Gay Actors vs. Newsweek. The Controversy Continues

So that controversial Newsweek article "Straight Jacket" -- which suggests that no gay actor can ever successfully play a straight character -- is still rocking the internet. Or at least Twitter. The article's author Ramin Setoodeh is also the Oscar blogger for Newsweek and I swear my fury at him has nothing to do with the fact that I'm terrific at Oscar blogging and have been for a decade but I never get employed by household name magazines to write about them ;) I swear it. I didn't actually know he was their Oscar blogger until today.

Mr. Setoodeh is gay himself -- as he and his new enemy Kristin Chenoweth were both quick to point out -- but that's really neither here nor there in this discussion because homophobia knows no sexual orientation. It can exist in anyone. And whether or not he intended the cynical piece to be self-serving (he's certainly more famous now), that's the effect. So it's hard to listen to him whine about how angry people are at him.

In his latest piece, a response to the attacks that have come swiftly down on him for the piece (including from celebrities like Kristin Chenoweth, Glee's Ryan Murphy and Cheyenne Jackson), he claims that it's been entirely miscontrued and tries to reconfigure the article as being only about two things: the Tony nominated performance of Sean Hayes in Broadway's Promises Promises and that there's no test case for a major male movie star coming out and how the audience would respond and why is that and wouldn't they reject it?

ShareI use the word "reconfigure" because those were only two of the points he made in the article (and one of them isn't a point but a leading question) and they were the two that offended me the least. I haven't seen Promises Promises but when I saw Damn Yankees I felt that Sean Hayes wasn't playing the role much differently than he played "Just Jack" on Will & Grace and that that was a problem in a new context. So maybe he is all wrong for that part... who knows? And it's true that a major male movie star hasn't really come out in their prime to test any of these theories. But so what? Just because something hasn't been done before doesn't mean it won't be done eventually...in fact it almost always means the exact opposite.

Here's what I wrote in response (albeit cleaned up for grammar as I get sloppy when I'm angry)

This is a dodge when what's needed is an apology.

I take no issue with citing one actor for a specific role --- there have been and will always be specific roles for which any actor is not well suited. The problem is that the primary example, Sean Hayes in Promises Promises, is used to paint a large and unflattering picture of gay actors with broad strokes.

It's pretty horrifying to suggest that Sir Ian McKellen, widely regarded as one of the greatest actors in the English language, is unsuited to 90% of the great roles throughout history. Who in their right mind (I mean a mind without homophobic impulses) would suggest this?

And the examples are obviously cherry-picked to draw a conservative "stay in the closet!" picture for actors who haven't come out. I haven't seen one single thing to suggest that audiences want Cynthia Nixon replaced as Miranda in Sex & the City now that she's come out of the closet. I mean, really!?

More troubling still is the not-so veiled suggestion that some of the greatest movie stars of all time suddenly have worthless filmographies. I'd venture that anyone willing to enjoy Hollywood classics won't see the work of Montgomery Clift for example and think 'Damn... this movie is pretty good but IF ONLY HE HAD CHEMISTRY WITH LIZ TAYLOR.' As if A Place in the Sun doesn't offer a striking fascinating chemistry between two of the greatest stars who ever lived.

So in short (too late) I think we still need an apology.

According to Newsweek logic, these terrific beloved actors pictured above (among hundreds of others) are unsuitable for about 90% of the roles they've ever played. What a shame! So many classics and memorable entertainments must now be dismissed because these people are queer. [/sarcasm]

Anyway, sometimes you just have to vent. I must let this go now. Are you still thinking about this controversy or are you just waiting for it to go away?
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May Flowers, Sex and The City

May Flowers

I'm not sure that Georgia O'Keeffe would have loved Sex & The City but I'm pretty sure Sex & The City loves Georgia O'Keeffe. Those lady flowers are everywhere.


While it's true that you can't really make a wedding movie without a floral arrangement, Sex... doesn't just use flowers for the bouquet toss.

Just give me the damn symbolic vaginas
-The Bachelor (1999)

Flowers cling to Sarah Jessica Parker's Carrie Bradshaw like she's a one woman photosynthesis factory. It'd be a stretch to say that every costume includes them but more often than not costume designer Patricia Field has dipped Carrie in vats of them: green florals (buying an apartment), red (bragging about her boyfriend), purple (single again), huge gigantor white florals just because. She's a photosynthesis factory and a color wheel.

Subtlety has never been Sex and the City's strong suit. The movie is all about the act of handing her ladyparts over to Big permanently, so they must be fully visualized. She even beats Big over the head with them!


Carrie has never been a shrinking violet, she's always an exhibitonist. She parades it around. She turns heads with it on the street. She even writes best selling books about it as you know.

The other women are not without their own floral motifs. Charlotte (Kristin Davis), always the most subdued, doesn't wear a lot of flowers but she's named her daughter "Lily" so she's done her part. Her sexuality was always goal oriented anyway.

The older women get floral representation too, albeit with less saturation. Carrie's envious editor (Candice Bergen) has given up. She's framed hers and hung it in her office.


Samantha (Kim Cattrall), who kept Sex in Sex and the City (the TV show) even when it forgot its libido late in the run, isn't having a lot of sex (in the movie). She wears no florals but in one key sequence she decides that she must have a pricey bit of jewelry at auction.

