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OUT BROADWAY STAR KYLE DEAN MASSEY BREAKS THROUGH THE GLASS CEILING

June 1, 2016, 12:20 am
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American television and Broadway star Kyle Dean Massey


American television and Broadway star Kyle Dean Massey co-stars on the hit ABC television series Nashville, but has also drawn rave reviews for his roles in Pippin, Wicked, Next to Normal and Xanadu on the Great White Way.

Three Dollar Bill sat down with Massey – an instructor at such organizations as Camp Broadway and Broadway Artists Alliance – to reflect on life on Broadway and what it’s like to be an openly-gay entertainer in Hollywood.

Three Dollar Bill: Which do you prefer, acting on the stage or the screen?

Kyle Dean Massey: It’s like comparing apples and oranges. I like all of it. My first passion was always the stage, it’s what got me into all of this in the first place. The TV stuff came later. So I lean towards the stage. I know it better.

Laurence Olivier once said acting on screen is all about the eyes, and onstage it’s all about your hands. What do you think?

I approach it all the same way, then steer myself in one direction or the other. I don’t look at (screen versus stage) as different things. I know when I do Wicked – I’ve done the show on and off for several years – when I go back I spend almost all my time auditioning for TV and film stuff during the day, then I’ll come to work at night on a huge show like Wicked and the associate director will tell me, “It’s a little small!” I think people have this idea that stage work is really big and “gestury” but I think it can be just as nuanced as television stuff.

How thrilling is it to star in a big-budget blockbuster on Broadway? Does the glamour and romance of it fade after a while?

Yes, of course it does! (Laughs)  It’s just like any other job, I think. You show up and you do it. People often ask me what it’s like to be in a huge glitzy show. And I say it doesn’t matter because when you stand in front of the set you look out at a big, black empty space, sometimes with a spotlight in your eyes. In that regard, it doesn’t feel that much different from doing high school plays. You’re not feeling the environment like the audience is. The only difference is your partners have Tony Awards!

What is it like to be an openly-gay actor? Were you afraid there would be a glass ceiling?

No. It was never a calculated thing for me, to be open about it. I was doing Next to Normal on Broadway and I was being interviewed a lot and people wanted to ask me these questions and I wanted to answer them honestly. It was nothing greater than that.

Did industry people advise you against publicly coming out?

Nope. I didn’t have any kind of fame to protect. I mean, I was starring in a Broadway show – big deal! That’s a very accepting community. People also ask if I’ve lost out on some roles, and there is no way for me to know that. But I do honestly feel I’ve gotten roles because I am gay. I think it goes both ways.

What advice do you have for young gay actors debating whether or not to come out?

I feel very strongly myself that the best form of activism is being an example. So for me being a normal out gay person is more powerful than marching on Washington. It is a personal decision – not like being closeted, but like not sharing everything personal in this day and age of social media. I think there is something to be said about keeping some things private and secret and somewhat special.

What was it like to play Kevin Bicks in the TV series Nashville? Were you able to bring some of your own personal truth to the table?

Totally! I remember when my manager sent me that audition, I knew this was the perfect role for me because I see a lot of myself in this character. The character is based on a real person who is a successful award-winning songwriter, a very cool and talented guy who I identify with. He has no hang-ups about his sexuality.


Twitter.com/bugsburnett
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WAKE UP CALL! COMEDY LEGEND KATE CLINTON'S 2016 STATE OF THE UNION

June 2, 2016, 1:21 pm
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American comedy legend Kate Clinton

Bugs' interview with Kate Clinton originally ran in the May 2016 issue of Fugues magazine

Without out American comedy legend Kate Clinton, there is no Rachel Maddow, no out Lily Tomlin, no Rosie, Ellen, Gina Yashere or DeAnne Smith. Kate Clinton was our first out dyke stand-up comic – in my book she is still the queen, and this is my 11th annual Kate Clinton interview – and, if Kate has anything to do with it, her namesake Hillary Clinton (no relation) will become president of the U.S.A.

“I wish Bernie Sanders well, but in my lifetime I really would like to have a woman president,” Clinton, now 68, says unequivocally.

It’s no understatement to say neither Clinton is “feeling the Bern” but at least Kate acknowledges Sanders has been a welcome addition to the Democratic race, despite the fact many Sanders supporters say they will refuse to vote Hillary if she wins the nomination.

“Let me say I am no longer allowed at dinner parties with young people, and that if the arrow in Hillary’s logo was weaponized, I would be using it!” Kate cracks. “But it’s a free country. I think that Bernie is certainly moving Hillary to the left… I am thrilled by the excitement of the youth and the tenor of the whole Democratic debate. Whatever happens at the end of the primaries, this is a very dangerous time, and if you say you’re not going to vote, then you didn’t get the point.”

About Susan Sarandon criticizing Hillary Clinton, Kate says, “Are you kidding? It’s, like, such white privilege. I really think it’s a detour and maybe just too much legalized marijuana, I’m not sure.”

No stranger to helping political causes, Kate Clinton will emcee the Levity & Justice for All benefit in New York City on June 16, to support LPAC, the U.S. national grassroots lesbian political action committee that supports pro-LGBTQ, pro-women’s rights and progressive candidates. LPAC is also the first U.S. national LGBTQ organization to endorse Hillary Clinton for President, and their June 16 all-star line-up features Rosie O’Donnell, Billie Jean King, Lea DeLaria, Karen Williams, Judy Gold and Marga Gomez, among others.

“Others have political action groups, why don’t we have one?” Kate asks rhetorically. “The benefit will also be held in the historic Town Hall which was used by the suffragettes. It’s just great to be there!”

Wouldn’t it be great, I say, if Hillary made an appearance?

“Well, you know I am doing stunt double work! And when it’s over I’ll do Jamie Lee Curtis. You won’t believe how many people stop me to ask if I’m Jamie Lee Curtis!”

As for Donald Trump, I suggest the Republican chickens are coming home to roost. “It’s fun watching bullies getting bullied. And the (Republican establishment is) acting like they don’t know where all of this comes from! Trump is the embodiment. He is all about branding. He totally knows what to do. It’s staggering. It’s such a terrifying and amazing moment, how it has just blown up the ways of campaigning.”

It’s also mind blowing to think Kate has been an out queer comic since 1981, back in the Jurassic era when there was only a handful of out LGBTQ heroes, like Billie Jean King and David Kopay. 

Clinton has performed in Provincetown now for some 29 years, the last 11 headlining at the landmark Crown & Anchor.

“My new show is called Wake Up Call because after a movement victory we get a little drowsy, like we did with marriage equality here (in America),” explains Kate. “After the emancipation of the slaves, there were the Jim Crow laws. We’re in that moment now, with the Jim Queer laws, trying to make America straight again.”

In summertime, Kate adds, “so many people come to my shows to hear what happened that day because they spend the day at the beach. It’s not so much comedy, it’s news! I do the set up and they say, ‘He did?’ This will be a great summer because everybody wants to hear about the election.”

After all these years, Provincetown remains a queer oasis frequented by approachable LGBTQ celebrities like Pulitzer-winning author Michael Cunningham and filmmaker John Waters. “You see Rosie O’Donnell, Paula Poundstone, Lily Tomlin,” says Kate, who tells me her favourite Provincetown memory is of the late legend Miss Ellie who died of pancreatic cancer in April 2011.

Miss Ellie was a transgender woman renowned for her yearly-updated sign, “79 years old and living my dreams,” singing standards in front of Town Hall with her battery-powered karaoke machine.

“Miss Ellie was one of the sweetest things in Provincetown,” Kate recalls. “When she died, it was a real loss to the town. Still living the dream.”

Clinton will wind down her summer-long Provincetown residency with Bride Pride on Oct. 15 when women from all over the planet will converge for a group wedding scheduled during the 32nd annual edition of Provincetown’s legendary Women’s Week. Of course, Kate “Mad Vow” Clinton – an ordained minister through the Universal Life Church – will perform the nuptials.

“Bride Pride wants to enter the Guinness Book of World Records for most lesbian weddings and I am going to be a minister!” Kate says proudly.

Meanwhile, back in New York City where Clinton and her spouse Urvashi Vaid live, a transgender woman was allegedly raped inside a single-occupancy unisex bathroom at – of all places – the historic Stonewall Inn this past March. 

“The Stonewall today is not the Stonewall that we knew,” Kate sighs. “I mean (now) it’s like an amusement park down there. There are tours going through there all the time! There’s a lot of tourism. It’s not what it was.”

Then, on a more serious note, Kate says, “The level of violence against trans people is just staggering. I do think the trans movement has made extraordinary organizational strides, they’ve done incredible work in such a very short time.”

Just look at the declining mainstream use of the word tranny: In 2013, on Joan Rivers’s Internet TV series In Bed with Joan, RuPaul discussed being slammed by the trans community for using the word. “The trannies should know that a nigger said it to a kike. Here we go again. Calm down, for chrissakes! Everybody take a deep breath,” Ms. Rivers told me afterwards.

But like Kate tells me, “I believe it was your own very own Margaret Atwood who said the conquering nation always has its own language. I think what’s happening is that old syntax of language is busting up. You can see it in the preferred gender pronoun. I am very fascinated by the age difference of it. For Joan’s generation, tranny was a compliment. And for it to have moved to an insult is part of the change of the power structure, which is a good thing. It’s harder to keep up because of the Internet, which speeds things up exponentially. Luckily we have young people in our lives. It’s just harder to keep up. I still don’t do it well. The point is, you don’t fall on your sword.”

After all these years, the warm and measured tones of Kate – who was a high school English teacher before becoming one of America’s finest stand-up comics – only add to her icon status.

“My job as a comic is to examine language, talk about it and make people aware of it,” Kate says. “It’s been 35 years, my dear, and I still love my job!” 

For more Kate Clinton and to purchase tickets for her concert dates in Provincetown this summer, visit kateclinton.com. 


Twitter.com/bugsburnett
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THE TRIUMPHANT MONTREAL HOMECOMING OF RUFUS WAINWRIGHT

June 23, 2016, 3:10 pm
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Rufus Wainwright returns home to Montreal
(All photos courtesy Festival International de Jazz de Montréal)
Bugs' interview with Rufus Wainwright originally ran in the June 2016 issue of Fugues magazine.
Elton John once famously said Rufus Wainwright is the best songwriter alive. And for a while there, in the media, Rufus could do no wrong. His eponymously-titled 1998 debut album was named one of the best albums of the year by Rolling Stone, and he was the toast of the town everywhere he went, especially when he returned home to Montreal.
Elton John once famously said Rufus Wainwright is the best songwriter alive. And for a while there, in the media, Rufus could do no wrong. His eponymously-titled 1998 debut album was named one of the best albums of the year by Rolling Stone, and he was the toast of the town everywhere he went, especially when he returned home to Montreal.
But as fast as the media builds up celebrities, it is also quick to tear them down. So it was no surprise the claws were out when Wainwright’s first-ever opera Prima Donna debuted at the Manchester International Festival in July 2009. Wrote Warwick Thompson of Bloomberg, “There were tears of joy in Rufus Wainwright’s eyes when he took his bow after the world premiere of his opera… There were some in mine too, though the joy sprang more from relief that it was over.”
But Wainwright soldiered on. Prima Donna  made its North American debut at Toronto’s Elgin Theatre at the Luminato Festival and won a Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding New Musical/Opera in 2011, before being famously mounted the following year by the New York City Opera, with red-carpet friends Yoko Ono and Anjelica Houston in attendance – a fascinating turn of events since Prima Donna was originally commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera until a dispute over Wainwright’s decision to write the libretto in French led to an acrimonious split.

Most of all, Wainwright wanted Prima Donna  to play in Montreal. This summer, eight years after its debut in Manchester, Wainwright will get his wish when Prima Donna  will be performed at the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal.“It’s been a long and winding road to Montreal with Prima Donna ,” says Wainwright. “Having it performed in Montreal, especially at Salle Wilfred-Pelletier where I grew up going to the opera, is coming full circle in so many ways. I am also excited to be working with the great (Québécois) soprano Lyne Fortin, one of the first opera singers I ever saw perform, in La Bohème. I wish sometimes that Montreal had been more at the forefront with this project, but Montreal – and this is why I love this city – it is one of the great bohemian capitals and one of their traits is they like to be fashionably late. So this is exciting and it means a lot.”

The July 2 and 3 concerts will each be divided into two parts: first, the acclaimed, abridged 60-minute symphonic visual concert of Prima Donna  with three soloists (including Fortin) and a large orchestra led by American conductor Jayce Ogren, against a film backdrop by Italian director Francesco Vezzoli starring American artist Cindy Sherman as Maria Callas, and wearing Callas’ actual costumes; followed by Wainwright on piano accompanied by the orchestra, performing his greatest hits in the second half. 

In his notes for Prima Donna, Rufus writes he “drew heavily from many of my own personal experiences as a performer, plus those of my mother.” 

During our interview (my 24th or 25th with Rufus, I’ve lost count) Wainwright explains the diva in his opera “pays the price for a treacherous interview with a journalist” – and here Rufus laughs – “that draws very much on my own experiences in show business and what must be done to continue. As for my mother’s life, at the end of the opera, the opera singer’s voice really becomes a metaphor for her body. When my mother (singer-songwriter Kate McGarrigle, who died of cancer in 2010) was ill, there was a similar kind of acceptance she had to make about her physical state.”

Fortunately Kate McGarrigle was able to attend the Prima Donna premiere in Manchester in 2009. “That was really important” Wainwright says.

Since his mother’s death, he adds, “The best advice I ever got in terms of losing a parent – especially losing your mother – is that essentially your mother gives birth to you twice: once when you are born, and once when she dies. She gives birth to you again. That’s the best way I can explain it. It’s just a whole new world. There’s always the sadness, but there is also a whole new perspective. That’s life continuing.”

Wainwright has plenty of Montreal memories. There was the night he and his sister Martha sold T-shirts and posters during a McGarrigles concert at Le Spectrum: “Our mom and our Aunt Anna decided to let the kids take care of the merch booth and we were supposed to sell the posters for a certain amount of money and basically ended up giving them away, making deals!”

Wainwright famously honed his musical chops playing weekly shows at Montreal’s fondly-remembered nightspot Cafe Sarajevo on Rue Clark before moving to New York in 1996. “It was fun and boisterous, also a little bit intense because the people who ran the cafe were from the former Yugoslavia and they brought over that wild vibe with them,” he says. “It was a wonderful bubble that I experienced there, because it was devoid of any major labels or agents. It was just me doing my own thing.”

