Dwindling Decorum

In 1982 when I was just 29 years old, I was asked to be on a special panel at the Canada Council. I don’t remember much about it — it a one time only advisory panel on theatre. On the panel with me was the acclaimed actor Eric Peterson. Peterson was only 6 years older than I was — but I thought of him as an elder; he had been acting since 1971, and I was just starting my professional career.

At one point he turned to me and privately confessed (keep in mind, I am paraphrasing as I can’t remember exactly what he said — this is the jist of it):  “I’m sorry to say I’ve never been to your ‘Buddies in Bad Times Theatre’. You know, a lot of people wouldn’t be caught dead going there — unless they were wearing a paperbag over their head.”

So what did I do, after Eric Peterson said this to me? Did I rise from my seat, in righteous indignation, and declare the meeting an ‘unsafe space?’ Did I call for Eric Peterson’s resignation from the committee? Did I cry?

No, I thanked him for what was obviously a well meaning joke, if perhaps somewhat ineptly communicated. We continued our discussion, and continued contributing to the panel. And I think we learned quite a bit from each other.

Of course nowadays if someone made such a comment, the person who made that comment would be subject to social media scrutiny, declared a pariah and exorcised from the theatre community without question.

What has happened to our public discourse? Where is the decorum? 

The problem is this: we no longer allow for intention.

It is only words that are important. If people speak in a manner that is deemed offensive by someone else, it doesn’t matter what their intentions are, or if they apologize. They are immediately demonized. 

Everyday Feminism asks “What does the intent of our action really matter if our actions have the impact of furthering the marginalization or oppression of those around us?” Impact is certainly important, but this new decorum — which is really the opposite of decorum — does not help well intentioned people work out their differences or mitigate their ignorance. It simply closes the door on discussion, and divides us.

I knew that Eric Peterson was trying his best to be sympathetic to a cause that he didn’t fully understand, and I gave him full credit for that. I didn’t waste time blaming him or hating him.

When did  our public discourse become so mean-spirited? And why?

Welcome to Marwen: It’s a Hate Crime

I just watched  Welcome to Marwen, Robert Zemeckis’ new film. 

I almost missed it. Since it only earned a rating of 27% on Rotten Tomatoes, I’m sure I’m not the only one who crossed it off their list. 

But here’s a tip. Rotten Tomatoes is aimed at the ‘I rely on movies to babysit my kids’ crowd. As a result, most of the really bad reviews are for films that have adult content.

For instance, the holiday flick Holmes and Watson got only a 6% rating on Rotten Tomatoes — and rightly so. I saw it and I can attest to the fact that it’s basically a bunch of bad penis jokes. 

But Welcome to Marwen is, on the other hand, a real work of art. It easily measures up — perhaps surpasses —Zemickis’ earlier classic Forest Gump.

Unfortunately hardly anyone is going to see it.

What a lush, gorgeous, thoughtul, compassionate, imaginative movie this is! I had tears in my eyes when I wasn’t laughing. It’s based on the real life story of Mark Hogancamp, an outsider artist who created his groundbreaking works after being almost beaten to death by a bunch of thugs. He was left with parts of his memory and some cognitive skills missing. As part of his recovery, he devoted himself to photography — producing achingly beautiful photographs of the dolls that peopled the miniature cardboard city he created in his own back yard. 

But Zemickis’ film has a beauty all its own. He has used his consummate animation skills to recreate Hogancamp’s inner artistic world. You will find yourself watching animated scenes full of unlikely drama that are disturbingly, absorbingly ‘real.’ The film careful explicates the complex relationship between art and the soul.

So why is everyone ignoring it?

Like the TV shows of Louis C.K., and the movies of Woody Allen, Welcome to Marwen is the most recent casualty of #MeToo. Whatever the noble intentions of that movement, the effect (as the French feminists have noted) has been to put a chill on sexual art. 

Zemeckis’ masterpiece is a film about a heterosexual crossdresser. Mark Hogencamp was a shoe fetishist who photographed busty Barbie Dolls in sexy outfits. One of the ‘politically correct’ criticisms of Welcome to Marwen on Rotten Tomatoes tells us: “The female characters in Welcome to Marwen are all a little too yielding, a little too understanding... They expect so little of Hogancamp that it's all too easy for him to impress them, and all too easy for us to feel good about ourselves in the process.” 

