#also just realised 3/5 are movies about gay couples. they just make the most inspiring posters i guess

[jakeperalta]

★ countdown to christmas (take two) ★ day 1 of 24: taylor swift songs as holiday film posters

christmas tree farm, in the style of white christmas (1954)

'tis the damn season, in the style of carol (2015)

back to december, in the style of the holiday (2006)

champagne problems, in the style of happiest season (2020)

lover, in the style of single all the way (2021)

[leoninapelliolovesconchitawurst]

ENGLISH TRANSLATION ( Jeannette Nobbe)

VOLSKRANT.NL 31/01/20

by Mennon Pot

https://www.volkskrant.nl/cultuur-media/conchita-wurst-sorry-dat-ik-zo-n-wandelend-cliche-ben~b0477817/

(Conchita) Wurst: 'I'm sorry I'm a walking cliché'.

Above all we know Conchita Wurst as the bearded 'female 'singer who won the ESC in 2014. But we've moved on and are a bit wiser. It´s just Wurst now, but the beard is still there.

With light feathered steps, Thomas Neuwirth (31) enters the conference room of the hotel in Groningen where he is staying: black combat boots, black leather pants, tight black T-shirt, the black beard and the perfect short trimmed jet black hair..

He introduces himself as Tom. It's not difficult to recognise the bearded drag queen Conchita in him. (Kopenhagen, 2014, remember?) but the dress and wig are stowed away for a while. Conchita has a sort of sabbatical, so to speak.

Neuwirth is on tour as a man. Stage name: Wurst. Yesterday evening he performed in Groningen; the next concert will be 7 february at the Melkweg in Amsterdam. His new album 'Truth over Magnitude' also carries the artist´s name Wurst.

Let's get this straight: when the subject is Conchita Wurst, the word 'transgender' sometimes comes a long. Wrongly. Neuwirth is a man, ('but incredibly gay, of course'), who has a choice from now on: being on tour as a drag queen (Conchita) or as a man (Wurst) .

´a lot of fun, being a masculine stage persona', he says. Conchita will turn up again somewhere else.

Holland appreciated Conchita's 'Rise like a Phoenix' with the highest score, almost 6 years ago.

Neuwirth didn't forget: twelve points, douze points from Holland for the bearded diva from Austria.

Then hectic years followed. 'After the Song Contest I thought, I have to make the most of it now, build my fame and cash it in. So I surrounded myself with all kinds of experts, managers, stylists, make/up artists, the whole circus. After 3 years I was exhausted. I couldn´t do it anymore. I told my audience every nigh, be yourself, believe in yourself. But along the way, I forgot myself.´

He got rid of the experts’ circus and is having a relaxed tour now, with a small entourage. He feels good again, although in 2018 he had to announce he is infected with the HIV virus. His manager politely asks, almost in an humble manner, not to talk about that.

Tom doesn´t appear to be very worried about that. There has seldom been a star who starts an interview so cheerfully. ´A great photo shoot and after that talk about things I find beautiful and fun.

Terrific, I was already looking forward to it when I came out of bed.´

´Curriculum Vitae'

1988 – Born as Thomas Neuwirth in Gmunden, Austria

2007 – Candidate at the talentshow Starmania, and boyband Jetzt anders!

2011 – Debut as female persona Conchita Wurst, the debut single `I´ll be there´

2012 - Second place at the Austrian Songfestival

2014 – ESC winner with ´Rise like a Phoenix

2015 – First album ´Conchita´, co-presenter ESC

2018 – Second album ´From Vienna with Love´

2019 – Debut as male stage persona ´Wurst´, third album ´Truth over Magnitude´

2020 – Wurst ´Trust over Magnitude´ Sony Music

Wurst will be performing in the Melkweg in Amsterdam on February 7

SOUNDTRACK

Music from the Motion Picture Titanic ...1997

´My first CD. I was 9 years old when I bought it. `My heart will go on´’changed my life´. As it were, Céline Dion gave me permission to be utterly dramatic and to be over the top. When I came out of the closet, I heard that song in my head.

It was also a liberation for me as a singer. My mom always sang with a thin, high falsetto voice. I thought that was how it should be. Dion taught me, you may yell as hard as you can, with all the power you have in you. When you sing so loud, you can’t fake it. The sound you push out of your body, is the sound of your body, unique and by definition authentic. Céline Dion taught me that singing is something really physical.´

SERIES

The Crown ..Netflix..., 2016 until 2019

´For me it´s getting difficult to watch a movie to the end. I guess that´s because of all the series on Netflix and HBO. My favorite is `The Crown´.. ´the intro alone is so beautiful, that liquid gold that forms a crown, such art. I used to watch it twice. Ít says something about the fact that I can´t choose between the two women who play Elizabeth and the two men who play prince Philip. All the actors are great. The costumes, the stories, the palaces, it´s so delightful. The history also intrigues me, after every episode I checked on Wikipedia if it was really what had happened.