Wainwright also enjoyed Montreal’s gay scene, even after he left Montreal for New York. “I’m sure it’s treacherous today, it’s always been,” Rufus says. “I remember it was pretty down and dirty, especially since, with AIDS, New York kind of shut down. But Montreal remained pretty decadent and open. So I would come up (to Montreal) from New York to continue the lascivious fun!”

Wainwright is now married, to Jörn Weisbrodt, artistic director of Toronto’s Luminato Festival (“This is our last year in Toronto, Jörn’s last festival with Luminato, so we will be returning to New York”) and he is the father of Viva Katherine Wainwright Cohen, his five-year-old daughter with Leonard Cohen’s daughter Lorca Cohen (“It’s the only thing that tops opera!”). Meanwhile, his just-released album Take All My Loves: 9 Shakespeare Sonnets features nine adaptations of Shakespeare’s sonnets with guest appearances by the likes of Carrie Fisher and William Shatner. And he is busy writing his new opera Hadrian, about the gay Roman emperor and his lover Antinous, commissioned by the Canadian Opera Company and scheduled for their 2018-2019 season.

“It’s a much larger piece than Prima Donna: it’s four acts, there’s a chorus, dancers, at least 10 main characters, it’s a mammoth undertaking,” Rufus says happily. “What I love about my project is that it is very much rooted in the tradition of grand opera, big sweeping romantic statements and larger-than-life characters who ruled the world. It’s my Antony and Cleopatra moment – Hadrian and Antinous and the Roman Empire. There’s nothing couched about it.”

As for the annual McGarrigles / Wainwright concerts to benefit the Kate McGarrigle Fund at the MUHC Foundation, Rufus says, “This year we’re not doing them in Montreal or New York, were doing it in Nashville at the Ryman Auditorium, home of the famous Grand Ole Opry, with Emmylou Harris. And just the other day Emmylou was having coffee with Dolly Parton, so that’s all I’m going to say! One can pray! So come on down to Nashville!”.

Rufus Wainwright’s Prima Donna and greatest hit songs concert headlines the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal at Salle Wilfred-Pelletier, July 2 and 3 at 7:30 p.m. Visit placedesarts.com for tickets.


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BRIT COMIC ALAN CARR RIFFS ON DIVAS, QUEER IDENTITY AND GRAHAM NORTON

July 23, 2016, 8:31 am
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Bugs' interview with Rufus Wainwright originally ran in the July 2016 issue of Fugues magazine.

Out comedian Alan Carr has become one of the hottest comedy stars in Britain since winning the BBC New Comedy Award for Stand-up in 2001, and is probably best-known around the world for his hugely popular long-running television talk show Alan Carr: Chatty Man. In addition to being an LGBT fan favourite himself, Carr’s TV guests over the years include Lady Gaga, Britney Spears, Adele, Grace Jones, Naomi Campbell, Mariah Carey and Bette Midler. Clearly, Carr loves his divas.

Here’s my fun one-on-one with Carr on the eve of his Just For Laughs solo show Yap Yap Yap, which runs at Salle Claude-Léveillée at Place des Arts from July 25 to 30.

What do you like least about celebrity interviews like this one?
Alan Carr: “The intense media training these celebrities get can really spoil a good interview. You get guests on at the start of their career who are SO much fun, they then get more famous, break America and come back on and they’ve been media-trained to fuck. Any hint of personality or uniqueness has been beaten out of them! Everything is so vanilla – they love everyone, every track on their album is brilliant, oh and when I’m in England I just love eating fish and chips, yeah yeah yeah, and you just know they’ve got a drinking problem, shagging their assistant, and halfway through a nervous breakdown.”

Who is your favourite celebrity guest?
“Rihanna is a lot of fun, because she goes with the flow, you don’t get a massive list of things you can’t talk about. She’s everything you want in a guest: funny, sexy, and talented. She’s like a Bajan me! I also love Grace Jones because she is NUTS!!”

What distinguishes British comedians from American comedians?
“I haven’t really seen that many differences between us, although, the publicity photos are very different. Everyone looks amazing with their dazzling smiles and smooth skin. In Britain we will tend to pull faces, gurn and look a bit more wacky. If I stood there smoldering, looking out with ‘shag me’ eyes in a photo I think people would take the piss.”

Were you funny as a kid?
“I’m not like a typical comedian – I was never the class clown – I kind of got laughed at rather than laughed with, so I sort of beat people to it. I was in an absolutely awful job in a call centre going nowhere fast and I decided to do stand-up as a release and I guess it worked out.”

How did growing up gay inform your world view, and how does being gay shape your comedy?
“Some people think that because I am camp I am one of those professional gays who have a gay dentist, gay doctors, only support gay charities and need gas and air if they go in a straight bar. That’s not me. I don’t see things in a gay way, I try to see the joke. It's hard enough coming up with jokes let alone then putting them through a ‘gay’ filter to see if they fit your persona. For me, a joke is a joke, fair and square. If it makes me laugh then I put it in the act. An audience full of gay, straight, bisexual, transgender, black, white, people all laughing at the same joke – now that’s what I call REAL equality.”

Are you a gay comedian, or are you a comedian who happens to be gay?
“I am a comedian who happens to be gay. It interests me that some people say all I talk about is being gay in my act and if you look at my last three DVDs I don’t even mention it. I deliberately didn’t because I knew I would get that criticism. It’s strange: Irish comedians can talk about being Irish and their Irish sensibilities for a whole hour, Aussie comics, Australian things. But if I talk about gay things its ‘have a day off – change the record’. It’s odd but very telling. Straight comedians can make jokes about anal sex and it’s edgy, but a gay comedian talking about it, ironically someone who might actually partake in bumming is seen as unpalatable. I guess it's easier for some people to just dismiss it then confront their prejudices. They do the same with female comedians – ‘all they talk about is periods and being fat’ – which is complete bollocks. I think they are scared that if they laugh at one of my punchlines they might turn gay.”

Do you consider yourself an outsider?
“Oh my God these questions! In British gay lifestyle magazines the questions are ‘Who’s your favourite celebrity crush? Do you wear boxers or briefs? What’s Katy Perry’s best song?’ This is like talking to a therapist – I’ll be pointing to a doll next saying where the homophobe touched me! I think I need to come to Canada and lighten the mood over there!”

Is there a fun and friendly rivalry between you and Graham Norton?
“The British Press like to pit us against each other but it’s all showbiz wank. Graham is a friend and a fantastic chat-show host. He makes it look so easy and his line-ups are to die for. (The bastard! Ha ha). However our dogs hate each other – I went for a walk with my dogs in a park near Graham’s house and as it happens Graham was walking in there too. I said ‘Hi Graham’ and at that moment our dogs started snarling at each other and trying to go for one another. It would have made a great pap shot or a TV program: ‘When Gay Celebrity Dogs Attack!’”

Do you have a funny or scary anecdote about a live onstage moment that spun out of control?
“I was performing last year on stage in the Midlands in this really old Georgian theatre and I did a joke about a Ouija board and as soon as I said the word Ouija the bulb shattered above my head and I was plunged into darkness. It was so scary. Me and the whole audience went ‘Oooh.’ I’d never been heckled by a ghost before.”

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MISS PAMELA! LEGENDARY ROCK n ROLL SUPER GROUPIE PAMELA DES BARRES TELLS ALL

July 28, 2016, 6:07 am
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Des Barres' infamous memoir I’m With the Band: Confessions of Groupie
was first published in 1987
Bugs' interview with Pamela Des Barres originally ran in Three Dollar Bill on Sept. 4, 2008
There was a time in 1950s America when pop stars called groupies Top 40 Fuckers."That’s what Dion’s wife told me," says author Pamela Des Barres, the 1960s beauty who found fame as the ultimate rock’n'roll groupie to the stars.
"I think groupies are misunderstood," says Des Barres. "They are judged as loose women. "Groupie" has become synonymous with "whore." But everybody is out having sex. It’s a double standard. You don’t even have to have sex. Some girls just want to hang out."
Des Barres is not finished. "I also think groupies are feminists of the highest order because we do what we want."
Des Barres says the term "groupie" wasn’t coined until 1967. That, of course, was the year of the Summer of Love, when an 18-year-old Des Barres got her first taste when she bumped into her friend’s Laurel Canyon next-door neighbour, Jim Morrison.
As Des Barres famously wrote in her explosive 1987 canon-creating tell-all, I’m With the Band: Confessions of Groupie ("My friend Gene Simmons – and that’s all he was – told me I’d sell a lot more books if I used the word ‘confessions’ instead of ‘memoirs’!"), Jim Morrison looked like a Greek god.

"I was a virgin at the time and was holding onto my virginity!" Des Barres recalls. "But we did make out, did some heavy petting. He was a very poetic guy."
The ’60s also gave birth to the "Supergroupie"– kind of like the supermodel of the rock world – and the biggest of all was Des Barres, whose life influenced the Cameron Crowe movie Almost Famous.
"Supergroupies were girls who were taken on the road, actually ended marrying many of the guys, the ones you see in photos with them," Des Barres explains. "There were groupies all over the place but there weren’t many supergroupies. Linda Eastman [McCartney] and Yoko Ono were the queens!"
In 2008′s more isolated, insulated corporate world of rock, Des Barres says, "The supergroupies today are Gwyneth Paltrow, Drew Barrymore, Winona Ryder. It started with Patti Hansen and Keith Richards, and Mick has dated lots of models.
"So now supergroupies are models, actors, strippers – though they’d never consider themselves to be groupies. It’s also easier for these people to meet each other because it’s harder now for a regular girl to break in."
Des Barres says there were gay and lesbian groupies too, though she can only name one gay male groupie. That’s because most gay rock stars are still closeted.
"It’s still a very macho community and [gays] are afraid of not getting work," says Des Barres. "It’s the way of the world, but thankfully it is shifting."
Back during Des Barres’ supergroupie heyday, rumours of Jim Morrison’s taste for men made the grapevine when he hung around Andy Warhol’s Factory crew.
Acclaimed rock biographer Stephen Davis documents, in his 2004 bio Jim Morrison: Life, Death, Legend, Morrison’s affair with a Hollywood hustler in June 1968. Davis writes that Morrison "reportedly had a fleeting relationship with a well-known male prostitute who worked along the strip. This hustler then tried to extort money by threatening to expose Jim’s secret sexual habits. Jim’s lawyer, Max Fink, arranged for a meeting between the hustler and an intermediary, who was a private detective and leg-breaker. The hustler was left bleeding and missing teeth in an alley behind a motel near the Los Angeles airport, and the blackmail attempt stopped."
Morrison’s Doors bandmate Ray Manzarek eviscerated me when I asked him once if Morrison was bisexual (and that, of course, is the problem with the closet: You only know what you see).
So I ask Des Barres her thoughts.
"I never witnessed him being bisexual, never even heard rumblings of it," Des Barres says. "[But] he was so fucking stoned I don’t think he even knew who he was with at a certain point in his life. He couldn’t even see. We’d see him staggering down the street and he’d fall down and nobody would even pick him up. He was in a bad way. But, yeah, he could’ve had experiences he didn’t remember!"
During her groupie years, Des Barres had relationships with Keith Moon ("I’d have to recuperate for two weeks after he left town, he was so outrageous!"), Mick Jagger ("He made androgyny acceptable") and Jimmy Page ("One night he gave me mescaline and didn’t take any so he could be in control").
Des Barres has spent the last 20 years legitimizing the groupie, notably in two of her other books, Take Another Little Piece of My Heart: A Groupie Grows Up and Let’s Spend the Night Together: Backstage Secrets of Rock Muses and Supergroupies, both re-released by Chicago Review Press this week.
And on Sept. 9, the original supergroupie, Miss Pamela, turns 60.
"I’m hosting a party and everyone I’ve ever met will be there! It’s gonna be a humdinger!" Des Barres laughs. "Everyone has to dress like it’s the 1960s. My invitation says, ‘Step into the ’60s with me.’ But I hope to grow older gracefully and joyfully and show others that it’s not so bad getting old."
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VILLAGE PEOPLE POP ICON FELIPE ROSE TALKS SEX, DRUGS AND DISCO

August 16, 2016, 10:03 am
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Felipe Rose: "I’ve never done interviews for Out Magazine or The Advocate."

Bugs' interview with Felipe Rose originally ran in Three Dollar Bill on Dec. 2, 2004

I was a 12-year-old disco bunny when I saw the Village People perform live at the Montreal Forum back in 1978. The opening act was none other than Gloria Gaynor, who won the only disco Grammy ever awarded, in 1979, for her classic I Will Survive.

Last year, a full quarter-century later, I interviewed the Village People’s "Indian" character Felipe Rose – along with Thelma Houston, KC and the Sunshine Band, Martha Wash and others – for a cover story I wrote on the legacy and importance of disco. I was so taken by Felipe, and we got along so well, that we’ve met backstage each time our paths have crossed and have maintained contact ever since.

But back in 1978, when I was a disco bunny, Rose was having the time of his life as the Village People topped pop charts worldwide.

"I used to drink stuff that could peel paint off the wall," Felipe laughs over his cellphone from South Dakota, just a stone’s throw away from where his Sioux Indian father was born. "People still think we go out and party all night long, but that’s not the case. We’re all getting older. Things have to take a back seat. You reflect on your life and think, ‘What can I do to make this last longer?’ It’s like a car. You clean it up, put it in the shop and give it a tune up. I go to the gym, do my crunches and sit-ups. I watch what I eat. I always have a beer after a show, but that’s because of thirst. I’m a light social drinker but I love a great red wine with dinner."
HOUR magazine, August 2003

For years the world assumed (go figure) that the Village People were gay when, in fact, only original cowboy Randy Jones and Felipe Rose are. Jones recently married his partner in a NYC commitment ceremony and Rose has been living with his partner at their home in Richmond, Virginia, for several years.

"I don’t think I’ve made a point of being ‘openly gay’ – I’m just secure," Felipe explains. "I don’t sit on TV and talk about it. I’ve never done interviews for Out Magazine or The Advocate. When I speak about myself, I speak in the solo sense. I don’t talk about the group’s private life. We’ve always kept that aspect of our lives quiet and private. I have more straight friends than gay friends and just because Jacques [Morali, the producer who created the Village People] discovered me in a [NYC] gay club, well, it could have been a straight club. My private life doesn’t play a role in what I do on stage. People always tell me, ‘You helped me come out.’ I always reply, ‘You did that on your own.’"

