens of famous women in history. But, it must be noted that these aforementioned women were more “beards” (think females as ‘camouflage’ for gay men) than fag hags—proper. But, Ms. Garland, on the other hand, with a little help from narcotics, benzos and vodka, slowly re-configured and re-imagined the “beard”—which some people, nevertheless, still participate in today; however, it must be stated, at the beginning Ms. Garland also participated in the act of “breading;” for example, Vincente Minnelli and Mark Herron, who both were caught using a double headed dildo. And, at the sight of that, well, something transformed in Ms. Garland. The transformation of the beard to the fag hag was a slow process for Ms. Garland, as it would be for others. As another example of a beard, as it variously lives on, the woman Tom Cruise was or is married to, and artificialiality impregnating – if by ‘artificial’ we mean Collin Ferrall banging them raw – all the while Cruise was being barebacked by who knows how many hustlers – who couldn’t spell their own name even if you paid them more (or gave them a hit) – in Cruise’s Starwagon™. So, these women were breads (e.g., Mimi Rodgers, Nicole Kidman, Penelope Cruz, and Katie Holms), but they were also slowly being transformed—consciously or unconsciously—into a fag hag—as if touched by the specter of Ms. Garland, which you can always smell her presence from the aroma of Vicodine, benzos, and vodka—the ingredients of her new perfume that comes out in late November 2011, and exclusively at Barney’s.
Now to be honest, and I am not one to gossip and fabricate stories, but some women refused the role of the beard—and even the fag hag—to Mr. Cruise (e.g., Ms. Kidman), but it has been noted in numerous reputable texts that she can only have anal sex, as the National Enquirer has extensively researched; and her doctor told me over cocktails that “her anal cavity is a hole back to Australia.” He offered me a tour during her next visit. I said, “That is absolutely disgusting. Australia is hot, and I don’t eat shrimp.” Now on the other hand, Cruise’s other wives and girlfriends became fag hags.
To be more specific on the history of “faghagism,” and this will be on the midterm, in more ways than one, the fag’s (m)other—which is to say the hag—was transformed from an act and into a “being,” an identity category—which seems to have a relationship to the invention of homosexuality as an act transformed into an identity category in late 1700s, as the drug-using, barebacking, hustler-loving French historian / philosopher Michel Foucault has eloquently argued. On a similar point, more research must be done on the topic of the fag hag, using Ms. Garland’s inventions and transformations, as an identity category. Now, but going back to the beard, it needs to be clearly stated that the fag does have to come out of the closet—or the restroom stall or the bushes or People Magazine—in order to have the beard’s other become a fag so that the beard can become—but never cum—a hag of a fag.
Through my research, being a fag hag is a reciprocal relationship and highlights the polyvalence of power. I mean, all us fag hags—yes, I am a fag hag; nowhere does it state that one has to be a “woman” to be a fag hag; for historical figures look at Andy Warhol and Brigid Berlin (fag hags to each other) and before him Thomas Eakins and his younglins (meme chose). Truth be told, I am always taking care of my not-so-straight boys and the all-out gay ones too: all those early morning phone calls by the “straight” ones wondering it they are gay because they swallowed (who hasn’t), or the gay ones having me drive them back and forth to a Lesbian/Gay Center for a screening—they all have a punch card: “10th free with semen flavored lollipop”—all these boys’ hysterical and distraught need a (m)other (fuck the biologism of gender). Like any fag hag, I don’t really mind, but Jesus Christ of Nazareth, fuck me at least once, Ethan! Oh, Jesus Christ … we will get to that fag soon enough.
Moving forward on this train-wreck of a theory, a re-thinking of identity all us fag hags had to, at one point or another, give our fags, whether they admit it or not (like Zac Effron) all-out comfort, love, pills, and a lot of attention (as they leave at the bar to find, and we have to find our way back home). Oh yeah, “straight boys”—show me one—and I’ll show you a bottle of whisky—which, listen to me now, doesn’t necessarily guarantee you’ll get banged, but you will have your hands full. Oh “straight boys,” all of them only as straight as their erect cocks (otherwise known as a fag hag teasers). Yes, those endearing boys, what we have had to do, what we have done, what we continue to do is give them: courage to come out. And, I would call this one of the enactments, technologies of a “Garland Modality” or, a “Garland Faghagotry”—smell the pharmaceuticals and liquor? She is here, Judy?
Now, a “Garland Faghagotry” is based on certain procedures, technologies—for example, in Ms. Garland’s case—and even lovely daughter Liza’s case (indeed, like mother like daughter!)—to help and heal a “boyfriend” or “husband” “to come out, come out, wherever you are, and see the cock-sucker you really are,” which, in the case of Garland’s husbands she would sing into the bushes were hubby and gardener were—and, according to dear, lovely hubby, he was “just helping out.” (And, as we know the same wasn’t all that different from lovely Liza.) So, Ms. Garland dated and married gay men and loved her fans, which also all happened to be gay.
Now, what many do not know about Ms. Garland is that she was the top (in more ways than one) in her marriages. She had the best stap-ons in the world. And, YSL, her dear friend, made her the most precious strap-on that money and love could buy—and, by the way, Halson made Liza’s. It is not a well know fact that Demi Moore bought Ms. Garland’s strap-on at an auction at Sotheby’s for 3.5 million—Ashton Kutcher is thrilled, I’ve literally heard him screaming in utter jouissance. Backtracking, eventually every one of Ms. Garland’s husbands would “come out,” in one way or another, and, indeed, some didn’t—it would be redundant—and join the circle of fags that would surround her—and, no doubt the same will happen to Demi and Ashton and his fuck-buddy Ryan Seacrest (no secret there). To be sure, us fag hags are always helping our boys realize their full potential, as well as take their part in so-called “gay life and culture”—oh, so marvelous for them, no? I’m usually still finding my way back home from the bar my fag-friend left me at for a horse-hung stud, donning Diesel jeans, V-neck t-shirt, and some name brand tennis shoes. These latter boys are called fag-hag stealers.
Recently, I had tea with my good friend Liza at the Beverly Hills Hotel, we discussed her faghagetry that was inherited by her dear Mother, and which Liza fully accepts and promotes and her dearly departed friend, Andy Warhol’s, “hag-fagism”: which is kind-of like “faghagism” but without the weight problem. Anyway, Liza told me that Judy always topped her (gay) husbands, and she experienced more than one mudslide. So, I asked Liza how Ms. Garland handled this—I mean we all know she hated messes! And to my surprise I found out that Liza was a medium. So there, at the hotel, we contacted Ms. Garland: I asked her (via Liza) how she dealt with shit shooting out of her hubbies butts like a proverbial “Old Faithful.” She said in her crusty, vodka and Vicodine induced voice, “if you can’t feel your body, then you can’t feel the shit, or smell it either! In a sense I am always ‘over the rainbow’.” Yes, she was, she was.
Liza, whom I didn’t know was so gifted with contacting the spirit world, also helped me channel back in time, to the night of July 22, 1969, just weeks after her 47th birthday, and which may have been the catalyst for the gay riots at Stonewall Inn, which welcomed in the lesbian, gay, and trans movement. In this moment of channeling to the past, I saw Ms. Garland on the floor of her bedroom with a bottle of vodka in one hand and a ruby slipper in the other, which I think had some shit on the heel. She looked up, as if into the sky streaked by a rainbow, and she cried aloud, “Why hast thou forsaken me … I don’t know if I am gonna make it over the rainbow, but hopefully these pretty, little pills will get me over it.” Then her spirit slumped out of her body; she died. Yes, like Jesus Christ, but with a drug and alcohol problem (so like Jesus Christ), a gay husband, a baby fag hag daughter, and a ruby shoe with shit on it. The scene was like a beautifully tragic death scene painted by the sodomite Caravaggio—like so many images of his oil paintings of Jesus Christ suffering and dead. Like Jesus Christ the Superstar, Ms. Garland not only went out singing, but she died for all of our sins, and especially for all the fag hags, whose right is the Kingdom of Heaven—or at least Nieman Marcus—because we have given our lives to gay men who wont ever return the love; we have been there day and night for our fags—all those men who use and abuse us but whom we love, and will continue to love as long as there are narcotics, liquor, and, yes, chocolate. So there is an everlasting lanconian beauty of faghagotry, which I have only touched upon—but alas this is all the time I have today. See you next class.
***
Theoni V. Aldredge the Greek born film costume designer died the other day. I loved her work in The Great Gatsby and Eyes of Laura Mars. She got her big break from actress Geraldine Page who was in Tennessee Williams film version of Sweet Bird of Youth with Paul Newman. Page persuaded director Elia Kazan to hire Aldredge. She was 78 years old.
***
Today one of my Rock Hudson boy beauties from my MoCa piece dejecta came by and visited me in Silverlake. We had a wonderful time shooting the breeze at the flat I am staying at, and he took me for a drive in his cute convertible car. The weather was perfect so I decided to give the young man a Vaginal Davis style tour of Los Angeles and took him to some of my favourite haunts in the city which included Barnsdale Park, Melrose Hill, Harvard Heights and Koreatown. Since this 20 year old child is Greek from London attending USC he really enjoyed my take on the city. He told me something very disturbing about one of his tenured professors at USC named Walter Williams who teaches Cultural Anthropology and who he filed a sexual harassment complaint against that was ignored by University officials. When you have tenure in the fagademic world even if you kill a student you can't be fired.
Went to din din at Tender Greens last night with two of my oldest girlfriends Glen Meadmore and Dora from Ventura. I go way back with these tall drink of water ladies. Dora has owned a punky store up in Ventura for the last 24 years, and travels the globe to exotic locations looking for giant cock-a-doodle-do. When I first met Miss Dora she was a shy undergrad at Loyola Marymount and looked like a boy straight out of an early 60s film like Bye Bye Birdie. She and Bouffant St. Marie ruled a clique of young queens and admirers in Ventura’s small gay community. Dora would frequent LA and became a part of The Amoeba Records & Filmworks kollective that was headed by Gomorrah Wednesday and Quasi O’Shea out of Hollywood. She had her own club on Hollywood Blvd called Sissy USA. It was a blast catching up with her misadventures that included a stop at the old Flex Sauna where she shared a shag with James Frankenstone of Club F*ck and Sinamatic fame. Dora knew who he was, but he didn’t recognize Dora in a her masculine persona. I go way back with Frankenstone, and remember when he was a simple but trendy suburban lad from Arcadia who was straight with a girlfriend,but the minute he took his first whiff of Hollywood underground nitelife he was transformed. Seems like his penis is also going through some major transformations of the pumped kind. I’m not one to gossip so you know you didn’t hear it from me. I wonder what ever became of James’s black lover who was going to law school that we all referred to as Huggy Bear? James also had at one point a humpy negro beau who was a professional ice skater with Icecapades. One time James modeled for me in a fashion show I did at the old Lhasa Club on Hudson and Santa Monica Blvd in Hollywood. He has always had a great physique but he was so stiff and uncomfortable on the catwalk-it was hilarious.
Met with Emi Fontana Tuesday of West of Rome. She took me to the Coffee Table for luncheon and we talked about her Pacific Standard project that’s in conjunction with the Getty next year at this time. Emi and I are born on the same day in the same year so its like we are twin sisters from different mothers. Her last West of Rome project featured Marnie Webber. So I guess I will be making a return engagement to Los Angeles sometime this year for research and development.
Wednesday Emi came over and we did more brainstorming for our project. It was really wonderful going over ideas and suggesting site specific locations that we might use for this piece. I am really interested in perhaps doing something at the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library in the West Adams District or the former house of Mary Pickford on the private gated street Fremont Place between Olympic and Wilshire Blvd. This mansion was built in 1916 and in the 1970s Muhammed Ali lived there and I was invited to a reception given for top graduates from Los Angeles High School, which is my alma mata. The food was amazing and there was a chamber music quartet playing. I also think that the One Institute would be an interesting location as well, and using their archive like I did in Platinum Oasis would add to the gravita of the project.
