Sometimes a gay sportswriter needs to remind himself that he’s gay. So last night I took a page out of the “Gilmore Girls” and watched all three “A Star Is Born”s.
Here’s the Reader’s Digest version of the story. Big male alcoholic star plucks tiny lady from obscurity and gives her a chance. She succeeds, they fall in love and marry. Her career eclipses his. He loses his job. He gets in trouble. She decides to give up her career to make sure he’s safe. He kills himself. She goes on.
This film was made three times. The 1937 version starred Janet Gaynor and was produced by David O. Selznick. The 1954 version was a musical produced and starring Judy Garland as a comeback vehicle. And Barbra Streisand starred and produced the 1976 version.
What stunned me was not only how each movie was progressively longer than its predecessor. But I was shocked how timeless the original 1937 version was.
Of the three, the original was the one that stuck closest to the story. Both Judy and Babs’ versions loses themselves in their musical numbers, although I have to admit that I did a gay gasp when Judy first came on screen for her first number. Of course, of all of the musical numbers in that version that first one was probably the most germane to the story line.
As Judy’s version kept going, it becomes more and more clear that this was clearly a vehicle for Judy and her comeback. She was already a veritable mess on movie sets and with her love life. MGM had cancelled her contract years beforehand, and she partner with Jack Warner at Warner Brothers to release this movie.
It became funnier as you see James Mason’s character spiral down towards alcoholism while Judy was the stable one.
The most dated version was the Babs version. Instead of the movies, it’s set in the world of stadium rock of the 70s. Kris Kristofferson is the lead singer and guitarist for this Bachman Turner Overdrive type of stadium schlock rock band, and Babs sings what she sings. Basically it was everything that was bad about the 70s set to celluloid.
The most ridiculous scene came as Kris gives Babs her first big break. At a gig Kris becomes disinterested in his music. The crowd is on the verge of a riot. He tells Babs to come onstage and do her thing. She does reluctantly. She sings one of the prototypical power-Babs ballad, and the crowd loves her. Yeah, this stoned and drunk crowd expecting bad 70s rock loves the torch singer.
Then there is this:
It’s remarkable that in most cases the original is always the best. Here is its availability:
Of course, I had to count on my fingers to figure out what grade I was in. Ten minutes later and a prolonged period of squinting towards the sky in contemplation, I finally figured out it was my freshman/sophomore year in high school. Well, to be fully accurate, in the LAUSD at the time high school was grades 10-12. So really it was my final year of junior high school and first year of high school.
Being a March baby, my 15th year encompassed most of 1994. Kurt Cobain shot himself effectively killing grunge. The Juice went loose. Tanya Harding became the most infamous figure skater in history.
There were two albums that I played over and over again.
Tori Amos – Under the Pink
Hearing “God” on KROQ was a bit of a revelation especially for a boy who played the piano and had just become an atheist a couple of years prior. It was refreshing to hear a piano in rock, and it was even more refreshing to hear a woman be so defiant. What can I say? I was a huge “Roseanne” fan and a huge grunge fan, so at heart I was a feminist.
I bought the album on tape because I carried around my Walkman with me everywhere. It was a nice Sony one that could switch sides without having to eject the cassette. I completely forget where I got the $80 to buy it, but it got me through high school.
Of course it is during this time in a kid’s life that identity and hormones just become a hurricane in one’s psyche, and by this point I was pretty sure I was gay. Of course I couldn’t tell anyone because it’s high school. Duh.
A song like “Icicle” showed me that sexuality was nothing to be ashamed about. Unfortunately I’m a slow learner, so it wasn’t until second semester of my junior year that I started to come out.
“Yes, Anastasia” was the epic ode to the Romanovs. “Cornflake Girl” was a dancey number. “Pretty Good Year” has the burst of anger. “The Waitress” is just complete id.
I haven’t listened to this album in a while, but for that year I damn near wore the cassette out.
Nine Inch Nails – The Downward Spiral
This album served two purposes. Of course there was the sexuality angle.
Everyone talks about the “I want to fuck you like an animal” lyric of “Closer”. But in all of the funk of the song, there was this bit that I at 15 thought was the sexiest part of the song:
Through the forest, above the trees
Within my stomach, I scrape off my knees
I drink the honey from inside your hive
You are the reason I stay alive
At a time when a bumpy bus ride gave me a hardon, you can imagine what a whispering Trent Reznor could do to me.
