SF Film Critics CircleAnnounces 2018 Award Winners
|
|
Tweets from Amy Schumer, Chelsea Handler and Sarah Silverman using anti-gay slurs are under the spotlight after a row over comic Kevin Hart.
Musician and actor Nick Cannon called out the trio in the wake of a row involving Kevin Hart, who quit his role as host of the 2019 Oscars last week when a series of homophobic tweets resurfaced.
Hart sent tweets attacking “fags” as recently as 2012, while in his 2010 comedy tour he said: “As a heterosexual male, if I can prevent my son from being gay, I will.”
The star is far from alone in having used anti-gay slurs, however, and Cannon highlighted tweets from three white female comics who had used the same language in the past.
In a 2012 tweet, Trainwreck star Amy Schumer wrote: “Enjoy skyfall fags. I’m bout to get knee deep in Helen Hunt #thesessions”
Chelsea Handler, who hosted Netflix talk show Chelsea, wrote in 2010: “This is what a fag bird likes like when he flexes.”
Wreck-It Ralph star Sarah Silverman sent a 2010 message that reads: “I dont mean this in a hateful way but the new bachelorette’s a faggot”
Sharing the messages, Cannon wrote: “Interesting🤔 I wonder if there was any backlash here…”
Neither Amy Schumer or Chelsea Handler have responded, but Sarah Silverman shared a Twitter thread from a gay author Greg Hogben responding to Cannon, writing: “Thread❤️.”
In the thread, Hogben wrote: “Do you remember the first time you saw someone get punched in real life? There was no sound effect ‘thwack’ like in the movies. The victim probably didn’t do a perfect movie stuntman roll. Could you feel the violence behind it? Recognize the malicious intent to inflict injury?
“That’s what homophobia feels like to me. I can feel the violence. I can feel the malicious intent.”
— Greg Hogben
“That’s what homophobia feels like to me. I can feel the violence. I can feel the malicious intent.”
He added: “There’s been a trend of LGBT allies being accused of homophobia recently… the thing is, a lot of gay guys [don’t] take offence to these comments, because we didn’t feel the violence or malicious intent behind it. Because we knew they were jokes. Because we knew these people were LGBT allies.”
The thread shared by Sarah Silverman pointed out that she, Chelsea Handler and Amy Schumer are all long-time LGBT+ allies who helped fight for equality and fundraise for LGBT+ charities.
Hogben added: “We knew the history and backgrounds of these women. They used their massive platforms to help us long before marriage equality. And continue to do so.
“I can’t say the same for Kevin Hart. I can’t find a history of helping at-risk LGBT youth. To be honest, his tweets and his stand-up gig saying he’d ‘do anything not to have a gay son,’ made me bristle. In short, it *felt malicious*.
“I appreciate Kevin Hart’s apology and think it’s great that he’s ‘evolved and grown,’ but I don’t think there’s much of a comparison in your tweet. So while I understand your attempt to ‘both sides’ this issue, I hope you can see why some gay men don’t see it the same.”
The spat comes after Saturday Night Live comic Michael Che defended Kevin Hart.
Speaking on SNL on December 8, Michael Che said: “Also if Kevin Hart isn’t clean enough to host the Oscars than no black comic is.”
Alluding to convicted sex offender Bill Cosby, he added: “The only black comic who’s cleaner than Kevin Hart is booked for the next three to ten years.”
Fans were taken aback by the poor performance of MNEK’s debut album this year, such was the hype around the 23-year-old. He’d carved a name for himself the decade prior writing and producing for artists like Beyonce, Kylie and Madonna, and for hit collaborations with Zara Larsson and Stormzy.
But what happened with this project? You can’t fault MNEK’s bassy, velvety voice. The music certainly wasn’t lacking, either. The brash Correct and pulsating Tongue are glossily produced, instantly addictive and insanely confident.
They should have gone stratospheric, but didn’t. The nimble, joyously poppy LGBT anthem Colour with Hailee Steinfeld got a decent push via its video (and a superior lyric video), but didn’t connect either.
Language will go down as one of the most-dissected music mysteries of 2018. It’ll be interesting to see how MNEK’s next record does, and there’ll surely be one, as he’s an irrepressible talent.
First things first, the presence of controversy-causing Girls on Rita’s long-delayed sophomore album is galling. What could have been her Lady Marmalade moment with Cardi B, Bebe Rexha and Charli XCX was instead a conceptual and musical low point for all involved. The tempo drags, the melody’s feeble and the lyrics, which clunkily explore same-sex attraction, are at best immature (‘Sometimes I just want to kiss girls!’ they chant like a nursery rhyme) and at worst offensive.