Emi surprised me with a visit by artist Marnie Webber who I haven’t seen in many years. The last time I saw her was at a party of Tommy Gear’s for his ex lover Lyle Ashton Harris. Marnie is a big art star now. She gave me a copy of her catalogue Magasin. Emi gave me a copy of the book Insurgent Muse-Life and Art at the Woman’s Building by Terry Wolverton. The Woman’s building will feature heavily in the new piece I create for West of Rome. I’d also like to involve Phranc, The Jewish Lesbian Folk Singer who was one of the founding mack mamas of the Woman’s Building. The famous portrait that Cathie Opie took of me with the green hair was taken at the Woman’s Building. Later in the evening the massage therapist and performer Rage who lives in the duplex next door to Ron Athey’s heard my loud voice and came by to visit as Emi & I were brainstorming together. Rage is a hoot, and I’ve missed her.
Later Emi took me to dinner at Café Stella where there were lots of trendoids and celebutants like Eva Longoria with this dark haired man that the waitress told me was Penelope Cruz’s brother, also Hayden Christiansen the Canadian Star Wars star was looking chunky but funky with some funny looking but well dressed young woman, and a way too skinny and brittle looking Halle Berry with handsome French hotskin Olivier Martinez. There was some uncomfy scrambling when Halle’s ex Gabriel Aubry also showed up with a date.
Andre Balazs the boutique hotel god said hi to me as I was leaving. Mr. Balazs is quite a stud, and was with some stringy haired fugly blondine haired lady when he should have been asking me out on a date. The food at Café Stella’s is sumptuous. I ordered the lentil soup and Emi and I tore open our yummy pork chops and mash potatoes.
***
Received a lot of emugs from people who saw dejecta wanting a copy of the text read by Dr. Robert Summers. So here it is in all its glory:
Judy Garland Modalities and the Everlasting Lanconian Beauty of ‘Faghagotry’
It’s a well-known fact—it almost goes without saying—that Ms. Judy Garland was and still is (if only in a spectral form and force) the Grande Dame of the modern-day fag hag. Now, there were proto-fag hags: Helen of Troy, Cleopatra, the Virgin Mary, and the Non-Virgin Mary Magdalene, Marie Antoinette, which is to name only a few of the dozens of famous women in history. But, it must be noted that these aforementioned women were more “beards” (think females as ‘camouflage’ for gay men) than fag hags—proper. But, Ms. Garland, on the other hand, with a little help from narcotics, benzos and vodka, slowly re-configured and re-imagined the “beard”—which some people, nevertheless, still participate in today; however, it must be stated, at the beginning Ms. Garland also participated in the act of “breading;” for example, Vincente Minnelli and Mark Herron, who both were caught using a double headed dildo. And, at the sight of that, well, something transformed in Ms. Garland. The transformation of the beard to the fag hag was a slow process for Ms. Garland, as it would be for others. As another example of a beard, as it variously lives on, the woman Tom Cruise was or is married to, and artificialiality impregnating – if by ‘artificial’ we mean Collin Ferrall banging them raw – all the while Cruise was being barebacked by who knows how many hustlers – who couldn’t spell their own name even if you paid them more (or gave them a hit) – in Cruise’s Starwagon™. So, these women were breads (e.g., Mimi Rodgers, Nicole Kidman, Penelope Cruz, and Katie Holms), but they were also slowly being transformed—consciously or unconsciously—into a fag hag—as if touched by the specter of Ms. Garland, which you can always smell her presence from the aroma of Vicodine, benzos, and vodka—the ingredients of her new perfume that comes out in late November 2011, and exclusively at Barney’s.
Now to be honest, and I am not one to gossip and fabricate stories, but some women refused the role of the beard—and even the fag hag—to Mr. Cruise (e.g., Ms. Kidman), but it has been noted in numerous reputable texts that she can only have anal sex, as the National Enquirer has extensively researched; and her doctor told me over cocktails that “her anal cavity is a hole back to Australia.” He offered me a tour during her next visit. I said, “That is absolutely disgusting. Australia is hot, and I don’t eat shrimp.” Now on the other hand, Cruise’s other wives and girlfriends became fag hags.
To be more specific on the history of “faghagism,” and this will be on the midterm, in more ways than one, the fag’s (m)other—which is to say the hag—was transformed from an act and into a “being,” an identity category—which seems to have a relationship to the invention of homosexuality as an act transformed into an identity category in late 1700s, as the drug-using, barebacking, hustler-loving French historian / philosopher Michel Foucault has eloquently argued. On a similar point, more research must be done on the topic of the fag hag, using Ms. Garland’s inventions and transformations, as an identity category. Now, but going back to the beard, it needs to be clearly stated that the fag does have to come out of the closet—or the restroom stall or the bushes or People Magazine—in order to have the beard’s other become a fag so that the beard can become—but never cum—a hag of a fag.
Through my research, being a fag hag is a reciprocal relationship and highlights the polyvalence of power. I mean, all us fag hags—yes, I am a fag hag; nowhere does it state that one has to be a “woman” to be a fag hag; for historical figures look at Andy Warhol and Brigid Berlin (fag hags to each other) and before him Thomas Eakins and his younglins (meme chose). Truth be told, I am always taking care of my not-so-straight boys and the all-out gay ones too: all those early morning phone calls by the “straight” ones wondering it they are gay because they swallowed (who hasn’t), or the gay ones having me drive them back and forth to a Lesbian/Gay Center for a screening—they all have a punch card: “10th free with semen flavored lollipop”—all these boys’ hysterical and distraught need a (m)other (fuck the biologism of gender). Like any fag hag, I don’t really mind, but Jesus Christ of Nazareth, fuck me at least once, Ethan! Oh, Jesus Christ … we will get to that fag soon enough.
Moving forward on this train-wreck of a theory, a re-thinking of identity all us fag hags had to, at one point or another, give our fags, whether they admit it or not (like Zac Effron) all-out comfort, love, pills, and a lot of attention (as they leave at the bar to find, and we have to find our way back home). Oh yeah, “straight boys”—show me one—and I’ll show you a bottle of whisky—which, listen to me now, doesn’t necessarily guarantee you’ll get banged, but you will have your hands full. Oh “straight boys,” all of them only as straight as their erect cocks (otherwise known as a fag hag teasers). Yes, those endearing boys, what we have had to do, what we have done, what we continue to do is give them: courage to come out. And, I would call this one of the enactments, technologies of a “Garland Modality” or, a “Garland Faghagotry”—smell the pharmaceuticals and liquor? She is here, Judy?
Now, a “Garland Faghagotry” is based on certain procedures, technologies—for example, in Ms. Garland’s case—and even lovely daughter Liza’s case (indeed, like mother like daughter!)—to help and heal a “boyfriend” or “husband” “to come out, come out, wherever you are, and see the cock-sucker you really are,” which, in the case of Garland’s husbands she would sing into the bushes were hubby and gardener were—and, according to dear, lovely hubby, he was “just helping out.” (And, as we know the same wasn’t all that different from lovely Liza.) So, Ms. Garland dated and married gay men and loved her fans, which also all happened to be gay.
Now, what many do not know about Ms. Garland is that she was the top (in more ways than one) in her marriages. She had the best stap-ons in the world. And, YSL, her dear friend, made her the most precious strap-on that money and love could buy—and, by the way, Halson made Liza’s. It is not a well know fact that Demi Moore bought Ms. Garland’s strap-on at an auction at Sotheby’s for 3.5 million—Ashton Kutcher is thrilled, I’ve literally heard him screaming in utter jouissance. Backtracking, eventually every one of Ms. Garland’s husbands would “come out,” in one way or another, and, indeed, some didn’t—it would be redundant—and join the circle of fags that would surround her—and, no doubt the same will happen to Demi and Ashton and his fuck-buddy Ryan Seacrest (no secret there). To be sure, us fag hags are always helping our boys realize their full potential, as well as take their part in so-called “gay life and culture”—oh, so marvelous for them, no? I’m usually still finding my way back home from the bar my fag-friend left me at for a horse-hung stud, donning Diesel jeans, V-neck t-shirt, and some name brand tennis shoes. These latter boys are called fag-hag stealers.
Recently, I had tea with my good friend Liza at the Beverly Hills Hotel, we discussed her faghagetry that was inherited by her dear Mother, and which Liza fully accepts and promotes and her dearly departed friend, Andy Warhol’s, “hag-fagism”: which is kind-of like “faghagism” but without the weight problem. Anyway, Liza told me that Judy always topped her (gay) husbands, and she experienced more than one mudslide. So, I asked Liza how Ms. Garland handled this—I mean we all know she hated messes! And to my surprise I found out that Liza was a medium. So there, at the hotel, we contacted Ms. Garland: I asked her (via Liza) how she dealt with shit shooting out of her hubbies butts like a proverbial “Old Faithful.” She said in her crusty, vodka and Vicodine induced voice, “if you can’t feel your body, then you can’t feel the shit, or smell it either! In a sense I am always ‘over the rainbow’.” Yes, she was, she was.
Liza, whom I didn’t know was so gifted with contacting the spirit world, also helped me channel back in time, to the night of July 22, 1969, just weeks after her 47th birthday, and which may have been the catalyst for the gay riots at Stonewall Inn, which welcomed in the lesbian, gay, and trans movement. In this moment of channeling to the past, I saw Ms. Garland on the floor of her bedroom with a bottle of vodka in one hand and a ruby slipper in the other, which I think had some shit on the heel. She looked up, as if into the sky streaked by a rainbow, and she cried aloud, “Why hast thou forsaken me … I don’t know if I am gonna make it over the rainbow, but hopefully these pretty, little pills will get me over it.” Then her spirit slumped out of her body; she died. Yes, like Jesus Christ, but with a drug and alcohol problem (so like Jesus Christ), a gay husband, a baby fag hag daughter, and a ruby shoe with shit on it. The scene was like a beautifully tragic death scene painted by the sodomite Caravaggio—like so many images of his oil paintings of Jesus Christ suffering and dead. Like Jesus Christ the Superstar, Ms. Garland not only went out singing, but she died for all of our sins, and especially for all the fag hags, whose right is the Kingdom of Heaven—or at least Nieman Marcus—because we have given our lives to gay men who wont ever return the love; we have been there day and night for our fags—all those men who use and abuse us but whom we love, and will continue to love as long as there are narcotics, liquor, and, yes, chocolate. So there is an everlasting lanconian beauty of faghagotry, which I have only touched upon—but alas this is all the time I have today. See you next class.
***
Theoni V. Aldredge the Greek born film costume designer died the other day. I loved her work in The Great Gatsby and Eyes of Laura Mars. She got her big break from actress Geraldine Page who was in Tennessee Williams film version of Sweet Bird of Youth with Paul Newman. Page persuaded director Elia Kazan to hire Aldredge. She was 78 years old.
***
Today one of my Rock Hudson boy beauties from my MoCa piece dejecta came by and visited me in Silverlake. We had a wonderful time shooting the breeze at the flat I am staying at, and he took me for a drive in his cute convertible car. The weather was perfect so I decided to give the young man a Vaginal Davis style tour of Los Angeles and took him to some of my favourite haunts in the city which included Barnsdale Park, Melrose Hill, Harvard Heights and Koreatown. Since this 20 year old child is Greek from London attending USC he really enjoyed my take on the city. He told me something very disturbing about one of his tenured professors at USC named Walter Williams who teaches Cultural Anthropology and who he filed a sexual harassment complaint against that was ignored by University officials. When you have tenure in the fagademic world even if you kill a student you can't be fired.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
HUHU-TUNTEN
The Vaginal Davis doll is exhausted to no end. I went to bed last night at 8pm after Andrew Gould my former Bricktops partner and his ex-wife Charity Hope Valentine and her new gorgeous Eurasian beau Tashi came by where I am housesitting in Silverlake.
MoCa put me up at the Standard Hotel Downtown which was very comfortable. The Hotel itself is a little too trendy for my taste. I did checkout the rooftop pool but the lunky’s hanging out got on my last raw nerve.
My room was fantastic with a great view of the elegant California Club and across from it what use to be called the Arco TwinTowers. Peaking out of the foreground the imposing Library Crump Crawler. The weather this week has been dreamy, not too hot and not too cold. Just perfect with clear blue skies and gentle breezes. Its freezing in Berlin so I am lucky to be back in my old hometown.