I’ll admit it. This album got me into industrial music. From here I checked out Ministry. Then KMFDM. Then My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult. With grunge essentially over with Kurt Cobain dead, it really was time for something new.
I still like listening to this album. When I quit smoking a couple of years ago and my hormones reverted me back to my 15-year old angst-ridden self, it was a bit of catharsis.
I want to call it a bit of mental retardation. Whatever it is, my family is having Thanksgiving dinner tonight. That means I’m cooking the damn bird today. So there it is soaking in all of the salt to keep it moist. And we know how much women love that word “moist”.
It’s not mental retardation, really. My uncle and aunt who normally host our family get-togethers want to take a roadtrip, so here we are.
And leaves a big question: what am I going to do tomorrow? Well, there is football and family. My aunt is visiting from Dallas so I have that. But the question is what I’m going to make for dinner. I don’t know.
Another night at the Smell, and for once I wasn’t there to watch a friend’s band play. Xiu Xiu were in town, and for some reason despite them being my favorite band at the moment I had never seen them before.
It was a fucking hot August night making me thankful I had air conditioning in the car. The mere thought of being crushed into that oppressive storefront of a venue had my balls dripping in a Pavlovian sweat. Despite the cool air blowing in my face as I drive up the Harbor freeway, pit stains began to emerge in full view on my baby blue hammer-and-sickle tee. It’s one of those nights.
The two lines of coke didn’t help things any. Neither did my Aquafina bottle filled with gin and tonic. But hell, everyone was going to be sweaty in there. I was going to be sweaty AND happy.
I park my car on the street, and pay the homeless guy two bucks to look after my car. I walk down the dilapidated alley armed with my Aquafina bottle and a lit cigarette trying my best to put on a disaffected face despite the excitement brewing up inside.
I step in and pay the $5. The heat of the windowless building suffocates me for a brief moment, every bit as bad as I anticipated. For some reason there are a ton of people just hanging out in the entranceway, a foyer of sorts. They’re talking with friends, looking out into space with all of their weight on one leg, a jaunty stance that evokes the Nirvana line, “Here I am now / Entertain me.”
I walk past all of that and towards the back of this foyer. An empty ratty ass couch sits right next to the hallway that connects to where the musical magic happens. It was a couch I once claimed as my throne when my friend Tamra’s band Cold War performed several months ago. I was very exhausted that night and couldn’t bring myself to move from that spot.
“It looks like the queen hath arriveth,” a voice coming out of the bathroom says. It’s disarming: I can’t tell whether it was mocking or just a simple declaration. I can’t even tell if it was directed at me.
I look up and see a tattoo down a skinny veiny arm, a shock of black hair, a Smiths tee (how fucking predictable at a Xiu Xiu show) and gray Dickies. The smirk on his face is just as disarming as the tone.
I can’t utter a word. All I can muster is a squint, a quizzical look and a swig of my gin and tonic.
He plops down next to me, yanks my Aquafina bottle and takes a giant swig. Part of me wants to slug him right in the gut. Who is this skinny ass motherfucker? I can take him out right now.
Part of me wanted to rip his shirt off, straddle him and feel his hard on pressing against my ass and stick my tongue down his throat so hard he choked to death.
Instead I do neither and stay staring at him like an idiot.
“What? The cat’s got your tongue,” he antagonizes as he moves ever so closer to me. I can feel my breath getting shorter and short, my heart beating faster and faster. Not knowing how to process everything I so wanted to put my fist through his face.
He keeps approaching inch by inch. My heart keeps beating faster and faster. In a matter of seconds his face is inches away from mine.
“I wouldn’t get too close if I were you,” I finally manage to mumble.
“Or what?”
I grab his head. For a brief second, I didn’t know what to do with it. The wall was right there to put his head through. Instead I force a kiss.
The only taste is lust. There is no such thing as a proper kiss, a proper way to proceed. There is only him and me and our limbs, as clumsy as they are.
From the kiss, every wall crumbles. I straddle him trying to gain the upper hand. He fights me to take control of the situation as our mouths are connected like a freakish Siamese twin nuclear experiment gone awry.
We slide down the couch onto the floor laughing, slithering our way into random legs, completely succumbed to that carnal thing we were taking part in. He spits in my mouth. I pull his hair. We are oblivious to everything around us as we became a tangled mess of arms and legs and hair and saliva.