Silver linings, though: the song prompted Rita to disclose her past relationships with women. Phoenix alchemises this emotional honesty into a collection of finely-drawn pure pop songs that are often surprisingly vulnerable.
Half-comprised of pre-existing singles (just like the 90s!), Rita’s song with the late Avicii is Phoenix’s strongest moment: the sad, searching but entirely danceable Lonely Together was one of the best songs of last year.
Elsewhere, Your Song, Anywhere and Let You Love Me are a fizzing, mid-20s, love-induced head-fuck musical triptych. Rita’s got a strong voice but often opts for a delicate delivery here, expressing innocence and confidence simultaneously; one could believe all the songs are about the same person. Other tracks like Only Want You, Velvet Rope also click sweetly into place.
Their million-selling debut Communion made a crowd-pleasing splash in 2015. And while Years & Years’ sophomore effort – a concept album about a futuristic, sexually-evolved world – had less of an impact, it’s the more ambitious and artistic of the two.
‘You don’t have to be straight with me, I see what’s underneath your mask,’ sings fearlessly queer frontman Olly on the spell-like Sanctify, the first cut from the album. It’s a strange, tense song, with tribal drums and beckoning vocals. On it, Olly invites his hetero-identifying lover to ‘sanctify’ his body. There are religious undertones, and yet, it’s as gloriously homoerotic as pop gets.
It’s telling, then, that after Sanctify didn’t light up the charts, the silly, sweet kiss-off If You’re Over Me, with its dangerously catchy chorus, was picked as the follow up single. A top 10 mainstay selling over 400,000 copies, it did its job.
But it’s not a fair reflection of Palo Santo’s weirdness, best exemplified in the title track. A depression-drenched ode to an ex, Olly sings likes he’s in a turned on trance as he longs for a past love and quite possibly destroys his new relationship (‘Do I look good in this position, just like him?’ he teases).
Troye took a queer leap of faith with his second album. The thirst was real on My My My!, a euphoric celebration of gay sex and love (‘spark up, buzz cut, I’ve got my tongue between your teeth,’ Troye lulls). It’s the perfect introduction to the concise and sexy Bloom.
The sexuality peaks with the title track, labeled by fans an ‘ode to bottoming’ that paints receptive anal sex as beautiful and inviting an experience as walking through a garden. ‘The fountains and the waters are begging just to know ya,’ he says, before comparing his backside to a flower. OK, maybe this is the gayest song of the year.
The second best song is the playful Plum. Here, Troye compares the perfect stage of his relationship to sweet, ripened fruit that might be on the turn. One’s mind wanders to Call My By Your Name’s peach scene; indeed, you can imagine Elio penning lyrics like ‘jealous you can sleep, you’ve been keeping me up and I mouth the words I think I wanna speak.’
For this listener, Troye’s graceful, haunting voice underwhelms on slower tracks like The Good Side and Animal. And I feel his maddeningly underplayed Ariana Grande duet Dance To This was a massive missed opportunity. But otherwise, I’m still enthralled by this album four months later.
Lil Peep’s second album was released posthumously last month: the ‘trip hop rapper’ sadly passed away of an accidental drug overdose last year. From Amy Winehouse’s Lioness: Hidden Treasures to Michael Jackson’s Micheal, music lovers are often wary of cobbled-together collections of a late artist’s songs. And rightly so. They’re often disappointing.
Not in this case. Come Over When You’re Sober, Pt. 2 feels authentic. It perfectly frames the bisexual star’s uniquely sombre sound. That he’s at all affiliated with the modern SoundCloud rap scene is a mystery to me. His music has more overtly in common with 90s grunge and the better 00s emo bands. The tortured, pleading Sex With My Ex could be Nirvana, and is funereal and intoxicating.
On the downtempo Cry Alone and the desolate, echoey Runaway, a lonely-sounding Lil Peep speak-sings brutally honest lyrics exploring messed up relationships, drug use and mental health. Listeners with such issues of their own should proceed with caution. The pessimism and sense of looming tragedy could prove triggering for some.
I should also mention, the guest artist on wistful bonus track Falling Down will give some LGBTIs pause for thought. The late XXXTentacion, who was murdered in July, was of course flagrantly homophobic. Lil Peep brings something gentle and searching out in him on thus bonus track, as two lost souls struggle to decipher their pain (‘your love is like walking on a bed of nails’). Listening to it with hindsight is devastating.
