Fuck Assimilation

I wanted to finish up June with a little story from a few weeks ago.

I was waiting at the bus stop on LaBrea and Pico with my friend Jessie (she can back me on this) that evening. That particular bus bench had one of those spiffy ads for the movie District 9, which I have been waiting to see with mounting anticipation. The ads, which are part of a very clever marketing campaign, look like this:


Before I say anything else (and you'll see why this is important) I should warn you, never ever attempt to take the bus that runs along LaBrea. You'll wait about an hour, only to eventually climb aboard an overcrowded, rickety vehicle with an actively rude and beligerant driver. It goes through a mostly-latino neighborhood, making it very difficult for the locals to get very far out of the area, which is not a particulaly nice one. It also makes it logistically harder, more time consuming and less desirable, to go up LaBrea to the relatively nicer, more commercially thriving neighborhood, or up to the Hollywood area, where tourists might see them.

So we're sitting on this bench and I look at it, about to say something about how I love this particular marketing campaign and I'm looking forward to the movie, and South African accents are hot, when I notice some interference with the lettering of the ad. Stepping back and squinting (it was kinda dark) we made out a new, shocking message.


I apologize for the poor quality of the pictures. I will summarize the damage: the word 'Human' in the first line had been abbreviated to just the letters 'US.' Then the 'Report Non-Humans' had been changed to 'Deport Non-United S' with 'tates Citizens' trailing after it. Strong, hateful words to put out in a community that is already horribly marginalized.

I was surprised that I couldn't find anything about our bench online. There was, however, a similar picture of a different bench on Bunny Blog. It looks like this:

I'm the victim of my own racism sometimes, and I beat myself up about it. When you live around any particular ethnic group for a long enough period of time, you start to notice things that annoy you. I lived around white people for eighteen years, and that got old really fast. But people in this town really hate the latino population for what they see as refusal to assimilate. I'm aware of my own prejudices, and in my time in LA I've had the misfortune to meet many people who aren't aware of theirs, but that doesn't mean sights like this are any less upsetting.

I've seen discrimination on both sides of the line, and heard racial hatred spew from mouths of all colors and creeds, and what can you expect from a city where everyone comes to get away from their closed-minded upbringings in small towns in flyover states. All it does is feed the mindset inherent to the city itself. LA was designed to keep it's population segregated, which is obvious if you know the town's history or looked at the city plan (yes, LA was actually planned), and its residents are doing their best to make sure it stays that way.

On another, lighter note, I offer this photo, courtesy of faithful YWBT operative Brian, who recorded this piece of fagtastic defiance in a port-a-potty at San Francisco Pride this past weekend. This is exactly what's missing from LA's gay community, this spirit of "You know what, we have baseball bats too!" That's exactly what we need, an antidote to something like the Happy Hour 'Demonstration' hosted by Fiesta Cantina, a good safe distance away from anyone not already part of the choir, on May 26, 2009. Where are the fags setting buildings on fire? That's what I want to know!

Oh well, I'm not bitter. This rant should have ended several paragraphs ago. Happy last day of June, everybody!

Completely Inconsequential Film History Brought to You by Pixar

I had the pleasure of taking in the new Pixar film Up today, and it exceeded all of my expectations, which were pretty high to begin with. I don't recall the last movie that had me in tears the first fifteen minutes, then had me laughing like a little girl just a few frames after. Yet another masterpiece from the best animation studio in the world.

I was particularly hooked by the 1930's newsreel that opens Up, how accurately it captured the material from that period (see the very first ever post on this blog for my thoughts on the Hearst Metrotone collection at UCLA). In the newsreel, we see the diminutive protagonist Carl as a little boy, watching the exploits of ficticious explorer Charles Muntz, who travels the globe in search of exotic creatures by way of a giant diridgible. This, combined with my recent failed attempt to locate my school's copy of Kevin Brownlow's The War, the West and the Wilderness ... segue... made me think of all those filmmaking explorers who went out to the Pacific, the Arctic, and Near East and nearly everywhere in between to capture places never before photographed. I particular, I thought of a husband and wife couple, Martin and Osa Johnson.


Active between 1914 and 1937, Martin E. Johnson and Osa Leighty Johnson made several documentaries on location in Africa and the South Seas, including Congorilla (1932), which they touted as "the one and only picture shot entirely in Africa." Their collaboration ended in 1937, when Martin was lost in a plane crash.


