Category: LGBT

Strike A POSE

We love ‘POSE’ – a must-watch on the telly box. The first two series were compulsive viewing and pioneering in the heart-warming but warts-and-all portrayal of the LGBT drag ball scene of 80s and 90s New York. Gritty, witty and fabulous, the edgy drama pulled no punches. Life on the margins was rough and tumble and then AIDS joined the party to make it deadly. The cast of largely unknowns delivered a sparkling script with conviction and passion. It’s no surprise that POSE has been lavished with critical acclaim and showered with gongs and globes.

We could hardly wait for the third and final season on the BBC. It had already aired in the US – again to universal praise – so we were on the edge of our seats with anticipation. Tragically, it didn’t start well. The clunky plot of the opening episodes seemed like it had been chucked together by committee using keywords. Usually we don’t have a problem with Yankee accents but during one particular mumbling scene we had to switch on the subtitles. Touches of former brilliance did emerge mid-series but the saccharine pep talks about lurv just went on and on. The hard edge was lost. We still lurv POSE but the romance has sadly cooled.

High Camp in a Big Tent

We love a live show and they don’t get more lively than ‘La Voix’, drag queen extraordinaire and a glorious blend of song, sparkle and wit. La Voix belts out the tunes in the best tradition of old-fashioned drag cabaret where the voice and the repartee are just as important as the frocks and the wig.

It was high camp in a big tent – ‘Interlude in the Close’, a big top in the grounds of Norwich Cathedral’s Lower School. La Voix’s old razzle dazzle was part of the wider opening up of the arts across the city, after a very dark time. Even during the Blitz, the theatres stayed open; not so with COVID.

The only downside was travelling back to the village on the last bus with a load of young people who’d been out on the razzle themselves. They were no trouble, but there wasn’t a mask between them. Forgive them, for they know not what they do.

Queer as Folk

I was bullied from the moment I first flounced through the school gates. Nothing physical, you understand. That would be unseemly at a traditional grammar school with a 400-year-old charter granted by the Virgin Queen. Besides, beatings were reserved for the teachers to dish out. I suppose I hardly helped my cause by being a bit lippy and totally rubbish at rugby.

Poofter, bumboy, shirt-lifter, homo, pansy, bender – you name it, I got called it, often accompanied by a teapot impersonation. We all fell about at that one. Kids can be cruel and the cruellest jibe of all was the word ‘queer’. Back in the buttoned-up seventies it was the nasty label of choice – in the playground, on the street, in the pub, in the redtops, on the box, everywhere. I hated it. I still do.

But we’re all queer now, apparently. It’s all queer this, queer that. I get the point, I really do – turning a negative into a positive can be incredibly empowering; just like me perking my pansies. And I can see the convenience of a one-word-fits-all. But who got to decide? Whoever it was didn’t bother to ask me. So just for the record, I’m not queer, I’m gay. God knows I earned that right. End of.

National Treasure

I got my first jab a few weeks back but, being a tad younger than me, Liam had to wait a tad longer for his. He got his first shot in the food court at the Castle Quarter Shopping Centre in Norwich where life-saving injections rather than artery-hardening fried chicken are now on the menu.

Vaccine centres across the realm come in all shapes and sizes but none is more majestic than the soaring Gothic splendour of Westminster Abbey in London. And who better to enter stage right than Norfolk boy Stephen Fry, actor, writer, presenter, everyone’s favourite audiobook narrator and all-round gay good egg. Here he is getting his first jab by Poets’ Corner, final resting place of writers, artists and actors down the ages – Chaucer, Browning, Tennison, Dickens and Olivier, among many others.

It’s a place for national treasures like Stephen Fry.

Turning the Lockdown Blues Pink

This cocktail of winter and lockdown blues gets so boring. Then something comes along to turn the blues to a sunny shade of pink and make me realise that there are worse things in life than being a bit bored.

A virtual performance by The Pink Singers of the 80’s synthpop classic ‘Together in Electric Dreams’. Featuring over 130 LGBT+ singers and musicians from around the world, the second lockdown video from the Pink Singers aims to bring a little bit of queer joy in these challenging times and show that even when people are ‘miles and miles away… love never ends’.

The Pink Singers

Amen to that.

I first saw this winter-warmer on Faceache thanks to the marvellous Annie of Back to Bodrum.

It’s a Sin

So far, February has delivered freezing Russian snow and an icy blast from the past on Channel Four. Storm Darcy brought two-foot snowdrifts, abandoned cars and our resident pheasant pecking about for frozen morsels. But it was Russell T Davies’ AIDS-era drama, ‘It’s a Sin’, that really chilled us to the bone. Brilliant as it is, the series made for tough (though compulsive) viewing especially for those, like me, who survived the worst of times, ducking the Grim Reaper’s scythe by the skin of the teeth. By episode three I was ripping open the wine box to squeeze the last drop from the plastic bag.

Many have binge-watched the series on-demand. That wasn’t for us. There’s not enough wine in the box for that. So we took it as it came, broadcast-wise. Last night’s brutal and uncompromising finale was the bitter pill that had us fighting over the Kleenex. The irony of screening the series during another health crisis was not lost on us. I hear it’s gone down a storm with the current cohort of young gay boys putting it about town, leading to a record uptake in HIV testing. Good job, Russell.