PARTIES

´At Christmas I always come back to Vienna. I love the lights, glitters and decorations, my inner Mariah Carey is looking forward to it every year. Christmas 2019 was extra special because it had been a long time since the whole family came together at my grandmother´s house.´

I would love it to be like that every year... A couple of days being together in one home. Talking, getting to really know my family. Maybe now you think, days on and on with uncles and aunts, such horror! It is easy to say that I don´t really have much in common with these people. But I do, Really. They all have a story and similarities with your stories. Ask them about your life and tell them about yours.´

That´s what Christmas is all about to me. To me, the birth of Jesus has not that much to do with it.´

ISLAND..

I have an agreement with my best friends to go on vacation at least once every two years. We have been to Mykonos a couple of times, THE especially gay island. I´m sorry I sound like a walking cliché.´

The sun, the sea, the beaches, the small streets, so cosy. We rent a house with a pool and for a week or two we live in our own little paradise, actually being a bit tipsy the whole time. Go shopping and cook.´

`What´s also very important, on Mykomos, the wind is always blowing the right way. I love to watch the women, because their dresses and their hair flutter so beautifully.´

STYLE ICON

Victoria Beckham

I was and still am a big Spice Girls fan and I especially admire Victoria Beckham, because she lives her life the way she wants. She appears in tabloids every day, but has survived a crisis in her relationship and has stayed happy with the love of her life and her family. I think that it´s really strong.´

In regard to her style, she can go from very classy to very trashy, I like that. One day she´s wearing a designer dress, the next she and David Beckham are walking in identical jogging suits. She couldn’t care less. I think that it´s inspiring.´

´I think she is utterly authentic, raging through the glamour. Although I have never met her, I´m sure that I could have a lot of fun with her. I´d love to drink some tequila with her for an afternoon or so.´

AGE

30

´I thought becoming 30 was really special, I lost my wild behaviour, came to be more restful. Some way or another I think a lot about some things my mother said: in my twenties, I ignored those lessons, but now I´m 30, I suddenly realised she was right for example how important family and friends are.

I´m 31 now, I have inner peace and my life in order, but I still feel young. I´m convinced that this the best period of my life´. My advise to everybody... be 30.´

ALBUM

Recomposed by Max Richter / The Four Seasons ..2012

I don´t play any instruments and until not too long ago, I didn´t really know much about music. I really found that a pity sometimes. Fortunately, my good friend Martin studies at the School of Musical Arts... !! He´s studying the history of music intensely and tells me about a lot of great composers. I learn a lot from that.´´I never understood classical music and didn´t really know anything about it, but thanks to the listening sessions with Martin I fell in love with Vivaldi..

The pop artist of the classical artists.

´Max Richter interpreted Vivaldi´s Four Seasons and composed it in a modern fashion. It´s a modern, post minimalistic piece, completely different from the original one, but you still recognise it. Greatly done, at the moment it´s my favorite album.´

BOOK

Friedrich Schiller « Ueber die aesthetische Erziehung des Menschen ». About the aesthetic upbringing of the people..´

´A good friend advised me to read the philosophical letters from Friedrich Schiller ..Letters, 1794-1795)

That´s a hard job to do. Because of the old fashioned German I had to read some sentences 5 times. You always have to wrestle yourself through a thick layer of 18th century sexism.

´But further on you´ll find something beautiful. Schiller writes a lot about finding your inner beauty and your own truth. Dare to be yourself. Embrace your darker sides. Those are important as well.´

´At the same time he preaches self-perspective.. don´t take yourself too seriously, you´re not the center of the universe. That is very worthy to me. Namely because I DO think I´m the center of the universe, haha.

`Still it´s very wise of him, to send a message from 1795 to a 21st century queen with a Mariah Carey complex.´

CLUB

Circus in Vienna

´The Arena is a huge complex in Vienna, a concert building with a mega discotheque. A couple of times a year they organize Circus, my favorite gay club night. I always go there with my group of closest friends, but it´s actually a bit of a rule that we lose each other and disappear into the crowd.´

´I roam around all night- Every room, every floor has its own musical theme and decoration. I love the types of people I meet there, their clothes, their fetishisms, everything.´

….Arena Vienna, Baumgasse 80, Vienna

CITY

Amsterdam

´I live in Vienna, I love Vienna and I will always come back there, but the greatest city I´ve been to is Amsterdam – since then I traveled all over the world so I know what I´m talking about.

´Of all the cities I visited, Amsterdam is the only one where I would want to live a period of time. So that´s what I´m gonna do, this summer, for a few months to begin with.´

´I can see that Amsterdam also has the flagship stores from all known store chains. And a lot of tourists, like every special city. But I see all these small jewelry shops where they sell their self-made jewelry. Little bakeries. Cosy streets. And a lot of water. I love water. I love cities with lots of water.´

[thehandmaidstalehulu]

The Handmaid’s Tale is the latest in a long run of small-screen book adaptations to announce that it will continue beyond the end of its source material. And unlike the novel that inspired, say, Netflix’s 13 Reasons Why, Margaret Atwood’s book doesn’t tell a closed-ended story, leaving open endless storytelling possibilities within the world of Gilead.

