Think what you will about Scientology (and I don't think about it too much), it hasn't by any stretch been in the forefront of the religious right's political anti-gay campaign. So what to make of the call to boycott Hollywood's latest version of "Hairspray" because it stars John Travolta, a prominent Scientologist? What's next, calls to boycott movies with devout Southern Baptists, Mormons or Catholics (which, if you buy the "logic" of this campaign, would actually make more sense)? In fact, the whole thing smacks of a cheap stunt, or at least narrow-mindedness-which, ironically, is what "Hairspray" is dissing.
Travolta, for his part, vehemently denies he (or Scientology) is anti-gay. And John Walters, gay-camp auteur of the original film, is backing him up.
A more legitimate critique of the newest "Hairspray," made by some critics, is that the original 1988 indie film starring the late, famed transvestite "Divine," and the subsequent Broadway incarnation starring Harvey Fierstein (who also cut his performance teeth as a cross-dresser) were in-your-face transgressive. You never doubted that Divine or Fierstein were drag queens playing big mama Edna Turnblad, which expanded the theme of prejudice against those outside the mainstream. Whereas Travolta, the AP's Christy Lemire writes, plays Edna as a woman, not as a drag queen pretending to be a women. "He plays it straight, for lack of a better word, and with a touch of pathos. The joke is completely lost," she laments.
That may or may not be a legitimate critique, but if gay activists and activist-editors feel that way, their beef is with the film's openly gay producers, Craig Zadan and Neil Meron, and not with Travolta-or Scientology.
23 Comments for “Who Is the Bigot?”
posted by Rhywun on
Travolta, for his part, vehemently denies he (or Scientology) are anti-gay.
If you investigated Scientology a little more, you’d find out that they ARE in fact anti-gay, they will try to “cure” you of it if they find out you’re gay, and L. Ron himself was rabidly anti-gay. Not that any of this should be held against Travolta; hey, I’ve liked a lot of his work and I have nothing against the guy. I do find this kind of protest to be totally ineffectual, although I can understand where they’re coming from by focussing attention on a star like Travolta. Personally, I find it more worthwhile to simply tell my friends the results of my research into Scientology, let them research further if they wish, and let them come to their own conclusions. I find that more effective.
posted by MM on
Boycotts like this are idiotic. But, I still won’t see the movie because I don’t identify with this so-called “gay” film, not to mention that Travolta in a dress just sounds ridiculous.
posted by ETJB on
Scientology’s official views on LGBT issues can be found on a nice little Wikipedia article.
The call for the boycott seems silly (for the reasons given). Maybe it is because of..what..er..side of the fence a certain actor is rumored to bat for.
posted by The Real James on
Drag is not gay.
Stonewall was about drag, not gay.
Gay rights are about men who love men.
That being said, Hairspray is the perfect vehicle to discuss the difference between drag and gay. Men who dress as women can be either gay or straight, Divine or Travolta, Fierstein or Dustin Hoffman, RuPaul or Klinger. Some Like It Hot was transgressive without being specifically gay. Hedwig and the Angry Inch has used many different people in the lead to point out the issues raised in that play are human issues, not drag issues.
Gay is not about breaking gender boundaries. Gay is about being masculine and loving masculine.
Hairspray is about breaking boundaries, which is fine, but that’s a theme which transcends gay or straight, fat or thin (which is a more important issue addressed by the movie), or black or white.
Drag is an interesting way to perform and raises many important issues, but–
Drag Is Not Gay.
posted by Greg Capaldini on
By launching his cheap and attention-getting attack against the actor and the movie, the editor of the Washington Blade gave the best possible illustration of why I and many folks in the DC area no longer read that paper.
posted by Bobby on
I love John Waters but I hate remakes, so I won’t see it. Besides, the original Hairspray wasn’t really radical, even Waters admits that, it had a PG rating because he wanted the movie to be about racism and segregation, not sexuality. Divine played the role of a woman, not a tranvestite, and when I saw it at 12, I had no idea she was a man.
