#we love a centuries-late queer awakening

[gilmores-glorious-blog]

isaac being able to refer to himself as gay is so special to me <3 the growth !! 😭😭

[echofromtheabyss]

I am starting to have this idea that queerness isn't the only thing that gets constructed differently over time. So does straightness.

I think there is a unique quality to 1950s-80s heterosexuality that sets it apart as a distinct "thing." It's distinct from before. It's distinct from after.

The 90s-2000s are in kind of a long tail of this cultural motif, and now we're seeing this particular expression of heterosexuality really disappear in a lot of types of media and in the public eye; society just isn't trying to match up 18 year olds the way it was between the 50s-80s. Increasingly, a middle class person is going to stay sexless up until age 25 then they have 5 years to get their shit together to get married. This is a really alien way of thinking about life and love to Boomers, who basically may be, as heterosexuals, the very most privileged generation with the very most social options.

This is really coming up for me writing a sci fi setting that's basically just stuffed with frustrated Boomers.

First of all, heterosexuality in the Late Midcentury and Late Century begins to be constructed as an actual agentic lifestyle and mode of hedonic expression and freedom as opposed to just a broad social expectation.

Like, a 50s square is just assumed to be heterosexual by default.

But increasingly from the 60s on, in many cases, a heterosexual is increasingly actually agentically heterosexual. And agentic heterosexuality requires 1) increasing sexual agency, 2) a high number of options, and 3) the acknowledged existence of non-heterosexuality (even if you think it's the devil or something) and the idea that you come of age and learn your sexual identity/broadly have a sexual awakening. There are still unconscious trad gender role expectations mixed up in all of this too for a lot of people which makes this a much more confusing analysis.

Granted, I think that this last is far truer of Gen X and Millennials (declining options, higher agency, and a sense of "when did I know I was straight?" as opposed to just taking it for granted.)

Also I think this is actually going away.

No, we are not all becoming gay.

But what's going away is the shape of life that gave rise to a particular expression and construction of heterosexuality, now that middle class younger people are facing a couple of years at best (assuming you hit 25 as a total virgin in every respect, then are in a hurry to find a partner while you can, in what are really evaluative, status-conscious, shitty conditions) during which they have to do all their dating, then marry a Socially Appropriate Partner, and polyamory is a straight person's only way out of this shitty high-pressure thing we've constructed normie heterosexuality to presently be.

This is *not* the agentic heterosexuality of Boomers, and Gen X maybe got to experience the fading end of it. Also, it's not the "marry for transactional reasons because it's What Everyone Does/and we just assume everyone is straight anyway" of pre-Boomers because 1) it's clearly not what EVERYONE does, being able to marry at all is privilege now 2) we now have the youth narrative of figuring out your sexual identity (though this happens very differently for Zoomers than it did for anyone older than Millennial). It's easy to say heteros are just a default that people assume to be a norm, but in 60s and 70s work it becomes really clear that some men and women are actually horny for each other. That actually stops being legible later which is where a lot of Stalking is Love comes in, because the media stopped representing female thirst and female initiative. (Lots of analyses here but in 50s work - women actually flirt back, whereas in 80s-90s work, men flirt and women roll their eyes or act icy.)

And it stops being legible entirely once society stops being so openly horny. It's like the Sexual Revolution created a very specific construction of heterosexuality outside of normie heteronormativity, that is... kinda its own thing and its own energy. It stops being as legible because 1) the norm got bigger and more liberalized toward a larger number of behaviors and 2) society is just less horny. But that's not all. I think modern LGBT identity is constructed differently from the world I came out in. In a weird way, it's like 80s-90s LGBT identity is downstream of the Sexual Revolution and 60s-70s ideas about individuality, in ways that lots of expressions of modern LGBT identity are not; modern LGBT identity is... different somehow in ways I can't put my finger on. (I am NOT saying there were no LGBT people prior to the Sexual Revolution!)

FWIW, the idea that sexual and gender identity can be constructed differently in different times and cultures, is fairly standard Queer Studies 101, the big thing is that here I'm actually considering that *heterosexuality* constructs differently in different cultures and eras, too.

[thefisherqueen]

Granada's Sherlock Holmes: The mazarin stone

I feel like the ghost of Jeremy Brett is starting to possess me by watching so much of the Granada series lately. I even dreamt of him last night, lol. Might be better for my inner peace to take a break, but nah, being normal about something is overrated, so tonight I'm watching The mazarin stone. An outlier in the canon stories for having only one act, for being almost all dialogue and for taking place entirely within Baker Street. From what I read, this is all because it is an adaption from a screen play. I quite enjoyed this story with its great dialogue and think it would work even better in a visual medium, so I'm very curious to see the Granada version.

So this episode starts with Holmes talking about obsession and being haunted by a ghost. Feels relevant to my currant state

The opening scene is an prologue to the canon story then, with Holmes telling Watson he'll be away for several weeks. Watson will be lonely :( Watson's patients will be glad :)

Holmes saying he will be watching Watson with his third eye. Ehm, sir? Interesting storytelling choice

Such dramatic music in the scene where the diamond gets stolen, it's making me laugh

Not sure why those ladies in Watson's practice are here, but I love them. What a comic duo. It appears that Watson is struggling to figure out why they are there as well. Wait. Garridebs? I guess this episode is loaning some material from that story, then. That makes sense because I imagine it would be hard to fill a full episode with just the Mazarin story

Ladies, after some hipster nonsense of not being able to be ill because of their habits: "We insist that all our gentlemen do the same." Watson: "...your gentlemen?" *trying hard not to judge* Ladies: "Our gentlemen tennants" Haha, love this scene. I did spent some time before thinking about how awkward victorian doctor's consults must have been, with all those societal norms of modesty. I bet Watson would be really good at putting his patients at ease, though

Oh no, let Mycroft sleep! He certainly did not deserve such a rude awakening. Rude man talking to Mycroft: "You must keep your brother on a shorter leash" I feel like getting into a fist fight with that man on behalf of Holmes. Do not talk about my man like that

Mycroft is taking on the case? Was Jeremy Brett not available for this full episode? Because of health reasons, maybe? All right, that's a fresh development, let's see how it goes

I love the strong visual storytelling of the count actually shooting at female figurines when Mycroft confronts him

This episode is an interesting interpretation of each character's different way of investigation. Mycroft uses his network to speak to people and gain access to places he can follow the count, Watson stays polite and pretents to be quite ignorant while secretly thinking on it and gathering information from documents, while I think Holmes usually does everything the other two do but adds a lot of hands-on examination and a trick or two

Mycroft flirting with the ladies Garridebs threw me off. I guess this series has so many queer vibes that I didn't expect that level of straightness

I actually really like getting to see Mycroft and Watson working together. I do miss being able to stare unnecessary long at Jeremy Brett, of course

Just a side note, but the two sisters sleeping in one bed is an interesting detail. Besides houses historically commonly being small, in part because of heating reasons, bedding used to be very expensive; I would have to do research to say anything specific, but I do know from museum visits that it was quite common until at least the start of the 20th century for siblings to share a bed and thus save the family on cost. It would make sense for two unmarried elderly sisters to still be sleeping together if they got used to it after their whole lives doing so, even in the case they could now afford seperate beds, rooms maybe even. I think no one would have frowned if Holmes and Watson themselves would have shared a room. It was common for the lower classes and just didn't have the sexual/romantic association it does today. Which begs the question: what did cause victorians to become suspecious a sexual same-sex relationship was going on? I would be delighted if anyone could tell me more. I have just brought 'Strangers: homosexual love in the nineteenth century' by Graham Robb, so I hope I'll soon learn more

Watson still gets wounded in the confrontation, I see. And by that nastly looking diamond cleaver. Ouch. What a shame we didn't get the emotional 'It was worth a wound' scene. I LOVE however that it is the sisters who save Watson when he got that knife pulled to his throat. You go, ladies! And Mycroft in interrogating mode is quite delightful

Mycroft... in multiple bodies? Being immortal? Is the count hallucinating? What is going on???

Holmes is proud of his brother. Aww :)

This was a enjoyable episode, all in all. Of course I missed Holmes/Jeremy Brett in this, but even without the main character there it was still a good story, great acting and beautiful scene building. Just a bit of a shame for the odd paranormal (???) bits at the very start and end. They felt out of place and were unnecessary for the episode to work

[freddiekluger]

I am all ears for your season 3 cap's big gay awakening ideas 👀👀

alright, you asked so sit down and strap in

before we get started- a few details are recycled/repurposed from earlier headcanons/ask answers (characterisation is like that), and i came up with all this a couple weeks back, so any overlap with other peoples suggestions is totally unintentional! i’ve just been finding the energy to properly write them up as originally i riffed them with a friend late at night lmao

the captain: homo evolution

introduction (scroll down if you’re not bothered for the hardcore analysis/logic)

this isn’t necessarily what i think WILL happen as much as how i would do it. over the past two seasons of Ghosts, we’ve seen the captain’s main character arc being centred around him loosening up, from learning to value mike, alison, and the other ghosts more as equals than soldiers/means to an end to the season 2 finale, where cap is not only expressing an interest in flowers and fashion (distinctly un-soldierly pursuits) but joining the party and other men (the direct opposite of About Last Night, in which cap bah humbugs partying/’gay abandon’ and is left speechless by the mere presence of a mostly naked man). that being said, the captain is still the captain: his character is still centred around this need for rules and structure and he still finds his identity in the archetypal WW2 military man- all of his incremental moves towards a more ‘modern’ perspective have ultimately been made possible because, like Ben said on twitter, the captain isn’t CONSCIOUSLY aware that he’s gay. he has the underlying feeling that he’s different, he knows of his tendency to attach himself to specific men and form incredibly close bonds (and, as demonstrated by his attempts to hide them, is at least somewhat aware that that’s not the norm), but in his mind he’s written that off as merely “not being a ladies man”. 

the captain is from the 1940s- it’s one thing for him to see and be supportive of a same-gender wedding in present day England where gay=legal unions, marketed doritos, and homophobia being still present but generally frowned upon, and another thing entirely for him to have to apply it to himself. we’ve already seen that the captain appears to be stuck in the past more than any of the other ghosts (”the war is over!” “is it, alison? is it?”- he also references the past more frequently than most of the others), and in his past sodomite gay=punishable by imprisonment and chemical castration, back alley hookups, and the constant threat of blackmail and violence. obviously, despite all this, there was a vibrant underground queer history taking place in England during this time & not all of the above is accurate, but it’s what cap would have seen, and the England of the early 20th century is denoted as being a particularly brutal period for lgbtq+ folks (the destruction of the first world war exacerbated rage and frustration, and lgbtq+ people weren’t the only gorup to end up on the receiving end of that, but i digress). this is basiclly just a really long way of me saying that the captain compartmentalising to that degree was, and to some extent is, a survival mechanism. confronting his homoseuxality means confronting what it means for a 1940s man to be a dreaded homosexual, and all of that directly conflicts with the image of ‘the Captain’ he’s built in his mind. 

we’ve seen this in Redding Weddy, where the captain is aware that Havers means/meant more to him than was normal for a captain/2ic relationship (he does attempts to hide his affection- “i shall miss you, Havers. by which of course i mean we shall miss you “he left me, i mean he left for the front”), but is never able to fully verbalise WHY, and it only takes a series of increasingly dramatic prompts before he will even mention the idea of Havers, let alone begin to articulate their relationship. 

all this just goes to prove that for the captain to properly ‘come out’, there needs to be an external inciting incident- he could easily have gone on shadowing attractive men whenever they visit and avoiding interrogating those feelings for another seventy years if Button house remained without alison and mike. 

while at least julian, pat, and robin have noticed that the cap is not the most heteroseual of men (they’re the only ghosts who have visibly reacted when cap says gay shit), they all appear to have decided to just not mention it, which makes alison and mike our wildcards. not only has alison’s ability to see and communicate with the ghosts already connected them more to the modern world than they ever have been, alison, and mike by extension, has a personal stake in the wellbeing/general growth of the ghosts. happy ghosts=happy house, and like it or not some of them are even beginning to become friends. [i probably didn’t need to write all this like explaining my decisions, but i think figuring out the motivations behind everyon just develops the flavour and lets us have a sexy and accurate headcanon]

so,

the episode

while the captain might not consciously know he’s a fruit (derogatory), he is well and truly terrible at concealing the thirst (it’s not his fault things just keep slipping out!)- i love the idea of just having a supercut near the beginning of the episode that just shows that the captain has gotten even GAYER since last season, with slip ups becoming almost a daily occurence, but it’s getting to the point where it’s actually becoming a serious hazard. last week, he was supposed to be looking out for alison while attempted to put up blinds, but one of mike’s friends (who was over ‘helping out’, which mostly meant eating chips and covering himself in paint) walked through the room with his shirt off and paint handprints on the seat of his shorts, distracting the captain from realising that alison’s stepladder was about to give way. 