Gay life back in the day seems like it was way more freewheeling. Rose knows firsthand, though, that the gay community paid a price for those glory years: Almost every gay friend he had from that era has died of AIDS, including Jacques Morali.

"I’m still at a loss for words – this horrible disease…" Felipe falters. Then he adds, "All I know is what we [Village People] can do. We do charity concerts and AIDS benefits, but I’m exhausted. There’s no end in sight. We’ve lost so many artists and writers and directors clear across the board. I’ve lost almost everybody from that era. So to see the rising HIV [infection] rates freaks me out. I’d be terrified to have a child today. I try not to think too much about it because it makes me upset."

Felipe is also tired with gays on television ("There’s no mystery left") and upset with gays who helped vote in George Dubya for a second term ("Maybe this is the way our country is supposed to go – I’m completely at a loss").

Despite word of a possible Village People musical ("That’s all rumour") and over 70 million albums sold, Felipe is now solely focused on the Village People’s current tour opening for that other great gay icon, Cher.

"The combination of Cher and the Village People exemplifies what that [1970s disco] era was, and here we are still fresh and new," Felipe says. "Cher’s a pop and gay icon and so are we, and it’s weird talking about it because I just love doing it. We’ve had a helluva run. My partner says, ‘You’re at the top of your game.’ But another 29 years? No, no, no! Don’t go that far! The next five years are looking pretty nice. Then I’ll look and see if I’ve had enough."

Felipe then slyly adds, "I don’t want to be like Cher [after her numerous farewell tours] when you’re interviewing me five years from now and you tell me, ‘I thought you were done!’"


Twitter.com/bugsburnett
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LES AMOURS IMAGINAIRES: XAVIER DOLAN ON CANNES, SEX AND PORN

August 26, 2016, 8:01 am
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Xavier Dolan (Photo by Shayne Laverdière / courtesy Agence Goodwin)
Bugs' interview with Xavier Dolan originally ran in Hour magazine on June 10, 2010

Not only did 21-year-old Montreal film wunderkind Xavier Dolan find himself rubbing elbows with filmmaking royalty at last month’s 63rd annual Cannes Film Festival, but his new film, Les Amours imaginaires, part of Cannes’ Official Selection, got a standing ovation following a packed screening at the Salle Debussy.
Dolan drank it all in.
"I was at Cannes for 10 days, did 160 interviews, drank too much alcohol and smoked too many cigarettes!" he laughs. "[Then] I had this Cannes glamour moment where at some mini-shindig I walked into some bar with Benicio Del Toro and this French actress, and suddenly my life changed. These people were [no longer up] on the screen. They’re chatting with you and you’re talking to them about cinema and your life and their life and you’re laughing [together]!"
Dolan pauses.
"I don’t want to make it sound shallow, but I felt like part of a family."

Cannes loved Dolan so much that, after awarding him three prizes last year for his 2009 debut feature film J’ai tué ma mère (I Killed My Mother), his new film Les Amours imaginaires (awkwardly named Heartbeats in English) was invited to compete in the festival’s Un Certain Regard competition, parallel to the Palme d’Or, competing against Socialisme, a film by one of Dolan’s heroes, the legendary Jean-Luc Godard.
"I was more comfortable at Cannes this year, less afraid and less nervous," says Dolan.
Then he walked away with this year’s Regards Jeunes prize.
Child’s play
Les Amours imaginaires tells the story of a love triangle of two Montrealers (Dolan and Monica Chokri) lusting after the same young man (Niels Schneider, who resemblesTwilight‘s Robert Pattinson). Dolan is such a good director that people tend to forget he’s a pretty good actor too. The son of Quebec actor Manuel Tadros, Dolan learnt his chops as a child actor in such films as La Forteresse suspendue and TV series likeOmertà, la loi du silence. Now all grown up, Les Amours imaginaires features a very memorable scene where Dolan sniffs Niels Schneider’s T-shirt while masturbating.
"It wasn’t a hard scene to do. I love that scene! And we filmed it in a very simple way, a one-shot deal!" Dolan laughs at his own joke. "It wasn’t a closed set [because] I wasn’t showing my dick. I wasn’t really doing it! I was just rubbing myself. I didn’t have to abandon myself. It was just another scene that took maybe an hour."
Here I’m reminded of Dolan’s recent and pretty explicit interview with NYC-based Butt magazine, whom he told, "I’m open to everything. I did gangbangs, straight and gay. Wait, they were orgies, actually. They were more free-spirited and spontaneous. And smaller."
So I ask Dolan if he enjoys porn.
"Of course I enjoy porn, like all people who feel alone in love."
This is a recurring theme with Dolan – and not just in his new film. Dolan also told Butt mag, "I’ve been a lonely person for years."
But are boys throwing themselves at his feet?
Dolan looks at me. "Well, yes and no."
Now I’m reminded of another Montreal enfant terrible, Rufus Wainwright, who was also a forlorn precocious young buck when he started out years ago. Dolan isn’t exactly directing the movie of his life, but he knows exactly what and what not to say.
"I answered [Butt magazine's] questions with no filter," Dolan says. "It’s not about being politically correct – it’s about not wanting to deal with shit. It was a Butt magazine interview, not The Globe and Mail! It’s not the same audience."
Rose-coloured glasses
When I interviewed Dolan last year after he returned from his first trip to Cannes, both he and I were momentarily stunned to discover Dolan was born the very same day that Dawson student and gay activist Joe Rose was stabbed to death by homophobic thugs on a Montreal city bus, on March 20, 1989.
It’s remarkable because the tragic murder of Rose helped shape gay activism in this city for years. Twenty years later, about the gay-bashing scene in his J’ai tué ma mere, Dolan said, "Some people complained that the scene came out of nowhere, but it is the best-filmed scene in the movie because that’s how gay-bashings happen – out of the blue. A friend of mine was gay-bashed at three o’clock in the afternoon on Jean-Talon Boulevard! There is still danger today for gay people, even in broad daylight."
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JOHN WATERS RIFFS ON TRUMP, PRIDE, P-TOWN, DIVINE AND MONTREAL STRIPPERS

September 1, 2016, 6:18 am
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John Waters in 2016 (photo courtesy Admire Entertainment)
Bugs' interview with John Waters originally ran in the September 2016 issue of Fugues magazine.
The iconoclastic John Waters, who wrote and directed everything from Pink Flamingos to the original Hairspray, was once dubbed “The Pope of Trash” by no less than William Burroughs. Waters is also lovingly called The Prince of Puke, The Duke of Dirt and The Sultan of Sleaze. I first interviewed him back in December 2007 when he headlined Le National to perform his Christmas stand-up comedy show. Waters returns to Montreal to headline the Rialto Theatre with his hugely popular “This Filthy World” stand-up act, at the 2016 Pop Montreal festival.
So this summer I caught up with Waters in Provincetown, and we blabbed about everything from Donald Trump to Divine.


Three Dollar Bill: You once voted twice, for Shirley Chisholm in the United States presidential election of 1972. You actually borrowed somebody else’s ID and voted a second time.  

John Waters: The last election, the Obama election, The Gap asked us to create something about the election. So I did a button that said “Vote twice.” I never thought they’d accept it. But they did and put it in all the stores! And the day it came out people went crazy. The Gap said to me, “We will stand behind you.” Then an hour later they changed their minds and took every (button) out of the stores! I think it’s a collector’s item. 

You always vote.

Oh yes, I always vote. To me, it’s sexual when you vote. When you go in that booth, it’s like a peep show! 

What is your take on Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump?

He’s going to ruin the Republican Party for 10 years. I’m happy they picked him! I think the other ones are even worse, though: at least he’s met a gay person! I don’t even believe he believes that. I think he’ll quit the first day. And I think he’s broke too, that’s why he won’t show his taxes. 

What do you think of Caitlyn Jenner supporting the Republican Party?

I think it’s heresy. I think (LGBTQ Republicans) are like Roy Cohn. They are traitors.

I met Mink Stole last September and was wondering if you keep in touch with her and other stars of your films?

This summer in Provincetown we celebrated 50 years of knowing each other!

Do you enjoy your summers in Provincetown?

Oh yes. It’s my 52nd summer here. I have written half my books and movies here. I do like it. It’s about as healthy as I get. I go swimming, I ride my bicycle, I go to the beach for a half-hour every day.

Have you ever witnessed a Bridezilla bachelorette party in P-Town?

I don’t want to be unfair. I’m a radical feminist, so I love women who hate men, I just don’t like men who hate women. But they do put a big drag on it when they come into town in big droves – into any bar, not just the gay bars. The new thing is they go to drag shows, which I don’t quite get. They have the right to do it, so who am I to judge bachelorette parties? But they can be drunk and obnoxious. If they are misbehaved, I think it would be fair if drag queens wrote down their names and crashed their weddings. 

Has the Boatslip changed much?

I was on an airplane and I guess the pilot was a gay pilot and it was all men on the plane and he said, “Welcome to Provincetown, and hope you’re not late for the Tea dance!” And I was like, “Excuse me, I have been here 52 years and I’ve never been to a Tea dance!” 

What do you think about Pride parades?

It feels like there’s one every day! Where they need Pride parades isn’t in Provincetown and San Francisco, it’s in communities that are the most Republican and most restrictive. To me, every day is Pride. I think heterosexuals should march in Provincetown because they are the minority! Sometimes I like to go to straight bars, to feel like an outsider.

Your 1970 film Multiple Maniacs has just been re-released. How do you feel about the amazing shelf-life and longevity of your films?

I’m thrilled! They’ve restored Multiple Maniacs and it looks amazing. It’s like a bad John Cassavettes movie, it’s moved up to look like that. 

Do you re-edit your films in your mind when you see them years later?

Yeah, I look at them and say, “I should have cut that.” But no, they are from a certain time period and I wouldn’t go back and change them. I think most filmmakers, when they see their films later on, they think of what they could change. They just see the mistakes. I saw Multiple Maniacs at the Provincetown film festival and the audience was full of young people and they looked shocked! It made me laugh and I said, “What WAS I thinking? This is more hideous than I remember!”

In the wake of Orlando many people have forgotten that LGBTQ people have always been vilified, attacked and killed in cities across North America and around the world. This is nothing new. 

None of these terrorist attacks is more shocking than the other just because it is straight or gay. To me they are all done by assholes. That’s how powerless people fight, it’s with terrorism. It’s unfortunate, but for them it can work. It always has been an issue, it’s always going to be an issue. 

That night (at Pulse nightclub in Orlando) there were straight people there too. It was a gay club, but it was straight and gay people dancing together. And that is the only way gay bars are going to survive today because young people don’t want to be segregated. They don’t just want to be with gay people, they want to be with their cool friends straight and gay. And that’s actually a healthy sign. 

You’re still quite discreet. But you do love your celebrities.

I don’t know about discreet!! (Laughs) When I am out with celebrities, it usually is a work-related event. I always say, “If you are in show business and you have a dinner that is not tax-deductible, then you have a private life.” I have a lot of non-deductible dinners. 

We’ve lost so many greats this year, from David Bowie to Prince. What celebrity death has most marked you?

Obscure writers! I think Andy Warhol was a shocking death at the time. I knew him. As far as singers, I think Elvis. I first knew I was gay when I was eight years old and saw him singing and twitching. Elvis was important to me then. In my book Role Models I wrote about all the people who influenced me. Tennessee Williams (influenced) me because he wrote about bohemia. The first thing I ever wanted to be was a beatnik. So the first thing you ever want to be, whoever influenced you to want to be that, will always be your top role model in your life, no matter how old you are.

Why are you and Divine bound together forever?

Because Divine and I started out together, we made our early films together, and Divine in those days said the words best of all the people I worked with. I wrote those words for Divine. After Hairspray I didn’t write parts for people, I wrote a movie and then we would cast it. Up until then I wrote all the parts for Divine. It was a Divine vehicle, like a Susan Hayward picture! So I could hear him saying them as I wrote them. I didn’t have to direct him much, he knew exactly how to say what I wrote. 

Will John Waters write and direct another feature film?

Who knows? I’ve been paid to think up three of them. I have been working in Hollywood the last 10 years but they just haven’t been produced. Maybe not. My last two books were big hits, so I signed a two-book deal. So now I’m doing better in the book world than I am in the film world. Luckily I have many ways to earn a living. 

Do young men throw themselves at the feet of John Waters?

I wouldn’t put it that way, but I guess if I went looking for it, maybe! People do a lot of weird things at my signings: lovely people ask me if I will marry them, people have been nude waiting in line for me, I’ve signed dicks, asses and tits! I signed a tongue recently, that was new. There’s never a dull moment. It’s been good, and I haven’t been to Montreal in a long time either. I’m looking forward to it.

Montreal is famous for its male stripper bars.

I love your male stripper bars! I remember them!

The boys have full hard-ons too!

Actually I didn’t want to say, but that’s what I remember most! 

John Waters headlines his one-man comedy show This Filthy World: Une Soirée avec John Waters at the Pop Montreal festival, at the Rialto Theatre on Sept. 24. For tickets, visit popmontreal.com.

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TRANS ICON PATRICK CALIFIA: "BABY, I'M AN ACTIVIST IN THE SHOWER!"

October 9, 2016, 11:56 am
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Patrick Califia: "Male privilege is an unwelcome artifact of transitioning"

Bugs' interview with Patrick Califia originally ran in Three Dollar Bill on Nov. 19, 2009
"Baby, I’m an activist in the shower!" famed Texan author Pat Califia-Rice told me a decade ago, before she transitioned from a lesbian woman into a bisexual trans man.
Pat is now Patrick Califia, and the former Advocate sex columnist, celebrated author, marriage therapist, sex radical and queer icon has as loud a mouth as ever. 
"Nobody should be a man – the world won’t be okay until men stop existing," says the FTM (female-to-male) Califia. "It was actually pretty hard for me to transition on days when I felt like I was going to join the people who spit on the sidewalk and look up women’s skirts every chance they get. But one of the exciting things about being an FTM is the possibility of creating new forms of masculinity and addressing our society’s mistreatment of little boys and its crazy expectations of men."