When I first heard about Hayley Kiyoko, nicknamed ‘lesbian Jesus’ by fans, and her song Curious I was…dubious. I jumped to the conclusion that ‘curious’ was being utilized in the most basic of ways. That Hayley was a gimmicky artist feigning sexual ambiguity like many before her. How wrong I was.
After warming to her stunning debut Expectations, and noting the pride and electropop revelry with which it celebrates out and proud lesbianism, I revisited Curious. I finally paid attention to the complex narrative at play. ‘I’m just curious, is it serious?’ Hayley teases the object of her affection, who’s seemingly chosen a guy over her; ‘Calling me up, so late at night, are we just friends? You say you wanted me, but you’re sleeping with him.’
She doubles down on the theme with the infectious sexual confidence of He’ll Never Love You Like Me. Ditto the sweeping, pulsating wall of sound that is What I Need, her chemistry-laden duet with Kehlani. In a parallel universe, this was the Billboard Hot 100 number one of the summer.
She switches gear on the mid tempo Wanna Be Missed, my most-listened to song of the year on Spotify. She sounds defenceless, desperate, ‘fragile like glass’, but also sexy; laying her cards on the table and insisting ‘say you can’t walk, can’t talk, go on without me.’ An amazingly mature debut album.
After years of speculation and ambiguity, Janelle came out as pansexual on the cover of Rolling Stone this year, the same week her third album was celebrated by music critics worldwide.
Loaded with razor sharp political commentary and poetic lyrics, Dirty Computer is definitely food for the brain. But that’s not to say it’s weighed down by its own intellectualism. Its bursting with sound you can sing and dance to without much thought whatsoever.
Although you can’t miss the point of the epic, flirtatious PYNK, which conjures images of a vagina with more immediacy than even the above trousers. It also features the musical climax to end them all.
One of Dirty Computer’s best qualities is how different each song is from the next. And yet, each blends into the next seamlessly. The Prince-inspired funk of Make Me Feel is a high point, along with the pop-R&B of Crazy, Classic Life, which some of my favorite lyrics of the year: ‘I don’t need a diamond ring, I don’t wanna waste my youth, I don’t wanna live on my knees, I just have to tell the truth.’
Her graceful debut Chaleur humaine sold over a million copies worldwide. It was a masterclass in top quality, intelligent indie pop. Then French star Christine, who identifies as pansexual, waited four years to release the follow up. But Chris was worth the wait. It has a broadly similar sound to its predecessor, but intensified, and powered by hyper-articulation (she uses the word ‘soliloquize’, foe example) and plenty of sexual exploration.
If that makes the album sound like a chore, an easy in is the arresting Doesn’t matter. The cocky percussion and soaring, ethereal vocals combine to create light-footed dance song, full of strange synths and soaring vocals. The astonishing lyrics deal with weighty themes – suicidal thoughts, the existence of God – with elegance and honesty.
On Girlfriend, Christine plays with gender and sings with a light arrogance: ‘Don’t feel like a girlfriend, but lover, damn, I’d be your lover, girlfriend’. Here, the character she creates wouldn’t feel out of place on Grindr with the words ‘masc4masc’ on their profile…
Then there’s 5 dollars, the most beautiful, angelic-sounding song about sex work you will ever hear. The video ups the androgynous ante; I’m a gay man and the sight of Christine in a harness left me hot under the collar. And yet, for me, her voice is gloriously girlish, and that friction creates new, exciting possibilities.
The coolest, most up-to-the-minute record of the year.
The great queer music artist Perfume Genius (Mike Hadreas) has joined forces with W Records to release two exclusive tracks for which all proceeds will go to Immigration Equality to further the the rights of LGBTQ immigrants. Immigration Equality is the nation’s leading LGBTQ immigrant rights organization.
W Records is supporting the LGBTQ+ community in other ways, too. Perhaps the first to note is the regular QUEER ME OUT panels as well as a series of destination guides in partnership with them. that explore locations that aren’t always the first that come to mind for queer travelers.
The Pride L.A. spoke with Anthony Ingham, Global Brand Leader for W Records about partnering with Perfume Genius and advancing LGBTQ+ rights.
Tell me a little bit about W Records. Why would a hotel empire launch a recording label?