Right. Women should reject a sexual man like Hogancamp, shouldn’t they? It doesn’t matter that Hogancamp was effectively a victim of gaybashing. We are told to have no compassion for the man, and consequently not to enjoy a movie about him — because, in his dreams and his art, he had sexual fantasies about women and liked to wear high heels.

It was a vicious hate crime when those thugs to beat up Hogan Marencamp for acting ‘queer.’

But when you reject Zemeckis’ film for the same reason? Well, I don’t know how to tell you this, but —  you’re doing exactly the same thing.

Kevin Spacey and #MeToo

Recently Kevin Spacey was charged with sexual assault. He has released an odd and fascinating YouTube video ("Let Me Be Frank')  in his own defence. He was accused by Heather Unruh of buying liquor for her son William N. Little — when he was 18 -- and then molesting the young man, in July 2016.

Kevin Spacey has been called a ‘#MeToo pariah.’ 

But the accusations against Kevin Spacey have absolutely nothing to do with #MeToo.

This is not a defence of Kevin Spacey. If Kevin Spacey is found guilty then few would argue that he does not deserve to be punished. But the #MeToo website states that “Women in Canada live at greater risk than men of domestic violence, sexual assault and harassment” and that this violence is “gender based" and related to “sexism.”

What does all this have to do with Kevin Spacey? NOTHING. Kevin Spacey is a gay man. Gay men are not the same as straight men. And what makes them different is not simply sexual desire, but — homophobia. Young gay men are physically and verbally attacked while growing up at school, and often lose the emotional and financial support of their parents. (For instance, The Williams Institute tells us that though the homeless population only makes up 7% of young people in American; 40% of them are LGBT.) Then as they grow up, these gay young men must decide — as Spacey did — whether or not to come out at work.

Homophobia is, arguably, the reason why Spacey is not presently a major U.S. film star, In 1997 Spacey was the subject of a homophobic column in Esquire which gossiped  about his sexuality (‘Kevin Spacey Has a Secret’). Spacey subsequently moved to England and became the artistic director of the Old Vic. He refused to identify as gay in an interview as late as 2010, and didn’t actually come out until he was accused in October of 2017 of making ‘sexual advances’ to Anthony Rapp — at which point, he was attacked on all sides for using his confession as a distraction/defence against Rapp’s accusations.

I would argue that Kevin Spacey is a deeply damaged human being who has endured a lifetime of torture over the conflict between his sexual feelings and his career ambitions. It has been impossible for him to be both a successful Hollywood actor and an out gay man. This is not an excuse for his actions, whatever they are. It is a plea for us to tell the truth about his life.

The whole incident with William N. Little is so mired in issues of sexuality and homophobia that it is almost too dense to analyze. One doesn’t dare speak of William N Little — or his sexuality — as that would be ‘blaming the victim.’ But why hasn’t William N. Little himself spoken out publicly against Spacey? Why has he left that to his mother? He is 20 years old at least — not a child. Little’s mother, Heather Unruh, a television personality, has two children. Her son founded the organization SWEAR — Stand with Everyone Against Rape, at his High School. Her daughter now runs the organization. Is it a co-incidence that Unruh has raised two children as anti-rape activists and that one of them is now accusing a closeted gay man of sexual assault? And why is she is speaking publicly for her son? What’s going on?

I ask this because Kevin Spacey’s situation has nothing to do with gender-based violence or #MeToo. Spacey is not a heterosexual male who has committed an act of sexual violence due to sexism. He is a damaged gay man whose actions in the past have yet to be determined. 

Period.

If he is guilty — and thus deserves to be called names — let’s at least call him the right ones.

There’s no point in talking

to me anymore. For some. It’s been very interesting for me to see who wishes to talk to me these days, and who doesn’t.

You see once, I had a little bit of fame. (It was a long time ago.) Soon I was surrounded by people — but I didn’t know their motives. 

For example, a few years ago a young man wanted to talk about playwrighting. People don’t usually want to talk to me about playwrighting. But I love talking about it, so I said sure.

And when he sat down  in front of me I was impressed by what seemed at first to be intellectual passion. But a couple of sentences in, my fascination disappeared. 

He leaned forward. “What I want to know is — how do you write a hit that’s as popular as The Drawer Boy? I just want to know how to do that.”

I was speechless for a moment, as I had really been looking forward to talking to him about playwrighting. Then I told him that there was a formula for writing a popular play; in fact Eugene Scribe had perfected it many years ago. 