with the increased presence of non elderly men in the house (the previous owner wasn’t exactly the life of the party) the captain is getting gayer and gayer, but he’s also becoming more and more defensive, while his brisk demeanour and need for control regresses to much more of a season 1 state (a subconscious attempt to regain control as things get close to spilling over). it’s not the first time his repression has almost slipped, he spent much of his life surrounded by soldiers after all, but with no war and no corporeal body he’s got almost nothing to distract himself from it. needless to say, between the safety hazards and the almost agressive defensiveness which derails any interaction, something needs to be done about the captain.

throughout the week, alison tries to find the opportune time to talk to the captain about what’s going on with him for everyone’s sake, but cap keeps masterfully evading any ‘deep’ talk with willful misunderstanding or just straight up dismissal (which at times gets a bit rude), and alison really doesn’t have the time- her and mike are caught up with managing the first official room redecoration and butting heads with a passive agressive delivery driver. insert general shenangigans, but at some point the captain’s whole “accidentally sabotage something by being distracted and then attack anyone who dares even look at him the wrong way afterwards” act causes alison to exasperatedly blurt out “we all know you’re gay! we get it! you like men! you can drop the act!”. there’s no malice or anything but, as we know, when alison gets run ragged things don’t tend to come out quite right.

everything falls silent (and mike is vaguely confused), and the captain just looks like a deer in headlights. as alison catches her breath, pat pipes up with a “it’s alright, cap, we don’t mind- now we can focus on the task at hand”. the captain sort of regains his composure and once again attempts to brush them all off with a scoff and a “i haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about. if any of us is distracted, i-it’s... kitty!” but it’s easy to tell he looks rattled. most of his words don’t come out right, and after trying to blame kitty for their failures (she just had the unfortunate luck of being in his line of sight), he ends up doing an awkward little walk away which quickly turns into a full on sprint. mike, having finished processing alison yelling about gay shit to the air and kind of pieced together what must have happened awkwardly chimes in with “it’s okay to be gay!”- alison just pats him on the back (”yeah no he’s gone, mike.” “gone?” “sprinted away.” “huh”)

the episode continues with the captain flat out avoiding alison and the other ghosts to an almost funny extent as the other plots continue. it takes a bit for alison to realise why the captain reacted so badly (in fact, it’s actually mike who remembers that he’s 1940s ghost- “he’s probably just scared and taking it out on everyone else”). while thomas and julian vote for leaving the captain be so they can have some peace and quiet, fanny/pat/alison/robin decide someone needs to talk to him (fanny surprised everyone but after all, she got murdered because her husband had to live in secrecy- if talking to the captain will avert any further crises, she’s happy to make sure someone else does it for her). kitty’s still upset about being singled out, but she knows better than anyone that sometimes all you need is a friend- cue realisation no. 2.

with the captain avoiding everyone, sending in a regular emissary isn’t going to work. they need to find the least threatening person possible, with no agenda or history other than being there to help (a friend, if you will)- cue everyone looking at mike.

a quick offscreen briefing later, we see mike wandering out to the field where the captain has exiled himself- remember that up until this point, the captain was still in conscious denial about his sexuality, so being forced to confront it head on (and finding out that apparently everyone ‘knew’, which for cap would feel like an intimate invasion of privacy/forced vulnerability) would rattle him to the point of self-exile- he might not be able to run from his sexuality, but he can run from people. the thing is, mike can’t see or hear the ghosts, which means the captain can’t be frightened off by any expectations (mike actually talks to/at cap while facing completely the wrong direction, but consdiering the above point, this works rather well). 

the captain was alternating between pacing, fiddling with his swagger stick, and sitting, but he unconsciously stands to attention as mike wanders over. he’s used to mike not being able to see them, so mike asking to sit down takes him by surprise, disrupting his instinct to flee again.

mike begins a little awkwardly (”mind if i sit?” *silence* “...i’m just gonna assume that’s a no. or is it a yes? yeah anyways i’m just gonna sit. so... heard you’ve been going through a rough patch”), and the captain almost scoffs and wanders off, but something about the clumsy earnestness in mike’s voice, the captain’s vulnerable state, and the fact that it’s been so long since cap has had anyone actually check in on him, that he stays put. he keeps standing and staring away from button house, and mike keeps speaking to the empty air to his left, and alison and the ghosts stay hidden behind their bush a few metres away, but at least the captain is listening. for the first time in weeks, he’s not on the offensive.

“i can’t actually see or hear you, so i’m just gonna talk and assume you’re listening. alison mentioned you have a habit of running away but, um, maybe don’t do that please?”

“my mate daniel's gay. uh, homosexual, you’d probably say- did you have gay when you were alive? did it just mean happy? anyway, he didn’t come out- that means tell people- until he left high school. we all kind of guessed it, the other kids at school gave him a real tough time for it, but he just squashed it down. couldn’t imagine that all the things people were shouting at him were true, so he ignored it. he’s doing good now though. got married to his husband last year, currently runs a bookshop. so that’s nice.”

it goes quiet for a bit. the captain hasn’t moved, and we’re still only seeing shots of him from the back, but there’s a little less tension in his stance than there was before.  mike clears his throat before continuing.

“i’m guessing you’re probably pretty scared right now. i would be- i mean not that you should be, you shouldn’t, but coming from your... situation, i’m guessing it’d be hard. no one’s saying you have to be anything you’re not ready to be, but lots of things that are scary are actually not bad. airplanes, skydiving, clowns- well, not the clown from that movie, but he gives clowns a bad rep- i’m sure there are plenty of lovely clowns out in the world. still give me the creeps though.” the captain makes a captain-y noise of assent about the clown comment- he never liked them either. 

mike glances over to the bush where alison and the ghosts were attempting to listen in (they could only catch every few words- mary got particularly concerned about why mike had referenced clowns), and the captain still hasn’t run away, so alison motions for mike to keep going. he starts telling the captain a story from his uni days. it’s got nothing to do with the captain, or being gay, or self-acceptance, or anything like that- it’s just a standard tale of comedic but inventive problem solving. the captain sits himself down next to mike (to his right, avoiding mike’s gaze, and still staring away from button house), muttering that his legs are getting a bit tired. he sits there for a while, and mike just talks. sometimes he circles back to the gay thing, sometimes he just asks the captain questions, before remembering that he can’t actually hear any answer, but then he keeps asking anyway, thinking that cap might need to talk. he doesn’t at first, but slowly he offers up a word or two. and then a sentence, and then maybe more- mike will accidentally cut the captain off, or leave the silence to long, but the captain doesn’t mind (it’s a nice reminder that nothing he says will actually go on to have consequence). at one point, mike gets out his phone to show the captain photos of his mate daniel and daniel's husband, not just their wedding day but casual photos- couples drinks with him and alison, dinners at each other's places, the bookshop. 

alison and the other ghosts have long gone, and the sun is just about to sink below the horizon by the time the captain stands himself back up with the traditional knee crack and grunt. he looks at mike and nods, giving him a simple thank you before turning to walk (not run) back to button house, head held slightly higher and looking more relaxed than he’s been all episode. the captain has still got a lot to figure out, but at least it’s a start.

[i love the dramatic ending but the implication is that alison has to go and fetch mike bc he has no ideas cap has left and is prepared to keep going lol- also by no means is cap suddenly going to ditch his characterisation and become a yas kween gay right away, i didn’t go into the aftermath bc this is alreayd fucking LONG but let me know if you want follow up????}

EDIT: i've rbed this with the follow up/part 2 attached!

EDIT 2, much later: switched out mike's reference to his 'younger brother' to a school friend, since the christmas special confirmed mike only has sisters and we're all about accuracy here

[herrashmoo]

secondly, im not a tumblr teen. ive been on this website for god knows how long and ive been well versed in queer history. me calling them a pedophile, after a conversation with them resulted in them refusing to admit sexual imagery is not for children, them calling me a bootlicker and several other names, before getting wildly upset and blocking me, had nothing to do with their sexuality and everything to do with the fact that they couldnt tell me sexual imagery is not a thing for minors to consume period end of story. this is AFTER the fact i had been a bit more educated about pride and had ALREADY agreed where i went wrong. now about the sanitization of pride- thats wrong as well. dont get me wrong. but you cant seriously look me in the face and tell me that sexual imagery is not for minors. like- just that statement alone, right? so how is this such a controversy?

ugh okay I guess I’m gonna write A Thing. I’ll get into a proper response to your final questions but first, let’s do some context work.

first thing to make clear is that I know Jux irl, and I also want to make it pretty clear that they and I have pretty similar opinions here, I’m just slightly more likely to put my anger aside to reply to stuff. Do not get it twisted, rhetoric like the kind you were/are using is like, a big red flag for me, it’s the kind of shit reactionaries have been using for eons and like, were I in a less chill mood, I would’ve also likely written you off as a bootlicker troll. Their response was pretty aggressive but not completely misplaced, so I just want to make it clear that like, as another queer dude who is tired of seeing this shit every fucking May for the better part of a decade, I’m also exhausted and pissed off.

As for my claim of teenagerdom, I apologize if that offended, but you have to understand that, generally speaking, the loudest groups having this conversation on the regular are (1) right-wing reactionaries, TERFs, and their ilk trying to stir shit up (see: Operation Pridefall) and (2) young people who don’t have any context for Pride, often haven’t been, and only really have queer politic and history from tumblr and twitter threads featuring reactionary revisionism from the first group. When I see people engage in this conversation, I generally assume they’re in the latter group, as it helps me try to frame my responses in the best faith I can given how tired I am of this shit.

But that aside, sure. Kink isn’t for children. But provided there’s a parent accompanying this hypothetical child at Pride, their job is to explain and provide context for the things they can, and give a solid “you’ll learn more when you’re older” for the things they can’t. The Village People are all each in different kink gear, and as a kid I was told “they like to dress up, and there’s some costumes specifically for adults,” and I was good. I saw bare titties at festivals, smelled weed at concerts, saw bulge at the beach — these are normal human things that happen in the world, and having a responsible adult nearby to explain or provide context for them made them non-issues for me. I don’t think a kid seeing a pup hood is thinking anything more than “oh cool, that dude is dressed up as a dog.” Kids understand fantasy and make-believe. And especially as they age into their teenage years, withholding or sheltering them from knowledge about sex and sexuality can do real damage — hell, we’ve been having that conversation for over a century at least.

(Spring’s Awakening was first published in 1891 and was deeply censored in productions for the better part of a century, due to the content of the work, which is about how sheltering young teens (both straight and queer) from sexual content (and also mental health resources) leads them to try to figure shit out on their own and make catastrophic decisions that they don’t understand the consequences of until it’s too late. Great play, pretty great musical adaptation, wild that we keep rehashing its points like clockwork over a century after publication.)

But I am also of the opinion that Pride isn’t for children, as, while two decades of assimilationist politic would desperately try to argue otherwise, I am queer because I am sexually attracted to, and have sex with, other men. Pride is a response to the criminalization of queer sex acts, and so it is, in turn, a celebration of queer sex acts. So if someone wants to walk around in chaps and a jock, great! If someone wants to wear their pup gear or a harness or a rope tie or a vest, fuck yeah! It’s a space specially carved out for celebrating the queer experience — the original Pride flag (before it was simplified to make it easier to mass produce for profit, which, again, love seeing our culture made into product) had a pink stripe at the very top, specifically representing sexuality. It is, ostensibly, the thing that defines our community (at least the L G and B parts of it) as an outgroup against the mainstream society.

I think that, if you are uncomfortable with kink displays, or you’re uncomfortable with children seeing kink displays, then Pride is not for you or your children! Don’t go! There’s kid-friendly and sanitized versions of Pride in most major cities, do some research into your local/state Stonewall organizations and you can find more about them. But I’m already sick of having actual cops at Pride, I don’t need people who are uncomfortable with displays of sexuality also policing myself or any other queer person in a space they have spent decades carving out for themselves.

A final note — if you don’t understand why a queer person would blow up and completely write off your bullshit after calling them a pedophile, I urge you to do more reading, more listening. I know that in this brave new world of same-sex marriage equality and PrEP access that it’s hard to remember the collective trauma that the community has experienced, but this shit is inflammatory, you’re straight up spewing fightin’ words. The dude wearing a leather harness at Pride isn’t trying to corrupt any youth or fuck any kids, they’re just trying to live their shit, and I’m sorry that you and so many others have somehow decided that that’s an attack on a demographic of people who aren’t the audience for a celebration of sexuality. We’re not fucking pedophiles, and this “think about the kids” nonsense is some Reagan-era bullshit.

[fandomshatelgbtqpeople]

mod a’s lgbt musicals

Hi there! I’m a big theatre kid so I thought for pride month I’d put together a list of LGBTQ musicals. Despite its association with queer people, musical theatre is not known for its amazing representation. I’ve put together a list here of musicals I know of with queer characters. I’ve tried to avoid those where the queer characters are incredibly minor roles or those where the representation is just not good enough to be salvageable (*side eyes Legally Blonde*) I know there are many musicals I will have missed out but these are the ones I am most aware of. Feel free to add more! So without further ado, here it is.