W Records is a natural next step for the W brand. Just this year we kicked off our global music festival series, WAKE UP CALL at W Hollywood, W Barcelona, W Bali and soon we’ll be taking the multi-day, multi-stage performance to W Dubai – The Palm. Music has always been a passion for us, which is why we brought on Global Music Directors to curate the music experience at all of our global hotels from background music to on-site performances.
Back in 2016 we started exploring how we could support artists beyond our Living Room performances which each W hotel hosts with local talent. We created W Sound Suites, in-hotel recording studios, to support the creative process that is essential to the music we love. When we saw how impactful our partnerships with musicians like St. Vincent were for our guests, we wanted to build bigger and bigger platforms to highlight the new/next talent we love. Once we had thrown an international music festival, the question became what can we create that reaches an audience beyond the scene at our hotels? W Records was the answer. Now we can not only help foster creative expression but also help get the word out alongside artists we believe in.
Why sign with or partner with Perfume Genius? What does his influence have on the LGBTQ+ community that W Records likes?
Perfume Genius (Mike Hadreas) stood out to us for a lot of the obvious reasons; his overwhelming skill and artistry as a musician and producer among them. However, like W, he is vocal about his support of the LGBTQ community. We want to support him first and foremost as an artist in partnership with him and Matador (his label), but also beyond the performance. Each artist that works with W Records is given the opportunity to choose a charity. All W proceeds from the streaming of the two exclusive tracks released with each artist are donated to that chosen charity. In this case, Perfume Genius chose Immigration Equality and we are honored to be a part of supporting their vitally important work.
Can you tell me a little bit about the success of the QUEER ME OUT speaking panels?
Since day one, W Hotels has been dedicated to inclusivity and equality and it continues to be core to the brand experience. Each QUEER ME OUT event offers passionate panel discussions that dive into hot button issues as well as the work and play of experts and icons. We launched QUEER ME OUT in 2017 to continue the conversations that are essential to progress with incredible individuals like Mickey Boardman (Editorial Director for PAPER Magazine), Abiezer Benitez and Thomas Jackson (Editors of GAYLETTER Magazine) and Levi Jackman Foster (Photographer) among many others. Last year we hosted these discussions in North America at W Washington DC (June 2017), W Fort Lauderdale (July 2017) and W Montreal (August 2017).
For 2018 we took the QUEER ME OUT series global. As an international company, we want to push the conversation forward everywhere, not only in North America. So far this year, we’ve hosted QUEER ME OUT discussions at W Barcelona (June 27), W London – Leicester Square (July 7) and W Amsterdam (August 4).
Can you tell me more about Marriott’s corporate social responsibility Platform (SERVE 360)and how it correlates to the LGBTQ+ community?
SERVE 360 is a multifaceted initiative from Marriott International that aims to nurture, sustain, empower and welcome guests and global causes. Through partnering and supporting charitable causes, nonprofits, creating and implementing training, advocacy and supplier accountability, including those that are focused on the LGBTQ+ community, Marriott embraces travel as one of the most powerful tools for promoting peace and cultural understanding.
Can you comment on the overall social responsibility (especially with the LGBTQ+ community) of other big businesses?
I can’t speak to the motivations and actions of all corporations. As a global organization rooted in an industry that encourages cultural exploration and appreciation, I feel we as a brand have a responsibility to set an example. We can’t shy away from the difficult conversations that push us forward. We as individuals and businesses have to create the space, time and environment to talk about the real issues. Equality is non-negotiable and there is still work to be done. There was a time when a person, never mind a company, would have been shunned for speaking up for LGBTQ+ rights. We are proud to be supporting a cause we believe in. Supporting LGBTQ+ rights across all our initiatives is a privilege we have not and will not take for granted.
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association announced their nominations for the 76th annual Golden Globe Awards for best in film and television on Thursday and some prominent LGBT projects made the cut.
“The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story” received the most television nominations (four) including for Best Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television and a Best Performance by an Actor in a Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television nomination for Darris Criss’ portrayal of Andrew Cunanan.
Ryan Murphy’s other TV series “Pose” was nominated for Best TV series – Drama. Billy Porter received a Best Performance by an Actor in a TV Series – Drama nomination for his role in “Pose.”
For film, “Bohemian Rhapsody” was nominated for Best Motion Picture – Drama and Rami Malek was nominated for Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama for his portayal of Freddie Mercury.
Lucas Hedges earned a Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama nomination for the lead role in gay conversion drama “Boy Erased.” Troye Sivan, who also appears in the film, was also nominated for Best Original Song in a Motion Picture for the film’s song “Revelation.”