Mounting my performance installation dejecta/protecta in a few days was draining. Jonathan Berger the production and set designer and his collaborators Adam Levine and Marcus Pontello worked round the clock. Talented Marcus designed the Grecian tunics that all the girl living sculptures wore. They all looked like Ava Gardner from One Touch of Venus. It was really lovely.
Jonathan Berger is such a talented young man. I have never seen such agility and focus, and he really galvanized a large group of people into an unstoppable team.
Curator Suzanne Isken from the MoCa Education Dept was a life savior, making the impossible happen. We also had assist by pretty Dana Isken and Stacy Enoch. David Bradshaw took care of all the audio and lighting, plus a zillion other things and was a pleasure to work with. The last time we did something at MoCa together was in 1991 for the famous Helter Skelter Exhibit at the then Temporary Contemporary which is now called the Geffen Contemporary.
And the beautiful art students from all the local colleges and universities who volunteered to be in dejecta were just extroidinary and so creative. They went way beyond the call of duty working long hard hours and never griping or complaining. They looked so beautiful escorting the public to the dinner table holding their hands and flirting shamelessly. ZacKary Drucker and Wu Ingrid Tsang were the hostesses of the dinner party and were visions of graciousness and gorgeous composure. Wu is a master chef and created the minimalist cuisine that was served to the audience with assist by Dr. Jennifer Doyle working as her sous chef. This elevated the event far beyond anything that I could have imagined. The smell of this delicious gourmet food prepared so lovingly wafting through the Ahmanson Theatre was mind boggling.
The performances were great! The Boyfriend----just hysterical and in good voice with their dapper outfits, props and campus cutup behavior. Glen Meadmore looking dazzling in a white Rhinestone Cowboy getup crooning splendidly with everyone being able to understand his inventive lyric play because of the low tech acoustics. Bricktops girl Jean Spinosa as Lucia Joyce was so sexy and charming with latin hunkster Martin Matamoris and Buster Keatonesque Rick Whitmore. And the lecture by Robert Summers on Judy Garland Modalities and the Lacanian Beauty of the FagHag. I gave Dr. Summers who is a young brilliant art historian the title and he ran with it coming up with such a crazy and inventive lecture. My favorite bit was when he said that Michael Jackson was his own faghag. That left the audience in stitches. Darling Larry Bob Roberts of Holy Titclamps and the webmaster of my website read from his new book The International Homosexual Conspiracy and also expounded on Sodomite Eugenics talking about the twink gene and bear gene. Just ribald. Last night I introduced Larry at Book Soup on the Sunset Strip where he was doing a reading from the book, and Larry has gone from a shy retiring dork to quite a seasoned performer. I was really proud of his transformation. Coming out to see Larry read was the self absorbed silver fox of a gay writer Trebor Healy, who hasn’t aged that much, Big Dicque Dave who use to be an editor at Unzipped Magazine, bon vivante Clint Catalyst looking like a gothic Ray Bolger, and film critic David Ehrenstein who gave me so much juicy gossip that I can’t remember it all but I did write down that he said that when the French director Andre’ Techine was a young hustler he had an affair with philosopher Roland Barthes. Before the reading Larry Bob and his wonderful lover Tommy took me to Real Food Daily for a splendid vegan dinner that was pure ecstasy.
In the afternoon I went by Kustom Creative to visit with Jeffrey Hilbert and Little Papa Frank Rodriguez at their independent ad agency. We had a marvelous time together gossiping about Tyler Perry’s film version of For Colored Girls . . .though they were busy with deadlines. Both Jeffreyland and Frank came to my piece and loved the sexy boy beauties.
To try and unwind I went to the Los Feliz Theatre to catch the Darin Aronofsky film Black Swan starring Natalie Portman. Just heard that the star and director are nominated for Academy Awards. The movie isn’t really that good, but it isn’t completely bad either. The tone is just so off in a way I really can’t describe.
Getting back to dejecta/protecta. Julie Tolentino and PigPen aka Stosh Fila presented their lovely endurance piece Cry of Love-The Honey which captivated the crowd at MoCa’s Ahmansen Theatre with its delicate beauty. For 4 hours Julie stood with honey dripping all over her. It was such a nice companion piece to the minimalist dinner. We couldn’t have done dejecta without the help of Julie and PigPen who is an expert in getting materials to use for any occasion as she works in the film industry building, painting and designing complicated set pieces.
O and I have to shout out to filmmaker and visual artist Janie Geiser who screened two of her flawless 16 milimeter films The Fourth Watch and Terrace 49. Janie is a stunningly attractive woman and so sweet and personable. I had first seen her films through Billy Miller’s program at Basso Kollective in Berlin and when I mentioned I wanted to show some 16 milimeter films as part of the piece, Jonathan who worked with her as a teenager recommended Janie and her husband Lewis Klahr and they were perfect in every way possible. The music in their films also went well with the music I was using throughout the piece. Talk about serendipity. Lewis showed his collage film Downs are Feminine which is very edgy and sophisticated.
Jean Kim who I worked with so well for Speaking From the Diaphragm in New York did all the video work for dejecta/protecta. Jean is so quiet and serene. She is such a calming force of nature and a pleasure to work with. On a tight schedule she filmed the screen tests of the Rock Hudson Boy Beauties and Dorothy Arzner Dance Girl Dance Lovelies. Along with Hector Martinez taking photos used as a wallpaper backdrop the films had this ethereal quality like they were floating in time and space. Jean is so talented that the mainstream has been sniffing at her door. The MTV remake of the incredible British teen television show Skins hired her to do videos. And now everyone is going to want to use her services.
The roster of celebutants attending the four shows on Jan 22nd of dejecta/protecta reads as a who’s who in almost every field imaginable. Here is the list, and other names have been coming to me as well: MoCa director Jeffrey Deitch brought with him photographer David LaChapelle,Simon de Pury, Chris Johansen, Bennett Simpson, Dan Colen and Nathan Sawaya. Others who got to sit at table: Emi Fontana of West of Rome, Craig Roose, Marc Frietas, hockey player Anze Kopitar,
NY Socialite Waris Ahluwalia, PC Valmorbida, Sebastian Jondeau with Brad Koenig, China Art Objects gang who will be selling my makeup paintings in the LA Art Fair, Lisa Mark with husband Channing Hansen, Stella of Stray Pop, Sean deLear, Nicky Giovanni Leonard and wife Sandra O Noshe Didn’t, MarLou DeLuna & Hal Marinas, Tom Guinness, Andrew Garfield, Karen Lofgren, and Michele Carr of Velvet Hammer.
***
This sweet note came to me about dejecta/protecta:
Lovely Ms Davis,
Dejecta/Protecta your wonderful performance tonight was absolutely beautiful funny amazing really really enjoyable. My buddy Hector came with me and we both greatly enjoyed ourselves.
That was really cool how that auditorium space was completely transformed with all that fabric and the creepy big doll things off to the side and that gorgeous lady in the corner with gooey sticky honey dripped all on her and that guy standing above her on the platform, and the very idea of the dinner setup was funny interesting uncomfortable fascinating and special cute beautiful too. May not make sense me putting it in writing, but that's how I think it in my head and felt it inside, you know? Funny how the book thing on the table in front of me had my mom's first name on it and the lady across from me mentioned the title of the book in front of her, and it turns out to be this book I tried hard to read 15 years ago and it was so unnerving painful to read it that I only made 20 pages and had to give up. (And I never give up!). Those young people are so lovely! Are they students of yours? I looooved how they personally seductively led us into the dining room. The podium presentation of faggery haggery history was reeeeelly interesting and yes funny. The film with music was great too, those male boinking images and naked lady images remind me of a deck of male cards I saw at a neighbors house in Silverlake and a set of trick drinking glasses that one of my aunt's husbands has at home. Mmmm hmmm. Glen Meadmore!! I liked so much seeing him hearing him again after all these years. I do recall some of his polaroid photos montage artworks at MOCA some years ago in a show we had, but onstage.....well he was wearing a lot less clothing last time I saw him. I was pleasantly glad he was a part of this performance.
You! You! You! What a most beautiful smile you still have on your gorgeous face! You really did look exactly like the last time me and my buddy Hector saw you at the old club on Virgil and Santa Monica ages ago.
Your voice and presence was so wonderful so close to all of us in the audience. What you said really sparked up in my brain about a lot of things. And not all of them frivolous and smiling. Which my dear Ms Davis is a wonderful effect to have on someone. Thank you for doing such a great creative work at MOCA. I am so honoured to have seen you and your talented group performing. Thank you sooooo much.
Breathe In The Love, Breathe Out The Jive.
Rosenda.
***
And now to bring me back to reality I get this email from my sister Teresa about my family and my oldest sister Gracie who is dying of cancer:
Gracie keeps getting up from chemo. But her clothes are falling off of her because she's lost so much weight.
Now Marky(my nephew) is in a Rehabilitation Center. He still has short term memory loss and needs to be reminded to bath and dress himself. Both sides are recovering from stroke. So he is weak. With his heart working at 15% it's not likely he will get much better. Gracie has gotten power of attorney so Kim (Marky’s ex wife)can't take his money. She did try by getting checks from the bank-even with his name on them only. So Gracie wants me to be power of attorney when she dies... He really can't remember when to take medication or how to cook or when to eat. So he can only live by himself with In Home Support.
Darren (My nieces husband) is about to go away to prison for his criminal activity. Terri is relying on his unemployment. So the reality of what he did is sinking in. And, he is very worried about Terri and the kids now. Of course this is too late. Terri had to have emergency surgery on New Years' Day. We were all at Victorville when she got strong cramps. She got her tubes tied but she got pregnant in her tubes. The tube ruptured and she was bleeding internally. She had to have a c-section to remove the fetus and repair the rupture before she bled to death. After the surgery her hands were very cold because she lost a lot of blood. But now she's better. But she can't look for work until she gets healed. So times are still hard for her. Darren cried because he does love his kids and he did want the baby. Of course 5 children is impossible. And Darren said he is very sorry for everything now. He's just one of those people who learn the hard way!
Hope to see you next week. Let me know! Love you!
***
So yes Vaginal Davis wasn’t exactly hatched as many people think. She actually came from something resembling a human family.
The Vaginal Davis doll is exhausted to no end. I went to bed last night at 8pm after Andrew Gould my former Bricktops partner and his ex-wife Charity Hope Valentine and her new gorgeous Eurasian beau Tashi came by where I am housesitting in Silverlake.
MoCa put me up at the Standard Hotel Downtown which was very comfortable. The Hotel itself is a little too trendy for my taste. I did checkout the rooftop pool but the lunky’s hanging out got on my last raw nerve.
My room was fantastic with a great view of the elegant California Club and across from it what use to be called the Arco TwinTowers. Peaking out of the foreground the imposing Library Crump Crawler. The weather this week has been dreamy, not too hot and not too cold. Just perfect with clear blue skies and gentle breezes. Its freezing in Berlin so I am lucky to be back in my old hometown.
Mounting my performance installation dejecta/protecta in a few days was draining. Jonathan Berger the production and set designer and his collaborators Adam Levine and Marcus Pontello worked round the clock. Talented Marcus designed the Grecian tunics that all the girl living sculptures wore. They all looked like Ava Gardner from One Touch of Venus. It was really lovely.
Jonathan Berger is such a talented young man. I have never seen such agility and focus, and he really galvanized a large group of people into an unstoppable team.
Curator Suzanne Isken from the MoCa Education Dept was a life savior, making the impossible happen. We also had assist by pretty Dana Isken and Stacy Enoch. David Bradshaw took care of all the audio and lighting, plus a zillion other things and was a pleasure to work with. The last time we did something at MoCa together was in 1991 for the famous Helter Skelter Exhibit at the then Temporary Contemporary which is now called the Geffen Contemporary.