Fun Home

The big Tony winner of 2015! Based on Alison Bechdel, a butch lesbian cartoonist. At the age of 43, she looks for new material by trying to explore her past and her relationship with her closeted gay dad. Looks back at a version of herself when she was 10 and a “tomboy” and at 19 when she came out and got her first girlfriend. Has very cute lighthearted moments as well as very sad moments. Has a beautiful song where small Alison sees a butch deliverywoman. Problems in that since the original broadway cast, Alison’s costume has got less butch. Content warning for suicide.

Here’s their Tony performance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMAuesRJm1E

The Color Purple

Based on Alice Walker’s novel about black women in the 1930s. Follows Celie who has been abused by men her whole life who discovers she is a lesbian but also makes a journey of self discovery and learns to love herself. Her love interest is a bisexual woman. Won best revival at the Tonys in 2016. Content warning for discussion/implied sexual abuse.

Here’s their Tony performance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3k2xzQyT2bk

Everybody’s Talking About Jamie

A teenage gay boy in Sheffield wants to be a drag queen and go to prom in a dress.Also a nice touch that is does not focus on him having a relationship (since he is sixteen) and him having to come out as he is already out. Focuses on his close relationship with his supportive mother. Has a diverse cast. Jamie is currently played by a black actor and his best friend wears a hijab and has a very diverse ensemble as well. Unfortunately has a part where Jamie responds to a homophobic bully by calling him a bunch of ableist and classist slurs.

Here’s a clip of the most popular song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7C3FuFWDdw

The Prom

Emma is a lesbian teenager in Indiana whose prom is cancelled by the PTA after she requests to bring her girlfriend to it. A group of Broadway actors come down to help her campaign to be allowed to attend prom, as well as styling her, helping her work on her confidence and educating the town’s people. What ensues is basically a two hour musical episode of Queer Eye. Cheesy and fun with so many musical theatre references crammed in. My one issue is that the show is rather harsh on people who are closeted since Emma has conflicted with her girlfriend Alyssa because she is not ready to come out.

Here’s a clip of their Tony performance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGcG_r5xv3E

Rent

Probably the most well known on this list. Artists in New York during the AIDS crisis. Two of the main couples featured are queer: Maureen is bisexual and in a relationship with Joanne who is a lesbian, and Angel is a transgender woman of color in a relationship with Collins, a presumably bisexual man. However, she tends to be played bi cis men and there are instances of her being misgendered by the main characters uncritically. In Rent Live (2019), all instances of her being misgendered were removed and her gender identity was confirmed. She was played in this by Valentina, an nb drag queen and has also been played by Pose’s MJ Rodriguez, a trans woman. Very diverse with Jewish characters and people of colour and in the live show, only 1 of the 8 main characters was white. Has been criticised over the years, mainly for its biphobic portrayal of Maureen who is promiscuous and implied to cheat, but in the 90s did a lot for the LGBTQ community and is more progressive than a lot of media even now.

Here’s a clip of Maureen and Joanne from Rent Live: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06oCfKYYPTY

And here’s some Angel and Collins: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hl-M94o_x8

Falsettos

Marvin comes out as gay in the late 70s but decides to move his ex wife and son in with his boyfriend. Addresses AIDS crisis in Act 2. Has “lesbians from next door” in act 2. F Revived on Broadway in 2016. All of the characters are Jewish. Unfortunately, in revival casts, very few actors tend to be Jewish.

Here’s the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjnAHOdMQVk

Come From Away

In the aftermath of 9/11, 38 planes are diverted to a small town in Canada called Gander. Shows people of different races and nationalities bonding in a scary time. Addresses Islamophobia. Has one song called Prayer where prayers from different religions overlap. Has an interracial gay couple called Kevin and Kevin. They break up in the end but are very important characters. Won best direction of a musical in 2017. The Broadway production starred Jenn Colella who has referred to herself as ‘mostly gay’.

Here’s a clip of Jenn Colella singing a song from the musical: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8ukgH6U-d0

Head Over Heels

Honestly I don’t quite know what this musical is about, even by reading the plot summary and listening to the soundtrack. I know it’s set in a Tudor fantasy world and that there are wlw couples as well as an explicitly non binary character, played by Peppermint, a trans woman, and that there are interracial couples and plus sized actors. It is a jukebox musical using songs by the Go-Gos and yes the wlw anthem that is Heaven is a Place on Earth is one of them. The soundtrack is fantastic even if you can’t follow what is going on.

Here are some show clips: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wx2qQ7QAPm0

Spring Awakening

German school kids in the 19th century discovering their sexuality. Two of the schoolboy supporting characters, Ernst and Hänschen, have a romance when they have a reprise of an earlier song in Act 2.  A BIG content warning as it has graphic discussions of rape and songs about it and a sex scene with very dubious consent. However there was a very wonderful 2016 revival using deaf actors and sign language.

This is another one you can very easily find the full show of on YouTube which I won’t link. However here’s the Tony performance for the revival: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSagsMcak4Q

If/Then

A woman named Elizabeth (originally played by Idina Menzel) moves to New York after a divorce and contemplated how different her life would be if she took two different paths. Four supporting queer characters. Her ex-boyfriend is bisexual and played by Anthony Rapp (who is bisexual in real life) and he gets a boyfriend in one timeline. Another of her friends is a lesbian called Kate who marries her girlfriend in the musical. Problems occur as in both timelines, cheating goes on in the lesbian relationship although they stay together in one. Elizabeth also says she doesn’t believe in bisexuals, a view no one ever challenges her on, however Lucas is very clearly bisexual which is some proof for the audience that she is wrong.

I’m not going to link it here but there are many very high quality bootlegs on it on YouTube if you want to watch,

Ghost Quartet

A bit of a weird one. This is more of a concept album. There are four performers who each play instruments and they tell the stories of many interconnected timelines. It is very hard to explain but there are souls travelling through time who keep being reincarnated as different people with different relationships to each other which usually end with one woman killing the other. In the song Soldier & Rose, the ghosts Rose and Pearl are lovers as Rose seduces the soldier for her honey.  In the song Four Friends, for one chorus the men sing “I like to put my hand on a pretty girls’s knee” and the women sing “pretty boy’s knee” and then they switch for the next chorus so they’re all bisexual. In general, a lot of fun if you like weird musicals and I mean really weird.

The full show is online: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJSaEJm8pCE

Mean Girls

Yes there’s a musical of it. I was not looking forward to it when it was announced but have actually grown to quite like it. It’s hardly lyrical genius but the songs are fun and a lot of the problematic aspects of the film have been fixed. Damian is more explicitly gay in the musical and sings about an ex boyfriend in one song. Janis is heavily implied to be a lesbian (confirmed by actress offstage) and she doesn’t end up with Kevin Gnapoor. She is played by a queer actress in the tour cast. Both queer characters are much bigger roles than in the movie and get several songs each. I’d consider the musical to be quite white feminist but it does address issues such as the sexualisation of teenage girls and the notion that to be ‘sexy’ is ‘empowering’.

Here’s a clip of one of Damian’s songs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-zM6QKkxEQ

& Juliet

An English jukebox musical about what might have happened to Juliet in Romeo and Juliet if she had not died at the end. I haven’t seen it but I’ve listened to the soundtrack and it is mainly comprised of 21st century songs by women. One of Juliet’s best friends is non binary although is played by a cis man as far as we know. Also I went to the same school as one of the actors which is a bonus for me. Very diverse cast.

Here’s a trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dm2k9nS3o20

In Transit

A capella musical about several people’s adventures on New York public transport. Two of the main characters in this ensemble cast are an interracial gay couple where both are pocs. They are engaged but one of them is having trouble coming out to his mother. I found it refreshing in that his fiance for the most part was not upset with him at his struggles in coming out and they were both able to live fulfilling lives despite this. I am always astonished by the talent of a cappella singers.

Here’s a trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhvik6qoass  Another one where the bootleg can be found very easily on YouTube

Firebringer

Remember A Very Potter Musical? Well, the company that did that are still putting out new pieces of theatre on their YouTube channel. In 2016, they put out their ridiculous comedy musical Firebringer, about a group of bisexual cavewomen. I won’t spoil the ending but trust me, it’s great. You may know it from the viral clip of one of the main characters singing ‘I don’t really wanna do the work today.’

You can watch the full musical here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmVuNlu0LCk

Special Mentions

Company

Musical by Stephen Sondheim about a man unable to commit to a relationship, surrounded by his friends who are all in couples. However, the award-winning 2018 West End revival chose to change the genders of some of the characters. The main character Robert became ‘Bobbie’ (although all of her love interests were gender-swapped as well). One of the originally M/F couples became an M/M couple. It opened on Broadway for about a week before the Covid outbreak so that will be one to look out for.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtDK03y4gT0

In the Heights

A musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda about the Latin American community living in Washington Heights in New York. The original theatre production has no explicitly queer characters. However, in the upcoming movie version (that was meant to be released this summer but has been pushed back to next summer) it has been confirmed that the characters of Daniela and Carla (Daphne Rubin-Vega and Stephanie Beatriz) will be explicitly a couple.

I absolutely love this musical and the trailer for the movie looks beautiful check it out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0CL-ZSuCrQ

[queerchoicesblog]

Writing Update

Hi lovelies,

not sure how many of you are still interested but here's another writing update. *ta-da!*

I just wanted to let you know I will complete the miniseries set in Sixties and take a break afterward: I have a few ideas but I'm impossibly slow at writing now so I will start adding new miniseries once I have them ready or almost ready instead of posting them in progress.

So they will probably be back in October while next month I'll try to post the last chapters of the Zetta x Adele Series (hopefully) followed by an Epilogue, pretty much what I think may happen after the end of the story.

A little preview of the new ideas for the new wlw miniseries for Time After Time.

First of all, surprisingly I used to listen to the opera when I was younger. Sometimes at theatre with student discount tickets, more frequently buying CDs. I've recently watched online a theatre adaptation of Amadeus, Milos Forman biopic about Mozart and his well known rivalry with the Italian composer Salieri. Long story short, I'm back to the opera! And that lead me to an interesting -and queer- (re)discovery.

I don't know if you've heard of the Wedding of Figaro, a comic opera written by Mozart towards the end of the 18th century. And that happens to have a travesti role 👀

A “travesti” (literally meaning pants) role, is an operatic part written with the intention of a woman singing as a male character. These parts are often written for mezzo-sopranos (literally, middle-soprano). Mezzo-soprano voices are slightly lower that that of a soprano, but higher than that of a contralto. These characters are often young, romantic boys, or comedic men. An actress who plays a trouser role needs slim legs and a pretty face to attain the appropriate gender identity of the role.

The character in question is Cherubino (Cherubin), a young page described as "a little Adonis" that is experiencing the awakening of love, and seems to fall in love with every woman in sight, though never the right one. Let's have a look at him:

In this aria, he sings his being a love bewilderment's victim: check the subtitles for the whole text.

Now while calling Cherubino (or any other travesty character) a lesbian character would mean going a bit too far, there is an undeniable homoerotic undercurrent between him, so similar to a woman, and the other female characters who seem to have a liking for him.

That is to say...that one MC of an upcoming series set in late 18th century Vienna will be an opera singer cast for this role 🏳️‍🌈

Taking inspiration from another series I've watched over the past few weeks, I get this idea for another "geo & time located" series: what about turn of the century/Belle Epoque Paris? Can you hear the maddening rhythm of the Can Can? Well, we know all about how can can female dancers have been muses of painters and - still are- objects of desire of men through history. What if we drop that narrative and one if them chooses a woman instead?

Stay tuned,

Thank you for your support so far!

E.

[hereisisa]

I’ve reading a lot about queer coding lately and I’ve found this beatiful dissertation written by Leila Matte-Kaci:

“Thawing the snow queer: queer readings of Frozen’s Elsa”

It’s obviosly about Elsa of Frozen and queer coding.

You can read it there, (and trust me it’s worth reading), but if you don’t have time I’ve made a recap of the strictly-Elsa facts here. All credit goes to Leila Matte-Kaci.

First things first. What is the “queer reading”?

Queer reading: “a way of understanding a text without heteronormative assumptions”.

The queer reading of Frozen will tell us Queen Elsa is a lesbian, and here’s why.

1. She’s a Monster 2. She’s a Femme 3. She’s victim of queer melancholy (longing for acceptance) 4. Her “coming out” story 5. Her looks and sexual awakening 6. Anna.

Now let’s analyze every statement.

Elsa is a monster

 She is a witch.

More specifically, she is understood to be a witch as the dialogue makes clear: “Sorcery!” - “a wicked sorceress”. In being named so, Elsa “is therefore connected to centuries-long Western cultural associations between witchcraft and lesbianism” (Doty, 2000, p.59).

Consequently, the witch having been especially associated with the image of the lesbian, Elsa’s link to the character type further reinforces the connection between her monstrosity and queerness.

Like the monster, Elsa’s powers are also understood to be dangerous and wrong, and something which she must keep hidden.