 

It’s My Birthday and I’ll Cry If I Want To

I’m now officially old and young people in shops call me sir. I’d like to say 60 is the new 40 but who am I trying to kid? Gravity is taking its toll, my bald patch is getting bigger and my pubes are turning grey. Looking on the bright side I now get free prescriptions and free eye tests, potentially saving me a queen’s ransom as, health-wise, it’s only downhill from here. I also get 25% knocked off fruit and veg every Tuesday at the local farm shop.

To paraphrase an old saying to bawdy effect…

You’re only as old as the man you feel.

Well, I’m feeling a 59 year old so that really doesn’t help.  

I was born on a Sunday 60 years ago in utilitarian army digs in Canterbury and according to the nursery rhyme…

…the child who is born on the Sabbath Day is bonny and blithe, merry and gay.

I guess that makes me a handsome, carefree, drunken old poof. Well, if the cap fits…

So there it is, my card was well and truly marked from birth. No wonder I developed a liking for anything dashing in a uniform. Now I’m official past my use by date, I’ve decided to become a grumpy old git and shout loudly at the telly whenever someone says something stupid. That’ll keep me busy.

Spamalot

I’ve been plagued with spam comments ever since I started this blogging malarkey – nearly 370,000 so far. Just like Domestos and germs, my spam filter kills off 99.9% of ’em so I don’t have to. I used to get an eclectic mix of spam – the collective weaknesses, desires, vices and foibles of humanity laid bare, blended with endless machine-generated auto-babble. These days the slut and smut stuff is mostly absent, and I generally just get pseudo-clinical gibberish, all targeted at a single post from way back in 2012. Here’s an example:

Decrease of a stage of hemoglobin at males up to 120g/l, at girls up to 110g/l is possible. This can imply dependence on male breadwinners, abandoned opportunities for paid work, and exhaustion that extracts a physical and psychological toll. The former is shown, for example, in exams for cutaneous sensitization, whereas the latter is proven in impairment of the power to resist infection erectile dysfunction for women Correlation of preoperative depression and somatic percepRecommendation #2: tion scales with postoperative incapacity and quality of life afer Collecting data concerning the preoperative characteristics and lumbar discectomy. In the course of therapy, the following duties are solved in every particular affected person: fi reduction of exacerbation; fi selection of adequate primary remedy; fi reduction of the danger of development of complications; fi decreasing the danger of side effects in the course of the course.

The post in question is Goodbye to the Turkish Living Forum. It caused quite a stir at the time, I’m pleased to say. Has the post been deliberately targeted? Who would do such a thing? Who knows. But anyone searching online for the forum will often find my ancient post on the first page of Google – the sweet spot for any website – just below the entry for the forum itself. Perhaps all these spam attacks are keeping it there? Happy days!

The Seven Sisters

Who knows what life will be like once we’re released from house arrest? What will the so-called new normal look like? What’s certain is we’re all Zooming, streaming and buying online like never before. This was already the direction of travel and it just got turbo-charged. How many bricks and mortar businesses will survive is anyone’s guess.

And then there are the most ancient of games – cruising, coupling and canoodling – and the arenas where these rituals are played out. From an LGBT perspective, swiping right had already forced many a gay boozer to call time for good. Why bother with the faff and expense of propping up a bar hoping for a chance liaison when you can order in with free delivery? But these places aren’t just about a Saturday night takeaway, they also provide a community hub and a safe haven from a sometimes hostile world.

An old friend sent me – via WhatsApp, ironically – these amazing images of some of London’s most iconic gay pubs, venues with long and infamous pedigrees. I don’t know who took the pictures so they can’t be credited but they brought back a flood of memories of my gloriously misspent past.

Ladies and gents and all those in between, I give you the seven sisters. As the old saying goes, use them or lose them.

  • King's Arms
    The Kings Arms: famous for bears, their admirers and Jivin’ Julie’s sunday night karoake
  • The Eagle
    The Eagle: the youngest of the seven sisters
  • Admiral Duncan
    The Admiral Duncan: made famous by a nail bomb which, in 1999, killed three and maimed many others
  • Halfway to Heaven
    Halfway to Heaven: where Liam first caught my roving eye 14 years ago
  • Duke of Wellington
    The Duke of Wellie: always my favourite Soho boozer right next door to my least favourite, Rupert Street
  • Comptons
    Comptons: Soho’s boozy, cruisy bar frequented by likely lads from all over the world
  • Royal Vauxhall Tavern
    The Royal Vauxhall Tavern cabaret bar and the eldest sister by far. Listed status may not protect it from demolition.
    My mother watched drag shows there in the sixties

Petty Prejudices

“Ar ya brothers?”

asked the driver in broad Naarfuk as we clambered into the back of the taxi. Here we go, I thought. We’re gonna have that conversation again.

Cabbies are notorious chatterboxes, aren’t they? I think it’s in the job description. And they’ve usually got a view on absolutely everything, with opinions often slightly to the right of Attila the Hun. I knew where the conversation was heading and I didn’t fancy going round the houses so I cut straight to the chase.

“No, we’re husbands.”

“Oh, reet. Me youngest is gay too.”

It turns out our local yokel is totally unfazed by his son’s sexuality and he told us about it – loudly and proudly all the way.

“’Bin goin’ steady wiv the boyfriend for a couple of year now. I ‘ear weddin’ bells. I might get me a noo ‘at!”

So much for my petty prejudices.