I won’t explain that formula in terms of The Drawer Boy — as I certainly don’t mean to suggest that Michael Healey is merely a craftsman. But I don’t mind speaking about it in terms of Come From Away.

The secret to writing a hit play — in case you want to know — is this. First, try not to challenge the audience’s basic assumptions about themselves. If they come into Royal Alexandra Theatre thinking that middle class white people are essentially good people — like the Come From Away audiences do — then they need to be congratulated on that fact. Also, your piece should centre around a controversial topic (something ‘edgy’), but the play itself must not be controversial, or ask any deep or probing questions about that topic. If you want to, you might add a suspenseful plot — you know, withhold some information until they very end. But audiences are a little less literate than they used to be, and don’t care as much about that anymore. Add a little romance, set your play in a locale that the audience will find ‘exotic,’ and you have the basics for what Scribe would have called a well-made play.

I told this young man the magic formula, and he went away. I don’t remember his name. Maybe he’s one of the creators of Come From Away.

But why in heaven’s name did this young man think that someone like me could somehow help him make his fortune in the theatre? 

Fame. 

That’s what it was, the fact that I was — or had been — somewhat famous at one time. 

Well I have news for this young man and anyone else like him. After all that’s happened, no one can ever mistake me for famous; I am merely infamous. That means (please write this down!) talking to me will no longer get you anywhere. In fact, if you are ambitious in the theatre, I suggest you stay away from me.  If you want to  be rich and famous and/or solidify for yourself a position in the 'entertainment industry,' you’d better talk to someone else.

Of course, if you want to have a serious (or perhaps oddly funny) discussion about art, theatre or sexual politics—I’m still available for discussion.

Just so you know.

Otherwise there is, in fact, no point in talking to me.
Thank God. 

Ten Good Things About Spending Christmas Alone

It can be depressing, can’t it? Christmas. Especially when the forces of circumstance cause you to spend it alone. Well I can think of at least 10 reasons why spending Christmas alone is better than spending it with other people:

1. You don’t have to listen to that boring instructor at your Aquafit classes monologue anymore because your Aquafit classes have been cancelled ‘for the holidays.’

2) You can always find a seat at one of those insanely popular Christmas movies (i.e. a movie written by an actual scriptwriter — not a committee, a movie written by and for adults — to win an Oscar, a movie which is actually a good movie — with absolutely no superheroes) because there is usually one SINGLE seat left (not two mind you, but one).

3) The only guys in gay backrooms are the guys who take sex very seriously in exactly the right way. (Look for the the guys wearing Santa hats. Really. They are really fun.)

4) Listening in on other people’s conversations is easy and the conversations are so fucking sad (well, it’s Christmas), that you could write a Christmas story that is even better than ‘The Gift of the Magi.’

5) You don’t have to visit with any boring relatives because all your boring relatives are finally dead.

6)  You can finally give your cat the love she deserves (and she will finally stop staring at you like that!).

7) You finally have time to read all those long, obsessive texts that people send you, texts that rest, stylistically, somewhere between an 18th century novel and crack inspired glossolalia.

8. Masturbation.

9. There’s really no reason why you can’t watch your favourite movie for the five hundredth time (mine is ELECTION).

10. You can finally admit that it’s better to be with people who you truly like (like, yourself) than people who you see out of obligation or because you are married to them or related to them or because you have this crazy idea that being alone is the same as being lonely. 

Hey, here’s a newsflash for Christmas: it’s not.

Sky Gilbert Says Goodbye to Buddies

I am withdrawing the workshop of my opera Shakespeare’s Criminal (composed by Dustin Peters)  from the 40th Anniversary Season of Buddies in Bad Times Theatre. It’s time for me to go. Listening to people at the ‘Long Table,’ it became clear to me that Buddies is no longer a Gay and Lesbian Theatre, as it was when I was the artistic director. It has evolved into a space for a new generation of people challenging the mainstream in a new way. In order for those who have been wounded by the white colonial capitalist patriarchy to heal, they need their own home, and they must take power in that home.  Buddies is now a home for people representing a range of intersectional genders and identities. This is a wonderful thing and I applaud it.  I have no doubt that in the future Buddies will produce plays which will have powerful messages. And also, significantly, Buddies will host concerts, speeches, films, rallies, wakes, celebrations, demonstrations, protests and ‘Long Tables.’ There will be laughter, there will be tears, there will be rage, and there will be redemption — all for important causes. Social justice, trans activism, reconciliation issues and the rights of people of colour, importantly define the youth of today — and our youth is our future.