The lyrics “Conceal, don’t feel, put on a show, - Make one wrong move and everyone will know” express what Elsa has learned to do from her father.

From childhood,  she was taught to fear and hate herself by her parents who believed her to be a danger to their family and their kingdom. Therefore, Elsa is taught that what makes her different (her powers/monstrosity) must be regarded as a shameful secret, in the same way that queer desires have often been viewed.

She stands against the heterosexual marriage.

The reveal of her powers happens just as Elsa refuses to give her blessing to her sister’s marriage.

Anna falls in love with Prince Hans, the two quickly decide that they want to marry. Elsa, presumably the legal guardian of her younger sister as they are both orphans, disapproves of the match and refuses to give her blessing. In the ensuing fight between Anna and Elsa, the latter’s magical powers are revealed. Elsa’s opposition to Anna’s romance with her prince exposes her “villainy” to the world and leads to everyone labeling her a monster. Just like the monster and the traditional fairytale villain, by standing against the heterosexual marriage of the heroes, Elsa opposes the heteronormative order and becomes dangerous.

Her desire to keep her sister from becoming the possession of the stereotypical hero shows her to be a witch. Therefore, the narrative links Elsa’s monstrosity (her powers) with an opposition to the heteronormative order, further reinforcing the connection between Elsa’s witch-like powers and queerness.  

If this was not made clear enough, the film continues to drive home that point as Elsa tries to escape the walls of her castle. Coming face to face with groups of parents with their children (the nuclear family, a symbol of the heteronormative order), she finds that they all recoil from her when faced with her powers.

The nuclear family here sees her as a threat and is frightened by her monstrosity. Therefore, Elsa not only threatens heterosexual romances (Hans and Anna), she threatens the existence of the “traditional family.” Elsa is perceived as a threat to the heteronormative order as she stands in the way of heterosexuality and the nuclear family.

Much like the monstrous queer, Elsa is terrifying to these parents and their children because her powers (her queerness) are a direct threat to their existence.

Frozen therefore, like many other monster films, associates the supernatural with queerness in a way that could be very problematic as it reinforces the idea that heterosexuality is “normal,” while queerness is “abnormal,” even monstrous.

However, the movie does in some way lead its viewers to question this divide. Elsa is labelled a monster by the other characters, but she appears sympathetic to the viewers. She is the one with which we are meant to empathise, and at the end of the story, we are meant to rejoice in her self-acceptance.

In other words, Elsa does appear to us to be different but not monstrous. Instead, many of the so-called “normal” characters, the very same ones who have labelled her a threat, are the ones who take on a monstrous guise. Their hatred and bigotry render them awful and terrifying.

She’s a “Femme”

In the first lesbian movies or movies with lesbians characters they were coded as butch or femme. I’m not gonna waste time explaining what’s a butch and what’s a femme assuming you all know, but the “lesbian femme in movies” were sexy lesbian vampires.

The lesbian vampire who is described by cultural historian and film maker Andrea Weiss (1993) as follows: “she has long hair, large breasts, pale white skin, and wears floor length, translucent dresses”

Does this ring a bell?

As she accepts her powers, Elsa’s appearance changes; she lets down her long hair, her dress becomes translucent ice, and more of her white skin is displayed, especially her neck and upper torso. So, while her sexuality does not become as predatory as that of the lesbian vampire, her clingy dress, exposed skin, and the more sensual way she has of moving certainly appear to link Elsa’s ice powers with her sexuality and femininity. Just like the lesbian vampire, Elsa is coded as a sexual feminine woman, and this coding is associated with people’s fear of her supernatural powers.

When empowered, Elsa’s appearance becomes softer and girlish.

Moreover, Elsa has the capacity to create life out of snow and ice, giving life to both the snowman Olaf and a violent bodyguard nicknamed “Marshmallow.”

It is interesting to note that while she created a snowman as a child, that one remained inanimate. Her lifegiving powers only seem to manifest themselves after she reaches maturity; linking her birth-giving magic to puberty. Her powers then include giving birth, but they do not require a heterosexual coupling.

However, her powers are also that of creating an eternal winter. She spreads snow and ice everywhere.

Interestingly, the knights who come to defeat her do not do so armed with fire, which one might expect given that they are fighting an ice wielding witch; instead, they come armed with small arrows, swords, and spears, battling one phallic symbol with another.

The scene then seems to indicate that the knights are fighting to reassert their masculinity over Elsa, battling their small arrows against her large icicles. In fact, this image of her danger to men’s masculinity is given more attention when Olaf, while discussing Elsa, inadvertently walks into an icicle and remarks casually “Yes, I bet she’s the nicest, gentlest, warmest person ever. Oh, look at that… I’ve been impaled”.

However, in this scene, the icicles never threaten Anna. They never touch her, only the male characters are threatened by them. These phallic symbols clearly only challenge the masculinity of the male characters, Elsa opposes images of soft femininity and violent penetration, making her a threat to masculinity even if that threat is mostly a by-product of male fear.

The vampire’s love.

Anna is twice relegated to the role of damsel-in-distress. It can be seen first at the beginning of the film, when her sister accidentally hits her on the head with her ice power, and again at the end of the movie, when Elsa again inadvertently hits her (seemingly fatally). We’ll obviously find out later how badass Anna is. 😉

With Elsa and Anna Frozen is offering us something closer to the relationship between the lesbian vampire and her lover/victim than to the traditional fairy tale; a supernatural and feminine creature who loves the naïve heroine yet cannot help but hurt her as is her nature.

The narrative of the lesbian vampire film centers on the villain and the hero’s desire to possess the heroine as they both fight for ownership of her. Comparatively, Elsa and Hans do not fight over the possession of  Anna (Elsa does not hold romantic feelings for her sibling); however, as previously  stated, Elsa’s powers are revealed to the world because of a fight she has with Anna over  the latter’s decision to marry Prince Hans.

It is then her opposition to  the traditional heterosexual fairy tale marriage which starts the initial conflict. Just like the lesbian vampire, Elsa is keeping Anna from the masculine hero, albeit not by kidnapping her, but by standing in the way of her marriage.

Elsa is doubly dangerous.

She is a danger because she is a supernatural creature and because she opposes the heteronormative order.

Here comes the twist tho. Hans is the villain and Elsa’s choice to oppose the match is no longer the sign of her monstrosity but the wise decision of a loving sibling. Standing in the way of a heterosexual romance becomes morally coded as good, while Hans’ rescue of Anna becomes bad. The story of the queer woman being vanquished (the lesbian vampire of the movies) by the heterosexual man is reversed from the story of  the triumph of heteronormativity to one of triumph over heteronormativity.

The Queer Melancholy

“The queer melancholy (longing  for acceptance)” and feminist trauma (narrative centered around the fear/danger of girl  empowerment) that Brave’s Merida, Maleficent’s heroine of the same name, and Frozen’s Elsa all share.

The “coming out” story

Love Is an Open Door: Closet Metaphors in Frozen

Images of doors are more important to the film’s visual motif.

The story of Elsa is the story of a young woman kept hidden behind a door. The film is littered with images of open and closed doors. Moreover, the text keeps on pointing to their opening or closing as meaningful events. Clearly, doors and their opening or closing are central to the narrative.

This motif is especially  interesting when we look at how it resembles a familiar metaphor for one important queer experience, that of “coming-out” of the closet. 

Come Out the Door: Elsa’s Opening of the Closet Gates

As the king explains, off camera, his plan to isolate his daughter, we are treated to a visual sequence of the castle servants closing the gates, doors, and windows of the palace, before seeing Elsa walk to her room and close her door on Anna. The shadows around the door of her room then look something like the bars of a prison.

This is the first use of the imagery which will come to dominate Elsa’s storyline. This divide between closed/opened, in/out, silence/speech, secrecy/disclosure, alone/together, and private/public will make its way throughout the narrative. These divides are themselves part of the “coming-out” story, which serves to make Elsa’s tale very much queer. 

Elsa is forced to hide. Moreover, as she grows, she is taught that what makes her different is wrong, something she must learn to hide: “Conceal it, don’t feel it, don’t let it show”

But the older she gets, the harder it becomes for her to hide, and as puberty approaches, Elsa’s powers only become stronger.

The film reinforces this idea both through the text (“It’s getting  stronger”) and through its images. Elsa becomes increasingly enclosed as she grows. Her limited access to the outside world is a window, which she cannot touch without covering it in ice. As she approaches puberty, she can no longer  touch people without fear of hurting them. Finally, by the time she is a teenager and grieving her parents, Elsa is shown huddled in a ball, surrounded by a cold blue light, snowflakes floating in the air.

Her body has here become its own prison.

The anxiety about concealing this part of the self might be coupled with feelings of loneliness as one cannot share or reveal  oneself with anyone. Indeed, this may sound familiar to many queer youths who often  report feelings of isolation. Moreover, these people are at an increase risk of depression and suicide compared to non-queer.

Remember “Monster” where Elsa is contemplating suicide?

But let’s back to the doors.

Imagery of doors continues as we learn that on the day of the Elsa’s coronation, the gates of the castle will be opened, an event that we are to understand is exceptional.

“For the First Time in Forever”

Anna links the opening of the gates with romance. Anna is bathed in light, singing from an open window and later from outside the castle.

Meanwhile, Elsa sings about the importance of keeping herself hidden: “Conceal, don’t feel, put on a show,/ Make one wrong move and everyone will know”.

The animation shows her alone in her room. We first see her through the wooden frames of her closed window. The image looks almost like Elsa is singing from behind the bars of a prison. Through most of the musical number, Elsa remains in the shadows.

The opening of the gates heightens the likelihood that Elsa’s secret will be exposed, a fact that makes her terribly nervous. The opening of gates therefore signifies that Elsa is making herself vulnerable to the world; it is linked with the opening of herself. The opening of the gates then takes on a sexual meaning, overtly with Anna who hopes for romance and covertly for Elsa who dreads discovery. The gates signify that both sisters have reached sexual maturity. Anna is excited at the prospect of finding a partner, while Elsa is afraid that her body will betray her and disclose the truth of her sexuality.

One sister is out, while the other is closeted.  

 “Love is an Open Door”

For love and sexuality to flourish, one must open  oneself up to others. The song thus continues to link sexuality and romance to the door  imagery. To keep one’s door closed is to hold back on love. If we apply this idea to Elsa,  it becomes clear what this song would mean for her character. Her magical powers are nothing but a metaphor for her love. Elsa’s love and sexuality are being figuratively held prisoner behind the gates which she always keeps close. If love is an open door, then by keeping her door closed, Elsa is hiding what makes her different, her queer love. 

As the ball continues, Elsa is already thinking of retreating. In fact, once her sister’s announcement of her engagement comes to threaten her peace, Elsa announces her plan to stop the ball and close the gates once more. Like the closet door, the gates offer her a measure of protection, a way to hide herself from a world who would vilify her for being born different

The door imagery once again comes into play, and a terrified Elsa runs, opening a succession of doors to find herself face to face with her people, represented by parents and their children, one symbol for the heteronormative order. As they discover her magical powers, they turn away from her in fear.

The figurative closet door was opened, and what she feared would happen has happened. She has been rejected, and she has been seen as a monster.

Her fears being realised has a liberating effect on her. She has nothing left to lose. She has faced her people’s fear and revulsion and come out alright. This realisation leads to her singing the now famous song “Let It Go”, a song which also has been adopted as a gay anthem.

Elsa expresses her feelings as she abandons all pretenses and embraces who she is, taking pleasure in discovering her own powers and swearing off approval in lieu of self-love. She expresses her newfound freedom in these terms: “Turn away and slam the door!”

Elsa is figuratively opening a door and  slamming it behind her; keeping others out even if she roams free. The song ends on another door image as Elsa announces to the world, “Here I stand in the light of day. Let the storm rage on! The cold never bothered me anyway”.

Mixed with the lyrics of her song, this imagery evokes the well-known queer saying, “I’m here, I am queer, get used to it.”

Here she is in the light of day, telling Arendelle that she is different and that they best get used to it. This is Elsa’s “coming out”.

From then on, Elsa holds an ambivalent relationship with doors as soon as Anna knocks on the doors to Elsa’s ice castle, they open, indicating  that she is welcomed, that Elsa is no longer hiding. When captured and locked away  again, Elsa blasts open her prison cell, bringing down its very walls. This all shows that Elsa no longer wants to be confined or to seek the approval and acceptance of others.

“I belong here, alone, where I can be who I am without hurting anybody”

This only changes once Anna sacrifices herself for her. This solitary act of complete love and acceptance is the one that finally breaks down Elsa’s defenses. Elsa realises that she must learn to freely love and accept love in return: “Love, of course”.

It is the only thing that will allow her to control her powers. This is the turning point which allows her not only to love herself, but to share herself with others as symbolised by the last opening of the gate.

Elsa loves herself and is loved for  herself. She informs her sister that the gates will never be closed again as we see her  skating on the ice rink she created for the citizens of Arendelle within her castle grounds.

The gates are shown to be wide open. Her difference becomes celebrated rather than feared by her people and her family as the story draws to a close. 