You’d think the gay community would be more disposed to supporting trans rights than straight people, because we’re both battling the heterosexual establishment. But Califia was outraged when much of the U.S. gay community didn’t want trans rights included in last year’s ENDA (Employment Non-Discrimination Act) bill.
"I felt betrayed," Califia says. "I felt belittled. I ought to expect it, though. Every minority group that wins a little bit of power uses that power to step on somebody else. I’ve never seen this pattern change. Human beings continue to be prejudiced and afraid of the ‘Other,’ even if they are an ‘Other’ to somebody else. Being gay is no guarantee that you’ve got good politics about anything other than your own narrow set of issues."
The leather community is no better.
"The gay men’s leather community is actually going through a pretty hard time about the growing visibility of transmen. Ever since a publicly visible FTM, Billy Lane, ran for International Mr. Leather, various organizations have taken different positions about whether they will include transmen. Some cisgendered [born-male] leathermen are pro-trans inclusion; others are gender essentialists who absolutely can’t stomach it…
"I think it might be less of an issue if more FTMs were able to have genital surgery. As far as most men of all sexual orientations are concerned, it is the presence or absence of a penis that determines your gender. Many gay men are afraid of and hate women, sad to say. If they perceive a transman as having female genitals, that means he is icky and ruins the erotic tone of an all-male gathering."
Speaking of FTMs, this past summer I asked Gene Simmons of KISS his thoughts about Chastity Bono transitioning into a man.
"I love Chas," Simmons replied. "I was living with Cher when Chas and [her brother] Elijah were kids and I was a substitute dad for a while. Life is short and we should all make up and be happy. And everybody else be damned if Chas isn’t happy today, God bless. If Chas is happy, then she will have found the secret of life."
Chas now calls himself Chaz and, if anybody knows what it’s like to transition in the public eye, it’s Patrick Califia.
"Poor Chaz!" Patrick tells me. "He already had to go through Cher throwing a homophobic fit about him being a lesbian. Now I get the distinct impression Cher is equally unhappy about the gender change. And I frankly think that most of the negative publicity has been about the fact that Chaz is fat and not a pretty girl.
"If Chaz was going to become the kind of transman who looks like the star of Twilight, the media would be kissing his ass all up and down. Being in the public eye makes this whole process hell. I wish people would just leave him alone, let him see if this will make him happier, and withhold the judgments for several years. Transition is not a fast process. He has about 10 years of changes to go through before he knows what kind of man he is going to be."
One of those changes is the ingestion of testosterone. For Califia, whose landmark 1988 book Macho Sluts was reissued by Arsenal Books this week, "taking testosterone did change the way I process porn. It really did. I became a lot more interested in photographic and video material. I also found that I looked at it a lot more often and responded to it more strongly and more quickly. Testosterone made it easier to get aroused and it made my orgasms stronger."
Califia also notes, "I never respected [the powerful physical component of gender] before I took testosterone and felt it rewire my brain. I notice that I am more comfortable with confrontation now. I speak my mind more readily. I am less nervous in situations where physical violence might take place. I don’t like it, and I’m not good at it, but I will face it when it comes my way."
It may not be radical to be a man but, as Califia readily admits, "It feels very weird sometimes and like a guilty pleasure."
Twitter.com/bugsburnett
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PLAYWRIGHT JORDAN TANNAHILL ON VIDEOFAG, QUEERNESS, COMING OUT AND THE GGs

October 10, 2016, 2:16 pm
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Jordan Tannahill (photo by Lacey Creighton)
Bugs' original interview with Jordan Tannahill ran in POP TART in the Montreal Gazette on Oct. 21, 2015.


Governor General’s Award-winning playwright Jordan Tannahill is one of the hottest names in Canadian theatre and author of the 2015 book Theatre of the Unimpressed – a look at how dull plays are killing theatre and what we can do about it – as well as Age of Minority: Three Solo Plays, which won the 2014 Governor General’s Award for drama. He also ran a storefront arts space called Videofag out of a defunct barbershop in Toronto’s Kensington Market with William Christopher Ellis, which they closed in April 2016.The Canadian playwright, filmmaker, and theatre director has been described by The Globe and Mail as “the poster child of a new generation of (theatre? film? dance?) artists for whom “interdisciplinary” is not a buzzword, but a way of life.”
I sat down with Tannahill for toasté hotdogs, burgers and poutine at the Montreal Pool Room, on the eve of his play Total Liquidation, which his National Theatre School students put on at the Monument National in October 2015.

Pop Tart: Why did you write Theatre of the Unimpressed?
Jordan Tannahill: As a theatre maker and director, what makes live performance vital in the 21stcentury? When there is cinema, video and television, why tell stories live in front of an audience? The book attempts to answer that. Why live? I think the vitality of theatre still rests in that very simple, elemental question.
Do you think theatre in Canada could be more queer?
“I don’t know if cinema or television are more queer than theatre, but in some way theatre remains a fairly accessible form for makers. I think stories can be told anywhere, so if you run into a (conservative) gatekeeper then just go around them, make your own palaces.”
Make your own Videofag.
Exactly! I think the question you’re asking is if there is a lack of queer representation on major mainstream stages. Perhaps. I think the straight narrative is still the default narrative.
How central is your queerness to your identity?
I think it is very central. It is integral in my world views, in the art that I feel speaks to me, or the politics I support. Some of my shows are overtly about queer characters, but some od them are not, but (even then) I can’t help but write (in) queer characters. Questions about gender or identity, outsiders, voices on the margins – those are questions I am drawn to immediately.
What was your coming out like?
I was young. I was 14. My mom was great, she had a lot of gay friends, so I was exposed to gay men in my childhood. I came out later to my father, and when I did, he was very open and accepting. I can’t cry foul  when it comes to my own coming out stories. But when you are in a minority, you are aware of the hegemonic mainstream and you are consciously, biologically or implicitly rejecting that to some extent.
What is it like to win a Governor General’s Award?
That day was exciting in many ways, but it does transform your relationships. I don’t feel like I have to constantly prove myself with every project. I can present crazy, wacky, weird ideas to artistic directors now. There’s a kind of willingness now to see it through. The GGs have even allowed me to make even bolder, stranger proposals now. I am fortunate to have success at such a young age. I am increasingly producing my stuff not at spaces like Videofag, but at the NAC or Canadian Stage. But how to remain a shit disturber, how to remain angry, because for me anger is the primary fuel of good art.
How excited are you about directing your students in Total Liquidation?
I’ve been working with these actors for three years now, so I’ve seen them grow up. They have also created all of their own original punk music for this play, inspired by the Montreal scene, and they’re a politically-engaged group. This is a unique work, made with them and for them. We’re going to detonate the Monument National!
How do you like Montreal?
I just love it! For me Montreal is a profoundly queer city, it’s a romantic city, it’s a city dripping with sex and it has profoundly informed Total Liquidation, which is a politically and sexually-charged piece.
Are young men throwing themselves at the feet of Jordan Tannahill?
(Laughs out loud) I wish! That’s so sweet. Actually, I have a boyfriend now and I’m really falling head over heels for him!
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ROBERT OUIMET AND FRANCE JOLI: THE GODFATHER AND QUEEN OF MONTREAL DISCO

October 16, 2016, 9:37 am
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Robert Ouimet (L) and Pierre Gagnon at their Oct. 5 Red Bull Music Academy lecture in Montreal. Gagnon is one-third of PAJ Disco Mix, the edit team that created exclusive cuts for Ouimet’s DJ sets and revolutionized the disco edit format using reel-to-reel tapes, selling over half a million records at their pinnacle in the late ’70s (photo by Karel Chladek/Red Bull Content Pool).

Montreal’s famed disco scene cranked out many disco stars during its 1970s heyday and the scene’s epicentre was the city’s famed Lime Light disco founded by Yvon Lafrance in September 1973, on Stanley Street above where the Chez Paree strip joint stands today. 

Montreal DJ Robert Ouimet was the house deejay at the Lime Light from 1973 to 1981, and today Yvon Lafrance says Ouimet – known worldwide as the Godfather of Montreal Disco – was hands-down the best deejay in Canada from 1973 to 1982, when Ouimet was declared best North American DJ by Rolling Stone magazine in 1976, and won Billboard magazine’s DJ of the Year Award in 1977.

“I used to go to New York all the time during the week – I remember I was flown over there once for the premiere of (the movie) Thank God It’s Friday (starring Donna Summer),” Ouimet told me in 2013. “Then I used to work in Montreal on the weekends.” 
Disco diva France Joli (Photo by David A Lee)

Meanwhile, Montreal singer France Joli became an “overnight success” at the age of 16 back on July 7, 1979, when she headlined a legendary beach concert performance for 5,000 gay men now famously known as Beach ’79.

Donna Summer had cancelled at the last minute, so Joli stepped in as a replacement and sang her song Come to Me, which would chart at #15 on the Billboard Hot 100 Chart  – then at #1 on the disco chart – and to this day the song is widely-known as “the definitive Fire Island dance classic.”

“I was blown away, I was a kid and had never seen gay life like that before, it was beautiful to see two men embracing – and it was 1979!” France Joli told me in 2013. “I loved that freedom and the happiness that disco reflected. It’s impossible not to be happy and dance to disco. The lyrics could be dark, but the music always lifted you up.”

Both Ouimet and Joli will take part in the Québec Électrique: Montréal Discoville event at the Paradoxe Theatre as part of the 2016 Red Bull Music Academy conference being held in Montreal. 

The RBMA describes Ouimet as “one of the most influential DJs of Montreal’s heyday, ruling the dancefloor of the legendary Lime Light club. Montreal was the second biggest disco metropolis in North America after NYC, with many homegrown disco stars, and was an important springboard for imports from Europe. As the city’s leading DJ, Ouimet played an important role breaking hits like Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love” in North America.”


I interviewed both Ouimetand Joliin 2013 for stories about the evolution of disco in Montreal. It is important to remember that the Montreal of the 1970s was really a city of broken dreams, dreams that had their roots in the cosmopolitan explosion of Expo 67, the most successful World’s Fair of the 20th century, and the 1969 inaugural season of Nos Amours, the Montreal Expos.

Then came the FLQ and the October Crisis; the billion-dollar Summer Olympics that Montreal’s then-mayor Jean Drapeau infamously claimed couldn’t have a deficit any more than a man could have a baby; increased pressure by police on gay businesses as bathhouses and bars were raided. There was the election of the Parti Québécois in 1976 – which shattered yet more dreams and fueled the anglophone exodus – and four years later, the failed referendum of 1980, which in turn crushed the dreams of Quebec separatists.

Mirabel Airport – built where it was because politicians and urban planners anticipated that Montreal would triple in size to become one of the world’s great metropolises – became a symbol of everything that had gone wrong in Montreal.

So disco music became a salvation of sorts for Montrealers and discotheques their new cathedrals. As Harry Wayne Casey (aka KC of KC and the Sunshine Band) once told me, “Disco was feel-good music that delivered on the promises of the 1960s.” 

Joli was just 12 in 1975 when she signed with her first manager, legendary musician and songwriter Lee Gagnon, who at the time famously worked with Charles Aznavour and Ginette Reno and who now lives in NYC. “Lee taught me to walk in high heels and put me in singing and piano lessons!”

Joli then auditioned for producer Tony Green when she was 15-years-old. “I sang Evergreen and Hopelessly Devoted To You, and I guess I impressed him because three days later Come To Me was written for me.”

That classic #1 disco song was recorded in November 1978. By the time Joli replaced Donna summer at Fire Island in July 1979, she was on the cusp of full-fledged stardom.


“My head was spinning, but my Mom kept me grounded. I didn’t go crazy on drugs, I didn’t blow my money – but then again, what money? I’m not any different than any other artist from back then. Look at all those artists from the 70s and early 80s ­– and I perform with them all the time – nobody lives in a palace,” Joli says. “But it’s okay because we have longevity. We’re not filthy rich, but we’re still making a living.”

Today Robert Ouimet is known worldwide as The Godfather of Montreal Disco, and Montreal’s Queen of Disco France Joli is still hugely popular performing at Pride and other events, primarily in the United States.

Both Ouimet and Joli have fond memories of The Lime Light in Montreal.

Says Ouimet, “The Lime Light really was better than Studio 54, and that’s (mostly) because it was a fun place for everybody – men, women, black, white, straight and gay. A lot of international stars also (partied) or performed at the Lime Light. I saw Alice Cooper. Grace Jones used to come often. The Ritchie Family and Gloria Gaynor played there; so did James Brown (for five consecutive nights in 1977). One night I was at a David Bowie (concert) with a promotion man and I brought them and Iggy Pop to the Lime Light afterwards to see Gloria Gaynor perform live at the club!”

Joli also performed at the Lime Light twice.

“I have a very vivid memory of the Lime Light when Gonna Get Over You came out (in 1981) and the place was so full that people were hanging from the ceiling, on top of the speakers, from the railings, and the fire department came the place was so full!” Joli laughs. “People were dancing and screaming and I could feel the floor (bounce so much), I thought it was going to collapse! In its heyday the Lime Light was the place to be.”


While the homophobic “Disco Sucks” movement claimed discos from coast-to-coast, dance music never really went out of style in Montreal. 

However Quimet points out being a deejay in the 1970s and being a deejay today are essentially two different jobs.

“When I first started I was mixing fade in, fade out. After a while you get the hang of mixing records because the beats were never the same, so you wait until the end and you enter the other one. Today it’s not the same thing. Today it’s mostly machines doing drums and beats. They’re not real drummers like in the 1970s who were very hard to mix because the tempos were uneven. Disco was great because you had down-tempo stuff, mid-tempo and up-tempo stuff. I would start at 90 beats-per-minute and finish at 135-140. You don’t see that anymore. Today you hear 125, 126 to 127 and that’s it. There’s no variety. Today it’s easier to (deejay) because there is no fluctuation in the beat. It’s always the same thing.”

Whatever you do, just don’t call Robert Ouimet a living legend. He won’t have it. “I don’t feel like I’m a legend at all,” he says. “I feel more like a pioneer. I’ve been doing this for a long, long time. My career never went down. After the Lime Light I had a lot of gigs, was a resident at a lot of clubs. I never went away. I (even) won a Juno (Award). I just really love music and I love what I’m doing. And disco is happy music. You feel it because it’s from the heart.” 

As for Joli, she acknowledges the major role her gay fans have played in her career. “They kick started my career on Fire Island and their love today is still unconditional, and I feel very blessed.”

