The cast was fine, the production if anything too extravagant. Years ago when I saw La Cage Aux Folles on Broadway I was very disappointed. It gives a convincing central energy to the play. You can feel the generosity of his love, both for his son and Zaza and how the circumstances of the script are wrenching him apart. He owns the stage like the late Robert Preston. I cannot imagine anyone else in the role. Time after time he sets Harvey up with the ease of a latter-day George Burns. (And if they are smart, the straights should also come along for the ride.)Ĭhristopher Sieber is the perfect “straight” man. Spending more than fifty years of my life dedicated to the cultural expression of the GLBT community gives me the authority to beg every gay person in this country to see Harvey in this role. I suggest he more than acts it, he inhabits it with wrenching heartbreak and ultimate pride. A critic friend says he doesn’t sing it so much as act it.
It seems I have heard everyone but Alvin the Chipmunk sing “I Am Who I Am.” I have never heard anyone sing it with the searing authenticity Harvey brings to it. Harvey Fierstein was born a Broadway star with La Cage he is now a certifiable Broadway legend. You could reach out and touch it were you not in danger of burning your fingers.
Not since Taylor and Burton has there been such a hot theatrical love affair! And this time there is no question about “the kiss.” The chemistry between the two of them is palpable. If you have passed the sell-by-date, hustle someone else’s body. If you do not have the price of a ticket, hustle your body in Times Square. You must see Harvey Fierstein and Christopher Sieber in La Cage Aux Folles. Not when magazines such as yours and newspapers like the Times treated the queer community like a dirty little secret. Freeman Gunter, Michael Giammetta, and my good friend John Devere are real heroes of the movement, and were it not for publications like Mandate and Michael’s Thing, neither of these plays would have survived let alone prospered. Street Theater, my play about the Stonewall uprising, is presented yearly. A Perfect Relationship is a huge hit in India where it is credited with recent political gains. Plays of mine from the 1970s have become central to the gay literary canon and are still being performed all over the world. Mandate did eventually deteriorate into a gay porn publication, but initially, it was a main source of considered reviews and serious reportage. John Devere’s coverage of the protests surrounding the filming of Cruising is still a high-water mark of gay journalism. Under the editorship of John Devere, it contained thoughtful reviews covering all of the arts, and essential articles on the emerging gay liberation movement. It featured some of the early stars of GLBT photography, John Michael Cox, Jr., Jürgen Vollmer, and first and foremost, Roy Blakey. Mandate magazine was started as an “out” version of After Dark in the early 1970s.
#Gw2 frozen out guide doric landing full#
There are careers in the arts still going full force that began thanks to his taking notice of them. They were all there, all the early voices of what would become queer culture. The covers of Michael’s Thing may have featured pretty boys almost in their all together but inside the focus was theater, dance, cabaret. It also was a handy guide to the most important institutions of the early days of liberation, the gay bar. It was the one of the main and most reliable sources of information. Michael Giammetta published Michael’s Thing between 1970-2000 as a guide to cultural and social happenings of the GLTB community. The New York Times refused to even use the word “gay,” and only mentioned our community if the article was derogatory. It was an era when publications like New York magazine dismissed the culture coming from the queer community with a sneer and a snicker. She may be right about Playguy and Honcho, but she does a huge disservice to Mandate and Michael’s Thing. She lists magazines that Freeman Gunter worked for, describing them as gay porn. Molly Young’s article on Freeman Gunter in the current New York magazine (April 11), makes a sad and dismissive mistake. From Doric Wilson’s A Perfect Relationship
0 kommentar(er)