And please, it’s not transgressive, Victor/Victoria was transgressive, Boys don’t cry was transgressive. This is Hollywood lightfare.
posted by James on
Victor/Victoria was not about being gay–again, female impersonation is not gay. There are straight female impersonators. The characters in the movie happened to be gay, but their desire to express themselves in effeminate ways was not gay. Boys Don’t Cry, The Crying Game, Priscilla Queen of the Desert, The Birdcage, Outrageous–all Not Gay. Gay characters are involved, but their feminine traits are not linked to their homosexuality. Those movies, like Tootsie, Mrs. Doubtfire, Norbit, or Cabaret (the Joel Grey character was straight), could just as easily have involved straight lead characters.
The fact that some straight men like to play golf, say, doesn’t mean that all golfers are straight. The fact that some gay men like to dress as women doesn’t make all transvestites gay. There are many straight transvestites, and movies about transvestites are not ipso facto movies about gay men, though the characters might be incidentally gay.
300–now there’s a Gay movie!
posted by James on
P.S. Nobody considers Mulan, Yentl, or Peter Pan to be “lesbian” movies just because a woman dresses like a man–why is it automatically a “gay” movie when a man dresses like a woman?
posted by Pete on
First full disclosure: I was officially excommunicated from the Church of Scientology at the age of 18. I had that letter framed and hung in my living room for years.
Apparently Naff hasn’t heard that old saw about choosing one’s battles wisely.
Water’s original works were fun edgy stuff at the time, but not any more. And seeing it commercialized and mainstreamed isn’t. For the context and nostalgia, I’d recommend renting The Cockettes instead.
The cross dressing silliness is very traditional stuff. Comes from Scottish Panto and older Commedia Del Arte stuff. Mid Century America had merely forgotten it and so thought it was “transgressive” or “gay”. Couldn’t be more mistaken. One could argue that the role reversal inherent here has been a universal in low comedic theatre at least since Plautus.
posted by Bobby on
Well, as someone who knows Cabaret very well, I played one of the nazis in high school, which I don’t think is gonna surprised anyone here, I think Joel Grey was actually bisexual. There is a scene where he tells Liza that all his relationships with women have been a disaster, so he sticks mostly to men. Sure, he experiments with Lizza, but eventually he goes back to men. Now, if you’re talking about the host of the Cabaret, and not just Liza’s boyfriend, he also was very gay.
posted by PJ on
Bobby, I think you are confusing Joel Grey for Michael York. Joel Grey played the sexually ambiguous emcee in the movie (and on Broadway.) The emcee doesn’t get that serious with anyone at any time in Cabaret.
AFA the drag goes, I can’t wait to see Hairspray. I love the classic 1988 version. I haven’t seen the Broadway play. Travolta is no Divine. I don’t care. It should still be fun and I am very excited. Scientology has nothing to do with any of this.
Personally, I think Travolta’s take on the whole thing was funny. He didn’t care that Edna was huge, he just wanted her to have a waspy waist and he wanted her to be pretty. hahahaha
I think we need to fight the real fights and not create new ones. Leave the Scientologists alone. They are nuts but they have a right to believe what they want.
posted by ETJB on
“Gay is about being masculine and loving masculine.”
So, then if you are not a ‘masculine’ gay man you cannot be gay?
posted by Bobby on
You’re right, PJ, Michael York was the brit that had relationships with men and women.
posted by James on
For me, gay means loving the masculine within yourself and loving the masculine in other men. So, yes, it is a question whether men who choose to love and express the feminine within themselves can truly be called gay. Actually, I don’t think effeminate men are gay. (It’s odd that it would be considered an insult to say someone is not gay. Am I guilty of “you’re-not-homophobia”?)
Feminine loving masculine is the definition of “hetero,” loving something different. I am “homo”–I love the same thing as myself. An effeminate man loving a masculine man is a “heterosexual” just as much as a man loving a woman is a heterosexual.
When you look at Robert Smith, Billie Joe Armstrong, Alice Cooper, Marilyn Manson, David Bowie, et. al., you have to admit that there are just as many straight men who present themselves as effeminate. RuPaul has much more in common with Marilyn Manson than, say, Walt Whitman or Achilles. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
posted by Adam on
“Gay is not about breaking gender boundaries. Gay is about being masculine and loving masculine.”