France Joli will perform live and Robert Ouimet will spin at the Québec Électrique : Montréal Discoville on Oct 21 at the Paradoxe Theatre (5959 Monk Boulevard) in Ville Emard. About the event, the RMBA states, “Montréal’s status as disco’s second city may be an unlikely one, but the DJs, record labels and clubs that sprouted up back in the late ’70s know the truth: The genre was the soundtrack to the city, in both French and English. In a special celebration of the vaunted Lime Light club’s enormous influence on the city, local disco royalty Robert Ouimet, Michel Simard and LOST HEROES (Christian Pronovost)  – three DJs with almost a century’s worth of experience among them – will play alongside disco diva France Joli and special European guest Alexander Robotnick, whose productions showcase the heavily synthesized Italo sounds that flavoured Montréal disco at the time. Held at the opulent Théâtre Paradoxe, it will be a night that puts Montréal disco back on the map for those who knew about it way back when, and those who are finding out about it for the very first time.” Admission: $10. Showtime: 9 p.m. Click here for tickets.

Excellent 2014 Red Bull Music Academy story “How Montreal Became Disco’s Second City.” 

RBMA Radio 60-minute Academy Afternoons podcast on Montreal Disco Pioneers

RBMA Radio 60-minute Academy Afternoons podcast on Montreal's Disco Heyday 

Transcript of the Oct. 5, 2016, Red Bull Music Academy lecture with Robert Ouimet and Pierre Gagnon about Disco's golden era in Montreal.

RBMA Daily goes behind-the-scenes and visits the legendary Lime Light DJ booth in excellent story Nightclubbing: Montréal’s Lime Light

Twitter.com/bugsburnett
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ANNIE PROULX: HOW SHE MADE BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN "PACK A STRONGER PUNCH"

October 25, 2016, 5:09 pm
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Proulx: "Brokeback Mountain coalesced thoughts and feelings that many people secretly held."
At the start of her career, American journalist and author E. Annie Proulx submitted stories to publishers using the name EA Proulx because, she says, it was easier to get published if editors thought she was a man. 

Those days are long gone.
Annie Proulx (Photo by Gus Powell)

I recently interviewed Proulx, the literary titan whose novels include The Shipping News (1993), which won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award for Fiction. But she may be best known for her short story “Brokeback Mountain,” which was originally published in The New Yorker in 1997 and begat an Oscar-winning film as well as an opera for which Proulx wrote the libretto. 

In a wide-ranging interview, Proulx and I discussed her love for Canada, her new novel Barkskins which explores her deep concern for the future of our planet; how she comes up with her characters’ names, such as Ennis del Mar, Jack Twist, Ribeye Cluke and Beaufield Nutbeem; and, of course, the “Brokeback Mountain” phenomenon.

When I asked why she thinks her story “Brokeback Mountain” resonates with audiences as deeply as it does, Proulx replied, “‘Brokeback Mountain’ coalesced thoughts and feelings that many people secretly held. The story and the film helped show the injustice of ostracism to a general public. The time was right for change and the story seeped into the culture. By making the protagonists individualistic, hard-working tough cowboys, the most masculine American identity, the story packed a stronger punch than if the characters had been any other profession.”

Read my full interview with Proulx by clicking here.

Read my column about how Hollywood homophobia killed Brokeback Mountain's chances for winning the 2006 Oscar for Best Film—despite my blurb the film studio used in its Oscar-race campaign—byclicking here.

Twitter.com/bugsburnett
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TONY WINNER MICHAEL CERVERIS GIVES GOOD HED (WIG)

November 5, 2016, 11:30 am
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Tony winning actor Michael Cerveris (Photo courtesy In The Wings Promotions)

Playbill calls legendary American actor Michael Cerveris “arguably the most versatile leading man on Broadway.” And for good reason: Cerveris has played everything from Shakespeare’s Romeo to the homicidal title character in Sweeney Todd, to trans rock diva Hedwig in the landmark rock musical Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Along the way he has won Tony Awards for Best Featured Actor in a Musical in 2004 for his portrayal of John Wilkes Booth in Assassins, and Best Leading Actor in a Musical in 2015 for his portrayal of Bruce Bechdel in Fun Home.

On the eve of his Nov. 11 acting masterclass in Montreal – during which participants will have the opportunity to work one-on-one with Cerveris – I sat down with Michael for a candid Q&A about his spectacular career. The interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

Three Dollar Bill: Laurence Olivier once said acting on screen is all about the eyes, and onstage it’s all about your hands. What do you think?
Cerveris in Fun Home (Photo by Joan Marcus)

Michael Cerveris: I see what he says that, and it’s not necessarily wrong. From a sheer physics standpoint, it’s a little hard to track somebody’s eyes from the back row. Buy it does speak to something that I learned more from Olivier than I realized: I do feel like I am a physical actor. I want every part of my body communicating something to the audience, and not just be a talking head. I tend to find physical gestures for my characters onstage and tend not to think about that for my on-camera work.

How thrilling is it to star in a big-budget blockbuster on Broadway? Does the glamour and romance of it fade after a while?

The noise and shininess of it might fade, but the things I care most about don’t fade: the connection with the audience, the opportunity to tell a story you believe in and care about. To be honest, as fun as the glitter and glamour is, I find a lot of it distracting and exhausting. After opening night is done, and after the awards season is done – no matter how it goes – that’s when I feel really comfortable and like to get back to the actual job, which is going to work at the theatre eight times a week. The real joy is working with other actors and connecting with the audience.

What is your routine settling into each new dressing room?

I tend to really move in. I know actors who won’t even put up a postcard until the reviews are in. But I’m the opposite. I go in trying to will the show to have a long life. I know I will be spending more time in my dressing room than I do in my apartment. I also like to compose a dressing room that makes sense with the show. So my dressing room for Evita had a little turntable and tango records from the 40s and 50s. My dressing room for Fun home was much more 70s oriented – I even had Partridge Family records! I like to continue the world of the play in the dressing room so it’s not a jarring thing to go back and forth, one to the other.
Cerveris' dog Evangeline (a.k.a. Evie) was a
fixture backstage at Fun Home
(Photo courtesy Michael Cerveris)

What is it like to win a Tony Award? I’m thinking the first time in 2004, for Assassins.

I had already lost once before, which was a great thing in retrospect. It had all the excitement, the rush of attention. Then all of sudden it’s gone and you’re left with just the job. That really helped me appreciate what the enduring thing is, which is the job itself.

Did you feel the same way the second time in 2015, for Fun Home?

The first win was such a dizzying surprise. I felt overwhelmed during my acceptance speech. The second time it felt more meaningful, like an acknowledgement not just of my work in Fun home, but a recogition of a couple decades of work. It felt more earned, whereas the first felt more like a gift.

I love that you have played two incredible queer roles, Hedwig, and Bruce Bechdel in Fun Home. Let’s start with Hedwig. Do you have a special memory from playing that role, off-Broadway or in the West End?

John Cameron Mitchell was a friend of mine, we came up in the off-Broadway scene together. I was so floored by Hedwig that I went back to see it four times never thinking that anybody but John would play that role. Then when he was tired and wanted to take a month off, he called me to take over and I was thrilled and terrified. But it was such a liberating experience – in many ways the most personal performance I did before Fun Home – because Hedwig is such a larger-than-life character and there is something about drag and the whole persona that you create that is really freeing and liberating and allows you to show very vulnerable parts of yourself with the protection of this huge mask.
Cerveris with Miriam Hor off-Broadway in
Hedwig and the Angry Inch 
(Photo by Carol Rosegg)

How did playing Bruce Bechdel in Fun Home take an emotional toll on you?

Carrying around the pain, fear and self-regret that Bruce had to carry around for his whole life – doing that eight times a week – takes a toll. You walk around in character all day. There is a residual effect from carrying dark and troubled emotions around with you and then live them out every night onstage. You try to shake it off when you leave the theatre at night, but it doesn’t go away. I played other roles like Sweeney Todd that were dark and troubled, but in most other plays you get some kind of catharsis or purging that makes it is little easier to let go. With Bruce, you never really do.

What is the difference between Broadway and West End audiences?

When we first arrived in London to perform Hedwig, we realized – especially in the spoken sections – we needed to pick up the tempo a bit because British audiences, at least at that time, listened more quickly and processed information more quickly than American audiences. We guessed that it had something to do with the tradition of Shakespeare and complicated verse plays, whereas the bulk of what American audiences see is more visually oriented and linear-action oriented. We found British audiences were getting a little ahead of us when we performed it at our leisurely pace we sometimes did in New York. So we speeded it up.

What can participants expect from your acting masterclass?

As with most things I’m involved with, expecting the unexpected is probably a good idea. My teachers all had a similar kind of idea of what good truthful performing was, but all had different ways of getting you there. I left my schooling with a really great tool bag with lots of different tools I could use depending on what the task was, and it has stood me in good stead over the years. I don’t have just one method or technique that I try to indoctrinate people in. What I like to do mostly is to see what someone brings to the masterclass and respond to that.

In The Wings Promotions presents the Michael Cerveris masterclass in Montreal on Nov. 11. During the workshop, participants will have the opportunity to work on musical theatre or pop selections, monologues or on-camera scene work. Enrollment in the masterclass is extremely limited and open to participants who will each have one-on-one time with Cerveris, as well as auditors who can observe and learn from the audience. The masterclass will conclude with a Q&A with Michael and time to grab a selfie or autograph. To participate, the fee is $195 and to audit the class, the fee is $75. For more info or to register, click here or email masterclass@inthewingspromotions.com.

Click hereto read classic Three Dollar Bill interview with Alison Bechdel

Click here to read vintage Three Dollar Bill  interview with John Cameron Mitchell

Twitter.com/bugsburnett
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CAKES DA KILLA: "I DON'T IDENTIFY AS QUEER. I AM JUST A RAPPER."

November 7, 2016, 7:59 am
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Cakes da Killa: "I don’t identify as queer. I am just a rapper."

Up-and-coming American rapper Cakes da Killa has been compared to Lil’ Kim and Foxy Brown, but has also been making headlines as an openly-gay performer. Out magazine describes Cakes – a.k.a. Rashard Bradshaw – as “the class clown of the next generation of queer hip-hop musicians (who) may also become leader of the pack.” This wave features such performers as Shamir, Big Freedia, Mz Jonz, Mykki Blanco and Le1f. 
Check out the animated video clip below of Cakes da Killa's new single New Phone (Who Dis) from his just-released 2016 album Hedonism. Meanwhile, I originally sat down with Cakes da Killa for a candid interview when he performed in Montreal in November 2015. 

Three Dollar Bill: You came out in Third Grade. What was that like?
Cakes da Killa: My mother found an innocent love letter in my book bag and confronted me about it. I tried to eat the note and when that didn’t work I ran around the house with it and she chased me. After a while I just stopped running and told her I was gay.  I think she was more taken aback that I was aware of sexuality that early on more so than the gay aspect of it.
School wasn’t anything too dramatic. I was big enough to defend myself and I was funny enough to be semi popular which didn’t make me an easy target for bullying. My home life didn’t really change much after coming out. A mother always knows even when she wants to act surprised.
You have said “An openly gay rapper shouldn’t be breaking news.” But here we are talking about it again. Why can’t people let this subject go?
I don’t know. Maybe for headline shock value or click bait? I think we’ve already established I’m an openly gay MC already so if we just focus on how talented I am that would be amazing. I’ve accomplished a lot in the last four years as an underground artist that doesn’t really depend on my sexual preference but on my work ethic and skills. I do see the importance of visibility which is why I never wanted to be closeted. I doubt me being closeted would work out though.
Are you a queer hip hop artist, or a hip hop artist who just happens to be queer?
You know the answer to this question already. I don’t identify as queer. Are you a Caucasian journalist? Are you a male journalist? Your job title is journalist. No need for the extra adjective. I am just a rapper.
The old-school mentality that “queer hip hop” is an oxymoron, why does it continue?
I think the artists who the media force into that category find it annoying because we have few things in common sonically, and we all don’t all identify as queer. Lastly, hip hop is a genre that leaves room for variety. I guess those older hip hop purists find it oxymoronic because rap is a man’s man sport and a homosexual is consider less of a man. This way of thinking does nothing to me, though, because I still have bills to pay and songs to make.


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FELICE PICANO 100% UNCENSORED—ON FAME, STONEWALL, GAY LIT AND QUEER LIFE

November 17, 2016, 4:44 pm
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The trailblazing Godfather of Gay Lit, Felice Picano

I call literary icon Felice Picano the Godfather of Gay Lit because Felice revolutionized gay literature as the founder of SeaHorse Press and as one of the founders of Gay Presses of New York, which launched such writers as Harvey Fierstein, Dennis Cooper and Brad Gooch. In fact, when SeaHorse Press began in 1977, it was just the second gay publishing house in the world, after Gay Sunshine Press in San Francisco.

Felice is also a world-class memoirist who has met everybody: Rudolf Nureyev once grabbed his bum, Felice had lunch in Fire Island one afternoon with Elizabeth Taylor, his cock was photographed by Robert Mapplethorpe, and when he outed the late Anthony Perkins years after their affair, critics screamed, “Picano is a name-dropping slut!” There is also bootleg film footage of Picano at New York City’s famed Continental Baths in 1971, where Bette Midler is performing with her pianist Barry Manilow and pulls Felice out of the crowd. “This was all set up beforehand,” Felice says. “Bette sort of sings to me, looks down at my crotch and says, ‘Oh, you’re disgusting!’ and pushes me back into the crowd because I had a hard-on at that point, but it wasn’t from her!” 
I first met Felice at a Montreal brunch in either 2000 or 2001, and have written my annual Felice Picano column ever since. Once, when I wrote a column about my crush on Justin, a Tanzanian cook I became infatuated with when I hooked up with an overland truck in Kenya a lifetime ago, Felice – mindful of the criticism and threats I’d gotten from irate readers at the time – wrote me, “I always remember what my grandmother told me: ‘If everyone likes you, that means you’re mediocre.’ I’m not, and neither are you.”
Nights at Rizzoli
(Or Books)

Felice is the author of 35 books of poetry, fiction, memoirs, nonfiction and plays, including his must-read memoirs True Stories: Portraits From My Past, True Stories Too: People and Places From My Past and the award-winning Nights at Rizzoli.
 
I caught up with Felice recently, to preview his recent appearance in Montreal headlining the Never Apart Centre’s Legend Series, whose past guests include Mink Stole, Bruce LaBruce, Joey Arias and Carole Pope. We talked about everything from Robert Mapplethorpe to queer politics in the age of Grindr. The interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
 
Three Dollar Bill: From the beginning of your career, was your objective to achieve fame and respect as a literary figure?

Felice Picano: Fame was not my intention. In 1980 when I became quite famous, it was too much and I pulled back. I stopped publishing books for six years because I just didn’t like what fame was doing, not so much to me, but to the people around me. 
 