Martin and Osa were a cute couple, but they were hardly the most inventive, or ethical, documentary wunderkinden. They did the Robert Flaherty trick of playing records for the "natives," or of giving a chimpanzee a beer and filming the results. Basically, they look down on the natives and say "Aren't you glad you're not them, America?" They even filmed and touted (there's that word again) their own capture of a gorilla family, having the mother killed and the babies isolated by hired locals. For this work, they received sold-out premieres on Broadway.

Here are a few shots of the Johnson's at work. Not glamorous, but then even a PA gig on Entourage probably isn't as sexy as you might think.

This still reveals that the Johnson's offered equal opportunity employment, at least once they got to the location. In those unequal days of the 1930's, even Oscar Micheaux was stuck with white camera operators.

I do wonder what Martin and Osa would think of the currently thriving American film presence on the Dark Continent.

For more information, check these out:

The Osa Johnson Safari Museum, located in her hometown of Chanute, Kansas. Finally, there's a place in Kansas I actually want to go to. Can you say your local library has a safari museum and used to be a train station? Do you suppose there is such a place, Toto? Probably not, unless you're lucky enough to live in Chanute.
http://kansastravel.org/safarimuseum.htm

The blog where most of these images came from, and which also has a lot more information about them:
http://theselvedgeyard.wordpress.com/2009/02/04/martin-osa-johnson-safari-film-legends/

Another article/photo source:
http://www.a2oxford.info/pages/reno_2006/pages/osa_arc.html

Oh, and GO SEE UP.

Out of Despair comes... Blog Posts

I was doing a little research online for an English research paper, the due date for which is thankfully not for a couple more weeks. In hopes of finding inspiration for a topic, I did a search on propaganda and came across some fantastic World War One posters. Scrolling through and enlarging them one by one, I thought 'This would be terrific fodder for at least one blog post.' And that is why I am selecting a few and offering commentary on them below.

We live in an age of overly-colorful print ads. I wish we could go back to the simpler times, when all you needed was an artist who could draw women well and color them in even better.

Very little has changed since the War to End All Wars. We still teach our white kids to shit all over those who are less fortunate.

The origins of the corn subsidizing in America.

...and look good doing it!

Talk to Chuck.

"I got your liberty bonds right here..."

Even in war time, child nudity is wrong.

Theater people are shameless name droppers.

You can find more information on this title by here - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0289290/

aka Der Angfall die 50 Meter Stahlzehestefel.

"No, because you're family's poor!" she continued.

It might hurt a little at first, but once you get used to it...

Just when you thought the Boy Scouts couldn't get any gayer.

I'm always a fan of nurses in furs.

Back when the homos actually cared about politics.
When the uniform isn't sexy enough, try smoking.

Link to poster page on the sidebar.

'Angels' Devilishly Fresh, Fun

Last Thursday, I went out to Casito del Campo, a Mexican restaurant tucked away in the hills of Silverlake. I've eaten there before, and recommend it, but this time I was there to see a show in the basement.

That's right. A show. In the basement. "Some thing with latin drag queens being " was the jist of it. I took a deep breath, squeezed into a tiny seat between my date and the Asian mother of one of the secondary performers' friends, and got ready to be thoroughly bored and insulted.

In fact, the exact opposite happened. Why? I was witnessing a performance of Chico's Angels, a long-running but woefully neglected take on the 1970's television show Charlie's Angels, only with latin drag queens Kay Sedia, Freida Laye and Chita Parole. One of four episodes (or so I think I heard), this particular show sent them on the Love Boat, where they attempt to apprehend the culprit behind several attempts on the life of Coochie Coochie mistress Charo (jes, that Charo). Along the way, there are probably 25 musical numbers (with terrific choreography), several simulated slow-motion 'NNNNOOOOOOOO!' moments, and some surprising, delightful sight gags.

Love Boat Chicas (that's the name of the show) is. like most drag comedy, a collection raunchy double entendres, ethnic stereotypes (i.e. Latino men preening in dresses) and 1970's pop culture references. It just does it all so freakin' well that the past 25 years or so of bad drag queens and self-loving attempts at camp humor are forgiven. I haven't laughed so hard at something I normaly can't stand since the last Brian DePalma movie. This time, I was laughing with them.

