June 29, 2007 GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE

eveningsout

Onstage and off-camera How queers mold entertainment

by Anthony Glassman

If there is one place that LGBT people have always felt at home, it was in the theater, and later, the movies. Whether it's the escapist nature of stage and screen or the ability to portray a different persona echoing the need for secrecy in the history of homosexuality, queers have been a constant presence, both in front of the audience and behind the scenes.

Ranging from Greek man-boy love to Sir Francis Bacon's love of "hornéd actresses" (young men portraying

female roles on the stage), on to gay director James Whale on the set of the classic Bride of Frankenstein to David Hyde Pierce's low-key coming out, homosexuality is tied as tightly to popular entertainment as a dryad

to a tree.

Which is not to imply that it's all been the boys, by any stretch. Marlene Dietrich, Janis Joplin, Barbara Hammer, Ellen DeGeneres

and other women have

all loved other women,

The

VIEW

front

HERE

with varying degrees of forthrightness in their dealings with the media and the public.

Two fascinating books examine aspects of the interconnection between sexual orientation and the arts, one delving into one man's theatrical world, the other providing a glimpse into the lives and works of a number of gay and lesbian film directors.

The first is Ridiculous! The Theatrical Life and Times of Charles Ludlam by David Kaufman (Applause, $17.95), which won a Lambda Literary Award for biography and the Theater Library Association Award for outstanding theater book of the year.

The heavy tome chronicles the actor, writer and director's entire life, from his childhood in Long Island to his death at the height of his fame in New York City, another theatrical victim of AIDS.

Filled with photographs and reminiscences from his friends, Ridiculous! revolves, as any discussion of Ludlam's life must, around the Ridiculous Theatre Company, his troupe of actors and the means by which his outré plays saw the light of day. Ludlam, as did many of his actors, played about half his roles in drag, and like his contemporary Charles Busch, often wrote simply to have good roles to perform.

His widow, Everett Quinton, is a constant presence for much of the book. Quinton is performing in The Robber Bridgegroom and Booth in repertory at Cleveland State University's Summer Repertory Theater until mid-July, and seeing him onstage is the closest we can get now to witnessing the prime of Mr. Charles Ludlam. There is a manic energy that suffused the alternative theater scene in New York in the '70s and '80s that is difficult to find now, in part because so many of the principals have been lost.

Turning to the world of film, Matthew Hays' The View from Here: Conversations

Mirah

Continued from page

I think.

Regardless of the twisted psychology of the last few paragraphs, she will be playing in Columbus on July 15, and then in Cleveland on July 19. She'll have a back-up band both nights, but it will not be Spectratone International, so it's not really clear how much of the new album she will play, or if she will stick mainly to her previous efforts.

with Gay and Lesbian Filmmakers (Arsenal Pulp Press, $22.95) is exactly what the subtitle says it is: a series of interviews with directors, covering the wide range of terrain between the underground and the mainstream, the chaste to the pornographic.

The book is a little Canadian-heavy, but that's to be expected from a volume released by Canada's finest independent publishing, not to mention one of its most gayfriendly.

Besides, there is nothing wrong with having Bruce LaBruce, John Greyson, Ian

Iqbal Rashid and Patricia Rozema all in one book. What is surprising and confounding is the absence of Noam Gonick, director of Hey Happy! and Stryker among other films, who is at least as big a name as half of the directors Hays includes. Gonick would also give the book some sideways Ohio flavor, since his brother is the vice president for information technology services at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.

THE THEATRICAL LIFE and TIMES of CHARLES LUDLAM

DAVID KAUFMAN

There are interviews with filmmakers one might have gone an entire life without realizing were gay, like. Don Mancini, writer of the Child's Play quintet of films about a murderous doll inhabited by the spirit of Brad Dourif (or a serial killer played by Brad Dourif either way, it's creepy and campy and fun), or Randal Kleiser, the director of Grease and The Blue Lagoon.

Then, there are interviews with directors you can't not know are gay: the aforementioned LaBruce, Gregg Araki, Kenneth Anger, Rozema, Monika Treut, Rose Troche, Gus Van Sant.

Despite the interviews being formatted in a Q&A fashion, they have a very conversational feel, and give great insight into the personalities behind the films, the struggles that made the creators who and what they

are.

Some of the questions and answers, especially with bigger names like John Waters, are nothing new: Waters considers himself an activist and gay, but not necessarily a gay activist. Readers have seen comments like that from him before. But reading that he isn't worried about Republicans making

films because he just won't see them, just like the Republicans didn't really worry about Pink Flamingos because they didn't see it, is quite humorous.

As a special bonus, Hays includes an interview he did as a 21-year-old whippersnapper with the late, lamented Divine, thrown in right after the interview with Waters, who made her a household name well, in the seedier households, anyway.

Whether stemming from a desire to break free of society's expectations or consummate skill in appearing to be what that same society expects, queers have left their mark, and these two books show it in black and white.

Either way, both shows should be amazing.

The July 15 show in Columbus will be at the performance space in the Wexner Center for the Arts, North High Street at 15th Avenue, at 8 pm. Tickets are $10, available at www.wexarts.org.

The Cleveland show on July 19 will be at 9 pm in the Beachland Ballroom and tickets are $12. The Beachland is at 15711 Waterloo Rd in Cleveland. For tickets, go to www.beachlandballroom.com.

Laura Veirs is opening for Mirah on both dates, and the Cleveland show also features Expecting Rain.

2003

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