Melissa McCarthy received a nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama for her role in “Can You Ever Forgive Me?” where she portrays lesbian author Lee Israel. Richard E. Grant also was nominated for Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture for the same film for playing gay character Jack Hock.
“If Beale Street Could Talk,” the film adaption of James Baldwin’s novel, was also nominated for Best Motion Picture – Drama, Best Screenplay in a Motion Picture and Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture for Regina King.
Other LGBT projects nominated include “The Favourite” for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy and “Girl” for Best Motion Picture – Foreign Language. Debra Messing also received a nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a TV series – Musical or Comedy for “Will & Grace.”
“A Star is Born” continued to rake in accolades with nominations for Best Motion Picture – Drama, Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama for Lady Gaga, Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama and Best Director for Bradley Cooper and Best Original Song in a Motion Picture for “Shallow.”
“Vice” received the most film nominations (six) including Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy.
Sandra Oh and Andy Samberg host the ceremony which airs on Jan. 6 at 8 p.m. on NBC.
Check out the full list of nominations below.
Saturday December 15, 2018 @ 7 pm. Occidental Center for the Arts proudly presents: Guitar Virtuoso Peppino D’Agostino ! Internationally renowned finger picking acoustic guitarist, composer and master teacher D’Agostino will present a dynamic concert covering his original classical, folk, Irish, Italian, Brazilian, flamenco and jazz compositions aka “minestrone music”. Don’t miss this warm and engaging award-winning ‘giant of the acoustic guitar’ as he brings his mesmerizing virtuosity to OCA’s acoustic sweet spot for the fifth time ! “Peppino’s music is deep and beautiful”…Tommy Emmanuel. $25 Adv/$28 at door. Fine Refreshments available. Art Gallery open for viewing and gifts. Wheelchair accessible. www.occidentalcenterforthearts.org; 707-874-9392. 3850 Doris Murphy Ct. Occidental, CA. 95465
For most of her young life, Michelle LeClair was a worrier.
She had to be: her mother was somewhat of a free spirit who married often and “was gone a lot.” For that, LeClair grew up as the Independent Responsible Child; the one who, as a teen, wanted a job so she could pay for her own car, as she recalls in the new memoir “Perfectly Clear.”
And so LeClair’s mother helped her get a job selling L. Ron Hubbard training materials for Sterling Management, an organization run by Scientologists. It didn’t take long before LeClair surprised everyone, herself included, by excelling beyond expectations.
Her success and her mother’s influence led the Church to invite LeClair to one-on-one member counseling, ostensibly to determine her “purpose on earth,” but also to lead her deeper inside Scientology. Church members offered her their friendship, but LeClair noticed that she was asked nearly constantly for more money. As her career rose, so did the Church’s requests for donations and soon, she was writing astoundingly frequent five-figure checks to the organization.
And it might’ve continued so, if not for one thing.
As a teenager, LeClair fooled around once with a female friend, which she had to confess to a fellow Scientologist, information that went into a file. Even after LeClair married and had children, her long-ago fling was flung in her face repeatedly, particularly after she tried to divorce her abusive husband. Scientology has long considered homosexuality repugnant, she was reminded, and that nagged at her enough to make her question this faith in which she’d been raised.
She questioned even deeper when she fell in love with a woman named Charly.
Halloween is long over. The decorations have been put away. But if you didn’t get scared enough then, “Perfectly Clear” will finish the job perfectly.
It starts with the opening pages, in which author Michelle LeClair is arrested for a crime that never happened, fabricated, she says, by Scientology members. It’s a small story compared to what else follows, but its heart-pounding presence in the front of the book takes readers by the scruff and shakes us.
That leaves a lingering feeling of alarm that continues to run in and out of the rest of this memoir as LeClair (with Robin Gaby Fisher) lets readers see what she did not. We’re privy to the manipulation she recalls but didn’t notice then, the pressure she felt but dismissed and the dawning fear that she could never get away.
That makes for an excellent real-life love story wrapped up in a psychological thriller that’ll also make you pick your jaw off the floor about every third page.
Recently, at a talk on queer literature, a panelist said it was time to move past first love and coming out narratives. I almost exploded on the spot. How do you get tired of first love stories? How do you get tired of coming out?