Somehow we wind up outside in the alley.
“Oh yeah, keep it up,” I hear him say. I look down and see my hand down his pants.
He climbs on top of me, and he gets more frantic clawing me. His eyes are closed and the desperation in him to get off bubbles up to the surface.
As I jack him off and his spittle falls to various parts of my face, neck, shirt, a sudden wave of clarity hits me. What the fuck am I doing?
Just as the self-consciousness hits me, he stiffens. That oh so familiar warm and wet sensation floods my right hand. And then the hate. At that moment I really wanted to kill him.
Sure just moments ago my tongue was jammed down his throat. I was moaning as he pinched my nipple. I subconsciously stuck my hand down his pants willingly.
But as the pheromones cleared out, I regained some clarity. I saw this cocky dipshit motherfucker who I knew was not going to reciprocate. Again, what the fuck am I doing?
I pull my hand out of his pants intending to walk back into the Smell and watch Xiu Xiu as they got ready to go on the stage. But seeing two stray pubic hairs on my palm set me over the edge.
I shove my hand to his mouth and wipe off as much of his cum off of my hand. I stand up and leave. I get back in my car, do a couple of lines and realize my bottle of gin and tonic is still in the Smell.
Saturday afternoon was the ultimate lesson in being careful what you wish for, you might just get it.
Oregon wide receiver Josh Huff told reporters on Monday that he didn’t want to play the Rose Bowl unless he’s playing for a national championship. Running back De’Anthony Thomas said, “We already won a Rose Bowl, so it feels like, ‘Whatever.'”
When Pete Carroll was coaching USC, he always said that his goal was to go to the Rose Bowl every year, that there was nothing tiresome about being in the Rose Bowl. He went to five Rose Bowls in a six-year period. The one missing trip was because USC played for the BCS Championship at the Orange Bowl.
In 2008 Rey Maualuga said that he and some of the seniors were getting tired of Disneyland and some of the activities surrounding the Rose Bowl game. They were clearly BCS Championship favorites after beating Ohio State in Week 3, but they faltered in Corvallis after the bye. They wound up going to the Rose Bowl and beat Penn State, but that was their last appearance in Pasadena in January.
The gods were much more severe with Oregon. They travelled to Tucson, and Arizona just whooped up on them. Although the Ducks outgained the Wildcats, Oregon coughed up the ball three times. Ka’Deem Carey carried the ball 48 times for 206 yards and four touchdowns. Quarterback B.J. Denker was an efficient 19-for-22 with two touchdowns and 102 yards rushing on 14 carries.
So fortunately for Huff and Thomas, they won’t have to settle for the drudgery of the Rose Bowl. They could maybe get BCS at-large bid at best. If that doesn’t happen, they could even go to the Alamo Bowl. But imagine how much fun Oregon will have at the Holiday Bowl in San Diego or the Sun Bowl in El Paso. Talk about a hootenanny.
I’m sure Arizona would love to go to a Rose Bowl — besides newcomers Colorado and Utah, they’re the only other Pac-12 team never to play in the game. California hasn’t played in the game since 1959.
Of course, the other big loss of the day was Oklahoma State housing Baylor. For weeks I did not buy Baylor. It’s easy to score over 60 points when you’re playing programs like Wofford, Kansas, Buffalo and Louisiana-Monroe.
If Baylor beat the Cowboys, I was ready to give them respect. I probably would have elevated them over Ohio State. But they didn’t.
Of the two losses, Oregon’s was more shocking. A team that just lost to Washington State at home completely thrashed them.
Justin Pearson, From the Graveyard of the Arousal Industry, Soft Skull Press, 208 pp, 2010.
I really want to have sex with Justin Pearson.
Sure he might not be the best lay since he tells us throughout the book that he is a rather boring person. Despite being in bands, despite the notoriety of his “Jerry Springer Show” appearance, he assures us he just scrapes by day to day just trying to make it to the next day like the rest of us.
But I’m willing to take my chances.
He named his record label after a Joy Division lyric: Three One G. He fronted one of my favorite bands of all time: The Locust. He fronts one of my favorite bands currently: Retox. He’s done more for queer kids than GLAAD, HRC and all of those other white-washed organizations have combined to have done.
And after reading his memoir and getting a peek behind the curtain, I still really want to have sex with Justin Pearson.