And the beautiful art students from all the local colleges and universities who volunteered to be in dejecta were just extroidinary and so creative. They went way beyond the call of duty working long hard hours and never griping or complaining. They looked so beautiful escorting the public to the dinner table holding their hands and flirting shamelessly. ZacKary Drucker and Wu Ingrid Tsang were the hostesses of the dinner party and were visions of graciousness and gorgeous composure. Wu is a master chef and created the minimalist cuisine that was served to the audience with assist by Dr. Jennifer Doyle working as her sous chef. This elevated the event far beyond anything that I could have imagined. The smell of this delicious gourmet food prepared so lovingly wafting through the Ahmanson Theatre was mind boggling.
The performances were great! The Boyfriend----just hysterical and in good voice with their dapper outfits, props and campus cutup behavior. Glen Meadmore looking dazzling in a white Rhinestone Cowboy getup crooning splendidly with everyone being able to understand his inventive lyric play because of the low tech acoustics. Bricktops girl Jean Spinosa as Lucia Joyce was so sexy and charming with latin hunkster Martin Matamoris and Buster Keatonesque Rick Whitmore. And the lecture by Robert Summers on Judy Garland Modalities and the Lacanian Beauty of the FagHag. I gave Dr. Summers who is a young brilliant art historian the title and he ran with it coming up with such a crazy and inventive lecture. My favorite bit was when he said that Michael Jackson was his own faghag. That left the audience in stitches. Darling Larry Bob Roberts of Holy Titclamps and the webmaster of my website read from his new book The International Homosexual Conspiracy and also expounded on Sodomite Eugenics talking about the twink gene and bear gene. Just ribald. Last night I introduced Larry at Book Soup on the Sunset Strip where he was doing a reading from the book, and Larry has gone from a shy retiring dork to quite a seasoned performer. I was really proud of his transformation. Coming out to see Larry read was the self absorbed silver fox of a gay writer Trebor Healy, who hasn’t aged that much, Big Dicque Dave who use to be an editor at Unzipped Magazine, bon vivante Clint Catalyst looking like a gothic Ray Bolger, and film critic David Ehrenstein who gave me so much juicy gossip that I can’t remember it all but I did write down that he said that when the French director Andre’ Techine was a young hustler he had an affair with philosopher Roland Barthes. Before the reading Larry Bob and his wonderful lover Tommy took me to Real Food Daily for a splendid vegan dinner that was pure ecstasy.
In the afternoon I went by Kustom Creative to visit with Jeffrey Hilbert and Little Papa Frank Rodriguez at their independent ad agency. We had a marvelous time together gossiping about Tyler Perry’s film version of For Colored Girls . . .though they were busy with deadlines. Both Jeffreyland and Frank came to my piece and loved the sexy boy beauties.
To try and unwind I went to the Los Feliz Theatre to catch the Darin Aronofsky film Black Swan starring Natalie Portman. Just heard that the star and director are nominated for Academy Awards. The movie isn’t really that good, but it isn’t completely bad either. The tone is just so off in a way I really can’t describe.
Getting back to dejecta/protecta. Julie Tolentino and PigPen aka Stosh Fila presented their lovely endurance piece Cry of Love-The Honey which captivated the crowd at MoCa’s Ahmansen Theatre with its delicate beauty. For 4 hours Julie stood with honey dripping all over her. It was such a nice companion piece to the minimalist dinner. We couldn’t have done dejecta without the help of Julie and PigPen who is an expert in getting materials to use for any occasion as she works in the film industry building, painting and designing complicated set pieces.
O and I have to shout out to filmmaker and visual artist Janie Geiser who screened two of her flawless 16 milimeter films The Fourth Watch and Terrace 49. Janie is a stunningly attractive woman and so sweet and personable. I had first seen her films through Billy Miller’s program at Basso Kollective in Berlin and when I mentioned I wanted to show some 16 milimeter films as part of the piece, Jonathan who worked with her as a teenager recommended Janie and her husband Lewis Klahr and they were perfect in every way possible. The music in their films also went well with the music I was using throughout the piece. Talk about serendipity. Lewis showed his collage film Downs are Feminine which is very edgy and sophisticated.
Jean Kim who I worked with so well for Speaking From the Diaphragm in New York did all the video work for dejecta/protecta. Jean is so quiet and serene. She is such a calming force of nature and a pleasure to work with. On a tight schedule she filmed the screen tests of the Rock Hudson Boy Beauties and Dorothy Arzner Dance Girl Dance Lovelies. Along with Hector Martinez taking photos used as a wallpaper backdrop the films had this ethereal quality like they were floating in time and space. Jean is so talented that the mainstream has been sniffing at her door. The MTV remake of the incredible British teen television show Skins hired her to do videos. And now everyone is going to want to use her services.
The roster of celebutants attending the four shows on Jan 22nd of dejecta/protecta reads as a who’s who in almost every field imaginable. Here is the list, and other names have been coming to me as well: MoCa director Jeffrey Deitch brought with him photographer David LaChapelle,Simon de Pury, Chris Johansen, Bennett Simpson, Dan Colen and Nathan Sawaya. Others who got to sit at table: Emi Fontana of West of Rome, Craig Roose, Marc Frietas, hockey player Anze Kopitar,
NY Socialite Waris Ahluwalia, PC Valmorbida, Sebastian Jondeau with Brad Koenig, China Art Objects gang who will be selling my makeup paintings in the LA Art Fair, Lisa Mark with husband Channing Hansen, Stella of Stray Pop, Sean deLear, Nicky Giovanni Leonard and wife Sandra O Noshe Didn’t, MarLou DeLuna & Hal Marinas, Tom Guinness, Andrew Garfield, Karen Lofgren, and Michele Carr of Velvet Hammer.
***
This sweet note came to me about dejecta/protecta:
Lovely Ms Davis,
Dejecta/Protecta your wonderful performance tonight was absolutely beautiful funny amazing really really enjoyable. My buddy Hector came with me and we both greatly enjoyed ourselves.
That was really cool how that auditorium space was completely transformed with all that fabric and the creepy big doll things off to the side and that gorgeous lady in the corner with gooey sticky honey dripped all on her and that guy standing above her on the platform, and the very idea of the dinner setup was funny interesting uncomfortable fascinating and special cute beautiful too. May not make sense me putting it in writing, but that's how I think it in my head and felt it inside, you know? Funny how the book thing on the table in front of me had my mom's first name on it and the lady across from me mentioned the title of the book in front of her, and it turns out to be this book I tried hard to read 15 years ago and it was so unnerving painful to read it that I only made 20 pages and had to give up. (And I never give up!). Those young people are so lovely! Are they students of yours? I looooved how they personally seductively led us into the dining room. The podium presentation of faggery haggery history was reeeeelly interesting and yes funny. The film with music was great too, those male boinking images and naked lady images remind me of a deck of male cards I saw at a neighbors house in Silverlake and a set of trick drinking glasses that one of my aunt's husbands has at home. Mmmm hmmm. Glen Meadmore!! I liked so much seeing him hearing him again after all these years. I do recall some of his polaroid photos montage artworks at MOCA some years ago in a show we had, but onstage.....well he was wearing a lot less clothing last time I saw him. I was pleasantly glad he was a part of this performance.
You! You! You! What a most beautiful smile you still have on your gorgeous face! You really did look exactly like the last time me and my buddy Hector saw you at the old club on Virgil and Santa Monica ages ago.
Your voice and presence was so wonderful so close to all of us in the audience. What you said really sparked up in my brain about a lot of things. And not all of them frivolous and smiling. Which my dear Ms Davis is a wonderful effect to have on someone. Thank you for doing such a great creative work at MOCA. I am so honoured to have seen you and your talented group performing. Thank you sooooo much.
Breathe In The Love, Breathe Out The Jive.
Rosenda.
***
And now to bring me back to reality I get this email from my sister Teresa about my family and my oldest sister Gracie who is dying of cancer:
Gracie keeps getting up from chemo. But her clothes are falling off of her because she's lost so much weight.
Now Marky(my nephew) is in a Rehabilitation Center. He still has short term memory loss and needs to be reminded to bath and dress himself. Both sides are recovering from stroke. So he is weak. With his heart working at 15% it's not likely he will get much better. Gracie has gotten power of attorney so Kim (Marky’s ex wife)can't take his money. She did try by getting checks from the bank-even with his name on them only. So Gracie wants me to be power of attorney when she dies... He really can't remember when to take medication or how to cook or when to eat. So he can only live by himself with In Home Support.
Darren (My nieces husband) is about to go away to prison for his criminal activity. Terri is relying on his unemployment. So the reality of what he did is sinking in. And, he is very worried about Terri and the kids now. Of course this is too late. Terri had to have emergency surgery on New Years' Day. We were all at Victorville when she got strong cramps. She got her tubes tied but she got pregnant in her tubes. The tube ruptured and she was bleeding internally. She had to have a c-section to remove the fetus and repair the rupture before she bled to death. After the surgery her hands were very cold because she lost a lot of blood. But now she's better. But she can't look for work until she gets healed. So times are still hard for her. Darren cried because he does love his kids and he did want the baby. Of course 5 children is impossible. And Darren said he is very sorry for everything now. He's just one of those people who learn the hard way!
Hope to see you next week. Let me know! Love you!
***
So yes Vaginal Davis wasn’t exactly hatched as many people think. She actually came from something resembling a human family.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
GETTING GERTIE’S GREGARIOUS GARTER
Its been absolutely enchanting returning to Los Angeles for my dejecta/proteca installation piece at MoCa. Hector Martinez picked me up at the airport Saturday and I couldn’t believe how balmy it was almost 85 degrees fahrenheit without a cloud in the sky and a nice coolish breeze blowing. I checked in to my trendy hotel and in the parking lot they were filming a movie with that sizzling young Academy Award winning actor Adrian Brody. All of downtown LA seemed to be abuzz with filmic activity. Hector took me to this little boite on Main Street called Pete’s where I guzzled a huge cheeseburger with sensational chipotle fries. On the way back to my hotel we ran into Solomon Monsour of Dirt Box-- the famed 1980s LA underground club, and his lovesexy galpal. They live in a hoite toite loft called The Roosevelt.
Young humpy British male ingénue Alex Garfield was on my connector plane to Los Angeles. From Amsterdam. Mr. G. is in the hit film The Social Network.
The next day Skot Armstrong of the legendary LA art collective Science Holiday invited me, my production designer & collaborator Jonathan Berger, Dr. Jennifer Doyle of UC Riverside and Dr. Robert Summers of Otis School of Design to a high tea party at the Biltmore Hotel’s luscious Rendevous Court that overlooks Pershing Square. Joining us was Kateri Butler my Managing Editrix from the LA Weekly and Maggie Song of the brilliant LA post punk band The Fibonacci’s. A wonderful time was had by one and all. Leaving the Biltmore I bumped into Billy Hoye my old Koreatown neighbor and UCLA classmate. Billy works as a set decorator on Hollywood films so of course he would be part of the crew on this Adrian Brody film that was taking over the city.
Monday Jonathan and I had a meeting with Wu and ZacKary at the Village Bakery in Atwater Village. The food was a little pricy, but super delicious, and the staff of sweet young girls warm and accommodating. From our breakfast meeting we went to this old fashion hardware store on Glendale Blvd to powwow with Julie Tolentino and PigPen aka: Stosh Fila who were coordinating all the supplies we needed for this performance installation. Thank god for Julie and PigPen. They are so GoTo strong and mighty. We went to MoCa for load in and met with staff members David, the AV Tech Coordinator who I last worked with 20 years ago on the Helter Skelter exhibit at the Temporary Contemporary which is now now known as the David Geffen Contemporary off of Alameda and 1st Street. Reconnected also with Mike the operations mgr, Jang the Exhibitions Director, EJ the audio meister and sweetie pie Matt who would be our tech guy for the entire week of installing this piece. Everyone has been so warm, supportive and helpful. Special shout out to Suzanne Isken who is the Artist Museum curator and her adorable daughter Dana who bakes killer cup cakes. Suzanne has been the guardian angel of dejecta/protecta.
There is still so much more work to be done for the opening performances on Saturday. Of course I feel like a chicken with its head cut off. Also collaborating on the production end of the project are juicy Marcus and sensational Adam. The day we were filming the Jack Smith style screen tests with Video artist Jean Kim and Hector Martinez taking photos was fantastic. We managed to stay on schedule with logistics that could have been nightmarish. Out student volunteers are all warm and bubbly from a lot of the Southern California art schools and universities. Such a great group of beautiful young men and women.
