Fugitive Kind because I'd heard it was a failed Tennessee Williams play. In fact it is. There is just not enough conflict, and the bad guys are simply bad and the good guys simply good. It’s a bit of a lecture too -- a beautiful one at times, about the difficulties for those who are of the ‘fugitive kind’ -- a bird that can never land, must always be in the air. Yes, certainly I get it. I’m that kind of bird, and it has caused me endless trouble. But you’re just supposed to want all the ‘fugitives’ -- Anna Magnani, Marlone Brando and Joanne Woodward -- to get together and be happy -- and that’s kind of impossible for fugitives -- by definition. And then Anna Magnani’s mean husband Victor Jory burns her dream to the ground at the (sorry spoiler) end. What to say about Marlon Brando? He was 36 -- a tad too old for the part-- (like Magnani) but still breathtakingly beautiful. However the lizard-skin jacket -- well, I'm not quite buying it. The same for his perpetual mumbling.Williams was very much writing about his lover Frank Merlo, and every other young man who he spilled his seed upon, and he writes about him lovingly. and makes this sort of male prostitute-ish character — i.e. the much maligned desired male — into somewhat of a real person. But Brando is an angel; his name sounds like saviour (Xavier). Again, a bit much. It’s all a bit much. Anna Magnani is astounding as usual; everything she does is real. And Joanne Woodward manages to be beautiful but not sexy, few can manage that (except perhaps Meryl Streep). The film is virulently anti-racist, and that’s good. But I hate preachy plays. There is a subtler and more controversial theme -- at least for us these days -- about the importance of art, as Brando and Maureen Stapleton (Vee Talbot) are both artists — she a painter, he a musician. Brando’s guitar means everything to him, he won’t let anyone touch it (gee -- what else might he be that protective of?). But he only plays it once, and is dubbed (Elvis Presley was supposed to play the part which would have made more sense). Stapleton goes blind (I think, the scene happened so quickly -- she appears in the distance yelling ‘I can’t see!’) And people keep threatening to take Brando’s guitar. All this makes sense if Brando is ‘Opheus’ but also I think this is all about Tennessee Williams sensing that his writing career was nearly over -- that the critics were trying to take away his guitar. Stanley Kauffman wrote that article in 1966 saying gay playwrights were undermining American culture, and the love of William's life -- Frank Merlo -- died in 1963, and basically Williams had nary a success after 1964. I can’t imagine someone taking away my guitar (i.e. this writing) but I’m sure it will happen, especially if I continue to say the kind of things I am about to say here, now. Theatre Passe Muraille is suggesting, for Canada Day, that we read The Truth and Reconciliation Report ‘with them’ (whatever that means). I have nothing against the Truth and Reconciliation Report (except the title is too long), but the fact that a theatre has told you to read a certain political document -- one that has a certain political point of view -- is offensive to me, and offensive to art. How many times do I have to tell you that I never wrote plays saying 'gay is good,' I wrote about what bastards gay men are, and got in a lot of trouble with my own community. Gay men are horrible wherever you go, I should know, I’m in Montreal and I’ve been having sex with as many horrible men as I can (it's research). When I ran Buddies I never made rules saying we wouldn't do work that was homophobic, or that we would only do plays by queers -- there was no 'screed.' Never mind, if you are an artist but not a polemicist you might just as well just send in a letter of resignation saying “I am not worthy, please burn everything I have created.” I have some friends who are already doing this — if I was to burn all my books I might as well just set myself on fire — as I am them. What's the difference between IKEA and The Holocaust Museum? I was at IKEA with my ever-controlling partner the other day (we shall call him partner after what he put me through-- none of this 'lover' stuff) and I happened to notice that not only are The Holocaust Museum and IKEA essentially nightmares, but they are set up in exactly the same way. The sadists who designed the enthralling Holocaust Museum (it is beautiful architecturally, conceptually) designed it so that you cannot wander around and visit things at random you have to go through the museum in chronological order, visiting the various terrifying incidents one by one -- as if you were a Jew watching your life disintegrate. Similarly, in IKEA you cannot turn around and go back, you must view the various furniture 'stagings' in a manner that has been decreed by IKEA management, and it is generally torturous and frightening and claustrophobic (like The Holocaust Museum) that is, if you have the notion that you are an independent human being, not just an automaton who buys things. My partner is no amateur sadist. It was precisely at the moment when I said ‘I can’t stand this anymore I have to go home!’ when he decided that he would take another hour picking out bed sheets (striped or white, what do you think?). But that’s love for you, isn’t it? (I mean, my putting up with that is love, isn't it)? Or maybe it’s just s/m — as in, when you think that you can’t take anymore your ‘master’ just goes a little bit beyond your limit, and then your tits are sore as hell the next day. Mine certainly are. I was drunk as a skunk at the bathhouse last night of course. Then this guy came along and twisted my tits while I moaned like a lady, gazing up at him imploringly with my big 'baby-hazels.' It turns out he was a massage therapist. He was kind. And when Tennessee was writing great plays (unlike this one) he said something about that. And it all had to do with strangers. Or something.