Are you telling me Felice Picano has not known anonymous sex in 40 years?

Well, not in America, at least!
 
Now people want to be famous just for the sake of being famous…

I know, and that was never my intention. All I wanted to do was write my books and get them published. That continues to be my intention. If people read them, great. If I can make a living that way, great. Over the years I have done just enough (events and publicity) so that when my books are published, I have enough going so people will know who I am and go out to buy them. 
 
What about Kim Kardashian?

Oh, (Paris) was just waiting to happen. 
 
Mapplethorpe photographed your cock. Was he a fame whore?

He was a hustler, yeah, he was after fame. He was more into money than fame. But I remember him telling me at one point, “If I do my job correctly I’ll be famous 50 years from now.” And I said, “Oh well, good for you.” He knew that very well at the time. 
 
How did Mapplethorpe photograph your cock?

He called me up in the middle of the night to come over to his studio. I said, “What for?” He replied, “We’ve done business before.” I recall that for Brad Gooch’s first book, a collection of short stories called Jailbait and Other Stories, Brad brought me a photo by Mapplethorpe. I put that on the front of the book, the first book cover Mapplethorpe ever had. So he called me up and said, “I want to do some business with you.” I went down to his studio and when I got there he started showing me all these photos of people’s dicks. I told him I had seen his dick photos of big black guys and said, “I’m nothing like that!” But I had dated his former intern Scott for a while and they would discuss dick all day and Scott said I  had a nice-looking one. So that’s how it happened.
 
Author Felice Picano
(photo by Carlo Capomazzo)
So you just dropped your pants or what?

He was taking pictures as he was blowing me.  And I don’t know where those photos are today! 
 
The opening line in a Haaretz story about the August 2016 closing of Tel Aviv's last gay bar, Evita, reads, “Tel Aviv users of Grindr, the dating app for gays, repeatedly encountered a pop-up ad inviting them to celebrate the absolutely last week of Evita Bar, which closed its doors on Saturday after 12 years.” How do you feel about the wave of gay bars closing?

When I was in Tel Aviv 25 years ago there were four gay bars. There are three or four gay bars here in West Hollywood that have been going for years and years, but others have closed around the city. I don’t go to them anymore unless I’m with somebody from out of town and they want to go to Mickey’s, and I’ll take them. I don’t know how (young people) are socializing because for (my generation) gay bars were about socializing. Then you see what happened in Orlando and you wonder if that’s how you want to socialize. 
 
How did Orlando affect you?

It was horrible to see so many people killed, but it affected me little because I have seen this stuff for years. There have been (anti-gay) assassinations for years. I remember (outside the Ramrod and) Sneakers bar in New York in 1980, this guy (38-year-old former transit police officer Ronald K. Crumpley) shot up the place  and two people died and injured four others. So to me Orlando was nothing new. But Orlando really affected young people who were politicized (by the shooting). 
 
Did the murder of Harvey Milk affect you?

When it happened, yes. I knew him a little bit, had only met him a couple of times. I liked him. But what affected me more was when (Milk’s killer) Dan White got off, that was astounding to us. 
 
You are helping promote the new documentary film Stonewall: The Movement. Why is this film important?

Well, considering that most gay kids know zero (about queer history), if they can spend an hour watching this movie, they can find out what all the major steps were. It’s not specifically about Stonewall, it’s about movements from the 40s, 50s and 60s, a couple of which could have turned out to be Stonewall. It’s got a bunch of talking heads, of which I am one.


 
Have you seen Hollywood director Roland Emmerich’s feature film Stonewall, which was filmed in Montreal in 2014?

No, but I did read the script.
 
Activists hated the script because it rewrote history.

I was not asked to vet it, I was shown it just before the film opened here and I said the same thing: This does not look historically correct. 
 
What is the problem with capturing the truth of Stonewall?

The problem is there was the event, which on the surface looked very glamourous and a lot of people would like to take credit for. The reality is it was the next 10 days of street protests and people marching around getting signatures for the Gay Activists Alliance – the Gay Liberation Front, actually, that was the first one –  that’s what actually made history. There would be no gay movement now if that didn’t happen. But that’s not so glamourous. That’s just people walking around with signs at subway stops. That’s what actually got things done. 
 
The first Pride march was held in New York City in 1970 to commemorate the first anniversary of Stonewall.

I was there. There were more people on the sidelines than were marching. There was a lot of harassment and very few police. 
A young Felice Picano (photo
via Picano's official Facebook page)
 
In addition to the official Stonewall 25 parade in New York to mark the 25th anniversary of Stonewall in 1994, there was also a renegade march organized by ACT UP where you were a parade marshal alongside Allen Ginsberg and Camille Paglia. 

Somebody from NAMBLA asked, “Would you march with us?” So I said sure. Although NAMBLA contacted me, they were not the main reason why I joined the parade, nor ACT UP, nor the others. I joined it because I was horrified there would be a 25th anniversary parade and certain LGBT groups were not invited. Camille Paglia, Allen Ginsberg – who was already quite ill – and I were asked to be the leaders of the (renegade) parade, the three of us said yes. We were marching completely illegally and we took the original route from 1970, which was not what (Stonewall 25) was doing. We were stopped (by the authorities), but by then we had accumulated about 4,000 to 5,000 people who had left the other march to come over to ours. They couldn’t stop us. Here we were, two Italians talking to somebody from (Mayor) Giuliani’s office. Camille told them to go to hell or something, did they want bloodshed on their hands? We were not going to stop and we kept on marching. 
 
You famously are one of the original seven members of the legendary Violet Quill Club which transformed gay lit in the 20th century.

There was none before us, and after there was. It’s that simple. There were homosexual books before that but there was no gay literature at all. 
 
So Gore Vidal did not write gay lit.

And he was not a gay person either. He was a good old-fashioned 1940s – 1950s homosexual. That’s what he was.
 
Did you like him?

Not much, no. We had some correspondence for a couple of years and I sort of unwittingly helped him to get something published.
 
Was he a bitter old queen?

He was a drunk old queen.
 
How excited are you about coming back to Montreal?

I always have a good time in Montreal, always feel like I get my due there as an author. But I want to see all the changes there. I first went to Montreal for Expo 67. The city was very different back then. The last time I was in Montreal I had a very good time with (male) strippers! What I really love is the way the strippers are announced in Montreal, and I thought there is nothing quite like this in the world! 

Links to previous Three Dollar Bill interviews with Felice Picano:

2004 interview in HOUR magazine: Picano on Troy Donahue, Larry Kramer and same-sex marriage

2007interview in HOUR magazine: Picano on Edmund White, Gore Vidal and Truman Capote

2009interview in HOUR magazine: Picano on Armistead Maupin, Rock Hudson, Don Bachardy and Mickey Rooney

2010interview in HOUR magazine: Picano on Tennessee Williams, Marlene Dietrich, Bette Midler, Bob Dylan and the Violet Quill

2011interview in FUGUES magazine: Picano on Martin Duberman, Allen Ginsberg and Elizabeth Taylor 

2015interview in FUGUES magazine: Picano on Woodstock, the Rizzoli bookshop, the Continental Baths, Bette Midler and Diana Vreeland

2016interview in FUGUES magazine: Picano on fame, Robert Mapplethorpe, Stonewall, Pride and queer life in the age of Grindr



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THE MAKING OF THE CLASSIC HOLIDAY FILM "BREAKFAST WITH SCOT"

November 20, 2016, 11:34 am
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Tom Cavanagh plays a gay NHL player in the classic 2007 film
Breakfast with Scot (photo courtesy Miracle Pictures)

Bugs' original column on Breakfast with Scot ran in the Dec. 6, 2007, instalment of Three Dollar Bill.
I’ve had a crush on Hollywood TV star Tom Cavanagh – the most handsome man on television – ever since I spotted him in the fab NBC-TV series Ed some years ago.
"Gosh, I’d love to see him lock lips with another guy," I thought then, never thinking I’d actually see Cavanagh play a gay role, never mind talk to him about it.
Breakfast with Scot
But unbelievably I did, this week, as Cavanagh called me (!) at home to discuss his fabulous new hockey movie Breakfast with Scot, a Canadian Disney-esque family film about a straight-acting gay couple, Eric (Cavanagh) and Sam (Ben Shenkman of HBO’s Angels in America), who adopt recently orphaned Scot, a swishy 11-year-old, musical-loving drama queen.
"It’s about a kid who doesn’t have a home, and every kid deserves to be loved," says Cavanagh, a married father of two.
The kid, Scot, is played by 12-year-old Montrealer Noah Bernett. And this is where things get really interesting.
One day seven years ago, not one but two friends on the same day told me that the owner of the Ripples ice cream parlour on the Main was also named "Richard Burnett."
So the next day, after my seven-year-old brother Skye and I went swimming at the neighbouring indoor Schubert Pool (back then we’d go swimming at the Schubert Pool or go tobogganing on Mount Royal every Saturday), we popped into Ripples.
When I introduced myself to the owner, he told me, "People have been mistaking me for you for years! You don’t know how much trouble you’ve caused me!"
When Richard told us he spelled his family name "Bernett," Skye piped up and said, "We spell our name B-u-r!"
Well, it turns out Richard Bernett’s son Noah is Scot in Breakfast with Scot. And I got to see father and son briefly two weeks ago at an advance screening of Breakfast at Montreal’s Image+Nation queer film fest.
"It’s just acting!" Noah nonchalantly told a delighted audience when asked what it was like to play gay.
Canadian actor Tom Cavanagh
Which is exactly what Cavanagh told me when I asked him the same question.
"It was just acting!" Tom said. "I had no problem whatsoever. I thought it was a well-written character, an angry guy who has a shot at transformation."
Angry because he’s a former NHL Maple Leafs player who is now a publicly-closeted national sportscaster in the Queen City. And this kid Scot, well, he’s going to blow everybody’s cover in what, for my money, is the best feel-good family comedy of the year.
And, to boot, Ottawa-born, hockey-worshipping Tom gets to skate and wear a Leafs jersey in the film.
"I went to high school in southern Quebec when we were engaged in the unholy Nordiques and Canadiens war and I was firmly entrenched on the Habs’ side," Tom, 44, explains. "At the time the Maple Leafs were the sworn enemy. You’d never think of wearing their jersey ever.
"But," Tom continues, "after moving to the States, I realized the sport doesn’t carry the same weight as it does back home. So I found myself pulling for all Canadian teams. Hockey matters in Canada. So it was an honour to have the blessing of the NHL and the Maple Leafs. We [the cast and crew] just about fell off our chair. Wearing that Leafs jersey really gives the film a feel of authenticity."
Meanwhile, licensing Elton John’s song Step Into Christmas for the Breakfast soundtrack is another of those extraordinary Pink Mafia stories. "That song would have cost us $200,000 that we didn’t have," Breakfast director Laurie Lynd told me.
Elton and his Toronto-born husband David Furnish were in Toronto having dinner at actor Eric McCormack’s place (Eric is an honorary gay because he played Will in Will & Grace). A mutual friend of McCormack and Lynd explained the dilemma to McCormack.
So McCormack relayed the story to Elton and – presto! – Elton immediately agreed to let his song be used in the most gay- and family-positive movie of the year. Both Lynd and Cavanagh hope Breakfast will now find a big audience this holiday season in theatres across Canada so the film can secure a distribution deal stateside.
"That would be the greatest Christmas gift of all," Laurie sighs.
As for Tom, he recently told NBCSports.com about kissing his co-star Ben Shenkman. "Let me quote Keats here: ‘Beauty is truth, and truth is beauty.’ And when you’re as good-looking as Ben, it doesn’t matter if you’re a man or a woman. Although I’m not sure if Ben’s wife wants to hear me say that."
I tell Tom I’ve long wanted to see him play gay, that he’s the handsomest guy on TV, and that he’ll win over gay fans worldwide for his portrayal of a gay NHL hero.
Tom is clearly delighted.
"Heh! Heh! Heh!" Tom chuckles, then adds, "The bigger the audience we get, the better! Cheers, Richard!"


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TRANSGENDER ACTRESS CANDIS CAYNE BLAZES TRAIL ON PRIME-TIME TV

December 22, 2016, 2:15 pm
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Candis Cayne was the first transgender actress to play a recurring trans character on prime-time TV (Photo by Scott Everett White)


Bugs' interview with Candis Cayne orignally ran in the Montreal Gazette on August 6, 2015.

Before Caitlyn Jenner began documenting her gender transition on E!’s eight-part reality TV series I Am Cait, there was Candis Cayne, the American actress and performance artist who came to international attention in 2007 for portraying transgender mistress Carmelita on ABC’s prime-time drama Dirty Sexy Money.
Cayne made history then, becoming the first transgender actress to play a recurring transgender character in prime-time television.
Now Cayne is back on television, in Jenner’s reality show. She is a close friend of Jenner, who tells the show’s producers in one episode: “Candis is a beautiful woman, but as far as dating in the future, I have absolutely no idea.”
Needless to say, Candis and Cait are two of the most talked-about transgender women alive right now.

“All I can say as far as Caitlyn is concerned is we’re very close and she is a dear friend of mine,” says Cayne.
About transitioning in the public eye, Cayne says: “It is definitely not for everybody. You have to be a very strong person with deep resolve and character to be able to transition so openly. I think Caitlyn is handling it really well. She has a great group of people around her — including myself and some other girls — who are helping her along this path. We’ve all become really close to her. I know she’s going to be fine and she’s doing it right.”
The landscape was much different when Cayne, 43, began her own transition at the age of 25. Born Brendan McDaniel, one of two male fraternal twins, she moved from Maui to New York in the early 1990s and became a popular choreographer and drag performer in gay nightclubs. She also performed at Wigstock, and remains friends with drag legends Lady Bunny and RuPaul.
“I met some girls like me in New York, and even though when I was young I realized I felt like a girl, I really didn’t know how to do anything about it,” says Cayne. “There were no computers, no one in the media was like me. I was wondering why I wasn’t happy, because I’m a happy-go-lucky person. So when I was in New York and saw this for the first time, I put two and two together and thought, ‘That’s why nothing is working in my life.’
“I really wasn’t a gay man. I realized then I wanted to grow older as a woman, not as a man.”
At first Cayne was wary of transitioning publicly.
I met some girls like me in New York, and even though when I was young I realized I felt like a girl, I really didn’t know how to do anything about it. I was wondering why I wasn’t happy, because I’m a happy-go-lucky person.  — Candis Cayne
“I was concerned about how audiences would react, because I have always been career-driven,” she says. “That was my only concern. I knew my parents would be fine, knew my family would be fine. I did my transition then, did it openly in front of New York audiences, and it turned out they were very supportive of me.”
After landing her history-making role in Dirty Sexy Money, Cayne was cast as transgender character Alexis Stone in Season 6 of Nip/Tuck. While she achieved mainstream success as a transgender actress playing transgender roles, she acknowledges she did feel typecast.
“Oh yeah, there is definitely a trans ceiling, but boundaries are being broken right now,” Cayne explains. “My form of activism is actually going to auditions, teaching producers and others on the set, going on news programs and talk shows and talking about being a trans woman.
“I may not have been marching on the White House, but I was doing my part. Dirty Sexy Money was a monumental feat, and that only happened eight years ago. That’s nothing in the timeline of life. We’ve come so far that now the E! channel is airing Caitlyn Jenner’s docu-series.”
Cayne co-hosted the free outdoor Never Apart: Village Paradise concert at Montreal Pride 2015 with Montreal nightlife legend Plastik Patrik, with guests Queen of House Barbara Tucker, queer rapper Cazwell and trans icon Amanda Lepore.
Cayne says her Montreal show was a throwback to her old performance days in New York City.
“I perform at Gay Pride (festivals) often. I realize my community — the LGBTQ — has always been my family, and I will always perform for my family,” says Cayne. “It is something that is in my heart. They get it, they get what I do, they get my glamour, and I love them back.”