El cho, Love Boat Chicas, runs through July 19, with a possible extention, but more importantly, is so worth getting over the hill to see. Oh, and buy their T-shirts and stuff. They need money, ok?

http://www.chicosangels.com/

Quick and Enigmatic

I wanted to do one quick post today, one of my favorite finds from the 50-cent bin at Fairfax/Melrose. I won't say too much about it. It speaks for itself.

I can't read most of the writing on the back. Maybe one of you can help me?

It's the Little Things

My neighborhood was invaded by homosexuals last weekend for the annual Gay Pride dog and pony show here in LA. I did my best NOT to get caught up in the fanfare, but I did manage to make it down the street (I live in the gay-berhood) to spend the afternoon in the closest, least busy anti-circuit bar, catching up with people I hadn't seen in a while, dishing the dirt with people I had, and occasionally maybe letting other peoples hands drift to over to unmentionable areas.

Yesterday (Sunday) was all one big Up reference. It came to be that somebody would say 'Squirrel!' and turn their head every time something (some body) they liked walked by. I haven't seen this movie yet; I must be the last gay man on earth who hasn't seen it. That'll go on my list of gay things I don't have, right below 'Gym Membership' and 'iPhone.'

LA Pride (some call it WeHo Pride) is epic. It's Intolerance without the sets. It's Gone with the Wind, with slightly fewer hoop skirts. It's like King Kong, and everybody gotta be Fay Wray. Where else can we go with this? It's like the prologue for Ten Commandments, and everybody gotta be Estelle Taylor. Anyways, I thought it would be nice to share a small but hardly insigificant detail from that epic journey, brought to you by my sexy shutterbug friend Chris.


We found this in the driveway of LA Buns & Co. left by someone with my sense of humor. For their work, I give ten whore diamonds. Happy Gay Pride, possums.

Dame Edna Lives! In the Past.

I just had the pleasure of seeing the first of what I hope will be at least one other live Dame Edna Everage shows, this one being last night's premiere at the Ahmandson Theater in Downtown Los Angeles. I took the train with my friend Kevin from Highland to Civic Center (also known as my daily commute to a temp job this time last year - *sigh*) and got in the cheap way, in the stand-by line. It's a good thing that neither of us were singled out by Dame Edna, or else our zero-dollar admission fee would have come out and we would have been reamed over the coals by herself and the audience.

With extremely minimal prior exposure to all things Dame Edna, I had only a rough idea of what to expect, so I certainly can't say I was disappointed on any level by the show. Dame Edna, aka Barry Humphries, is incredibly talented, so sharp-witted in his interactions with the audience and so wholly that character that you forget it's a man under that purple bouffant and the pair of winged glasses. The character of Dame Edna goes deeper than drag, deeper than camp, to a place we all know and, I'll say it, identify with. We each know a Dame Edna one way or another, and we each want to be her a little.

One highlight I would like to preserve for forever, occurred early on in the show. Edna had singled out a woman in the audience, and was trying to torture some audience participation out of her, when another (much younger) woman in the exact same seating area got up and tried to sneak out of the audience to use the restroom. Edna stopped and everyone in the audience laughed until the the girl realized she was on the spot and tried to reason her way out without getting heckled by the Dame. After the girl left, Edna suggested that everyone in the audience ask the girl in unison once she got back if she was "Feeling Better?" They did.

Dame Edna's performance was, as I said, a premiere, in this case for a tour called 'My First Last Tour.' I'm hopeful that I'll have more opportunities to see him him on further last tours. Maybe I'll finally get a Gladdy thrown directly at me in such a way that I can actually catch it, not wince as it whistles through the air towards me like the Confederate standard in O Brother Where Art Thou.

This entry is a two parter, Possums. For a while, there is a particular snapshot in my collection that I've been meaning to upload and share with all (both) of you who actually might be reading this. A mixture of (to a much greater extent) laziness and (to a lesser extent) waiting for the right moment-ness has brought us to the unveiling of this fantastic little chestnut from Melrose/Fairfax discard bins.


Voila! Dame Edna's sullen twin.

The back of this photo reads "Aug. 2, 1924" in black fountain pen cursive. Then just below that in scratchy blue ink is written "Mary Sandefer; My Grandmother; Take In N.M." This would normally be a 'bad idea' post but I've really grown fond of this glum woman with her rumpled, complicated and very stylish outfit. She's also making a bit of a Dame Edna face. Mary Sandefer, I'm glad that chance and posterity have brought us together.