I’m writing from a room full of bookshelves bowing under the weight of coming out stories, some recent, some old, all necessary. I’m thinking of Benjamin Alire Saenz’ Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, of Chinelo Okperanta’s Under the Udala Trees, of Audre Lorde’s Zami. Even David Levithan’s Two Boys Kissing, which comments that some of its protagonists have never had to come out because they were always out, is a coming out story.
I’m trying to explain the outrage I feel, a week after National Coming Out day, when inevitably someone on my social media feed, someone from some alternate futurity where there is no Trump and no fuckery and it’s all cupcakes 24/7, tells me we have to move beyond coming out.
I admit to a bias towards these books. I admit to a bias towards books about first queer loves and coming out. To me, the appeal of the queer first love story is that it contains within it a narrative of becoming. Queer love in this world is not just about loving or who you love. It’s about who you are: a discovery of a world, beyond the veil of the dominant paradigm, that you always suspected existed, but were too afraid to trust.
It’s Harry Potter: the owl shows up at your window and says guess what, you’re not going to Muggle School, you’re going to Hogwarts, and although there is all the suffering in the world ahead, we get to do things differently there. We get to redefine desire, time, and family. It’s Narnia: if you just get through this closet, I promise you’ll find a world of possibility. At least it’s Xena and we get to band together.
The trajectory of queer first love stories is the trajectory of infinite potential and adventure. It may be fantasy, but it’s the kind of fantasy that makes the world a little more bearable. The day you get tired of the coming out story is the day you get tired of realization, of becoming, of creation and becoming with others. I don’t know what you read about when you get tired of becoming. Maybe you read about ennui. I’m told there’s a lot of footnotes and tennis involved.
I need queer first love narratives. Maybe you do too: we read and write and cling to these books so hard because of what we can’t do with them: we can’t throw them into a time portal at our younger selves at a time when we most needed them, maybe with a little note attached saying, “you’ll get through this. It gets better for some but not for everyone. Look out for one another. Remember to floss.”
We read write them for others and for our younger selves, these books that we needed, that could have changed our lives. We read and write them as guidebooks for the poor lost selves we were: What is queerness? How do I do queer love? What time do I show up? What are the steps, where do I put my feet? We read them for joy and we read it for healing, for the if only and for the yes please, both to revisit those first loves and to live through characters who are either braver than we were or had more room to navigate their desires.
I love queer first love and coming out books with the wonder and passion and bitter fury of Molly Grue when she sees her first unicorn: where were you when I needed you? I need them in the world and I don’t think we’re done with them and if you’re writing one right now and need a pep talk, come find me—I’ll tell you how much your work matters.
I’m opening with this because I’d like to flag my tendencies, as a reader reviewing a novel of first queer love that usurps my notions of the coming out narrative. This novel troubled and stayed with me and I want to explore why.
Juno’s Swans by Tamsen Wolff is not a traditional queer “first love” novel. It’s not a story about becoming and it doesn’t contain bromides about the magic of new love. What it offers instead is a story about the limits of love: both the crash at the end of a first love, and the tunnel vision infatuation can give, the kind where everything outside that adoring gaze becomes flattened.
Juno’s Swans gives us Nina, a high school senior washed ashore from a summer in Cape Cod in which she went to an acting residency, fell madly in love with Sarah, and had her heart broken. It gives us the moment of falling in love and the knowledge that it must end. It also gives us richly drawn characters and complex situations: her best friend Titch, who is awkward and difficult in all the best ways; an older English professor who enters into a sexual relationship with Nina, then a high school junior; a half-absent mother; another older male acting teacher who also enters into a relationship with his teenage female student (unequal power dynamics and predation are a frustratingly under-explored topic in the book—I counted four such relationships). The novel gives us a particular moment in space and time: early 1980s and the early HIV/AIDS years, New York. It gives us magnificent clear prose and dialogue. It gives us all of those things, but the novel’s preoccupation is unapologetically with Sarah and Nina’s love for her.
Juno’s Swans soars when it recognizes and illuminates the tunnel vision of love, the before and after, and the struggle of conveying it:
the worst of it is that this connection doesn’t come often, sometimes doesn’t come at all, and once it has, it colors everything. If you don’t know what I am talking about, I don’t know whether to say, I hope you never do, or Whatever you do, never settle for anything less.
Wolff’s prose is so engaging, it makes Nina engaging, despite her focus on Sarah, who is perhaps the least interesting character in the book.
