The Picture of Dorian Grey (1945)
It’s somewhat tedious. And Hurd Hadfield (Dorian) is just not beautiful enough. He’s kind of prissy and (yeah, say it) well, gay. He also struck me as thoughtful and intelligent, I mean what would it be like to have Peter Lawford —who plays a minor role — as Dorian? Dorian’s supposed to be a sex object for chrissakes, and Wilde said “intellect destroys the beauty of any face” so what about even Warren Beatty or James Dean? Not Hurd Hadfield — all effete and intellectual— and just too delicate. Male beauty is not delicate. Wilde used to hang around with the working-class trade — smokey, card-playing, bisexual street-boy thugs (he called it ‘feasting with panthers’) who sold their bodies for a nickel. Yes, he was ‘in love’ with Lord Alfred Douglas, but they used to pick up boys together — because that’s what gay men do. Gay men love beauty. And if you are a young ‘non-binary’ reading this, fine, and if you hate pornography and gay bars, well more power to you — but someday you’ll come ‘round (if you are any sort of person at all), because beauty always wins. Especially when it’s gone. Can I give you a very good reason why beauty is inherently good? Because when you are enraptured by it you are not doing anything else.You are not waging wars, or being jealous, or sad, or mean; you are contemplating beauty. Because let’s face it — when we’re NOT contemplating beauty (or screwing it) — we’re often up to no good. The Picture of Dorian Grey is a rather inept adaptation of the famous Wilde book; the only real discovery is Angela Lansbury — angelic as Sybil Vane. She sings beautifully— and is the character that Dorian of course drives to suicide. George Sanders is urbane enough as the Oscar Wilde stand-in (although he’s not in the movie much). He lives “only for pleasure” and has all the great quips, like: “I believe anything provided it’s quite incredible.” Lonely old women say of him: “I despise your principles, but I enjoy the way you express them.” Remember, being obsessed with beauty — as Oscar Wilde was — does not mean being superficial, it means positing that the superficial has more depth than depth itself. Let me put it this way. Wilde was a modern sophist, which means he believed persuasion was more important than truth. According to the Greek sophist Gorgias we must be wary of ‘truth’ because in reality — what we accept as reality— is what we have been persuaded is true. Like right now. We have been persuaded that COVID-19 means “I care for other people.” It doesn’t matter than nobody we know has it, or is likely to have it, or die of it, or even to feel any lousier than they normally feel (except about not being allowed out of the house). It doesn’t matter that all the ‘facts’ we have been told (like that we can get it from smooth surfaces) are no longer facts. What matters is this one beautiful fiction: we are good people if we believe in COVID-19. This is persuasion, this is art, this is beauty. Gorgias would have us be conscious of how much we are swayed by beauty. So again, if you are 20 year old non-binary who thinks all my talk of beauty is body-fascist, and also that I’m too old and should just shut up — remember, it is you who are the true aesthete, baby, not me — because you are addicted to the incredibly sexy, alluring, untrue, fantasy-construction called COVID-19. (Now, back to the movie.) The only thing that interests me in this dull adaptation of Wilde’s book are the fetching descriptions of the dens of iniquity which serve to symbolize Dorian Grey’s dissipation. Dissipation has always interested me. (Have you ever read David Mamet’s uninentionally hilarious Edmund? It’s a play about dissipation by a man who’s obviously never ‘dissipated’). I, on there other hand, have solid credentials; I’ve been dissolute all my life, and especially lately. Now what was considered dreadful in those days (and now) was drugs — but the word ‘drugs' is mentioned only once in The Picture of Dorian Grey. What is instead necessary to conjure images of decadence are two things: cripples (I only use that word because this derogatory slur is one which would have been used by the filmmakers in 1945 and also, I am a cripple) and dwarves. They seem to hangout where Dorian hangs out. Inevitably these places are dark, and there is an old man playing classical piano in a minor key, and there is a lonely bottle on a table, and the girls are far too friendly. The redolent place names include: a “low den in a distant part of Whitechapel” and some “dreadful places near Blue Gate Fields.” George Sanders tells us that Dorian would “wander to the half-world of London on mild summer evenings.” Well here I am in Montreal and it is a very hot summer evening. Tonight, I intend to wander — like I did last night, and the night before. You will have to decide whether what I’m describing is the ‘half-world’ of Montreal. (I think it is an entire world in itself.) Yesterday during the day I was struck twice by the re-incarnation of my ex-boyfriend Shaun O’Mara. I was waiting for the streetlight to change and was initially accosted by his beauty. It was startling. Speaking of ‘feasting with panthers’ he was definitely one of those — effeminate in a street-drag-ish sort of way. Anyway this kid — he was maybe 20-something - was wearing tight black tights and a kind of black cape wrap thing that kept falling open — quite deliberately displaying his mouth-watering, lean, muscled physique. He had a bruise on his left cheek. Later, when I was sitting in front of Starbucks (using their wifi to post a blog like this) he swept up beside me “Sir...would you mind watching my dog? He’s an ex-junkie dog, so people always want to steal him.” I didn’t understand, but I loved him calling me ‘sir,’ so of course I complied. After, he thanked me, and called me ‘sir’ again. Later, he waved at me, as if we were old friends. Two nights ago, I followed another young man down the street at midnight and he pulled down his pants and showed me his ass. Complications ensued: we ended up trying to have sex on someone’s dark doorstep (ill-advised!). And last night another young man I followed into an alley was direct and to the point; all he really needed (in addition to the usual) was attention paid to his nipples. Wilde apparently said that “the pride of individualism is half the fascination of evil.” I’d say, true — if I believed anything really was true. But it’s more like a ‘pride of panthers,’ and yes, nothing could make me happier than having them feast on me.