My Childhood Doppelgänger Has Been Found!

I was just checking the Library of Congress photostream on Flickr (like you do), and I came across this lovely photograph from the Bain New Service.


Apparently, these are the children of somebody named H.P. Whitney. Aside from looking like a behind-the-scenes photo from a certain Hailey Mills movie from the sixties that I saw a few too many times as a child, there was one detail that caught my eye:


This kid.

Now, I can't say I'm either particularly straight-acting or swishy in adulthood but, as a kid, I was very girly. Sensitive, you might say. I was fortunate to be able to hang on to it long enough before various oppressive influences (Jordan Middle School, Jane Lathrob Standford Middle School, Boy Scouts) made me change my ways pretty significantly. This little boy is me from that era, right down to the limp eye-lids and high black socks with light colored shorts!

Thank you again, Library Congress. Who knew an institution of the American Government could make life so worth living?

Your Las Vegas

Friday night I was persuaded by my friend Grace to go see The Hangover, that new film set in Las Vegas about four guys who have a bachelor party so wild that they wake up the next morning with no memory of it. While I thought the movie itself was funny, I have a feeling my enjoyment of it was a little hampered by the lack of distance between the Friday night screening and the previous weekend's foray into the actual Las Vegas.

The Hangover is set in the 'nicer' part of Vegas, over in the Bellagio/Cesar's Palace neighborhood. We, on the other hand, were staying at the Golden Nugget, right on Glitter Gulch. Old town Vegas isn't like most old town centers with pedestrian thoroughfares. Those places usually have attractive historical facades, trees, places to sit and good-looking tourists.

Glitter Gulch, as it's name might suggest, was a place full of tragedy. Not the sudden, unexpected tragety, but the long-living, chain-smoking, crack-addled kind of tragedy that is really so much more depressing. This was a place shouded in nicotine and despair.

There were a few moments I have to preserve:

1. We are at the check-in counter. The girl behind the desk informs us that the pool has been closed. The following exchange takes place between her and my mother: "Is there another pool in the area? Do you have some kind of agreement with another hotel?" "No." "Well, I guess I might as well give my children cigarettes." We are mortified.

2. One look at the lobby, and I understand why Las Vegas is so popular with expatriates from the Emerates. They also would know not to go somewhere called Glitter Gulch.

3. We kept seeing members of the Griswald Family Reunion wandering around. We know they are part of the Griswald Family Reunion because they have "Griswald Family Reunion" T-shirts with their names (Chet, Bud, etc.) emblazoned on the back. I kept seeing members of the Griswald party and thinking about the prospective benefits of eugenic councelling. Yes, I know, that makes me a terrible person.

4. My sister, brother and myself were all waiting in the gift shop for mom and dad to join us. I get a text from Shaun that says 'It's 7:30. Are you being a slut yet?' I text him back: 'I'm with my brother and sister in the gift shop wating for our parents to come down. What do you think?'

5. My sister doesn't have her ID. There goes our plans to see the Chippendales dancers.

6. We do actually see some Chippendales dancers posing for pictures. I am still a little mortified that I retold Margaret Cho's joke about the Chippendales dancers to my dad and my brother. ("It doesn't work for women.")

7. My sister and I did end up having some fun time bonding and comparing guys as we wondered around. I think she wishes I were more adventurous. I know she's eighteen, but I still refuse to buy her cigarettes.

I think my parents do no research ever before they go on trips. It reminds me of the time my dad wanted to take us to Seattle for Christmas, not because we know anybody there but because it seemed "like a cool place." A month after settling on those plans, he realized that Seattle in winter was a bad idea for everyone (though I probably would have been fine, sicne I live cold weather).

With Vegas, mom and dad came away from the trip grossed out and depressed. I wanted to scream at them "What did you expect? It's called Glitter Fucking Gulch!" I have managed not to yet. I think if I ever do vocalize my thoughts on the subject I'll include something along the lines of: "The only reason any sane person would go to Glitter Gulch is for some sick kind of anthropology study."

I know both of my parents are smart people, and it makes it that much more frustrating to see their questionable judgement in action. If I learned one thing from this trip, it's the same I learn from all the others: This is my last family vacation. At least for a while. Till then, I will revisit The Hangover and probably enjoy it a lot more once the taste of real-live flesh-and-blood Las Vegas is finally washed all the way out.