Where it dips or maybe succeeds a little too well is where it gives us the limits of love: not only the end of Sarah’s love for our narrator Nina, which is sad, but Nina’s inability to see the world beyond. Outside their love affair, Nina’s grandmother is dying, Professor Pedophile is sending her increasingly desperate love letters, her best friend Titch is icing over. Outside, people in their circle are contracting what is then labeled Kaposi’s Sarcoma, and appearing at the novel’s margins with lesions and sunken eyes. There isn’t really a coming out because Nina doesn’t seem to notice the closet, or a world beyond.
Sometimes that love-myopia leaves me confused about the details and logistics: how do Nina and Sarah, high school-aged, live together as lovers over the course of the summer? How do they know how share a living space and make their lovers three course dinners? Nina’s single-minded focus on Sarah leaves big questions unexplored (in the absence of exploration, the subject of older men in power dating teenagers felt normalized—like Alan Bennett’s The History Boys, but without the puns). Nina’s bad case of loving Sarah renders HIV/AIDS–mentioned but not really digested—more like epoch scene setting, a walk-on subplot. I wanted the novel to take on those subjects. I wanted those cultural complexities and cruelties and limits of the world to be part of the adventure, part of the with of Nina’s becoming.
Without Nina’s ability to see what’s beyond her love, and without the novel’s willingness to explore that deficits of that spotlight, some of the novel’s metaphors go rogue—like the title, Juno’s Swans–a reference to Celia and Roselind’s closeness. Was that for Nina and her love Sarah? Was that for Nina and her dropped friendship with Titch? In the bounce of the reference, I couldn’t help but think of another mythological swan, Leda’s, in which an older male god abuses a power dynamic, like the professors in this story, and no one seems to mind.
And maybe that’s the heart of this novel: how infatuation can expand us so much in one direction, it limits us in others. It specializes us. It makes us miss the wildness of the world beyond. I want to find Nina in a year, or five, or ten, and say: now tell me the story of that summer. Now tell me who you’ve become. And what house you’ve been sorted into. And what it is to reach through a closet into a cold world that goes on forever and that we make together, and alone. How do we survive? Someday, I might need to know.
In Conversation: Gar McVey-Russell & Philip Robinson
Philip Robinson is an award-winning poet, writer and activist. His writing of poetry spans forty-nine years. Robinson is anthologized in several gay/queer literature’s front-runners: In The Life, A Black Gay Anthology, The Road Before Us: 100 Gay Black Poets, The Last Closet: real lives of lesbian and gay teachers, and When The Drama Club is Not Enough.
Philip Robinson also has two of his own books of poetry, We Still Leave a Legacy and in The Trenches The Voice of A Guidance Counselor. Philip is a long-term volunteer @ AIDS Action Committee (AAC) of Massachusetts on their Bayard Rustin Community Breakfast Committee. This iconic event will celebrate its 30th year in 2019.
Gar McVey-Russell is a writer based in Oakland. His work has appeared in Sojourner: Black Gay Voices in the Ages of AIDS and Harrington’s Gay Men Fiction Quarterly. Gar also writes a blog, the gar spot: fiction and musings from a black gay writer with delusions above his station. His first novel Sin Against the Race was published in October, 2017.
Philip Robinson and Gar McVey-Russell both began writing in the 1980s, Philip poetry, Gar fiction. Their writing spans from the beginning of the AIDS epidemic and the Black Gay arts movement to the age of RuPaul’s Drag Race, and greater visibility of black queer folks from the entire spectrum of gender and sexual identity. In this discussion, both writers discuss their beginnings, influences, and where their writing stands today.
Gar: Philip, your writing dates back to the 1980s, a period of great significance for Black Gay literature. I came out in the late 80s, so your voice was among those that provided me a safe space in which to explore my sexuality. What can you tell me about that time? Who influenced you and guided you in your writing?
Philip: I had the distinct honor to have met and become close and dear friends with two extraordinary writers, the late Thomas Grimes (Milking Black Bull: 10 Gay Black Poets, Poets on the Horizon) and author of numerous plays and the late Roy Gonsalves (PERVERSION and Other Countries: Black Gay Voices). These two individuals, soul-mates as well, changed my life through their love of the written word and ammunition of love in their delivery.
My literary “girlfriend” the late Joseph Beam took twenty-nine of us black gay writers and put us into a literary first, In The Life: A Black Gay Anthology. The outgrowth of this book came about because Beam felt a frustration with gay literature that had no message for and little mention of Black gay men. “The bottom line” he wrote, “is this: We Black gay men who are proudly gay. What we offer is our lives, our love, our visions.…We are coming home with our heads held up high.”