Its been absolutely enchanting returning to Los Angeles for my dejecta/proteca installation piece at MoCa. Hector Martinez picked me up at the airport Saturday and I couldn’t believe how balmy it was almost 85 degrees fahrenheit without a cloud in the sky and a nice coolish breeze blowing. I checked in to my trendy hotel and in the parking lot they were filming a movie with that sizzling young Academy Award winning actor Adrian Brody. All of downtown LA seemed to be abuzz with filmic activity. Hector took me to this little boite on Main Street called Pete’s where I guzzled a huge cheeseburger with sensational chipotle fries. On the way back to my hotel we ran into Solomon Monsour of Dirt Box-- the famed 1980s LA underground club, and his lovesexy galpal. They live in a hoite toite loft called The Roosevelt.
Young humpy British male ingénue Alex Garfield was on my connector plane to Los Angeles. From Amsterdam. Mr. G. is in the hit film The Social Network.
The next day Skot Armstrong of the legendary LA art collective Science Holiday invited me, my production designer & collaborator Jonathan Berger, Dr. Jennifer Doyle of UC Riverside and Dr. Robert Summers of Otis School of Design to a high tea party at the Biltmore Hotel’s luscious Rendevous Court that overlooks Pershing Square. Joining us was Kateri Butler my Managing Editrix from the LA Weekly and Maggie Song of the brilliant LA post punk band The Fibonacci’s. A wonderful time was had by one and all. Leaving the Biltmore I bumped into Billy Hoye my old Koreatown neighbor and UCLA classmate. Billy works as a set decorator on Hollywood films so of course he would be part of the crew on this Adrian Brody film that was taking over the city.
Monday Jonathan and I had a meeting with Wu and ZacKary at the Village Bakery in Atwater Village. The food was a little pricy, but super delicious, and the staff of sweet young girls warm and accommodating. From our breakfast meeting we went to this old fashion hardware store on Glendale Blvd to powwow with Julie Tolentino and PigPen aka: Stosh Fila who were coordinating all the supplies we needed for this performance installation. Thank god for Julie and PigPen. They are so GoTo strong and mighty. We went to MoCa for load in and met with staff members David, the AV Tech Coordinator who I last worked with 20 years ago on the Helter Skelter exhibit at the Temporary Contemporary which is now now known as the David Geffen Contemporary off of Alameda and 1st Street. Reconnected also with Mike the operations mgr, Jang the Exhibitions Director, EJ the audio meister and sweetie pie Matt who would be our tech guy for the entire week of installing this piece. Everyone has been so warm, supportive and helpful. Special shout out to Suzanne Isken who is the Artist Museum curator and her adorable daughter Dana who bakes killer cup cakes. Suzanne has been the guardian angel of dejecta/protecta.
There is still so much more work to be done for the opening performances on Saturday. Of course I feel like a chicken with its head cut off. Also collaborating on the production end of the project are juicy Marcus and sensational Adam. The day we were filming the Jack Smith style screen tests with Video artist Jean Kim and Hector Martinez taking photos was fantastic. We managed to stay on schedule with logistics that could have been nightmarish. Out student volunteers are all warm and bubbly from a lot of the Southern California art schools and universities. Such a great group of beautiful young men and women.
Friday, January 14, 2011
WARMER BRUDER
Last night’s Rising Stars, Falling Stars screening of the Alma Reville/Alfred Hitchcock 1927 film Easy Virtue was electrifying.Eunice Martin on klavier played as if her life depended on it. Among her staunch admirers in the audience-composer Hans Berg. With An SRO crowd it was a nice way to begin the RSFS series for the gnu yeart of 2011.Lots of hot young NYU visiting grad students like Ms. Jessica Giespert with her entourage Andy & Katherine plus Carlos Reyes and Jo-ey Tang who brought the most beautiful Korean boy on the planet with them. This young child mesmerized me with his sculptural masculine face and a rock hard tight body-yowza! I’d give up my last paycheck,if I had a paycheck for him to sit on my face 24/7. Also on hand hunky young artist Gunnar Neumann with posse,big peniled German sex machine Jan Klesse of the new rock band Tenderloin, lovesexy video maker Liz Rosenfeld, handsome proper butch video artist and junior curator Justin Tyme, Nanna Heidenreich of Arsenal Experimental with gal pal DJane Olga Damnitz(Thank you Nanna for the sweet smelling perfume), filmmaker Angela Anderson with British thespian Alex Pettyfer, Ulrich Ziemons(the handsomest man in Europe) with Nadja Talmi of Forum Expanded,cutie pie male ingénue Alden Ehrenreich with his Olympic athlete beau Artus Was, Daniel Hendrickson the Jewish Muslim and translator to the shtars who did the creative decorations in the Rote Foyer and designed my new RSFS poster, Little Alex of Macedonia aka: Tielemachos Alexiou who styled, beat the face and hair in shape of la hostessa making her look super glamoo. Little tiny bubble butt Alex is a gifted filmmaker in his own right with the Chocolate Grinder kollective was with his humpy Israeli lover Assaf Hochman, a dancer with the Catherine Sullivan Company. Arsenal Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus who is learning to speak Arabic made all the art honchos Leo Koenig, Galerie Neu’s Johannes Birkner-Behlen and dealer Jan Wentrup feel right at home. Rising Stars goes on hiatus during the Berlinale in February but will be right back atcha in March.
1940s big band singer Margaret Whiting died age 86. She had a very nice silky vocal tonality, evident in songs like “Moonlight in Vermont”. Though I wasn’t a huge fan, what did intrigue me about her was that she was married to gay porn star Jack Wrangler, 22 years her junior. They met in 1976, and he told her he was gay to which she replied, “Only around the edges dear.” They wed in 1994 after living together for many years and he died in 2009.
***
This from my sweet and handsome baby diaper Joel Gibb of the Hidden Cameras on holiday in Central America.
Queen Vaginal,
OH how I have been missing my favourite lady. Where are you? How are you? I briefly scanned your blog and am happy to hear you had such a wonderful New Years being pampered like the lady you are.
I am in the mountains of Costa Rica. Monteverde to be exact and it is breathtaking. Enrico and I went zip-lining today over the forests and it was definitely a thrill and the most "extreme" thing I have ever done. I feel like Tarzan today!
In case you were remotely missing me at all, please find enclosed the photo that the Siegessäule photo-lady took that evening I stepped away from Tenderloin rehearsal. Do you like?
So I am DJing with BlaB February 4th at SchwuZ. It won't be as fun as Djing with you but I am sure it will be easier then the three of us together. Ha ha.
So what are your LA dates? You are going to be gone so much this winter :(
I am back in Berlin January 24th....
OK, gotta go get ready for dinner...Enrico should be back from his night hike looking for Tarantula's.
Much love and laughter to you
joel
x
Last night’s Rising Stars, Falling Stars screening of the Alma Reville/Alfred Hitchcock 1927 film Easy Virtue was electrifying.Eunice Martin on klavier played as if her life depended on it. Among her staunch admirers in the audience-composer Hans Berg. With An SRO crowd it was a nice way to begin the RSFS series for the gnu yeart of 2011.Lots of hot young NYU visiting grad students like Ms. Jessica Giespert with her entourage Andy & Katherine plus Carlos Reyes and Jo-ey Tang who brought the most beautiful Korean boy on the planet with them. This young child mesmerized me with his sculptural masculine face and a rock hard tight body-yowza! I’d give up my last paycheck,if I had a paycheck for him to sit on my face 24/7. Also on hand hunky young artist Gunnar Neumann with posse,big peniled German sex machine Jan Klesse of the new rock band Tenderloin, lovesexy video maker Liz Rosenfeld, handsome proper butch video artist and junior curator Justin Tyme, Nanna Heidenreich of Arsenal Experimental with gal pal DJane Olga Damnitz(Thank you Nanna for the sweet smelling perfume), filmmaker Angela Anderson with British thespian Alex Pettyfer, Ulrich Ziemons(the handsomest man in Europe) with Nadja Talmi of Forum Expanded,cutie pie male ingénue Alden Ehrenreich with his Olympic athlete beau Artus Was, Daniel Hendrickson the Jewish Muslim and translator to the shtars who did the creative decorations in the Rote Foyer and designed my new RSFS poster, Little Alex of Macedonia aka: Tielemachos Alexiou who styled, beat the face and hair in shape of la hostessa making her look super glamoo. Little tiny bubble butt Alex is a gifted filmmaker in his own right with the Chocolate Grinder kollective was with his humpy Israeli lover Assaf Hochman, a dancer with the Catherine Sullivan Company. Arsenal Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus who is learning to speak Arabic made all the art honchos Leo Koenig, Galerie Neu’s Johannes Birkner-Behlen and dealer Jan Wentrup feel right at home. Rising Stars goes on hiatus during the Berlinale in February but will be right back atcha in March.
1940s big band singer Margaret Whiting died age 86. She had a very nice silky vocal tonality, evident in songs like “Moonlight in Vermont”. Though I wasn’t a huge fan, what did intrigue me about her was that she was married to gay porn star Jack Wrangler, 22 years her junior. They met in 1976, and he told her he was gay to which she replied, “Only around the edges dear.” They wed in 1994 after living together for many years and he died in 2009.
***
This from my sweet and handsome baby diaper Joel Gibb of the Hidden Cameras on holiday in Central America.
Queen Vaginal,
OH how I have been missing my favourite lady. Where are you? How are you? I briefly scanned your blog and am happy to hear you had such a wonderful New Years being pampered like the lady you are.
I am in the mountains of Costa Rica. Monteverde to be exact and it is breathtaking. Enrico and I went zip-lining today over the forests and it was definitely a thrill and the most "extreme" thing I have ever done. I feel like Tarzan today!
In case you were remotely missing me at all, please find enclosed the photo that the Siegessäule photo-lady took that evening I stepped away from Tenderloin rehearsal. Do you like?
So I am DJing with BlaB February 4th at SchwuZ. It won't be as fun as Djing with you but I am sure it will be easier then the three of us together. Ha ha.
So what are your LA dates? You are going to be gone so much this winter :(
I am back in Berlin January 24th....
OK, gotta go get ready for dinner...Enrico should be back from his night hike looking for Tarantula's.
Much love and laughter to you
joel
x
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
ANDERES UFER
Film historian Marc Siegel’s CHEAP mailing list post is always filled with wonderful tidbits of information about what is happening in Berlin. So if you are a visitor check out his recommendations below:
Hello CHEAP Friends,
A perfect way to celebrate the ice breaking mild weather would be to go see what some of the people in the CHEAP cosmos are doing with themselves in public. There are three things going on in January that are worth your last dime:
1. Vaginal Davis welcomes you into 2011 with a HitchCOCKian silent film, Thursday, Jan 13th
2. Our very own Tim Blue has created a new work for the child in you at
Theater an der Parkaue with Stefan Faupel. Premiere on Friday, Jan. 14.
3. Our very own Tim Blue will have his very own evening in Arsenal, Jan 31st.
So, first, Miss Davis in her own words, because these words are so juicy this month:
Hope to see you Thursday, January 13th at 9pm for the first Rising Stars,Falling Stars of the New Year. We will screen Alfred Hitchcock¹s silent version of faggoty Noel Coward¹s Easy Virtue from 1927. Accompanying the film on klavier is the great composer Eunice Martin.
To get everyone in a festive mood feel free to come dressed in Hitchcock heroine chic.Yowza! We suggest you wear a strangulating necktie, mink coat & typewriter-in-tow ensemble for that special oomph of Tallulah Bankhead glamour. I want to see plenty of murderous gay hysterical bottom runway realness, Mrs. Bundy ornithologist tweeds for handsome women, Jimmy Stewart peeping-tom haberdashery, Edith Head ill hairdos & dark grey shades. Mrs. Danvers sinister saaphic brittleness is always appropriate, along with Melanie Daniels spoiled socialite smugness or Grace Kelly cocktail gowns for hetero normative crossdressers. Oh and lets not forget to highlight our
Norman Bates neurotic tics.