What an odd thing to say. Fucking other guys is breaking a gender boundary. Most guys fuck women.
posted by James on
I don’t see “fucking other guys” as breaking gender boundaries. Being masculine has nothing to do with who you have sex with. And, FYI, most men don’t have sex with women because they love femininity. In fact, many men would say women are good for just one thing and everything else they can get from men. How many men do you know who go to chick flicks to learn more about the female experience? Or do most men spend their time watching other men do things? That’s what I mean by masculine loving masculine. I happen to be more honest than most men–I get everything I need from one gender.
posted by Boyf on
“Gay rights are about men who love men”
There are no lesbians, then, heh?
– “Gay is not about breaking gender boundaries.”
– “Gay is about being masculine and loving masculine.”
– “300–now there’s a Gay movie!”
– “Nobody considers Mulan, Yentl, or Peter Pan to be “lesbian” movies just because a woman dresses like a man–why is it automatically a “gay” movie when a man dresses like a woman?”
– “So, yes, it is a question whether men who choose to love and express the feminine within themselves can truly be called gay”
It’s a question for you, because, as far as I can say, nobody else believes this nonsense.
I remember a homosexual conservative, I think it was Bruce Bawer, who wrote a book whining about the visibility of effeminate men in gay rights organizations, which made heterosexuals think we’re all a bunch of queens
posted by James on
I don’t think there are any fundamental differences between gay men and straight men. I think all masculine men are basically the same–we just have different faces so you can tell us apart. Who you have sex with is not fundamental to who you are.
I think there is a huge difference, though, between masculine men and effeminate men. If you are a man, and you choose to express yourself as a woman, then you are, IMHO, rejecting your basic self.
If you are masculine and you love masculine and you have sex with masculine, then you are working to build the part of yourself that is most important to you. That seems normal and healthy to me.
I know there are a lot of men who are masculine who love masculine and who have sex with women–I can’t figure that one out. I’m here to offer them a better and more satisfying option.
posted by Bobby on
“Gay conservatives are just silly in insisting that, aside from sexual orientation, there are no psychological and behavioral differences between the average gay man and the average straight man?”
—There aren’t silly. Chasing after women is hard, chasing after men is hard, being rejected by women is hard, being rejected by men is hard. Sure, some gay men have psychological problems due to homophobia, but not all.
I think gay men and unmarried straight men have a lot in common. The same can be said of straight families and gay families. Rosie O’donnel may be a radical, but even she changes diapers, takes her kids to the doctor, and does pretty much everything else a straight couple would do.
The only thing I don’t have in common with straight men is that I hate it when they talk about the women they want to screw or when they watch football. Ironically, some gay men do like watching sports on TV, so they’ll have even more in common with straight men than I do.
posted by robinsgarret on
The title of this article is pretty fitting. ONE editor of ONE paper gets a wierd thought up his behind…and suddenly HE is “gay activists”, “gay editors” and the whole of gaydom is after scientologists.
There are more articles trying to spin outrage than the origingal outrage.
I think I figured out who the real bigot is…
posted by James on
I think it’s ironic that when you define gay as “masculine loving masculine” you are criticized as homophobic. If gay isn’t “masculine loving masculine” what is it?
Movies like Hairspray have nothing to do with my experience of being masculine and loving masculine. Brokeback Mountain does–as does 300, or Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, or the TV show Prison Break, etc. I like to hear the stories of masculinity embracing masculinity.
P.S. Rosie O’Donell is not like most parents–most parents don’t take baths with their kids and show off their private parts. She has done a lot to reinforce the negative stereotypes of homosexual parents.
posted by Bobby on
I stand corrected on Rosie O’donnel, although I will admit that in Europe it’s common for the entire family to be naked at the beach, or at Sweedish turkish baths. Since Rosie is a liberal and thus a european sympathizer, this does not shock me.
As for Brokeback Mountain, I didn’t see the movie but I read the plot and frankly, a movie about wife cheating gay men, where one of them ends up having sex in a public bathroom, is not my cup of tea.
posted by ETJB on
“Since Rosie is a liberal and thus a european sympathizer, this does not shock me.”
Does that mean that conservatives are “Middle Eastern sympathizers?” 😉