So Gar, is there a particular audience you are trying to capture through your writing?
Gar: I write stories that I would have wanted to read in my late teens or early 20s, when I was struggling with my sexual orientation. I didn’t read any gay fiction growing up. I think I was too scared to go there. But I was hungry for it. In Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison—a book that has stayed with me for decades—he includes a brief passage about gay nurses at the teaching hospital at the protagonist’s black college, and the secret lives that they live. Honey, I must have read that passage a half-dozen times! Sadly, the gay nurses never came up again. So I hope my writing will speak to others who are dealing or have dealt with issues of race and sexuality.
At the same time, I’m still naive enough to think that everyone, regardless of background, will want to read it, should read it. Case in point, a reader who identified herself as a straight white woman wrote a very lovely review of my novel on Good Reads. She wrote that she could identify with my story easily, because it deals with belonging. I think it’s important for all of us to find each other’s humanity. Really, it’s the only way in which humanity will survive.
Philip you have written a lot about the AIDS epidemic. How challenging is it to write about all whom you’re lost to AIDS? Has time permitted you the ability to do so?
Philip: In the beginning stages of this pandemic known as HIV/AIDS, I, like many others were at a precipice. It felt like I had been taken to the end of a long deserted road with no directions as to where to turn. I couldn’t begin to grasped the magnitude of personal friends I knew who had contacted the virus. I almost felt like I was witnessing a tremendous encroachment in my space, our sacred world, known as a community. People in rapid succession were being taken to the hospital, seen by doctors who themselves were confronted with this medical uncertainty, and in so many cases, these same folks were dead within months of their diagnosis.
In the late 1980s, I took the opportunity to channel my frustration, the intense pain, unanswered questions by volunteering at the AIDS Action Committee (AAC) of Massachusetts. I had heard about this new organization founded by Larry Kessler that was attempting to find ways to help us who were thirsty for information. Somewhere in that pursuit I was hoping to hear that this sudden departure from our norm, was an aberration of sorts.
Long-time social activist, and staff member at AIDS Action Committee, Harold DuFour-Anderson, presented a great concept to the AAC staff to start an annual Breakfast honoring the principles of the legendary black gay community organizer of his time, the late Bayard Rustin. In its design, the Bayard Rustin Community Breakfast (BRCB) was created to recognize the roles of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people from communities of color in the fight against AIDS epidemic.
As a writer, I often siege the opportunity to write about the insurmountable pain that surrounds me. The AIDS epidemic became that unspeakable malaise. There was this vulnerable cloud that casted a mask over us. So, I wrote to escape the suffering. I wrote about people I had met through our monthly readings together.
So, in my need to find solace, in 1988, I wrote this poem, We Still Leave a Legacy. In this particular piece I attempted to capture the dismay, a sense of silence, but also a degree of hope and determination. I needed to believe no one’s life is in vain. I firmly understood that yes, people die, but their legacies will live on. This was one way to cope with the vast loss. It was clear to me we needed to pay homage to those who came before us. In a spiritual way, we created our sense of hope, to diminish the fear.
What influenced you to write your new book, Sin Against the Race? What are some of the themes that are pronounced in this piece of work?
Gar: I just went to a screening of Tongues Untied recently at Oakland’s new LGBTQ Center in the Lakeshore district. It’s been a while since I had seen it. But scene after scene, I saw parts of my book—it influenced and informed me that much. For instance, there’s a scene when Marlon talks about how he learned about his identity behind the epithets thrown at him (faggot, motherfucking coon). I have a scene where my protagonist Alfonso says, that it doesn’t matter if he’s called a nigger or a faggot, the pain is the same.
So one of the major themes of the work deals with homophobia in the black community. It took me a while to realize that this is where I wanted to go. I needed to time to find that voice and give it permission to speak. I felt like I had to fight some internal barriers—there’s a strong sense in the community about not airing our dirty laundry. As the story evolved, and became, I think, more nuanced, then I felt better about this theme being my center. One thing I ended up doing is tackling the issue inter-generationally. So we see instances of homophobic tendencies in Alfonso’s father and grandfather, two political icons lionized by the larger community. We also see folks Alfonso’s age, Leon and his love interest Jameel, maintain a homophobic front to “keep it real.”
Those of us who are black and queer still live behind two veils sometimes, and we encounter a lot of the problems W.E.B. DuBois discussed over a century ago to this day. I’d say the difference now is that we’re a little less invisible than we used to be. That’s cause for hope.