Pearson recounts his childhood in Phoenix to his move to San Diego as a teenager after his father was murdered on Halloween. He recounts getting beat up and harassed in high school, being kicked out of his house at 16 and using music as a means to survive and deal with life.
There were talks of touring, how different music projects came together, getting shit stolen, getting the shit beat out of him, being antagonistic to the audience. There was love and breakups and quickie marriages.
Of course he recounts the “Jerry Springer Show” experience and said that backstage during the break he was roughed up by the show’s security for blowing a snotwad out of his nose and onto the carpet.
He talks about hanging out with Jaleel White and going to the Playboy Mansion.
With all of this in the foreground, there is the San Diego scene in the 90’s unfurling in the background. There, as much as he or anyone else wants to deny, is a bit of nostalgia in talking about the scene. It doesn’t wallow in it, however. There is no the-good-ole-days or these-kids-nowadays-just-make-noise moments. It’s just looking at the warts of the old days and rethinking the events and how they shape him now.
One thing that struck me about Pearson is that despite making no money, he kept on going because he loved what he was doing. He recounted an ex-girlfriend who went to L.A. for fashion school and got stuck in that machine.
She eventually moved away to work for a company in the fashion industry and seemed unhappy anytime I heard from her. She had so much soul and integrity. I would love to know what would have happened had she dropped the bullshit aspects of her career decision and tried to do something that was her own. I did that with my endeavors, and it has not paid off financially, but she could have never done something that uncertain. Maybe it’s because she comes from money. I fear being flat broke and deal with the uncertainty of my career decision, but I think in the long run it made me happier. (77-78)
Despite a life where violence frequently peeks its head, there is contentment in Pearson’s life. Sure he doesn’t get the luxuries that other bands like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs have, but he seems happy to be able to exert control on his life. Or, more accurately, to exert control on things he can control.
So seeing as much of the background as Pearson wanted to expose, I still want to have sex with Pearson. But I guess that won’t help the whole being called a fag thing that he has going for him. Sorry.
The proof is I took a picture of the laundry room and used Photoshop to make it look like something it doesn’t really look like. Oooooh! Got the detergent, the white vinegar, some quarters and instant clean!
So now I don’t feel so bad I don’t like Will Ferrell’s brand of humor. I guess I can once again look at my reflection in the mirror and look at humanity without disappoint or general dread.
I think I did miss the memo. Apparently there is a good segment of the population that believe he is funny.
With the upcoming release of Anchorman 2 we have all been battered with “Ron Burgundy” shilling for Dodge Durangos, Will Ferrell reading out the Dodger lineup in the NLCS and other tortuous tie-ins.
I never liked him on SNL. His over-the-top characters tried too hard, and they had the desperation of trying to appeal to middle America. There was something mean about his portrayal of a male cheerleader and a club hopper. In fact, most of SNL during that period was an attempt to dehumanize the margins to appeal to the populace.
The only film of his I watched was A Night at the Roxbury, and that was under coercion. You would have hoped that my turning a sketch into a feature film there would be some character development, but it stayed at the superficial level. Sure you can make fun of these stereotypes, but they are human also. Instead of tapping into that a little, it remained a ha-ha-look-at-how-pathetic-they-are type of schlock.
I haven’t watch any of his other movies. Every time I see him make a television appearance, I keep hoping for something funny to happen. I have yet to see it.
It confounds me how much people like him. I don’t get it. Can someone tell me why he’s funny?
He might be a great guy. But I just don’t find him funny at all.
During the National Anthem in Buffalo, they unfurled a giant flag. It ripped. I still haven’t stopped giggling.
It didn’t seem to affect the Bills. They beat the Jets 37-14.
But should we even be doing this? A lot of teams use the military and patriotism for PR purposes. If they were true patriots and truly supported the military, they would stop taking government handouts and pay the billions of dollars they rightly owe in taxes. They would stop hijacking cities for taxpayers’ money just to build new stadiums and arenas.
Samuel Johnson famously said, “Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel.” We should really be careful about the motives of people who wave the flag and beat the drum of the military.
I still don’t understand the purpose of singing the National Anthem before every sporting event, but I stand up every time and respect it. For a while the Dodgers wanted us to stand for “God Bless America” during the seventh-inning stretch. That was too much. Besides I’m an atheist.