This “coming-out” metaphor is made more obvious by the change in Elsa’s appearance before and after her powers are revealed. Indeed, after escaping Arendelle, Elsa celebrates by changing her looks, trading her conservative dress for a more sensual and feminine one.  

Looks and sexual awakening

In the beginning of the movie the colours she chooses to wear are dark and sombre.

Almost no hint of skin other than her face is revealed, every inch of herself is covered. She walks with her back straight, her head held high, keeping her arms close to herself.

She does not smile and talks very little. She keeps her emotion inside, always under tight control. She seems tense, rigid, and cold, attributes which are not stereotypically feminine.

While Elsa dresses in a way that reflects a feminine performance of gender, she also has some masculine attributes. Her tight rein on her emotions, her preference for dark colours, and her rigid movements are expected ways of expressing a preference for a masculine gender role. Similarly, her taciturn behaviour and the way she covers every inch of her body are less expected of a woman. It can then be argued that at her coronation, Elsa mixes feminine and masculine gender expressions.

However, much of this undergoes change after she reveals her powers. Once Elsa escapes Arendelle and breaks into song, Elsa transforms herself as if she is shedding her skin. Her dark dress becomes a sparkling pastel blue gown. While before her skin was covered, suddenly she reveals her neck and décolletage. A slit in her dress exposes one of her legs. Elsa also lets down her hair, letting it fall in a braid on her shoulders. Her movements become less rigid – her hips undulate as she walks on high heels, and she opens her arms wide as if embracing the world.

Elsa becomes livelier;  she runs, jumps, shouts, and smiles. Although ice surrounds her, she looks warmer, more attainable. Her new frock, which allows a lot more of her skin to be seen, combined with her more sensual way of moving give her a more sexual appearance. This seems to link Elsa’s powers with a sexual awakening. Her sex appeal is here on full display as if she has been keeping a tight rein not only on her emotions, but on her sexuality as well.

Elsa’s femininity is exaggerated in a way Anna’s is not.

Elsa’s exaggerated femininity from this point on marks her as a Femme.

Elsa is a powerful woman who exists outside of the spheres  of male powers. She is a Queen without a King. Her very lack of romantic interest in the  film makes her difficult to attach to the heteronormative order. She is the most powerful woman in the land both because of her magic but also because of her political title. Elsa is, however, a problem to many.

 She is stronger than a hundred men and cannot be controlled. Moreover, Anna’s fiancé questions Anna’s desire to see her sister, believing it is unsafe for her to see Elsa, and a visiting Duke looks at Anna with suspicion. Her blood relation to Elsa makes her as a possible threat, something Anna is quick to disavow. After all, if Elsa could hide her “deviance,” who is to say that the same is not true of her sister: “Are you a monster too? Is there sorcery in you too?”. The closeness of the women’s ties is then perceived by the male characters as  either suspicious or dangerous to Anna, the powerless and, therefore, pure and good woman.

  Anna

Still, Elsa’s lesbianism is not solely focused on her powers and independence but also on her bond to her sister, Anna. The importance of this relationship to her character also adds to her queerness. Elsa does, indeed, make her relationship with another woman central to herself. 

The importance given to their sisterly love, which overshadows their love for their respective princes, gives a queer feel to the tale. By implying that the love shared between women can be more important than a heterosexual romance, the tale is opening the door to queer possibilities. Allowing the possibilities that two sisters may love each other as deeply as any heterosexual couples also allows the possibilities that two women who are not related may love each other just as much. 

First, Anna, Olaf, and Kristoff believe that Hans’ love will save Anna, and later, they believe much the same thing concerning Kristoff’s love for Anna, but, in the end, their assumptions are proven wrong.

Elsa is instead shown to be Anna’s true love, in a complete reversal of heteronormative expectations.

Their love can break a curse. While I do not want to imply that Anna and Elsa’s relationship is in any way romantic, I do believe that their story brings out the possibility of a queer romance. Their love is an open door which challenges heteronormative assumptions about the importance of female love and relationships.

[antoine-roquentin]

The Victorian era is infamous, rightly or wrongly, for its repression of sexuality. But its temporal and philosophical heir definitely did repress the possibility of the homoromantic relationships between women and between men that had been normal, if not the norm, for centuries and centuries. This process was rooted in one of society's most fundamental adopted divisions, gender, so you can imagine that there are a whole lot of factors implicated in the shift that are all tangled around each other and mutually reinforcing. Some of the key ones include: industrialization and urbanization, women's colleges, class concerns, a crisis in masculinity (masculinity is always in crisis), and most importantly, the invention of "sexology" as a field of science at a time that science played a central role in cataloguing and normatively ordering society.

Anthony Rotundo, primarily studying men, argues that "romantic friendships" in America start to become visible in the Revolutionary War era and flourish in the mid-19th century. The 18th century is kind of a black hole for me so I'll take his word for when the concept of romantic friendships was jump-started, but it was by no means new. In the Middle Ages, Christians and Muslims alike wrote poetry and composed letters depicting homoromantic and even homoerotic relationships. I'm going back this far not for the heck of it, but because medieval society helps clarify key qualities of male and female "romantic friendships" that contributed to their eventual demise: a societal value on men expressing emotion (knightly tears; religious devotions) and the very, very limited possibilities for unmarried women to rise above the poorest classes. Romantic friendships did not threaten men's sense of themselves as men, patriarchal control of women, or marriage.

Socio-economic changes in the late 19th and early 20th centuries knocked all of that askew.

The 1870s-1920s saw a massive influx of young women and men into U.S. cities. On one hand, this was an age-old process that, for centuries, was basically the season cities could exist (they were population sinks--on their own, city residents could not reproduce enough to replace themselves given mortality rates). On the other, the type of work they found and the pathways for success in that work were much more recent. The old system of apprenticeships and family connections for men, and almost exclusively domestic servant work for women, absolutely persisted but were swamped by the numbers of factory workers and non-domestic service workers. To support the population boom, cities constructed residential hotels/dormitories/apartments that were often designated single-sex.

That situation made both male and female romantic friendships a threat to the gendered prescriptions of society. For men, it diminished the utility of romantic friendships as potential economic and social connections, meaning they wouldn't be stepping stones towards supporting their eventual family. For women, it opened a much more achievable possibility of financial stability outside marriage.

The blossoming of women's colleges at this time made that problem even clearer to the sexuality reformers and sexologists we'll meet in a little--because "these women" were most assuredly middle and upper-middle class. In short: the ideal marriage partners for men...in an environment where romantic friendships could permit them both prestigious social roles (scholars, administrators, politicians, professional artists, etc) and economic success without men. This was true, even long-term, for both students and teachers. About 10% of American women at the end of the 19th century never married; the figure was around 50% for graduates of women's colleges. So when men observed, as in this letter to the Yale student newspaper:

There is a term in general use at Vassar, truly calculated to awaken within the ima penetralia of our souls all that love for the noble and the aesthetic of which our natures are capable, The term in question is "smashing."

When a Vassar girl takes a shine to another, she straightway enters upon a regular course of bouquet sendings, interspersed with tinted notes, mysterious packages of ‘Ridley’s Mixed Candies,’ locks of hair perhaps, and many other tender tokens, until at last the object of her attentions is captured, the two women become inseparable, and the aggressor is considered by her circle of acquaintances as "smashed."

they might not have seen sexual competition, but the possibility of a lifestyle threat was lurking.

Men's romantic friendships were also under fire with respect to their emotionality. The gradual militarization of western culture over the 19th century (think the Salvation Army or the military trappings of the Boy Scouts) drove/was driven by a narrowing definition of masculinity on "muscles"--vigor, strength, athleticism, the Teddy Roosevelt stereotype. Whereas emotions had once been the healthy counterpart, gradually the internal dimensions of character and a value on openness and gentleness became a liability. (Marriage was still okay, because the idealized marriage was the husband/father rising up to 'be a man' and take care of his family).

Steeped in all these burgeoning developments and their implications came the sexologists, with an agenda not just to categorize society but to evangelize their "discoveries."

A lot of us are at least in passing familiar with the "homosexuality didn't exist as 'homosexuality', an identity, before 1900" trope. This can be taken too far (and often is), but it is nevertheless true that the later decades of the 19th century and early 20th century saw professional, middle-class scientists coalescing ideas of same-sex sexual relations according to Science rather than morality. Instead of a wrong step by step choice, it was an abnormal physical, inherited trait.

This idea got mixed up in Progressive Era utopian visions of societal improvement that, among other things, tagged "deviants" and lower-class people as hindering forward progress--just as same-sex sex, now identified with the people who practiced it, prevented heterosexual, reproductive sex.

And scientists like Bernard Talmey exhibited one of my favorite characteristics of historical men writing about women: in his 1904 book on, well, women, he announced his deep concern that the American public "does not even surmise of the existence" of sex between women. It was a scientific version of what I see in my medieval (male) clerics skating gingerly around actually mentioning lesbian activity because they don't want to put the idea in women's minds.

But this view of American sexologists, lagging somewhat behind their European counterparts, was crucial to the decline of romantic friendships among men and women. First, because it started off with a condemnation of these friendships that took away from social order regardless of whether there was sexual activity involved.

Second, because of the label first stacked onto the participants: inverts. That is, the inversion of proper sex/sexual order. Here we meet up with the rise of muscular masculinity against emotionality and gentleness, as well women's political activity and independent economic power against the norm of a separate women's/domestic sphere.

And so romantic friendships, instead of a natural part of growing up for men and women, became an aberration--not in the sense of "rare", but in the sense of "wrong."

...Unbeknownst to the sexologists, however, their codification of language and an identity for homosexual men and women gave people who did experience same-sex attraction a mutual self-understanding--a certain legitimacy. It's seen as the beginning of an LGBTQ+ movement (if not yet a civil rights one). So there is a lot to mourn about the loss of romantic friendships and what it signified. But this is one story about the past that also has a future.

Further Reading:

This is actually a topic where there are some books that hit the triumvirate of happiness: generally good historically, interesting to read, and affordable on Amazon. I'd recommend:

Michael Bronski, A Queer History of the United States

Lillian Faderman, Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers: A History of Lesbian Life in 20th Century America (this is older, now, and I have some problems with how it handles race and class, but it's well grounded in its sources, and both educational and entertaining)

Scott Herring, Queering the Underworld: Slumming, Literature, and the Undoing of Gay and Lesbian History

So that's where I'd start. :)

[rupaulvisage-blog]

(The artwork above is not mine, it is an edited version of another artist)

Ok so Fauxteen (fauxteen.tumblr.com / instagram.com/fauxteen) and his Drag Race/Steven Universe crossover got me feeling all sorts of ways. Go check out his other work and support it because it’s all incredible!

I’ve always loved the idea of having a RuPaul’s Drag Race superhero crossover team ala Justice League, X Men, Sailor Moon etc. and his Steven Universe crossover is the best thing I’ve seen that comes close to that. (Other than Fire Crotch and Melanina henny.) So I decided to come up with a concept for a Drag Race super hero team, and use his artwork as a concept piece.        

For the design of the team, I wanted the queens to be unified with a similar texture but each have their own signature color and aesthetic. I took the standard colors of the rainbow (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple & pink) and added a few others (turquoise, brown, black & white) to round the number to 11.