I took over Buddies in Bad Times Theatre from George Luscombe of Toronto Workshop Productions in 1994. George Luscombe was also a social activist and pioneer  — a socialist whose idol was Joan Littlewood (a disciple of Brecht). We had very different artistic visions, but we both saw ourselves on the ‘left’ of things. George Luscombe handed the space over to us acknowledging that we were the rightful heirs. I wish to do the same now. I no longer want my name, my voice, my essays, my ideas, my plays, my novels, my poems, my art — or anything about me — to be associated with Buddies. I'm happy to make space for others. Someday I’m sure, Evalyn will do the same.

As for me, I will continue to fight for what is important to me (and hopefully not to me alone) freedom of speech, freedom of expression, and the rights of gay men and drag queens — the rights of sex-positive people of all genders, sexualities and colours. 

I stand for effeminate sexual men, s/m dykes, sex trade workers, sexual spaces (like bath houses, porn shops and strip clubs), HIV and sexual health activists, gender and sexual outlaws, sexual liberation, the fetish community and all those who explore alternatives to monogamy and marriage. 

I will fight for freedom of speech because I think ‘art’ is very different from ‘politics.’ Both must be nurtured, but nurtured separately. Poetry must not bear the weight of society’s approval or disapproval.

Poetry must be free.

SKY GILBERT’S RESPONSE TO THE CANCELLING OF THE READING OF HIS PLAY DRAG QUEENS IN OUTER SPACE AT BUDDIES IN BAD TIMES THEATRE

          

          Buddies in Bad Times was founded and then run for 17 years by gender nonconforming individuals. Founder and past artistic director Sky Gilbert is a gender nonconforming gay person assigned male at birth (and a drag queen). Past president Johnny Golding (formerly Sue Golding) is a gender nonconforming person assigned female at birth. In the early 90s, controversially, Buddies invited Patricia Wilson — a transsexual female — to be our publicist, and for nearly two years she was the public face of Buddies.

There have been several times in Buddies history when bullies have tried to intimidate Buddies’ artists. However, in the past, it was conservative politicians — not the artistic director. 

In 1993 Christina Blizzard, a columnist for the Toronto Sun wrote an article about about two Queerculture events: S and M Workshops, and the Female Ejaculation Pajama Party (led by Shannon Bell). The S and M workshops, organized entirely by lesbians (some of whom were sex trade workers) involved “live demonstration on creative bondage, sensory deprivation, implements (floggers, paddles, canes) and their use, and brute force.” Another workshop explored “abduction, fisting, knives, forced confinement, bloodsports, rape play, etc.” After Christina Blizzard’s article, Toronto City Council (with the support of a young counsellor named Rob Ford) tried to stop city funding for what is now the 12 Alexander Street theatre, saying Buddies ‘was a theatre that shows violence and perversion.’ Did Johnny Golding (formerly Sue Golding) and Sky Gilbert turn their backs on these radical lesbian artists? Certainly many people found their words, views and performances controversial, and personally hurtful — even hateful. But no, Queerculture events were part of our artistic programming, and unlike the present artistic director, we stood behind the work being presented at the theatre, and the artists who presented it. This is the kind of theatre that Buddies used to be.

What Evalyn has done is not censorship; it is something far, far worse. Evalyn is an artistic director who has exhibited bullying behaviour towards me — one of her selected artists — and tried to intimidate me to the point where I have felt condescended to, humiliated, isolated, and unsupported. But most of all she is an artistic director who does not seem to fully understand an artist’s chosen voice —  specifically, the fragile, dangerous, nuanced, heart-crushing, searing, soaring, uncompromising language of poetry.

In 1989, federal Revenue Minister Otto Jelinek spoke at the Milton, Ont., Chamber of Commerce saying that it was time to stop arms length funding of the arts, using my play Drag Queens on Trial as an example. Now, many years later, here is an attempt by the artistic director of Buddies to silence my drag queens once again. I literally don’t know what to say. I will let Lana Lust speak: “I have not been afraid to look inside myself, to live on edge of morality, society, of the world itself — and if I must die for it — so be it. And to all the little boys out there who don’t want to wear their little blue booties but pick out the pink ones, to all the little girls who would rather wear army boots than spike heels, to anyone who has ever challenged authority because they lived by their own lights. I say don’t turn back. Don’t give up. It was worth it!” (Spontaneous, canned applause.)