Rising Stars, Falling Stars Thursday Jan 13, 2011 9pm Kino Arsenal 2 Alfred Hitchcock/Alma Reville’s Easy Virtue 1927 with musical accompaniment by Eunice Martin. After the screening join curator and hostess Vaginal Davis in the Rote Foyer for an intimate wine reception. 2 Potsdamer Str at the Sony Center Filmhaus in Historic Potsdamer Platz
www.vaginaldavis.com
After the smash success of CHEAPs english-language queer for kids
production of "Dr. Seuss ABC," Tim Blue and Stefan Faupel (the stars of that infamous piece) took it upon themselves to create something new for the Theater an der Parkaue (probably the only Staatstheater around that would let such talented goofballs create their own piece!). The result is: "Is there Anybody Out There?" a disturbing UFO musical inspired by Alice in Wonderland and the Wizard of Oz and with sets by handsome Senol Senturk (of CHEAP Blacky fame). We don't know what to expect from that perverse non-thespian/thespian trio, but it's sure to be strange, beautiful and fun.
The premiere on Jan 14 is already sold out, so go see it either on Sa,
15.01.2011 at 16:00 Uhr or Mo, 17.01.2011 at 10:00 Uhr. Take a few designer babies with you.
At Theater an der Parkaue, Parkaue 29 Lichtenberg.
Info at:http://www.parkaue.de/index.php?topic=22&playId=738
Sound and Image Works by Tim Blue at the Arsenal as a part of DAS
Weekend/Transmediale on Jan 31. Check out Tim Blue and Paul Rowley's
experimental feature THE ROOMS (2009) in its Berlin premiere! This is Tim's first feature and it is rife with the sensuous abstractions we know and love from his shorts! Indeed, the program will open with a short film and live music accompaniment by the Brothers Blue, Tim and John. A selection of Tim's shorts (film's I mean, not his skanky Bermudas) will be playing in the BlackBox! Not to be missed! Arsenal, Jan 31, 7pm
info:http://www.arsenal-berlin.de/de/arsenal/programmtext-anzeige/article/2118/30
4.html?cHash=940c59d480
Hope to see you in all your bottom bitterness or spoiled smugness!
Yours,
Marc
*****
CHEAP looks forward to...
*Vaginal Davis in LA! Again! Check out dejecta/protecta
A performance by Vaginal Davis
in conjunction with The Artists Museum
Saturday, January 22, 2011, 8pm
Ahmanson Auditorium at MOCA on Grand Ave.
*Brand new piece by Tim Blue/Paul Rowley/David Philips in this year's ForumExpanded!
*The Advocate for Fagdom in the Panorama at this year's Berlinale! a new documentary about Judy La Bruce with interviews by such decrepid
personalities as Susanne Sachsse, Vaginal Davis, Gus Van Sant, John Waters,blahblahblah! don't miss it!
*and of course...Susanne Sachsse singing Schoenberg! Prepare for the
premiere of a radical new production of that perverse Austrian atonalist'sPIERROT LUNAIRE on March 6, 2011 at HAU! Conducted by melancholic beauty Premil Petrovic and directed by the eternally and seductively washed-up JudyLaBruce! not to be missed.
Film historian Marc Siegel’s CHEAP mailing list post is always filled with wonderful tidbits of information about what is happening in Berlin. So if you are a visitor check out his recommendations below:
Hello CHEAP Friends,
A perfect way to celebrate the ice breaking mild weather would be to go see what some of the people in the CHEAP cosmos are doing with themselves in public. There are three things going on in January that are worth your last dime:
1. Vaginal Davis welcomes you into 2011 with a HitchCOCKian silent film, Thursday, Jan 13th
2. Our very own Tim Blue has created a new work for the child in you at
Theater an der Parkaue with Stefan Faupel. Premiere on Friday, Jan. 14.
3. Our very own Tim Blue will have his very own evening in Arsenal, Jan 31st.
So, first, Miss Davis in her own words, because these words are so juicy this month:
Hope to see you Thursday, January 13th at 9pm for the first Rising Stars,Falling Stars of the New Year. We will screen Alfred Hitchcock¹s silent version of faggoty Noel Coward¹s Easy Virtue from 1927. Accompanying the film on klavier is the great composer Eunice Martin.
To get everyone in a festive mood feel free to come dressed in Hitchcock heroine chic.Yowza! We suggest you wear a strangulating necktie, mink coat & typewriter-in-tow ensemble for that special oomph of Tallulah Bankhead glamour. I want to see plenty of murderous gay hysterical bottom runway realness, Mrs. Bundy ornithologist tweeds for handsome women, Jimmy Stewart peeping-tom haberdashery, Edith Head ill hairdos & dark grey shades. Mrs. Danvers sinister saaphic brittleness is always appropriate, along with Melanie Daniels spoiled socialite smugness or Grace Kelly cocktail gowns for hetero normative crossdressers. Oh and lets not forget to highlight our
Norman Bates neurotic tics.
Rising Stars, Falling Stars Thursday Jan 13, 2011 9pm Kino Arsenal 2 Alfred Hitchcock/Alma Reville’s Easy Virtue 1927 with musical accompaniment by Eunice Martin. After the screening join curator and hostess Vaginal Davis in the Rote Foyer for an intimate wine reception. 2 Potsdamer Str at the Sony Center Filmhaus in Historic Potsdamer Platz
www.vaginaldavis.com
After the smash success of CHEAPs english-language queer for kids
production of "Dr. Seuss ABC," Tim Blue and Stefan Faupel (the stars of that infamous piece) took it upon themselves to create something new for the Theater an der Parkaue (probably the only Staatstheater around that would let such talented goofballs create their own piece!). The result is: "Is there Anybody Out There?" a disturbing UFO musical inspired by Alice in Wonderland and the Wizard of Oz and with sets by handsome Senol Senturk (of CHEAP Blacky fame). We don't know what to expect from that perverse non-thespian/thespian trio, but it's sure to be strange, beautiful and fun.
The premiere on Jan 14 is already sold out, so go see it either on Sa,
15.01.2011 at 16:00 Uhr or Mo, 17.01.2011 at 10:00 Uhr. Take a few designer babies with you.
At Theater an der Parkaue, Parkaue 29 Lichtenberg.
Info at:http://www.parkaue.de/index.php?topic=22&playId=738
Sound and Image Works by Tim Blue at the Arsenal as a part of DAS
Weekend/Transmediale on Jan 31. Check out Tim Blue and Paul Rowley's
experimental feature THE ROOMS (2009) in its Berlin premiere! This is Tim's first feature and it is rife with the sensuous abstractions we know and love from his shorts! Indeed, the program will open with a short film and live music accompaniment by the Brothers Blue, Tim and John. A selection of Tim's shorts (film's I mean, not his skanky Bermudas) will be playing in the BlackBox! Not to be missed! Arsenal, Jan 31, 7pm
info:http://www.arsenal-berlin.de/de/arsenal/programmtext-anzeige/article/2118/30
4.html?cHash=940c59d480
Hope to see you in all your bottom bitterness or spoiled smugness!
Yours,
Marc
*****
CHEAP looks forward to...
*Vaginal Davis in LA! Again! Check out dejecta/protecta
A performance by Vaginal Davis
in conjunction with The Artists Museum
Saturday, January 22, 2011, 8pm
Ahmanson Auditorium at MOCA on Grand Ave.
*Brand new piece by Tim Blue/Paul Rowley/David Philips in this year's ForumExpanded!
*The Advocate for Fagdom in the Panorama at this year's Berlinale! a new documentary about Judy La Bruce with interviews by such decrepid
personalities as Susanne Sachsse, Vaginal Davis, Gus Van Sant, John Waters,blahblahblah! don't miss it!
*and of course...Susanne Sachsse singing Schoenberg! Prepare for the
premiere of a radical new production of that perverse Austrian atonalist'sPIERROT LUNAIRE on March 6, 2011 at HAU! Conducted by melancholic beauty Premil Petrovic and directed by the eternally and seductively washed-up JudyLaBruce! not to be missed.
Monday, January 10, 2011
ROHR ZU SCHMECKEN
This just in from one of my Weissensee students Katya Maya who is in the wonderful new band Leiseylento:
HOP laaa !!
wir haben ein grund zu feiern! vorgestern ist unsere CD - die allererste
special limited edition handmade wow wow- fertig geworden! juhu, dank an
viele wunderbare menschen ist sie toll geworden und jetzt gehen wir auf tour
mit unsere grosse schwester MY SISTER GRENADINE (mysistergrenadine.com) um
sie zu präsentieren.es fängt in Hamburg an... und für unsere liebe berlinerInnen ist das nächste LIVE termin am 25.januar chez madame claude*
our queer tango and experimental chanson first album ist ready! yeah! record
release is happening on tour next week and soon in berlin! thanks to all the
wonderful persons who helped us to make this great thing happen!
spread the word! leitet weiter ! kommt vorbei ! schickt eure familie !
macht verspätete weihnachts geschenke !
hope to see you all soon**
10.01. hamburg / pony bar
11.01. hamburg / sweet home
12.01. kiel / prinz willy
13.01. hannover / feinkostlampe
14.01. köln / vorstadtprinzessin ---- mit krikela
15.01. osnabrück / café mojo
für alle details adressen usw. bitte auf myspace schauen:
www.myspace.com/leiseylento °°°°°° dort sind auch neue lieder zu
hören°°°°°°°°new songs°°°°°°°°mit unsere special guest musicians°°°°°°°°
25.01 berlin/ madame claude , lübbenerstr.19, xberg, 21h
love** leiseylento**
***
My other amazingly talented NYU grad students Carlos Reyes, and Jo-ey Tang along with artist and curator Elly Clarke came by the Cheese Endique Trifecta last night for some hot toddies and snax. It was a very rousing salon at the Trifecta aided along with Kentucky boubon. The gorgeous Ms. Clarke is leaving Berlin for a while to teach as Senior Lecturer in Photography at Coventry University in blimy Birmingham, England. She will certainly be missed here in Berlina as this is one young woman who is a mover and a shaker, but in a more interesting loving way then those tired art careerists who are stretching their icky tentacles everywhere. Don’t let me get started as that is another subject for another time.
***
Earlier in the day I attended a grand bruncheon at the famous table of La Susanne Sachsse the fearless leader of collective CHEAP. The table was gloriously set with cascading tulips as we ate a hearty Jena style meal of pork & lamb snausages, potato porridge, white kabal sour krout and a winter green salad with film historian Marc Siegel’s famed secret dressing---yumsville.
Susi’s beautiful children Richard & Salome Gersh were also on hand, as well as Richard’s new sweet and pretty girlfriend Fraulein Vicki.
Marc & Susi and I chatted about next year’s big Camp Anti Camp Festival they are curating which looks like it will be very exciting as it will be the last project at HAU under the artistic direction of Mattias Lienthal the quirky genius of the Hebbel Theatre.
***
Saturday morn I took Daniel Hendrickson the Jewish Muslim and his boyfriend Piero Bellomo to a birthday breakfast at the Turkish boite La Femme on Kott Busser Damn. We were there very early so it wasn’t crowded.Usually this place is a madhouse as the food is very good, and the moultenly hot Turkish men populating the joint is very eyecandylishtic.