Each Queens Assigned Color:

Bebe - Brown If you google image search Bebe, or go to her website, she is always wearing brown and is always in some sort of animal print, and these two go great together. Her iconic Cameroon look was cleary the inspiration for her outfit in the piece. The color brown also has a great animalistic quality to it which goes hand in hand with her brand. (The outfit seems to be inspired by her Cameroon look)

Tyra - White When I think of Tyra, I think of her in her iconic wedding dress which initially had me place her with white. What I love is that white represents light, hope and purity amongst many things, which is why it’s the color worn by brides and angels. It’s ironic to put Tyra in white, almost in the same way she calls herself “America’s Sweetheart.” It gives me life thinking of her in a pristine angelic outfit knowing the attitude she has. <3 #jump #twice (The outfit seems to be based on her Season 2 promo picture, but as well, the wedding dress which had the same shape)

Raja - Blue Not necessarily inspired by a look, but when I think of Season 3, I always think of the color blue because of the promo trailers for the season. I’ve naturally associated that with Raja, and the color fits her very well. It’s sleek, cool and royal which matches Raja’s qualities. When it’s right, it’s right. (The outfit seems to be based on her entrance look, wearing the cyclops hat)

Sharon - Green Green’s hard to pull off and Sharon can pull off anything. I’m instantly reminded of her pride boat look, as well as her crowning look when she wore green. It’s also the color associated with witches which fits her brand very well. (The outfit seems to be a combination of her Season 4 promo look, as well as her crowning look)

Chad - Pink Chad’s the closest a winner has come to being a Barbie girl. She was often critiqued for being too perfect, too pretty, and too polished. Pink goes well with Chad’s princess aesthetic, being a showgirl, and having the bubbly personality she does. (Her outfit seems to be inspired by her AS1 promo look, as well as yellow bang cut wig she wore in Season 4)

Jinkx - Orange I always think of orange with Jinkx mostly because of her hair. Many outfits come to mind as well including her Season 5 crowning look, and her Season 8 reunion look. Something about the warmth of orange and the cookiness of it matches Jinkx and her broadway aesthetic very well. (Her outfit seems to be inspired by her Episode 1 Hollywood look)

Bianca - Black Bianca is one that could’ve been many colors, such as red or purple, but I decided to go with black. She is known for claiming she has a black heart, as her forte is reading people and throwing shade. She is known for being “evil,” and the color black is associated with darkness. However similar to Tyra, having Bianca in black is ironic for we know that she actually has one of the biggest hearts. It’s fun seeing her look so evil when you know she’s the opposite. (Her outfit seems to be inspired by her Season 7 reunion look, and her wig from the Season 6 black & white runway)

Violet - Purple Need I say more? Her name and essence matches the color perfectly! The femininity of pink but so much edgier.(Her outfit seems to be inspired be her Death Becomes Her look)

Bob - Yellow From Bob’s logo, to her crowning look, to many of her photoshoots, Bob always seems to wear yellow and the color seems to match her very well, more so than any other winner. It’s very bright and sunny, and since Bob is all about making people laugh and stealing the show, she really is always the brightest one in the room. (Her outfit seems to be inspired by her Book Ball look)

Alaska - Turquoise Alaska’s like Sleeping Beauty, she’s either very blue or pink to me. For this design, I decided to go for a turquoise color. This matches her new association with snakes very well. It also fits with the original concept behind Alaska, in which her character is an alien from the planet Glamtron. Not to mention the color turquoise is very arctic (as in the state of Alaska which I often forget to associate with her.) She was probably the most versatile to pick a color, but I think turquoise is a right choice. (Her outfit seems to be inspired by her AS2 promo look, and her wig being classic Alaska)

Sasha - Red The bitch is always in red, and so many of her outfits have splashes of red to them. As well, after her performance to So Emotional with the rose petals, the color red fits her even better now. (Her outfit seems to be inspired by her entrance look which no tea, no shade has the same silhouette of many other outfits of hers. The wig is obviously from So Emotional)

For their actual powers, I only began to brainstorm but wasn’t having that much luck. Maybe Bebe can turn into a jungle cat, and Jinkx can put people to sleep with her singing (Hey Jigglypuff! I just saw Jigglypuff girl!) or maybe she can control the weather (“monsoon”). If you have any ideas let me know!

Also I’d love to here your ideas on a backstory, why they all fight together and how they got their powers, as well as what Ru’s position is in all of this.

I tried to think of one and came up with a rough draft below that needs a lot of work.

I’d love to see other ideas or concepts behind something like this.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

BACKSTORY:

Long ago… before time as we know it… the world was made up entirely of the Gods. We know the famous ones, there was Zeus the king and god of thunder, Aphrodite the goddess of love and beauty, Poseidon the god of the sea, Ares the god of war, Hades the god of the underworld and so on and so on. But there was one god that seemed to escape the history books, and that god was known as… RuPaul! She was the god/goddess of one of the most powerful forces in the universe… queerness! (YAS GAWD!) She spread her eternal message of loving thine self before loving someone else and was easily the most fabulous god and one of the most powerful. Everybody loved her and looked to her for direction in the most troubling of times. Ru was in fact the god who invented colour and the rainbow itself. Many of the Gods had items that sourced their powers; Zeus had his lightning bolts, Poseidon had his trident, etc. RuPaul however carried the source of her powers upon her head in a luxurious crown. The crown was bejewelled with several gemstones along the surface, each gemstone a different color with a different power and meaning behind it. There are many stories from the ancient days about the goddess RuPaul, but those are for another time.

As the world began to evolve more and more throughout time, the gods naturally faded away and became one with the world…

When the world was in it’s 20th century, it was not in a progressive era that it should’ve been and was in need of some saving. In early 1960, a woman by the name of Ernestine became pregnant with a child. One day, a strange physic woman came to her and told her that her child was the incarnation of a legendary god, and that she was to name the child RuPaul. By the end of the year, Ernestine gave birth to the child, and as instructed, named him RuPaul. Ru began to grow up in the world without knowing who he truly was.

Then one day as he walking home, a young Ru walked past an old antique shop he had never seen before, and decided to go inside. The shop was filled with many wondrous things, and no one was in there except a mysterious woman who seemed to own the shop. Ru took a look around, and eventually came across a dazzling crown with various coloured jewels along the surface. It was like something out of a dream and he just had to have it! So Ru took the crown to the the front of the store and began to search his pockets for some money. The woman behind the counter just smiled at him and said “take this one on me.” Ru was so grateful, and just before he left the woman asked him for one more thing. She said she had one too many records in the store and asked him to take one off of her hands. She then gave him his very first record, a record containing the music of Diana Ross. With much appreciation for the gifts from the stranger, Ru left the store. That night at home, Ru was dancing around his room wearing the crown he got earlier, and truly feeling his fantasy. He decided to then play his new Diana Ross record. The music began, and as soon as she started singing, Ru’s crown lit up and all the powers within Ru were awakened. As time went on, Ru slowly began to learn who he really was, and what powers he possessed.

Around the time of the late 70’s, Ru went out in the world and began working as a female vigilante, using her powers to defeat crime against crime. She wore a fabulous iridescent costume and quickly gained public attention, making a name for herself. She met the likes of a woman named Michelle Visage who became Ru’s sidekick and trusted advisor. As well, she often worked alongside another vigilante by the name of Lady Bunny, who became Ru’s partner. Adventure after adventure, Ru sashayed and shantayed her way to victory in every battle. She saw many beauties of the world, as well as much of its darkness. Then, Ru made the biggest mistake any god could make… she fell in love. His name was Georges, and he was a farmer boy Ru met one night on the dance floor. Other than Michelle and Lady Bunny, he was the only one who knew Ru’s true identity.

One day, a new villain emerged on the scene. This villain however, was no ordinary foe Ru had faced in the past. He went by the name of Lord Padmunt and he possessed a tremendous amount of power, as well as led a powerful army of minions. The only one who could stop him was RuPaul, but Georges told her to be careful for she didn’t know the strength of his power. Lord Padmunt and Ru were great rivals who battled many battles for quite some time. With the powers of a god, Lord Padmunt could never defeat Ru. But then one day, he discovered her secret lover. He captured Georges as his prisoner and told Ru to surrender her powers, or the man she loved would die in front of her eyes. This wasn’t going to stop Ru who was determined to defeat Lord Padmunt. She managed to defeat him and banished him away, but in a terrible battle that severely injured both herself and Georges. Ru had a wide slash alongside her leg while Georges suffered a blow to the head. Georges was so severely hurt, that he was to remain in a coma for the rest of his life. Ru felt a tremendous amount of guilt on what had happened. As a god, she could easily heal herself of her injuries, but she didn’t have the abilities to heal Georges. Out of her love and respect to him, Ru surrendered her powers so that she could live the rest of her life as a mortal and have to endure the same pain inflicted upon Georges. With no powers, Ru swore to never fight another day in her life. Without her love, she went into a dark place and hid herself from the world, living in secrecy. The only two who knew of her whereabouts were Michelle and Bunny. The world believed Ru had died. And as their beloved hero was now gone, the people of the world strived to make it a better place in her honour and legacy. For some time, they actually did, and the world became a peaceful and more progressive place. But as we know, nothing last forever…

Much time had passed, and it was now the year 2008. The world was in happy place as Obama was just elected president. Ru watched the outside world through her television and was at peace in the direction things were headed, while knowing there was still more work the people of the world had to learn and do for themselves. However one day she was visited by her friend and former associate Michelle, who had come to deliver some news to Ru. Michelle had heard word of mouth through the grape vine, that a billionaire was trying to climb the ladder of the world to reach a more successful place. His name? Donald Trump. Michelle told Ru that this Trump character had plans to run for presidency and to hopefully become the successor to Obama. Although unqualified, Trump seemed to have a plan that would lead him to office without fail. Michelle would never bring news like this to Ru nowadays but she knew that this time it was important. She showed Ru a picture of Trump, and as soon as Ru glanced at his face, in an instant Ru recognized the smirk on Trump’s face and the gleam in his eyes. As a master of Scrabble, Ru also recognized that his name was an anagram of a name Ru once knew very well… Lord Padmunt. If he could manage to make his way to the highest position in the world, then there was no telling what danger lay ahead. Since Ru gave up his powers so he could grow old and live a mortal life in honour of Georges, he had previously vowed to never fight again, and he still vowed to honour that promise. But he knew something had to be done about this.

Ru went to a room in his lair with the highest amount of security, a room he hadn’t been to in years. In this room was his legendary crown. Ru took his crown and removed each of the eleven gemstones that were on its surface. Ru knew that by the end of 2016 to early 2017, Trump would become president. In this time, Ru knew he had to search far and wide to find eleven chosen ones who possessed enough charisma, uniqueness, nerve and talent as Ru did to follow in his footsteps. He would give each individual a gemstone which contained a fraction of Ru’s powers. These would give the chosen ones many wondrous powers like the ones Ru once possessed. Michelle was worried about finding people qualified, but Ru assured her they were already out there. For as she had been reincarnated, so had all of her powers. With the help of Michelle Visage, Ru began his search…

[This is one method, where the queens are regular men who obtain super powers rather than pre-existing super beings who form a team]

In 2009, Ru came across Nea Marshall Kudi, a prince of his people in Cameroon who came to America and began working with wildlife and the UN. Ru found him to be the chosen one of his first gemstone, the golden brown sphalerite. This gave Nea the ability to transform into warrior, Bebe Zahara Benet. The world had a new hero and the first of her kind.

In 2010, Ru found James Ross, a runaway groom who was trying to escape his past and provide a better life for his young child. He worked his way through life by going to school during the day, while stripping at night. Ru gave him his second gemstone, the white diamond, and this gave James the ability to transform into warrior, Tyra Sanchez. While still having their own adventures, Bebe and Tyra also began to work as a team.

In 2011, Ru discovered Sutan Amrull. He was a creative makeup artist and photographer, who was highly spiritual. Ru gave him the blue sapphire which turned Sutan into the warrior, Raja Gemini. The team was now a trio.

In 2012, Ru found Aaron Coady, a club goer heavily involved in the punk rock scene, always getting into trouble, who often experimented with witch craft. Ru found him to be the chosen one to receiving the green emerald, which gave Aaron the ability to turn into Sharon Needles. Sharon joined the group as its fourth member.

Later that year, Obama was already leading into his second term, and Ru and Michelle knew they had work harder to finding successors to Ru’s powers before the end of Obama’s second term. They came across Chad Michaels, a former pageant winner, and current Vegas performer who possessed all the qualities in receiving the pink rose quartz. Chad Michaels now possessed the abilities to turn into super hero, Brigitte Love. However, in a bizarre plan that ended up working, Chad still referred to herself as Chad Michaels in hopes of using reverse psychology to protect her identity.

In 2013, the team came across Jerick Hoffer, a struggling Broadway actor who was best suited for the role of Ru’s next gemstone, the orange spessartine, which gave Jerick the abilities to transform into Jinkx Monsoon.

In 2014, Ru and Michelle began to keep a watchful eye on Roy Haylock, CEO of a successful company that catered to literature and reading. As the bad bitch in charge, she was the chosen one to receive the powers of the black gemstone, the schorl, giving Roy the great power of turning into warrior, Bianca Del Rio.

In 2015, the world was fascinated with its latest “It Boy” in fashion. A youngster by the name of Jason Dardo. Ru realized that this young model was in fact the chosen one to receive the powers of the purple amethyst, transforming Jason into vixen, Violet Chachki.

At the beginning of 2016, with three gemstones left, Ru and Michelle came across comedian Christopher Caldwell. After years of the team wondering who would be the chosen one to receive the yellow gemstone, Christopher fit the bill. He obtained the yellow citrine and became Bob The Drag Queen.

With two gemstones left, and Trump’s presidency coming closer and closer, Ru and Michelle worked twice as hard to find the two remaining chosen ones. But something funny happened. Justin Honard was a close ally of the team. He was dating Sharon around the time she joined the team, and although Sharon wasn’t suppose to, she revealed her identity to Justin. Because of this, Ru and the team kept Justin close as an assistant despite his difficult relationship with Sharon that ended up turning into a beautiful friendship. As they continued to search, in an epic battle against an enemy where Justin was held captive (similarly to how Georges once was), Justin was revealed to being the chosen one of a gemstone, and it turned out one of the chosen ones was under their nose the entire time. They threw him the turquoise gemstone transforming Justin into Alaska 5000.

Just as Trump was elected president, in 2017 the team finally found their final member. An artist who owned his own gallery by the name of Alexander Steinberg. He was given the red ruby, and it transformed him into warrior Sasha Velour.