Season one left only the epilogue of Atwood’s book untold, taking viewers right up to the point where June (Elisabeth Moss), having finally rebelled openly against Gilead, is whisked away in a black van to destinations unknown, while Moira (Samira Wiley) escaped from the brothel and made it across the border to Canada.

So what exactly will season two of Hulu’s deservedly lauded adaptation look like, when it returns in 2018? Here are six of our best predictions for what’s to come.

1. We’ll see Emily in the Colonies.

The number one on basically everybody’s wish list for season two, whether you’re asking viewers or actors, is to see the Colonies. Sure, there’s an argument that this toxic hellscape, where the condemned are sent to pick up nuclear waste until their skin “peels off in sheets and they die,” is more powerful left to the imagination. But now that we know Alexis Bledel is coming back as a series regular in season two, a storyline following her character Emily into the Colonies—where she was surely sent after publicly running over that soldier—is close to a sure thing.

(Side note: Am I the only one kind of shipping Emily and Moira? I know they have shared exactly 0 seconds of screen time, but it’s not just that they’re both gay women—they’re both such natural born rebels, and such indomitable spirits. My great hope for season two is for them to at least interact.)

2. June will become a new kind of captive.

Before June is led away into the black van by government soldiers, Nick—who is an Eye and effectively one of them—murmurs that she should go with them, and to trust him. Now, on the one hand, Nick has luscious eyebrows and well-defined muscles and seems very sincere about wanting to protect the mother of (probably) his baby. On the other hand, he’s basically a blank slate, and could turn out to be his own brand of controlling misogynist.

I can easily see a season two where June ends up somewhere seemingly safe, under Nick and the Eyes’ protection, only to realise she’s now a new kind of captive. Now that she’s pregnant with his child, maybe Nick feels some ownership over her. And if it turns out Nick has used his influence with the Eyes to engineer this black van scheme and get June out of the handmaid life, isn’t that just one more example of women only having value when they’re pregnant? TL;DR: I don’t like Nick, I don’t trust him, I don’t ship it.

3. Redemption for Serena?

This is maybe an outside shot. After the finale—in which Serena callously taunts June with the sight of her kidnapped daughter Hannah but doesn’t let them reunite—I was pretty sure I had no interest whatsoever in any attempt to redeem this sociopath. Serena’s backstory as a televangelist and “domestic feminist” didn’t seem to leave a lot of room for her to see the light about Gilead, but it’s been increasingly emphasized throughout the show that she’s powerless in ways she didn’t expect to be. Her career is over, her marriage is a sham, and no one can even read her books. Could the loss of her second Handmaid, June—especially just as she has conceived a child—coupled with her husband Waterford’s general jerking around, pave the way for a change of heart? Plus, Yvonne Strahovski is so fascinating in the role that I’m into the notion of Serena becoming more of an anti-hero, purely for that reason alone.

4. There will be consequences for Waterford.

If nothing else, Serena is going to make him suffer, right? Their infuriating showdown in the finale, where she confronted Waterford (Joseph Fiennes) about his infidelity and he responded by telling her “You answer to me,” prompted her to finally put him in his pathetic place. She’s no longer pretending to be the dutiful wife, and his colleague Putnam’s grim fate seems to be foreshadowing his own comeuppance. Serena and Mrs Putnam shared a conversation where their husbands’ indiscretions were explicitly linked—and shortly afterwards, Putnam was punished by having a hand removed, at his wife’s request. Get worried, Fred.

5. Rita and the Marthas will play a larger role.

Right before June’s public rebellion against Aunt Lydia, she drew strength from reading scores of letters from Handmaids across the country, finally confirming that she is not alone. And as she’s being taken from the house, she whispers their location to Rita, who we later see finding them behind the bathtub. So if Rita wasn’t already involved in the Mayday rebellion, she sure will be now, suggesting that actress Amanda Brugel will have a much bigger role in season two. It would also be interesting to get some context on the Marthas—if you’re fertile, you’re a Handmaid, but not all infertile women become Marthas, so what’s the system? Again, I don’t think a world like Gilead benefits from being over-explained, and the show risks losing its intrigue if it gets too weighed down in world-building, but seeing more of the Marthas feels like an important piece to add.

6. A mind-boggling June/Luke/Nick/Waterford/Serena love pentagon is brewing.

Really though. Elisabeth Moss may have been joking when she told us season two would be “the most complicated Real Housewives episode you’ve ever seen,” but these dynamics are getting messy AF. June was married to Luke, and has a daughter with him, and while she thought he was dead she hooked up with Nick, whose baby she is probably pregnant with. But as a Handmaid, she was also forced to have regular sex with Waterford, so there’s an outside shot he could be the father; his wife Serena wants a baby at all costs, but at this point DGAF whose it is, and is also furious to discover that June has been her husband’s mistress. I’m exhausted.

It’s unlikely that all five of these characters will ever be in the same room together, but what a bizarre, charged scene it would be if they were. No matter what, June and Luke’s reunion is going to be in-ter-esting.