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AUTHOR DAVID BRET UNVEILS CLARK GABLE'S HOLLYWOOD CLOSET

December 24, 2016, 7:54 am
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A young Clark Gable

Bugs' interview with David Bret originally ran in Three Dollar Bill on May 29, 2008


When British CNN International correspondent Richard Quest was busted afterhours in Central Park last month with a rope around his neck, crystal meth in his pocket and a dildo up his ass, I told myself, "That’s why Anderson Cooper won’t come out."
I bet Cooper is afraid people will think he’s just another Richard Quest and then he’ll never get to replace Katie Couric as host of the CBS Evening News.
Another New Yorker, transplanted Brit Quentin Crisp, once astutely observed that when people think of gay celebrities, they wonder what they do in bed. Then they try picturing those stars having sex, and then inevitably picture themselves doing the same things.
"And they don’t like that," Quentin explained.
In America, when all a viewer can see when he looks at a homo is what he does in bed, your career – like Quest’s – is dead.
So, this week I was blabbing with fab British biographer David Bret. He’s written bios of Elvis Presley (Elvis: The Hollywood Years claims Elvis had an affair with actor Nick Adams and Col. Tom Parker blackmailed Presley by threatening to reveal "secret information" that Elvis was a homo), Joan Crawford, Errol Flynn, Maria Callas, and his good friend, the late Marlene Dietrich ("I was the last person she talked to – she called me two days before she died"). And Bret pretty well told me the same thing as Quentin Crisp.
Bret is currently riding a new wave of publicity promoting his terrific just-published bestselling biography Clark Gable: Tormented Star (Carroll & Graf), in which he exposes Gable’s secret gay life.

And, let me tell you, it was extensive. Or at least it was "until 1942, when he ‘became’ straight," quips Bret.
But just how repressed was Clark Gable about his bisexuality?
"Gable was brought up in a gung-ho atmosphere working with his father in the oil fields," Bret explains. "On Friday night [the oil hands] would fetch the local prostitutes and had 10 minutes each. That’s also the reason why Gable was so paranoid about cleanliness – from having sex with whores. And he did this because his father told him to. His father brought him up to believe he was a sissy. In the macho world of oilrigs, Gable was regarded as a bit of a pansy and his father called him that until the day he died. So Gable spent his entire life trying to prove he was a man."
There is a famous story Bret recalls in Tormented Star about why famed gay director George Cukor was fired from Gone With the Wind by David O. Selznick and replaced by The Wizard of Oz director Victor Fleming. Back at a 1937 party Cukor hosted, Gable spotted Cukor chatting with gay actor William Haines – whom Gable had serviced many times in his early years to further his career – and he assumed they were talking about him.

Liz Taylor described author 
David Bret as "a shit, 
but a lovable shit"
(Photo by Jeanne Bret)
So, unable to look a "woman’s director" in the eye, Gable had Cukor fired.
"Gable thought anyone who knew Haines had to be a raving queen," Bret says. "He didn’t want others to think that of him."
Gable also outed other actors such as Johnny Mack Brown and Rod La Rocque to prevent himself from being outed.
"In those days there were two gangs in Hollywood – Joan Crawford’s and Carole Lombard’s," Bret explains. "Lombard is the one who termed ‘fag hag.’ These gangs went to all the gay bars in Hollywood and no one thought anything of it because [actors like Gable] all had beards. But Gable was more discreet with his relationships, like Rod La Rocque.
"But when Johnny Mack Brown was making the [1931] movie Laughing Sinners with Joan Crawford, Gable had him fired because he thought he could do the role better," Bret continues. "Then he threatened to out him if he revealed their affair."
If Clark Gable was once a debonair hero, he no longer is in my eyes.
"Yes, he was very hypocritical. [Outing men he slept with] did make me think of him lesser as a man," Bret agrees.
Here I must mention that Bret is long married to a woman but is also openly bisexual ("I get the best of both worlds!").
Says Bret, "Had I been in the same situation [as Gable], I would have done the same thing [stayed in the closet]. It was very difficult being gay in those days, much more than it is today. And today it’s impossible. But today I’d also stick to my principles. Back then I would have made allowances because you would not have had a career."
The same might be said of Hollywood’s current crop of closeted matinee idols.
"Others will be writing the same thing about them in 50 years," Bret says, noting of Gable, "It was okay [for him] to deny he’s gay. But to ruin his boyfriend’s career? That wasn’t cool. But Hollywood is a cutthroat business."
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HOUSE OF LAUREEN: LIFE'S A DRAG – AND THAT'S WHAT MAKES IT FUN!

December 28, 2016, 4:20 pm
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House of Laureen onstage at Cafe Cleopatra (Photo by Kinga Michalska)


Montreal is one of the great drag capitals of the world, alongside New York, London, Vegas and Sydney. But the city hasn’t been home to a bonafide “house” since the House of Pride dominated the annual World Ball For Unity produced by Divers/Cité, the now-defunct queer Pride and arts festival that put Montreal on the international gay map in the 1990s.

The House of Laureen – named for Laureen Harper, wife of former Canadian PM Stephen Harper – first wowed audiences with their 2015 Montreal Fringe Festival debut Laureen: Queen of the Tundra. The production was so popular, the troup regrouped for their 2016 Fringe sequel, House of Laureen: Backdoor Queens – starring Anaconda LaSabrosa, Connie Lingua, Dot Dot Dot, Uma Gahd and host Noah in a riveting backstage look at the reality of drag, performance and politics – a show they will reprise as part of the 20th annual Wildside Theatre Festival which runs from Jan. 5 to 15 at the venerable Centaur Theatre in Old Montreal.
House of Laureen: Backdoor Queens
(Photo by Kinga Michalska)


You can also see the House of Laureen headline Montreal’s iconic Café Cleopatra on January 14 at 10 pm (after their early evening performance at the Centaur).

In August 2016, House of Laureen established their monthly residency at Café Cleopatra, last remnant of Montreal’s fabled red-light district. There are plenty of ghosts in this great old building – the Queen of the Main – which has been a showbar since 1895, and where the House of Laureen follows in the footsteps of such Montreal drag legends as Vicki Lane, Lady Brenda, Vicki Richard, Twilight, Farrah, Black Emmanuel, Gerry Cyr, Michel Dorion and Cantelli.

On the eve of their Centaur Theatre debut, Three Dollar Bill sat down with the girls from the House of Laureen for a brief Q&A about drag (their answers have been edited for brevity and clarity).

Three Dollar Bill: Why do you love drag?

Uma Gahd I love drag because it is a time when I get to be onstage, living out the fantasies so many of us have: being famous, being fabulous, being a star! I get to explore makeup artistry, costume design, dance, and theatre. Stand-up comedy, pop culture, music editing and lighting design. Drag encompasses so many disciplines and demands so much from us as artists that it really is challenging. Every performance that gets a reaction from the crowd is an accomplishment that required hours and hours of thought and work. It is so creatively fulfilling!

Anaconda LaSabrosa I love drag because it allows me to explore my artistic side. I use it as a coping mechanism, in a way. Drag helps me go through all of these different things I have discovered and learned to love, and has helped me find new talents that I didn’t know I had.  I love drag as it connects me with different people: I make them laugh and feel different emotions – which is fun – and I love getting people’s reactions afterwards.

Connie Lingua I love drag because I can express whatever side of my personality I want and because of the validation from audience – laughter, applause and shock feels so good!

Dot Dot Dot I love drag because it allows me to bring so many of my passions together: fashion, make-up, dance, theatre and gender. It is incredibly versatile, allows you to bring a wide range of talents, energies and styles to the stage. And because of this, allows you to continually be challenged and to grow. I love drag because it allows me to take my femininity and channel it through an art form that is beneficial to me and to others because it breaks down gender stereotypes. And I love drag because of the community that is built around it.

Why is drag important?

Anaconda LaSabrosa Drag queens have this power to share opinions, protest injustices, make the audience feel different emotions through our performances, our looks.

Dot Dot Dot Drag is important because it celebrates unapologetically bold, queer gender and sexualities. Drag is important because it is a longstanding queer art form that deserves to continue, which brings together our community, allowing us to discuss, explore, fundraise and take care of each other. Drag is also important because it is a fabulous, fun, glittery good time!

Uma Gahd I think that drag is so incredibly important because it is a celebrated expression of a part of my identity that is usually shunned. I was a sissy boy growing up in a tiny town; my limp wrist and my love for pop culture divas got me into a lot of trouble. Now, I take all of those things and wrap them up in sequins and glitter, shine a stage light on them, and I wow people with my talent. Parts of myself that people tried to convince me were detestable are now my biggest assets. Through drag we get to explore gender, identity and socialization. We get to think big thoughts and feel big feelings about ourselves that we are otherwise good not to. We reclaim our femininity, we understand our masculinity, and we know about all the things inside and outside that binary.

Connie Lingua Drag is more important now than ever because it laughs in the face of ignorance, dances to the joyful tune of freedom and wraps you in the glittering light of the in-between.

Visit the official House of Laureen website at houseoflaureen.com.

Twitter.com/bugsburnett
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HEROES AND ZEROS OF THE YEAR 2016

January 3, 2017, 1:26 pm
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Out pop superstar George Michael passed away on Christmas Day 2016

This is an expanded version of my column that ran in the January 2016 issue of Fugues magazine.
Here is my 21st annual column of the past year’s heroes and zeros.
Hero United States VP Joe Biden, for officiating the Aug. 1 wedding of Brian Mosteller and Joe Mahshie, both longtime White House aides. Tweeted Biden, “Proud to marry Brian and Joe at my house.”
Heroes Sydney’s Mardi Gras organizers, for uninviting Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull, who refused to hold a vote in parliament to legalize same-sex marriage (Turnbull prefers to pass the buck via a divisive national referendum).
Heroes The Beardy’s and Okemasis First Nation in Saskatchewan for hosting the first Two-Spirit and Pride Parade in Canada on June 9, and the Eskasoni First Nation, whose Nov. 5 Pride Day was the first celebrated by a First Nation community in Atlantic Canada.
Pride Day at the Eskasoni First Nation
Heroes AGUDA, the Israeli National LGBT Task Force, who – after Israeli LGBTQ activists unsuccessfully demanded Tel Aviv Pride be cancelled over government funding of LGBTQ tourism – seemed to say they will no longer be complicit in “pinkwashing.”
Hero British pop superstar George Michael, who should not only be remembered as one of the finest songwriters and most soulful singers of his generation, but also for his generosity and quiet philanthropy.