As a new era of hatred begins, it’s the responsibility of RuPaul’s gemstones to help save the world…

[13thgenfilm]

The 13th generation since the founding fathers is now fifty years old. We’re smart, unafraid, and ready to lead. The 2020’s belong to us.

TOWARDS A FILM COMPANY MANIFESTO ...

In 1993, I read a book called 13th Gen: Abort, Retry, Fail that attempted to curate and capture the unique voices of what is often referred to as Generation X. It was not the first book of its kind, but it registered with me because it was based on Strauss-Howe Generational Theory, which sees American history as an evolving and cyclical pattern of generations with similar themes. I found this overall concept completely relatable, but I didn’t much like the way my moment was being characterized. 

The messages we heard included -- You’re the lost generation; the most educated generation in the history of the country with the worst job prospects; unlikely to own homes or ever make as much money as your parents. The recession of the late 80s and early 90s confirmed a lot these points. In response, many of us chose art, ideas, film, and literature. We were decidedly inter-disciplinary. We embraced diversity. Many of us rejected the Reagan/Bush America as an aberration, believing that great things were just around the corner.

In the early 90s, I was in my 20s. Living in an affordable San Francisco (yes, it was very cheap to live here at one time), part of the first Post-AIDS generation to move into the Castro. Being an AIDS Activist was a no-brainer after my liberal arts education, which included two classes with the legendary Vito Russo in my final year at UC Santa Cruz. Pursuing a film career made sense, as I was always raised to believe that my major in school would be my chosen professional field (even if that major was weird.) At the time, the New Queer Cinema movement exploded, and I was right there ready to be a part of it. Nothing about my life at the time could be described as being lost or without prospects.

Interestingly, in the book, the 13th Generation is also talked about as the NOMAD. And, this is a word and a concept I connect to. We ... “enter(ed) childhood during an Awakening (the 1960s/70s), a time of social ideals and spiritual agendas, when young adults are passionately attacking the established institutional order. Nomads grow up as under-protected children during this Awakening, come of age as alienated post-Awakening adults, become pragmatic midlife leaders during a Crisis, and age into resilient post-Crisis elders.”

In November 2018, I turned 50, and I can see how this narrative is definitely playing out in my own life and work. I am ready to be a pragmatic midlife leader to be sure. I have had my share of crisis like anybody (meet me for a drink, and we can compare notes.) But, my view: let’s not wait until we’re elders for so-called "post-crisis resilience." I want to be post-crisis now. We need that resilience now.

Here’s my take on it -- 13th Gen’ers are potentially our best hope yet. It may sound self-important or perhaps a bit of hubris, but indulge me... 

We are the last generation to remember the ANALOG experience. The feeling of celluloid. The physical nature of things like the rough edges of the cassette tape as it made noise when it popped in and out of your walkman. The journal writing you often did in the cafe that you discovered for the first time in that as yet undiscovered neighborhood that felt like your special place. The photo album as an actual material thing, something you created out of photos that you took and at times even printed yourself in a darkroom. The idea of objects being touched and treasured.

And, we’re the first generation to fully experience DIGITAL life with all of our analog memories intact. We’re walking archivists. We’re likely to hold stories, secrets, and ways of making connections that could be precisely the bridge to the future that we will need in the 2020s. We’re now ready to lead this country, and we will do so with compassion and inclusion driving us forward.

It may feel hard to believe some days, but Trump is such a last gasp for air on the part of white patriarchy. It’s to be expected that things would be chaotic and intense while something so sick and frightful is gasping for air. We all feel like we’re choking at times.  But, we cannot forget -- our stories, our voices, our collective diversity is our power. Hate will not win, and filmmakers and storytellers help to ensure that is possible. I know this to be true deep down into my bones.

I am also part of that moment when the word QUEER was reclaimed and taken back by us for the purpose of being empowered. Being queer meant different things to different folks. Like for some, it was meant to include all forms of sexual expression that were non-procreative and therefore still in the category of outlaw (our Kink/BDSM/Fetish brothers and sisters were not only welcome, they were on the forefront.) For others, it was an early way to articulate how sex, race, class and other forms of identity expression and difference are what we call today “intersectional,” (read: people with multiple identities always at the forefront.) At the time, we used words like "the other" and "tokenize," as we were reaching for new ways to describe our experience. We had never been apart of any notion of the mainstream. 20+ years post-Stonewall and 10+ years into AIDS, our generation -- the 13th since the founding of the United States -- was writing so much of the script for the first time on the heels of the 21st century. During the 90s, we felt that power and potential at times.

My own impulse was much simpler, and it still works for me to this day. I just loved the idea of taking back derogatory terms and making new meaning out of them, especially meaning that challenged the status quo. In fact, at the time, I swear that the act of redefining words felt like the most important thing to be doing at times, even more so than protesting. If you change the very basis of words and language, you change assumptions, ideas, and well, you can potentially change everything. For the better. And, for more of us than less of us. This is what I love about the way in which pronouns have evolved to include they/them in recent years. It is such a joy to see those ideas around language and identity being explored by younger people in their own way on their own terms. This film company is all in.

At one point in my early career, I had the word “Turbulent” in the name of my film company. It was irreverent, oppositional, I loved it. Early branding in every sense. Today, I grab hold of the number 13 in a similar way that I did to “turbulent,” but now with much more experience to back it up. Traditionally unlucky, 13 now means everything powerful, everything hopeful. With that, 13th Gen, Inc. is now open for business in a whole new way. Bold and fearless like the generation we represent. We’ve been doing this work under that brand name since 2009, but now, we’re ready to take it to a whole new level. The films that define this company are meant to be like that -- unexpected, disarming at times, and surprising. The filmmakers ... some of the best in the field, telling stories in which the multiple identities referred to above are a given, confidently placed at the center of the narrative where they belong!

Be our partner. Let’s build this together -- established and emerging storytellers side by side, from all walks of life. 

~ Marc Smolowitz, CEO, 13th Gen, Inc.

[oscopelabs]

Personality Crisis: The Radical Fluidity of Todd Haynes’ ‘Velvet Goldmine’ by Judy Berman

[This month, Musings pays homage to Produced and Abandoned: The Best Films You’ve Never Seen, a review anthology from the National Society of Film Critics that championed studio orphans from the ‘70s and ‘80s. In the days before the Internet, young cinephiles like myself relied on reference books and anthologies to lead us to film we might not have discovered otherwise. Released in 1990, Produced and Abandoned was a foundational piece of work, introducing me to such wonders as Cutter’s Way, Lost in America, High Tide, Choose Me, Housekeeping, and Fat City. (You can find the full list of entries here.) Over the next four weeks, Musings will offer its own selection of tarnished gems, in the hope they’ll get a second look. Or, more likely, a first. —Scott Tobias, editor.]

Like the glam rockers it gazes upon through the smoke-clouded lens of memory, Velvet Goldmine is most beautiful when it descends into chaos.

Stolen, the way great artists do, from Citizen Kane, the skeleton of Todd Haynes’ 1998 film is a chain of interlocking reminiscences of Brian Slade (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), a David Bowie-like glam rocker who fakes his own onstage death in the mid-’70s. A decade later—in that most dystopic of years, 1984—his ex-wife Mandy (Toni Collette) and former manager Cecil (Michael Feast) relate their bitter tales of betrayal to a journalist (Christian Bale) whose assignment has him reluctantly reliving his own teenage sexual awakening under the influence of Brian’s music. Between the interviews, musical numbers, and onscreen epigrams, there’s also a mysterious female narrator who sometimes surfaces, like a teacher reading a subversive storybook, with dreamy exposition that reaches back a century to invoke glam’s patron saint, Oscar Wilde.

The film climaxes with a propulsive sequence of scenes that are exhilarating precisely because they merge all of these points of view, subjective and omniscient, into one collective fantasy. Brian and his new conquest, the Iggy Pop/Lou Reed composite Curt Wild (Ewan McGregor), ride mini spaceships at a carnival to Reed’s “Satellite of Love.” Two random schoolgirls, their faces obscured, act out a love scene between a Curt doll and a Brian doll. In a posh hotel lobby, Brian’s entourage, styled like Old Hollywood starlets on the Weimar Germany set of a fin-de-siècle period film, recites pilfered sound bites about art. Then Brian and Curt are kissing on a circus stage, surrounded by old men in suits. They play Brian Eno’s “Baby’s on Fire” as Haynes cuts between the performance, an orgy in their hotel suite, and Bale’s hapless, young Arthur Stuart masturbating over a newspaper photo of Brian fellating Curt’s guitar. Stripped of narration—not to mention narrative—the film seems to be running on its own amorous fumes, its story fragmenting into a heap of glittering images as it hurtles from set piece to set piece.

Visual pleasure aside, it’s a perfect way of translating into cinematic language the argument that underlies Haynes’ script—that glam’s revelations about the radical fluidity of human identity go far beyond sex and gender. As the apotheosis of teen pop audiences’ thirst for outsize personae, fictional characters like Ziggy Stardust (who Velvet Goldmine further fictionalizes as Slade’s alter ego, Maxwell Demon) melded the symbiotic identities of artist and fan into a single, tantalizing vision of hedonism and transgression. Kids imitated idols they didn’t quite recognize as pure manifestations of their own inchoate desires. Musician and fan became each other’s mirror, and both could become entirely new people simply by changing costumes or names.

But it’s pretty much impossible to imagine Velvet Goldmine’s distributor and co-producer, Harvey Weinstein, appreciating this as he watched the film for the first time—or seeing anything in it, really, besides an expensive mess.

Haynes and his loyal producing partner, Killer Films head Christine Vachon, had already been through hell with Velvet Goldmine by the time they delivered a cut to Miramax. Bowie had refused Haynes’ repeated requests for permission to use six Ziggy-era songs in the film, claiming that he had a glam movie of his own in the works. And in a production diary that appears in her book Shooting to Kill, Vachon points out one unique challenge of making a film about queer male sexuality: “The MPAA seems to have a number of double standards. Naked females get R ratings, but pickle shots tend to get NC-17s. Our Miramax contract obligates us to an R.” She also mentions that an investor pulled $1 million of funding just weeks before filming.

The shoot was even more harrowing than the two veteran indie filmmakers could’ve predicted. As they fell behind schedule, a production executive started nagging Vachon to make cuts. “Todd is miserable,” she wrote in her diary the night before they wrapped. “He says that making movies this way is awful and he doesn’t want to do it.” In an interview that accompanies the published screenplay for Velvet Goldmine, Oren Moverman asks Haynes, “Was the making of the film joyful for you?” “I’m afraid not,” he replies. “We were trying very hard to cut scenes while shooting, knowing that we were behind and we didn’t have the money for the overloaded schedule. But there was hardly a scene we could cut without losing essential narrative information.” It’s remarkable that he managed to capture 123 usable minutes’ worth of meticulously art-directed ‘70s excess (and ‘80s bleakness) in just nine weeks, under so much external pressure, on a budget of $7 million.

When the film finally reached Harvey Scissorhands, after months of editing, Weinstein told Haynes it was too long and the structure didn’t work. “He made suggestions that I didn’t follow, and then he just buried it,” the director told Down and Dirty Pictures author Peter Biskind. What happened next comes straight from the Weinstein playbook: “Even afterward,” Haynes remembered, “they threw out a DVD, they didn’t ask for a director commentary, my name wasn’t on the cover of it, it was buried in the minuscule billing block. He can’t even do the really small things that don’t cost anything—he never shows any respect.” (That Haynes never found a distributor he preferred to Weinstein, with whom he reunited for I’m Not There and Carol, speaks volumes about the way Hollywood treats ambitious filmmakers.)

After it failed to blow audiences away at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival, Miramax effectively dumped Velvet Goldmine. It debuted on just 85 screens that November, ultimately grossing about $1 million stateside. Its ridiculous theatrical trailer might well be a glimpse at the movie Weinstein was expecting: a “magical trip back to the ‘70s” with 100% more murder mystery and 100% less gay sex.

Critics were just as ambivalent about the film as festival audiences. While forward-thinking reviewers wanted to love it for its visual beauty and openly queer aesthetic, many lamented that its plot was slight and its characters hollow. David Ansen of Newsweek complained that “Haynes is unwilling to get too close to his characters. Slade, in particular, is a blank”—failing to see that Brian is a cypher by design. Like the Barbie-doll Karen Carpenter of Haynes’ debut feature, Superstar, and the fragments of Bob Dylan diffused across I’m Not There, Velvet Goldmine’s Bowie is less a portrait of the real person than a screen on which fans project their own fantasies about him.

At The Nation, Stuart Klawans rightly identified Arthur, not Brian, as the film’s protagonist. But he also wondered why he grows up to be such an unhappy adult. “Why is Haynes so tough on Arthur?” Klawans wanted to know. “Why, through the character, is he so tough on himself? It’s apparent everywhere in Velvet Goldmine that Haynes, like Arthur, loves Glitter Rock. He, too, fell for a mass-marketed product, which was no more likely than Mr. Clean to carry out a world-transforming promise. But instead of honoring the truth of his enthusiasm, so that he might look back on its object with a smile and a sigh…Haynes does penance for being a sap.”