This just in from one of my Weissensee students Katya Maya who is in the wonderful new band Leiseylento:
HOP laaa !!
wir haben ein grund zu feiern! vorgestern ist unsere CD - die allererste
special limited edition handmade wow wow- fertig geworden! juhu, dank an
viele wunderbare menschen ist sie toll geworden und jetzt gehen wir auf tour
mit unsere grosse schwester MY SISTER GRENADINE (mysistergrenadine.com) um
sie zu präsentieren.es fängt in Hamburg an... und für unsere liebe berlinerInnen ist das nächste LIVE termin am 25.januar chez madame claude*
our queer tango and experimental chanson first album ist ready! yeah! record
release is happening on tour next week and soon in berlin! thanks to all the
wonderful persons who helped us to make this great thing happen!
spread the word! leitet weiter ! kommt vorbei ! schickt eure familie !
macht verspätete weihnachts geschenke !
hope to see you all soon**
10.01. hamburg / pony bar
11.01. hamburg / sweet home
12.01. kiel / prinz willy
13.01. hannover / feinkostlampe
14.01. köln / vorstadtprinzessin ---- mit krikela
15.01. osnabrück / café mojo
für alle details adressen usw. bitte auf myspace schauen:
www.myspace.com/leiseylento °°°°°° dort sind auch neue lieder zu
hören°°°°°°°°new songs°°°°°°°°mit unsere special guest musicians°°°°°°°°
25.01 berlin/ madame claude , lübbenerstr.19, xberg, 21h
love** leiseylento**
***
My other amazingly talented NYU grad students Carlos Reyes, and Jo-ey Tang along with artist and curator Elly Clarke came by the Cheese Endique Trifecta last night for some hot toddies and snax. It was a very rousing salon at the Trifecta aided along with Kentucky boubon. The gorgeous Ms. Clarke is leaving Berlin for a while to teach as Senior Lecturer in Photography at Coventry University in blimy Birmingham, England. She will certainly be missed here in Berlina as this is one young woman who is a mover and a shaker, but in a more interesting loving way then those tired art careerists who are stretching their icky tentacles everywhere. Don’t let me get started as that is another subject for another time.
***
Earlier in the day I attended a grand bruncheon at the famous table of La Susanne Sachsse the fearless leader of collective CHEAP. The table was gloriously set with cascading tulips as we ate a hearty Jena style meal of pork & lamb snausages, potato porridge, white kabal sour krout and a winter green salad with film historian Marc Siegel’s famed secret dressing---yumsville.
Susi’s beautiful children Richard & Salome Gersh were also on hand, as well as Richard’s new sweet and pretty girlfriend Fraulein Vicki.
Marc & Susi and I chatted about next year’s big Camp Anti Camp Festival they are curating which looks like it will be very exciting as it will be the last project at HAU under the artistic direction of Mattias Lienthal the quirky genius of the Hebbel Theatre.
***
Saturday morn I took Daniel Hendrickson the Jewish Muslim and his boyfriend Piero Bellomo to a birthday breakfast at the Turkish boite La Femme on Kott Busser Damn. We were there very early so it wasn’t crowded.Usually this place is a madhouse as the food is very good, and the moultenly hot Turkish men populating the joint is very eyecandylishtic.
Saturday, January 08, 2011
MEINE FRAU UNSERE KINDER UND ICH
As part of the Vincente Minnelli festival at Arsenal I went and saw Brigadoon released in 1954 starring Gene Kelly, Van Johnson and Cyd Charisse. The film was a total flop when it was first run. For some reason I have never seen it, and I wasn’t expecting it to be that good, but it was incredible especially queeny Van Johnson who got to play the faggot that he was for the first time in his career. Ms. Johnson upstaged hunky bubble butt Gene Kelly in every scene with abandon and hilarity. His bitterness was rampant, and from all the drugs and alcohol abuse he was famous for it was very apparent on his bloated face and body. The story of the film involves a Scottish town that only appears every 100 years. The Ganymede lady Johnson become homo hysterical from all the humpy Scottish lads running around shirtless and winds up killing one in a homo stupor.
After the movie I rushed to Kreuzber g for the birthday party of the handsomest man in Europe Mr. Uli Ziemons who turned 29 but looks 19. All the Arsenal gang was there including Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus, Nanna Heidenreich of Arsenal Experimental with her hot galpal DJane Olga Damnitz. Uli & Olga helped me film my Cheese Endique Trifecta wall collages that will be apart of my dejecta/protecta installation performance in Los Angeles at MoCa on Jan 22nd. Can’t wait to go to Hell A and escape the freezing cold and icy Berlin conditions. Ms. Damnitz and I are also going to put on a low tech Berlinale Dorothy Arzner Party. Both of us are so sick and tired of the bad Berlinale parties that are so clueless. Also at Uli’s birthday party his heterosexual lover Guilluame and his wife and child who was dressed as a Tyranasaurus Rex, his platonic wife Nadja Talmi, the Brazillians with Michele Belague, Sandy Dennis doppelganger Bettina, Little Alex of Chocolate Grinder Kollective, British actor Alex Pettyfer with his boyfriend the hungthrob Olympic athlete Artus Was.
***
Thursday my NYU Barney Building grad students came by the Cheese Endique Trifecta for a visit. They are in town for a special 2 week exchange with NYU/Humboldt Berlin. We sat around my octagon table and drank hot toddies and ate snax until the wee hours. I love my beautiful NewYorikan students Jessica Gispert, Andy and Katherine. Sunday I am having my other grad students Carlos Reyes and Jo-ey Tang at the Trifecta.
Oh and here is the internet radio interview with Manuel Schubert of Film Highlights. Hope I copied it correctly to my old blogina.
Rising Stars, Falling Stars presented by Vaginal Davis by filmanzeiger
Rising Stars, Falling Stars - January 2011 - Vaginal Davis by filmanzeiger
And the marvelous genius that is Mark Simon of the Boyfriend who is part of my new piece dejecta/protecta sent me this letter from Anne Francis the star of TV’s Honey West from the 60s and once a film ingénue in the early 1950. She died this past week.
Dear Barbra,
It has gnawed at me for years that you have believed that I blamed you for
cutting most of my scenes from “Funny Girl.” I felt the sadness of the
misunderstanding all over again when I read a supposed quote of yours last year
saying that you had heard me blame you on a TV talk show. The only talk show I
did on the subject was on Johnny Carson, and Joey Bishop was subbing that night.
I tried to make it plain that I did not blame you, and had no idea why I was cut
from the film. To this day, I don’t know the circumstances that caused the
decision, but I am lead to believe it probably had to do with the length of the
film. The sub plot of Georgia’s histrionics with Florenz Ziegfeld was really not
necessary to the story about Fanny Brice.
In all fairness, I understand that the press believed that I felt that way
because my public relations person, who was also a very dear friend, did believe
it, and she made the statements that were attributed to me. I was caught in the
middle, and rather than point a finger at her, I did the best I could to refute
the story whenever confronted by an interviewer. The whole thing was messy and
painful. I had never been embroiled in that sort of ruckus before. I know you
were going through a lot of flack as well during those stormy days when first
you hit Hollywood (or It hit you!). I had hoped then that it would all blow over
quickly, but when I saw the quote you allegedly made recently, I felt awful once
more.
At the age of thirty five (over the hill in those days!), the role of Georgia
was a great gem for me, and I had high hopes (I had just come off of “Honey
West”) that it would do a lot for my “career.” The flashy role, along with the
drunk scene (which hit the editor’s floor) pretty much cinched the prospect of a
supporting nomination with the Academy that year. So, you can understand the
humiliation when each day a note would be slipped under my dressing room door,
“omit scene so and so.” The scene named would always be the one I had been
called in to do that day. I am not whining, dear lady. We’ve all taken our lumps
in this “Business.” I’m just sharing with you what was going on at that time
with me. You had your own problems. I marveled at how you handled yourself on
your first encounter with the alien world of the film industry.
I have had the greatest respect for your talent and for what you have made of
yourself, Barbra. You are a brilliant woman and I have always wished you the
very best. One more time, it is important for me before I leave this planet to
say, I have never accused you of having the role of Georgia cut to the quick.
God Bless,
Anne Francis
P.S. Your direction of “Prince of Tides” was superb.
______________________
Actress Anne Francis was cast as Georgia James, a Ziegfeld chorus girl and
troubled friend of Fanny Brice. For years it's been written (and repeated) that
Streisand had all of Francis' scenes cut from the film. Any writer who wanted to
characterize Streisand as a vindictive diva has repeated the myth that Streisand
cut out Anne Francis. For the record, writer Isobel Lennart tried to add the
same character to the Broadway play with similar results. The character was
dropped because the show is Fanny Brice-centric, not Georgia James-centric.
One of the quotes attributed to Francis was: “Every day, Barbra would see the
rushes and the next day my part was cut or something else was cut. Barbra ran
the whole show...She had the Ziegfeld girls’ scenes changed — one day she told
Wyler to move a girl standing next to her because she was too pretty, and the
girl wound up in the background. Eventually, the Ziegfeld girls’ scenes were
eliminated altogether.”
Supervising Editor Robert Swink had a different view. “I know the Anne Francis
role was cut down terribly,” Swink said. “But Willie [Wyler] only did it for the
sake of the picture. He had final cut. Streisand didn’t.”
In 2002 on her official website, Anne Francis wrote an open letter to Barbra
Streisand apologizing for the whole affair. She admitted her publicist
attributed the quote to her. “The sub plot of Georgia’s histrionics with Florenz
Ziegfeld was really not necessary to the story about Fanny Brice,” Francis
stated.
***
The role of Mama Rose in "Gypsy" has always attracted great divas, from Ethel
Merman to Angela Lansbury, Tyne Daly to Patti LuPone.
And now comes word that the greatest diva of them all -- Barbra Streisand -- is
next in line.
Streisand is deep in negotiations to direct, produce and star in a movie version
of "Gypsy."
She recently cleared a big hurdle -- 92-year-old Broadway legend Arthur
Laurents, who wrote the book to the show.
He's also directed several productions, including the scorching 2008 Broadway
revival for which LuPone won a Tony.
"Barbra and I have been getting along very well now for some time," Laurents
told me yesterday. "We've talked about it a lot, and she knows what she's doing.
She has my approval."
Laurents shares control of "Gypsy" -- perhaps the greatest Broadway musical --
with Stephen Sondheim, who wrote the lyrics, and the estates of Jule Styne, the
composer, and Jerome Robbins, the original director.
But everybody on Broadway knows that you can't do "Gypsy" without Laurents'
blessing. And he's very particular about who plays Mama Rose and how she plays
it.
He was, I'm told, concerned that Streisand might be reluctant to embrace the
brutality of the role.
In her drive to make her daughters stage stars, Mama Rose can turn psychotic in
a flash. The real Mama Rose killed an agent by pushing him out a window.
But Streisand's a movie star, and movie stars want to be adored.
A lovable, human Mama Rose would be a disaster.
"Barbra and I have had long talks on this very subject," Laurents acknowledged.
"She had a mother who she always thought was Mama Rose. I don't want to get into
the details, but the point is she knows. She's got it in her. She's going to be
much more than people expect."
"Gypsy" was made into a movie in 1962 with Rosalind Russell as Rose. It's a much
softer version of the stage show, marred by the fact that Russell never goes for
the jugular.
Asked if he'll write the screenplay to the new version, Laurents said: "No!
Hollywood is Hollywood, and I've already been there. But I'll be around."
Laurents and Streisand have been friends for decades.
He directed her in her first Broadway show, "I Can Get It for You Wholesale," in
1962. She had a small role, but the critics raved, and her career took off.
A decade later, he wrote "The Way We Were" for her.
"We're talking about 'Gypsy' being a bookend for us," he said. "She began with
me, and this will be a grand farewell for us."
As part of the Vincente Minnelli festival at Arsenal I went and saw Brigadoon released in 1954 starring Gene Kelly, Van Johnson and Cyd Charisse. The film was a total flop when it was first run. For some reason I have never seen it, and I wasn’t expecting it to be that good, but it was incredible especially queeny Van Johnson who got to play the faggot that he was for the first time in his career. Ms. Johnson upstaged hunky bubble butt Gene Kelly in every scene with abandon and hilarity. His bitterness was rampant, and from all the drugs and alcohol abuse he was famous for it was very apparent on his bloated face and body. The story of the film involves a Scottish town that only appears every 100 years. The Ganymede lady Johnson become homo hysterical from all the humpy Scottish lads running around shirtless and winds up killing one in a homo stupor.