Zeros Ugandan police, for raiding an LGBTQ Pride-week fashion show at Kampala’s Club on Aug. 4. Police detained hundreds of spectators for 90 minutes, beating and humiliating them as 16 other attendees and participants were arrested and later released without being charged.
Zeros Turkish police in Istanbul for using tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse a Trans March on June 19 and LGBTQ Pride march on June 26.
Zeros Peruvian police for using water cannons against LGBTQ activists in Lima on Feb. 13.
Zero Haitian Capital Commissioner Jean Danton Leger, who issued an order to block the four-day Massimadi LGBTQ arts festival in Port-au-Prince. The festival was postponed.
Zeros Organizers of the Cody Stampede Rodeo and Independence Day Parade in Cody, Wyoming, who allowed a float that featured a wildlife scene with an outhouse and sign that read “Transgender Restroom.”
Hero Mariela Castro, daughter of Cuban president Raul Castro, who lead Havana’s Pride parade on May 14.
Zero Fidel Castro, who sent thousands of gay men to labour camps known as Military Units to Aid Production. Even after Cuba decriminalized consensual same-sex sexual relations in 1979, Castro’s regime forcibly quarantined people living with HIV/AIDS in state-run sanitariums until 1993. Only after Castro resigned in 2008 did he apologize for the camps, known by the Spanish acronym UMAP, during an interview with a Mexican newspaper in 2010. Castro died on Nov. 25 at age 90. 
Hero Barack Obama, who in June unveiled The Stonewall National Monument in New York, which will cover nearly eight acres in Greenwich Village, including the historic Stonewall Inn.
Newspaper hanging inside The Stonewall Inn
(Photo by Drew Angerer / Getty Images / AFP) 
Zero The U.S. Department of Homeland Security which prosecuted Rentboy.com CEO Jeffrey Hurant who on Oct. 7 admitted in federal court that he broke the law by promoting “the exchange of sexual conduct in return for a fee” on his Rentboy.com site. Sentencing is set for Feb. 2, 2017.
Zero Wikileaks, for publishing data on gay men in Saudi Arabia, a country where just being homosexual can lead to imprisonment and execution.
Zeros The homophobic thugs who kidnapped, raped and decapitated gay Syrian refugee Wisam Sankari who was so badly mutilated that after he was found dead on July 25 he was identified by the trousers he was wearing.
Zero The terrorists who in April hacked to death Bangladesh LGBTQ activist Mahbub Tonoy and Xulhaz Mannan, editor of the local LGBTQ publication.
Zeros The five homophobes who kidnapped and tortured a 20-year-old gay man in Guadeloupe for five days in January. The unidentified victim was burned several times with a clothing iron.
Zeros The U.N group of 51 Muslim states who blocked 11 LGBTQ organizations from attending a high-level AIDS meeting in June; and the 54-member Africa group who in November unsuccessfully demanded the U.N. revoke the appointment of human rights expert Vitit Muntarbhorn of Thailand, who has a three-year mandate to investigate violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) worldwide.
Hero Botswana, for deporting anti-gay U.S. pastor Steven Anderson.
Zeros Homophobic U.K. soccer fans. A survey released in September by British LGBT charity Stonewall, reports 72 per cent of football fans have heard homophobic abuse at matches, while one in five 18 to 24-year-olds said they’d be embarrassed if their favourite player came out.
Buffalo Sabres goalie Anders Nilsson
Heroes The Premier League, which backed Stonewall’s LGBTQ Rainbow Laces campaign; The Edmonton Oilers of the National Hockey League, for wrapping their hockey sticks in Pride Tape; the Canadian Football League, which hosted their first LGBTQ Grey Cup party on Nov. 27 at Striker Sports Bar in Toronto; the San Diego Padres, who apologized to and sponsored the San Diego Gay Men’s Chorus holiday show after accidentally muting the Chorus singing the U.S. national anthem during a pregame ceremony in May; NHL Buffalo Sabres goalie Anders Nilsson, who has a Rainbow flag on the back of his hockey helmet; and Real Madrid superstar striker Cristiano Ronaldo who, after Atletico midfielder Koke reportedly called him a “faggot” during a Nov. 20 match, replied, “A faggot, yes, but a rich one, bastard.”
Zeros Texas and 10 other U.S states (including Oklahoma, Alabama, Wisconsin, West Virginia, Tennessee, Maine, Arizona, Louisiana, Utah and Georgia) who on May 25 announced they are suing over the Obama adminstration’s directive to U.S. public schools to let transgender students use bathrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity. Makes me wonder, just how many Republican lawmakers have been arrested for bathroom misconduct?
Hero Montreal’s Vanier College, which added 15 gender-neutral washrooms across their campus.
Heroes The National Basketball Association, which announced it is moving their 2017 NBA All-Star game from Charlotte to protest North Carolina’s anti-trans “bathroom bill”; the Cirque du Soleil, who cancelled its North Carolina concerts, as did Bruce Springsteen, who posted on Facebook, “Some things are more important than a rock show and this fight against prejudice and bigotry is one of them. It is the strongest means I have for raising my voice in opposition to those who continue to push us backwards instead of forwards.”
Heroes The 43 out LGBTQ athletes who competed in the Rio Olympics.
Zero Daily Beast “journalist” Nico Hines who dangerously outed athletes in an exploitative gay-baiting story headlined “I Got Three Grindr Dates in an Hour in the Olympic Village.” The Daily Beast pulled the story, apologized and sent Hines home after the IOC called the article “unacceptable” following an international outcry by LGBTQ athletes, activists and journalists.
 Trans comedian Tranna Wintour
(Photo by Reese Turner)
Hero Tinder, which on Nov. 15 finally allowed users to type a word that describes their gender identity. While some critics charge such disclosure may put trans people at risk, Montreal trans stand-up comic Tranna Wintour – another hero, who had a big year wowing audiences in Montreal and New York – told me, “Unfortunately dating period as a trans person is always a risk. I don’t think Tinder’s upgrade is making it any more dangerous.”
Hero Gay diver Greg Lougainis, who won gold medals at the 1984 and 1988 Olympics, and finally got his picture on a Wheaties box in May.
Hero Gay 21-year-old Australian pop sensation Troye Sivan who dedicated his Song of the Year win at the 2016 ARIA Awards to LGBTQ youth.
Zero Gay YouTube star Calum McSwiggan who claimed he was assaulted in a West Hollywood anti-gay hate crime on June 27. After being charged with vandalism and filing a false police report, he plead guilty to vandalizing a car, received a sentence of three years’ felony probation, 52 sessions of anger-management counseling and was ordered to pay $7,000 in restitution. Prosecutors dropped the false police report charge as part of a plea agreement.  
Zero Fiat heir Lapo Elkann who was arrested Nov. 27 for allegedly faking his own kidnapping to get $10,000 to pay for a two-day drug binge with a male escort.
Zero Gay British “journalist” and Breitbart Tech editor Milo Yiannopoulos. Enough said.
Zero Late Quebecois icon and filmmaker Claude Jutras who, according to a 2016 biography by Yves Lever, was a pedophile. The Quebec film world was “shocked” by the revelations.
Zero Gay Apple CEO Tim Cook who hosted a June 28 breakfast fundraiser for anti-gay Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan.
Hero Canada’s federal Liberal government, which on Nov. 10 began accepting gender-neutral travel documents for people planning to fly into, or through, Canada; and then on Nov. 18 passed Bill C-16 in the House of Commons, to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act to add gender identity and gender expression to the list of prohibited grounds of discrimination.
Hero Gay Liberal MP Randy Boissonnault, who was appointed PM Justin Trudeau’s Special Advisor on LGBTQ2 issues.
Zero Canada’s federal Liberal government, which – when it raised the Rainbow flag on Parliament Hill on June 1, also a first in Canadian history – called it the “Pride Flag.” Trudeau’s Special Advisor on LGBTQ2 issues, Randy Boissonnault, didn’t catch this, nor did a bunch of media outlets that should know better: The Advocate, CBC and Buzzfeed. The Rainbow flag was created by Gilbert Baker at the request of slain gay activist and icon Harvey Milk in 1978. Baker – who never calls the Rainbow flag the Pride flag – once told me, “The first time I saw the Rainbow flag on a flag pole was amazing, but what makes a flag a flag is that it’s not mine; it belongs to the people. It is torn from the souls of the people. So much art is all about branding, but mine – the Rainbow flag – it’s not about me. I don’t get royalties. If I did, it would change everything, and the Rainbow flag would not have the power that it does have today.”
The Rainbow flag was created by Gilbert Baker
Heroes Sad to see still more LGBTQ media outlets fold, such as AfterEllen, Next magazine and Frontiers magazine, which had been around since 1981 and which I wrote for in the 90s. RIP.
Heroes LGBTQ bars around the world, many of which closed in 2016, including my favourite queer bar in Tel Aviv, called Evita. Without a hint of irony, Haaretz reported, “Tel Aviv users of Grindr, the dating app for gays, repeatedly encountered a pop-up ad inviting them to celebrate the absolutely last week of Evita Bar, which closed its doors (on Aug. 1) after 12 years.”
Zero The American military, for imprisoning whistleblower and trans service woman Chelsea Manning in an all-male maximum security prison. Meanwhile, Thailand announced in July it will introduce separate jails for its LGBTQ prisoners.
Heroes Toronto artists William Ellis and Jordan Tannahill, who on June 29 closed their fabled Videofag performance art space in Toronto.
Hero Author Annie Proulx, who told me in September that Brokeback Mountain “coalesced thoughts and feelings that many people secretly held. The story and the film helped show the injustice of ostracism to a general public. The time was right for change and the story seeped into the culture. By making the protagonists individualistic, hard-working tough cowboys, the most masculine American identity, the story packed a stronger punch than if the characters had been any other profession.”
Heroes Black Lives Matter, for putting politics back into Pride Toronto and Vancouver Pride; plus hats off to the three queer founders of the Black Lives Matter movement: Patrisse Marie Cullors-Brignac, Alicia Garza and Opal Tometi, along with their most visible activist, openly-gay Deray Mckesson.
Canadian Navy Master Seaman Francis Legare
locks lips with his partner Corey Vautour
Zero 29-year-old Omar Mateen who killed 49 people and wounded 53 others inside the Pulse gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, on June 12. A self-loathing gay man shaped by a homophobic society and culture, Mateen preferred to be a mass killer than be gay.
Heroes The New York grassroots activists who founded Gays Against Guns, in the wake of Orlando. There now is a new gay agenda in America: Stop the NRA. If anybody can do it, it’s the queers.
Zero The U.S. Embassy in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, for publishing on its website a photo of six men signing a condolence book for the victims of the Orlando killings, with the caption, “LGBTI community signing the condolence book.” Many of the men pictured were later attacked by anti-gay mobs in the streets of Abidjan.
Zeros The gunmen who opened fire inside La Madame, a gay club in Xalapa, Mexico, killing seven and injuring 12 on May 22. The story went mostly unreported until the Orlando massacre.
Hero The Supreme Court of Mexico which on June 3 approved same-sex marriage across Mexico.
Heroes The 50 clerics in Pakistan affiliated with the Tanzeem Ittehad-i-Ummat who issued a fatwa on June 26 deeming it lawful to marry a transgender person; Geraldine Roman, the first transgender politician elected in the Philippines, on May 9; and Metro Bank, who on Nov. 3 became the first British bank to welcome customers who don’t identify as male or female – customers can opt for the title “Mx” rather than Mr., Mrs. or Ms.
Shi-Queeta-Lee became the first-ever drag
queen to perform at The White House
Zero Dame Edna, a.k.a. Australian comedian Barry Humphries, who called trans women “mutilated” men. Time to hang up your frocks, Barry.
Zero George Takei who criticized making Sulu (the character he portrayed in the original Star Trek TV series) gay in the 2016 movie Star Trek Beyond. Talk about boldly NOT going where no man has gone before.
Zeros Cissy Houston and her late daughterWhitney Houston, whose husband Bobby Brown confirmed Whitney was indeed bisexual and in a longtime relationship with her assistant Robyn Crawford. Brown believes the pressure on Houston to conform and live a heterosexual life led directly to her death.
Hero Rod Stewart, whose 1976 song The Killing of Georgie – an elegy to a murdered gay friend – was initially banned by the BBC, then became the first-ever Billboard Top 40 song about queer people. Forty years later, in March 2016, Stewart said of his five-year-old son Aiden, “He likes dressing up as a lady. So we don’t know which way he’s thinking… If he turns out to be a homosexual, that’s okay with me. As long as he’s happy.”
Hero Montreal Maestro Yannick Nézet-Séguin who on June 2 was named successor to James Levine as music director of the Metropolitan Opera.
Hero GRIS-Montréal executive director Marie Houzeau who was awarded the 2016 Women of Distinction Award in the Social Commitment category, by the Montreal Women’s Y Foundation.
Hero Desmond Tutu’s reverend daughter Mpho Tutu-Van Furth who gave up her Anglican Church license so she could marry the woman she loves, Marceline van Furth.
Hero 17-year-old Instagram sensation James Charles who became the first ever male COVERGIRL – or CoverBoy – for CoverGirl’s newest mascara, “So Lashy.”
James Charles is the first-ever male CoverGirl
Hero Scotland, for passing its “Turing Law” pardoning gay and bisexual men convicted of consensual gay sex when it was illegal, as opposed to England, whose own “Turing Law” bill shamefully fell after a Tory filibuster in the House of Commons.
Hero Norway, which became the first country in the world to offer HIV prevention drug PrEP for free. Meanwhile, PrEP was approved for sale in Canada as of Feb. 28.
Hero Marc Hall, who spoke at Montreal schools about the critically-hailed 2016 play Prom Queen: The Musical which chronicles his battle to bring his boyfriend to his high school prom back in 2002. “I was just 17, trying to figure out who I was and there was so much pressure on me,” Marc told me. “I wondered could I even do this? Am I strong enough? At the same time I was cast as this poster child for LGBTQ rights, which was quite intense for a 17-year-old. It was quite overwhelming.” In Montreal, as Prom Queen played to sold out houses at the Segal Centre, Marc Hall inspired a new generation to fight for change.
Heroes Lesbian Judge Maite Oronoz Rodriguez who was appointed Chief Justice of the Puerto Rico Supreme Court on Feb. 12, the same day Kael McKenzie was sworn in as Canada’s first transgender judge, on the Provincial Court of Manitoba.
Heroes LGBTQ  journalist Andrea Houston who teaches Ryerson University’s new Queer Studies course; and Line Chamberland,  research chair in the study of homophobia at the Université du Québec à Montréal, which in September received a $2.5 million grant from the Conseil de recherches en sciences humaines du Canada (CRSH) to conduct a seven-year study on LGBTQ issues.
Hero Luxembourg PM Xavier Bettel, who on May 15 became the first EU leader to marry his same-sex partner, Gauthier Destenay.
Hero Calgary drag queen Mz. Rhonda – a.k.a. LGBTQ activist and ordained pastor Ron Eberly – laid a wreath beneath the cenotaph at Central Memorial Park on Remembrance Day, to honour fallen LGBTQ soldiers. Let us hope this tribute will be expanded to Remembrance Day ceremonies across Canada, including Ottawa.
Hero Washington, DC, drag queen Shi-Queeta-Lee who on Nov. 17 became the first-ever drag queen to perform at The White House when she appeared (as Tina Turner) at the Transgender Community Briefing, an event sponsored by The White House Office of Public Engagement to celebrate the accomplishments made by the trans community. Shi-Queeta-Lee performed a fabulous version of Proud Mary.
Heroes Master Seaman Francis Legare made Canadian navy history on Feb. 23 in Victoria when he embraced his same-sex partner, Corey Vautour, after more than eight months at sea aboard the HMCS Winnipeg, which has a crew of 250. Being the first sailor off a ship is considered a Canadian navy honour decided by random raffle. “I am speechless,” Legare said after the kiss.
Drag legend Sheena Hershey
Heroes For coming out in 2016: NCAA player Derrick Gordon, Christian rock band Everyday Sunday frontman Trey Pearson, Spanish Olympic figure skater Javier Raya, Montreal pop singer Coeur de Pirate (a.k.a. Béatrice Martin), pro skateboarder Brian Anderson, Matrix filmmaker Lilly Wachowski (as trans), Lord Ivar Mountbatten, Haitian-Canadian DJ and record producer Kaytranada (a.k.a. Louis Kevin Celestin), and actors Colton Haynes, Nico Tortorella and Sara Ramirez.
Heroes Pulitzer-winning playwright Edward Albee, Coronation Street creator Tony Warren, Montreal Gay Village pioneer and mythic K.O.X nightclub founder Bruce Horlin, trans icon Lady Chablis, New York Times street-fashion photographer Bill Cunningham, Quebecois actor André Montmorency, Canadian folk legend Penny Lang, Mexican pop icon Juan Gabriel, beloved Toronto drag queen Chris Edwards, actor and trans activist Alexis Arquette, 1980s British pop icon Pete Burns, and Montreal drag legend Sheena Hershey all passed away in 2016. RIP. 
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