Others found the film’s collage of ideas and allusions cumbersome. “Velvet Goldmine is weighed down with self-important messages, but it’s also splashily opulent,” Stephanie Zacharek wrote at Salon. “It’s as if Todd Haynes had plunged his hand into a pile of clothes at a jumble sale and come out with a handful that was half velvet finery, half polyester rejectables.”

All of these reactions make sense, coming from adult critics who had probably seen the film just once, after reading months’ worth of reports about its troubled birth, in the sterile environment of a press screening. But what’s clear from a distance of nearly two decades, during which Velvet Goldmine has become a low-key cult classic, is that few films are so poorly suited to be judged on the basis of a single dispassionate viewing. If you’re looking for tight plotting and complex characters, you’re not going to find them in this mixtape of music videos, aphorisms, and waking dream sequences. There is no actual murder mystery, and Arthur’s investigation into Slade’s disappearance isn’t a source of suspense so much as an excuse to keep contrasting an incandescent past with a dull, gray present.

I’m lucky enough to have first encountered Velvet Goldmine under what turned out to be ideal circumstances: at age 15, on premium cable, late enough at night that it easily bypassed my rational mind en route to my adolescent subconscious. I had no idea how many details it cribbed from the biographies of Bowie and his contemporaries, or how much of the dialogue was quoted from their (and their heroes’) most memorable utterances. I bought the soundtrack without realizing that it put ‘70s originals side-by-side with contemporary covers and new songs by younger bands like Pulp and Shudder to Think in yet another glam pastiche. It wouldn’t have occurred to me to find the 1984 scenes unsatisfying because I got so instantly immersed in the ‘70s spectacles that they barely existed for me.

Not that the film only works on an emotional level. Haynes’ ideas about fandom, politics, sexuality, and identity become even more profound once you can see the organizing principle behind what might initially seem like a jumble of indulgent images. Like the death hoax Brian Slade uses to escape a fantasy life that’s grown too real for comfort, Velvet Goldmine’s loose plot is classic misdirection, obscuring a tight and purposeful structure that delays the resolution of the ‘80s storyline until it’s primed you to feel the loss of the liberated ‘70s viscerally. But you’ll never get that far into dissecting the film if you don’t fall in love with it at first viewing. And that’s easiest to do when you’re as impressionable as young Arthur, who watches Brian Slade flaunt his queerness in a televised press conference and imagines himself shouting to his parents, “That is me!”  

Revisit it as you grow older, though, and you might discover that the disillusioned 30-something characters now feel as rich as their idealistic former selves. Velvet Goldmine is often called a gay film, but that obscures the universal resonance of its queer coming-of-age narrative. Better to think of it as a bisexual film that uses non-binary sexuality as a metaphor for the boundless possibilities of youth—the promise of a future constrained only by the limits of one’s own ambitions and appetites. Its characters can’t achieve permanent liberation by “coming out”; to maintain lifestyles that match their desires, they would have to reject the monogamy that defines adulthood for most people. Particularly amid the AIDS crisis of the 1980s, which haunts the film’s dreary present on a purely subtextual level, it’s obvious why they (like the real glam rockers they’re modeled after) retreat from the liberated lives they staked out for themselves.

But you don’t need to buy in to the incendiary claim Brian makes at his press conference, that everyone is bisexual, to see how this storyline reflects the many kinds of disappointments that await most starry-eyed fans in adulthood. Klawans’ objection to Haynes’ treatment of Arthur feels naive because it assumes people should be able to peacefully coexist with their shattered dreams. Why shouldn’t he feel bitter about having joined a sexual revolution that didn’t, finally, set him free? “It gets better” for Arthur when he leaves his homophobic family to move in with a latter-day glam act in London, but sometime after he hooks up with an unmoored Curt Wild at a tribute concert called the Death of Glitter, “it” just gets boring as the world gets worse.

And the world really does sometimes get worse, though audiences in the relatively peaceful, prosperous late ‘90s might have forgotten about that. Watching Velvet Goldmine for perhaps the 25th time, two weeks before Donald Trump’s inauguration, at the end of an era that has brought unprecedented freedom of sexual and gender expression, I was struck by how vividly Haynes captures a culture’s flight from progress, and how rare it is to see that kind of transition depicted on film. His argument about fluidity turns out to be even more potent when applied to societies than individuals (or, at least, it seems that way in 2017). Our capacity for transformation may be infinite, but that doesn’t mean those changes are always for the best.

[newyorktheater]

Bob Dylan, whose songs are featured in “Girl From The North Country”

Playwright Taylor Mac brings “The Fre” to the Flea

Greg Kotis, Tony winner for “Urinetown,” is bringing a new show Off-Off Broadway

Patti LuPone in a gender-reversed Company, coming to Broadway

the late Michael Friedman

Martyna Majok, a playwright of the displaced in such plays as Ironbound and queens, is author of the long-awaited “Sanctuary City” slated for New York Theatre Workshop

Hilary Bettis, who was a writer for the FX series “The Americans,” brings a play about a recently deported mother Off-Broadway

Lynn Nottage, who has turned her play “Intimate Apparel” into an opera

Below is a selection of the abundant New York theater openings in March, organized chronologically by opening date*. Seven shows are opening on Broadway, a jarring mix of royalty and penury, a reflection perhaps of the divide in the world at large. Three are plays, three are musicals; a seventh is sort of both, featuring Bob Dylan’s old songs in a new drama by Conor McPherson. For the times they are a-changin’

#gallery-0-10 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-10 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 14%; } #gallery-0-10 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-10 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

There are also exciting shows Off-Off Broadway — including new works by Greg Kotis and Taylor Mac, whose play is said to focus specifically on the cultural divide. Off Broadway, a musical by the late Michael Friedman makes its debut, along with new work by Katori Hall, Martyna Majok, Duncan Macmillan, Hilary Bettis.

In celebration of Women’s History Month, there’s the third annual On Women theater festival in Brooklyn.

And then there’s the celebration of the ban on plastic bags in New York State (which has gone into effect this month) with “The Plastic Bag Store,” free in Times Square — half art installation, half immersive theater…and one of several boundary-crossing shows with cutting-edge puppetry on stage in this busy month of March.*

Each title below is linked to a relevant website. Color key: Broadway: Red. Off Broadway: Black or Blue.. Off Off Broadway: Green. Theater festival: Orange. Immersive: Magenta. Puppetry-Brown

For those shows that don’t have official openings, I list by first performance.

March 1

The Hot Wing King (Signature)

A comedy by Katori Hall (“Our Lady of Kibeho,” “The Mountaintop”) that  centers around the annual “Hot Wang Festival” in Memphis, TN.

March 3

The Perplexed (MTC’s City Center Stage 1)

Richard Greenberg, whose “Take Me Out” is being revived on Broadway this season, tells the story of two families, whose lives have been tumultuously intertwined for decades, as they gather in the massive library of a Fifth Avenue apartment to celebrate the nuptials of their children. Nothing goes smoothly

Coal Country (Public)

A new play with music by the wife-and-husband team Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen (The Exonerated) is based on first-person accounts of the explosion of the Upper Big Branch mine in 2019.

March 4

On Women Festival (Irondale Center)

The third annual three-week theater festival begins with “To Moscow! A Palimpsest” by Ada Luana and Gabriel F. (Brazil.) It continues with “Night Shadows—Or, One Hundred Million Voices Shouting” by Lynda Crawford, and two workshop presentations, “England’s Splendid Daughters” by Ann Kreitman and “The Fainting Room” by Becca Bernard.

March 5

Girl From the North Country (Belasco)

Written and directed by Conor McPherson, using songs that Bob Dylan wrote between 1963 and 2012, this play with music is set in 1934 at a guesthouse in Duluth, Minnesota (Dylan’s birthplace.) A group of travelers pass in and out of each other’s lives, and share stories that awaken each other with passion, fury and, beauty. This originated at the Public Theater. My review Off-Broadway.

  I Am Nobody (The Tank) 

An unhinged computer chip engineer threatens to destroy the world. What’s most noteworthy about this production is that it’s written by Greg Kotis, the Tony-winning author of arguably the most successful Off-Off Broadway show ever, “Urinetown.”

Kosmos Invers (HERE)

A new solo piece by puppeteer performance artist Karlan Sherrard with a powerful environmental message.

March 9

Unknown Soldier (Playwrights Horizons)

In this musical co-written by the late and much missed Michael Friedman, a woman sets out on a journey to unearth the secrets of her family’s past when she discovers in her grandmother’s home a mysterious photograph of an anonymous soldier, tucked away in a box of keepsakes.

March 10

72 Miles to Go (Roundabout’s Laura Pels)

Seventy-two miles. That’s the space between a recently deported mother in Nogales, Mexico and her husband and children in Tucson, Arizona. Written by Hilary Bettis, who was a writer for the FX series “The Americans”

March 11

  Anywhere (HERE)

Freely inspired by the novel Oedipus on the Road by Henry Bauchau, Anywhere evokes the long wandering of Oedipus accompanied by his daughter Antigone. The fallen Oedipus appears in the form of an ice puppet that gradually turns into water then into mist and disappears in the Erynian Forest

March 12

Six (Brooks Atkinson)

Pop-concert musical featuring the six wives of Henry VIII.

March 13

Twelfth Night (El Barrio’s Artspace)

“Audiences will be welcomed to Illyria…This romantic comedy will explore themes of wealth and class, identity and disguise, and love and loss. Our production will allow participants to directly engage with these themes with a high level of agency.”

March 15

The Minutes (Cort)

Letts’ most political work to date is a dark comedy about a town council meeting in the fictional town of Big Cherry that turns ominous.

The Fre (The Flea)

The Fre is written by Taylor Mac, and directed by The Flea’s artistic director Niegel Smith, his collaborator on “Hir” and “24 Decade History of Popular Music” and that makes this show a must-see no matter how weird or uncomfortable it winds up being. “In this queer love story, audiences will literally and figuratively jump into the mud with the Fre to hash out the current cultural divide.”

Washington Square (Axis)

A new adaptation of the Henry James novel written and directed by Randy Sharp. (A previous adaptation is “The Heiress”)

March 18

The Plastic Bag Store (20 Times Square)

The Plastic Bag Store, a public art installation and immersive theater piece by artist and director Robin Frohardt explores the enduring effects of plastics. The “store” is stocked with thousands of original, hand-sculpted items — produce and meat, dry goods and toiletries, cakes and sushi rolls — all made from discarded plastics. At night, the store transforms into an immersive, dynamic set for free performances where “hidden worlds and inventive puppetry tell the darkly comedic, sometimes tender story of how the overabundance of plastic waste we leave behind might be misinterpreted by future generations.” Free and open to the public.

  March 19

Hangmen (John Golden)

A dark comedy by Martin McDonagh about a retired executioner who now presides over a pub, visited by a mysterious gentleman. My review Off-Broadway

March 20

Treasure Island (New Victory)

In this rendition of the classic pirate story, 12 puppeteers animate marionettes to tell the swashbuckling adventures of cabin boy Jim Hawkins.

March 21

Best Life (Jack)

In Melisa Tien’s play, a woman of color can rewind time, but only within the last five minutes. The result: her exchange with a white woman in a cafe becomes increasingly alarming

March 22

Company (Bernard B. Jacobs)

Starring Patti LuPone and Katrina Lenk, this fifth Broadway production of the Stephen Sondheim/George Furth musical about a single 35-year-old with married friends, this one is “re-gendered” so that the protagonist is now a woman, Bobbie.

  March 23

Intimate Apparel (Lincoln Center Theater)

An opera based on Lynn Nottage’s play about the life and loves of Esther, a lonely, single African-American woman in early 20th century New York who makes her living sewing beautiful corsets and ladies’ undergarments.

March 24

Sanctuary City (New York Theatre Workshop)

Much anticipated (and much delayed) play by Martyna Majak, who was the 2018 Pulitzer Prize winner for Cost of Living, about two teenagers, life-long friends, in post-9/11 America.

March 25

Lungs (BAM)

Claire Foy and Matt Smith (who played Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip in the first season of “The Crown”) reunite in this look at love in the time of climate change, written by Duncan Macmillan (People, Places & Things)

March 26

The Lehman Trilogy (Nederlander)

The history of the rise and fall of the Lehman Brothers over 164 years, starting with the arrival of the three Lehman brothers from Bavaria in the mid nineteenth century. My review of The Lehman Trilogy when it was at Park Avenue Armory in April.

March 30

Oratorio for Living Things (Ars Nova Greenwich House)

A large scale musical work by Heather Christian, staged by director Lee Sunday Evans and featuring eighteen virtuosic singers and instrumentalists.

March 31

Diana (Longacre)

Jeanna de Waal portrays Princess Diana in this musical, with Roe Hartrampf as Prince Charles,Erin Davie as Camilla Parker Bowles, Judy Kaye as Queen Elizabeth

March 2020 New York Theater Openings Below is a selection of the abundant New York theater openings in March, organized chronologically by opening date*.