After the movie I rushed to Kreuzber g for the birthday party of the handsomest man in Europe Mr. Uli Ziemons who turned 29 but looks 19. All the Arsenal gang was there including Empress Stefanie Schulte Strathaus, Nanna Heidenreich of Arsenal Experimental with her hot galpal DJane Olga Damnitz. Uli & Olga helped me film my Cheese Endique Trifecta wall collages that will be apart of my dejecta/protecta installation performance in Los Angeles at MoCa on Jan 22nd. Can’t wait to go to Hell A and escape the freezing cold and icy Berlin conditions. Ms. Damnitz and I are also going to put on a low tech Berlinale Dorothy Arzner Party. Both of us are so sick and tired of the bad Berlinale parties that are so clueless. Also at Uli’s birthday party his heterosexual lover Guilluame and his wife and child who was dressed as a Tyranasaurus Rex, his platonic wife Nadja Talmi, the Brazillians with Michele Belague, Sandy Dennis doppelganger Bettina, Little Alex of Chocolate Grinder Kollective, British actor Alex Pettyfer with his boyfriend the hungthrob Olympic athlete Artus Was.
***
Thursday my NYU Barney Building grad students came by the Cheese Endique Trifecta for a visit. They are in town for a special 2 week exchange with NYU/Humboldt Berlin. We sat around my octagon table and drank hot toddies and ate snax until the wee hours. I love my beautiful NewYorikan students Jessica Gispert, Andy and Katherine. Sunday I am having my other grad students Carlos Reyes and Jo-ey Tang at the Trifecta.
Oh and here is the internet radio interview with Manuel Schubert of Film Highlights. Hope I copied it correctly to my old blogina.
Rising Stars, Falling Stars presented by Vaginal Davis by filmanzeiger
Rising Stars, Falling Stars - January 2011 - Vaginal Davis by filmanzeiger
And the marvelous genius that is Mark Simon of the Boyfriend who is part of my new piece dejecta/protecta sent me this letter from Anne Francis the star of TV’s Honey West from the 60s and once a film ingénue in the early 1950. She died this past week.
Dear Barbra,
It has gnawed at me for years that you have believed that I blamed you for
cutting most of my scenes from “Funny Girl.” I felt the sadness of the
misunderstanding all over again when I read a supposed quote of yours last year
saying that you had heard me blame you on a TV talk show. The only talk show I
did on the subject was on Johnny Carson, and Joey Bishop was subbing that night.
I tried to make it plain that I did not blame you, and had no idea why I was cut
from the film. To this day, I don’t know the circumstances that caused the
decision, but I am lead to believe it probably had to do with the length of the
film. The sub plot of Georgia’s histrionics with Florenz Ziegfeld was really not
necessary to the story about Fanny Brice.
In all fairness, I understand that the press believed that I felt that way
because my public relations person, who was also a very dear friend, did believe
it, and she made the statements that were attributed to me. I was caught in the
middle, and rather than point a finger at her, I did the best I could to refute
the story whenever confronted by an interviewer. The whole thing was messy and
painful. I had never been embroiled in that sort of ruckus before. I know you
were going through a lot of flack as well during those stormy days when first
you hit Hollywood (or It hit you!). I had hoped then that it would all blow over
quickly, but when I saw the quote you allegedly made recently, I felt awful once
more.
At the age of thirty five (over the hill in those days!), the role of Georgia
was a great gem for me, and I had high hopes (I had just come off of “Honey
West”) that it would do a lot for my “career.” The flashy role, along with the
drunk scene (which hit the editor’s floor) pretty much cinched the prospect of a
supporting nomination with the Academy that year. So, you can understand the
humiliation when each day a note would be slipped under my dressing room door,
“omit scene so and so.” The scene named would always be the one I had been
called in to do that day. I am not whining, dear lady. We’ve all taken our lumps
in this “Business.” I’m just sharing with you what was going on at that time
with me. You had your own problems. I marveled at how you handled yourself on
your first encounter with the alien world of the film industry.
I have had the greatest respect for your talent and for what you have made of
yourself, Barbra. You are a brilliant woman and I have always wished you the
very best. One more time, it is important for me before I leave this planet to
say, I have never accused you of having the role of Georgia cut to the quick.
God Bless,
Anne Francis
P.S. Your direction of “Prince of Tides” was superb.
______________________
Actress Anne Francis was cast as Georgia James, a Ziegfeld chorus girl and
troubled friend of Fanny Brice. For years it's been written (and repeated) that
Streisand had all of Francis' scenes cut from the film. Any writer who wanted to
characterize Streisand as a vindictive diva has repeated the myth that Streisand
cut out Anne Francis. For the record, writer Isobel Lennart tried to add the
same character to the Broadway play with similar results. The character was
dropped because the show is Fanny Brice-centric, not Georgia James-centric.
One of the quotes attributed to Francis was: “Every day, Barbra would see the
rushes and the next day my part was cut or something else was cut. Barbra ran
the whole show...She had the Ziegfeld girls’ scenes changed — one day she told
Wyler to move a girl standing next to her because she was too pretty, and the
girl wound up in the background. Eventually, the Ziegfeld girls’ scenes were
eliminated altogether.”
Supervising Editor Robert Swink had a different view. “I know the Anne Francis
role was cut down terribly,” Swink said. “But Willie [Wyler] only did it for the
sake of the picture. He had final cut. Streisand didn’t.”
In 2002 on her official website, Anne Francis wrote an open letter to Barbra
Streisand apologizing for the whole affair. She admitted her publicist
attributed the quote to her. “The sub plot of Georgia’s histrionics with Florenz
Ziegfeld was really not necessary to the story about Fanny Brice,” Francis
stated.
***
The role of Mama Rose in "Gypsy" has always attracted great divas, from Ethel
Merman to Angela Lansbury, Tyne Daly to Patti LuPone.
And now comes word that the greatest diva of them all -- Barbra Streisand -- is
next in line.
Streisand is deep in negotiations to direct, produce and star in a movie version
of "Gypsy."
She recently cleared a big hurdle -- 92-year-old Broadway legend Arthur
Laurents, who wrote the book to the show.
He's also directed several productions, including the scorching 2008 Broadway
revival for which LuPone won a Tony.
"Barbra and I have been getting along very well now for some time," Laurents
told me yesterday. "We've talked about it a lot, and she knows what she's doing.
She has my approval."
Laurents shares control of "Gypsy" -- perhaps the greatest Broadway musical --
with Stephen Sondheim, who wrote the lyrics, and the estates of Jule Styne, the
composer, and Jerome Robbins, the original director.
But everybody on Broadway knows that you can't do "Gypsy" without Laurents'
blessing. And he's very particular about who plays Mama Rose and how she plays
it.
He was, I'm told, concerned that Streisand might be reluctant to embrace the
brutality of the role.
In her drive to make her daughters stage stars, Mama Rose can turn psychotic in
a flash. The real Mama Rose killed an agent by pushing him out a window.
But Streisand's a movie star, and movie stars want to be adored.
A lovable, human Mama Rose would be a disaster.
"Barbra and I have had long talks on this very subject," Laurents acknowledged.
"She had a mother who she always thought was Mama Rose. I don't want to get into
the details, but the point is she knows. She's got it in her. She's going to be
much more than people expect."
"Gypsy" was made into a movie in 1962 with Rosalind Russell as Rose. It's a much
softer version of the stage show, marred by the fact that Russell never goes for
the jugular.
Asked if he'll write the screenplay to the new version, Laurents said: "No!
Hollywood is Hollywood, and I've already been there. But I'll be around."
Laurents and Streisand have been friends for decades.
He directed her in her first Broadway show, "I Can Get It for You Wholesale," in
1962. She had a small role, but the critics raved, and her career took off.
A decade later, he wrote "The Way We Were" for her.
"We're talking about 'Gypsy' being a bookend for us," he said. "She began with
me, and this will be a grand farewell for us."
Tuesday, January 04, 2011
THE POLITICS OF DISPOSSESSION
The wonderful Love Camel aka: Andrea Novarin came to Berlin to visit his Vagimule doll. Camel surprised the doll by treating her to a new year’s spa treatment somewhere in Brandenberg I think near Potsdam for New Year’s Eve. A stretch limo came and fetched us and drove us to the Chateau Spa. One of Camel’s friends from Milan is married to a super wealthy German industrialist who owns the place. I had facials, and massages by two big muscular blondines who treated me like a Teutonic prinzessin. Along with the gourmet meals that I ate which were incredible, I had a huge suite with a super deluxe king sized bed, and Jacuzzi style bathtub. Camel and I watched movies that he bought me for Christmas until 3:30 am. Camel also got me copies of the American cable series True Blood and Dexter which I am addicted to. He also bought me a Josephine Baker book and a book that features the letters of Louise Brooks to one of her young confidants in the early 1980s.
It was divine to escape Berlin and all the firecrackers, cherry bombs and fireworks that turn the town into a war zone which I hate. Love Camel also told me stories about his rich aunt who he inherited 350,000 euros from and why he hasn’t spoken to his mother in seven years. Love Camel also has invented some money making schemes that include a masturbation diet, tombstones with dance floor attached so people can dance on the grave of their dearly departed,and underwear from the underworld-wear it and your cock will be scared stiff.
Camel left today returning to London. He will visit me in February for the Berlinale and then I will go back to London with him to celebrate my 442nd birthday. Dominic Johnson of Queen Mary College and Frieze Magazine is planning a spectacular British style birthday.
Before leaving town for the gnu yeart holiday I Skyped with Crepe Suzette Mathelson, the famed Hollywood costume designer and my ex Club Sucker at the Garage partner Frank Rodriguez and hot lover the brilliantine artist Ginger Patrick. Crepe Suzette was on her way to South Africa for a movie starring Denzel Washington and the Sexiest Man in the Universe Ryan Reynolds. She gave me some hot movieland gossip that middle aged tiny tot Tom Cruise is getting double fudgepacked by actor Jeremy Renner. Miss Lady Tom is so wrapped up in the house of Renner that he has completely forgotten about his young wifette Katie Holmes who is livid that he is being so scandalously wreckless. We thinks that Missy Cruise has found true love at last, and is so dickmatized by having her sugar walls filled up to the brim that she is throwing caution to the break wind. Hot damn thank you ma’am-you climb that tree squirrel and get your proverbial gnut.
The wonderful Love Camel aka: Andrea Novarin came to Berlin to visit his Vagimule doll. Camel surprised the doll by treating her to a new year’s spa treatment somewhere in Brandenberg I think near Potsdam for New Year’s Eve. A stretch limo came and fetched us and drove us to the Chateau Spa. One of Camel’s friends from Milan is married to a super wealthy German industrialist who owns the place. I had facials, and massages by two big muscular blondines who treated me like a Teutonic prinzessin. Along with the gourmet meals that I ate which were incredible, I had a huge suite with a super deluxe king sized bed, and Jacuzzi style bathtub. Camel and I watched movies that he bought me for Christmas until 3:30 am. Camel also got me copies of the American cable series True Blood and Dexter which I am addicted to. He also bought me a Josephine Baker book and a book that features the letters of Louise Brooks to one of her young confidants in the early 1980s.
It was divine to escape Berlin and all the firecrackers, cherry bombs and fireworks that turn the town into a war zone which I hate. Love Camel also told me stories about his rich aunt who he inherited 350,000 euros from and why he hasn’t spoken to his mother in seven years. Love Camel also has invented some money making schemes that include a masturbation diet, tombstones with dance floor attached so people can dance on the grave of their dearly departed,and underwear from the underworld-wear it and your cock will be scared stiff.
Camel left today returning to London. He will visit me in February for the Berlinale and then I will go back to London with him to celebrate my 442nd birthday. Dominic Johnson of Queen Mary College and Frieze Magazine is planning a spectacular British style birthday.
Before leaving town for the gnu yeart holiday I Skyped with Crepe Suzette Mathelson, the famed Hollywood costume designer and my ex Club Sucker at the Garage partner Frank Rodriguez and hot lover the brilliantine artist Ginger Patrick. Crepe Suzette was on her way to South Africa for a movie starring Denzel Washington and the Sexiest Man in the Universe Ryan Reynolds. She gave me some hot movieland gossip that middle aged tiny tot Tom Cruise is getting double fudgepacked by actor Jeremy Renner. Miss Lady Tom is so wrapped up in the house of Renner that he has completely forgotten about his young wifette Katie Holmes who is livid that he is being so scandalously wreckless. We thinks that Missy Cruise has found true love at last, and is so dickmatized by having her sugar walls filled up to the brim that she is throwing caution to the break wind. Hot damn thank you ma’am-you climb that tree squirrel and get your proverbial gnut.
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