This flower ring is the essence of me. One of a kind.

It's a symbolic vagina for a symbolic vagina (oh, the folds and layers!). See, her boyfriend Smith Jerrod also wants to purchase the ring and Samantha's entire subplot becomes a tug of war between them. Smith wants her ladyparts for himself. She wants them back.

This leaves two characters and they're both conspicuously lacking in the flower power. 'Saint Louise from St Louis' (Jennifer Hudson) has no vagina. Poor thing. She's only there to help Carrie, so I guess they figure she doesn't need one?

And finally there's Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) who definitely has one but is being punished for pretending she doesn't. Her vagina is furious and only comes out once (barely visible: black on dark brown) to warn Big away from Carrie's vagina.

My vagina's angry. It is. It's pissed off. My vagina's furious and it needs to talk.
-The Vagina Monologues

Miranda is all work work work and 'let's get this over with' mood killer. Unless she learns to let Steve in, she'll never be able to wear bright floral prints again!

P.S. We'll find out if Miranda is back in bloom when Sex and the City 2 opens next year on this very weekend.
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TONY Award Nominations / Movie Connections

The Tony Award Nominations are upon us. As is my inconsistent tradition, I thought I'd share a little bit about a movies you can rent or think about to create an unfulfilling celluloid guilty-by-association approximation of the Broadway experience of the 2008/2009 season before the TONYs roll around on June 7th. Not everyone gets to New York to see the shows. And even if you live here, like me, you don't get to them in your financially challenged years. Tony Winners Cynthia Nixon (who seems to be everywhere lately, right?) and In the Height's man Lin-Manuel Miranda are announcing them live any minute now.

If you want a reminder of what's eligible which you can use to see who got snubbed check out this eligibility chart.

P L A Y R E V I V A L
Joe Turner's Come and Gone
This is the 2nd in August Wilson's famous 10 play decade by decade cycle of the African-American experience. The themes are identity and migration. There is sadly no great movie epic about The Great Migration (That's a missed opportunity A list writer/directors. Get on it!). The original production starred Delroy Lindo and Angela Bassett so you can rent one movie from each. Only one (!?!) of Wilson's plays has been filmed: The Piano Lesson with Charles S Dutton and Alfre Woodard in the lead roles.

Mary Stuart
Imagine a whole movie about Samantha Morton's doomed Mary Stuart instead of Cate Blanchett's cousin-killing Elizabeth in The Golden Age. Although maybe you wouldn't like to think about the Golden Age right now or ever again. My apologies!

A sampling of actresses who've played Mary: Helen Hayes, Vanessa Redgrave, Samantha Morton and Janet McTeer. Scarlett Johansson was set to play her in an upcoming film but that seems to be off her schedule now.

Better yet, rent Vanessa Redgrave's Oscar nominated turn as Mary, Queen of Scots (1971) with Glenda Jackson as her rival. Oscar nominee Janet McTeer (Tumbleweeds) is Mary of Scots in the Broadway revival. Further reading about Bess & Mary

The Norman Conquests
This comedic trilogy by Alan Ayckbourn was filmed in the 70s for television but it's not on DVD.

Waiting for Godot
This Beckett classic has been staged countless times and filmed a few times for television. It's so theatrical and abstract by nature (two men wait in vain on an empty country road. The end!) that it doesn't really invite the screen treatment. The current revival stars Nathan Lane and Bill Irwin. When I interviewed Bill Irwin (who shoulda been Oscar nominated for Rachel Getting Married) last year we talked about this a bit. I figured he could handle Nathan Lane what with all that sparring with Kathleen Turner already under his belt. I heartily recommend renting Beckett on Film in which interesting directors interpret Beckett's work. At the very least you'll get to see Julianne Moore doing Beckett's insanely great monologue piece Not I (see previous post)

M U S I C A L R E V I V A L
Guys and Dolls
The 1955 movie version starring Marlon Brando and Jean Simmons isn't really definitive since it's not particularly well loved and there are some singing issues. The current revival stars familiar actors from TV mostly (Oliver Platt, Lauren Graham and Craig Bierko). When they revived this musical comedy in London 4 years ago the Brits got two actors who fill me with glee: Ewan MacGregor and Jane Krakowski. No fair!

Hair
I LOVED this production (see previous post) but if you can't get to NYC to see it, you can always watch the 1979 Milos Forman film version.

Pal Joey
This got the film treatment back in 1957 with Frank Sinatra as star, so you'll want to rent that. Here's two videos to give you a slice of musical heaven this fine Tuesday morning...



Rita Hayworth and Kim Novak. That combo is almost too beautiful to look at. Double mmmmm. Stockard Channing and 80s teen star turned ubiquitous Broadway player Martha Plimpton are the "mice" on Broadway.

West Side Story
I really want to see this rare revival of my favorite musical of all time. But I could always watch the movie a gazillionth time.

B E S T P L A Y
Dividing the Estate
This isn't a new play but this family drama from Horton Foote is having its first Broadway run, therefore eligible for "best play". Foote died just two months ago but in his long career he wrote many plays and screenplays, too (including that film adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird which marked his first Oscar win). His most successful play-to-screen transfers happened in the 80s with the Oscar winners Tender Mercies and The Trip to Bountiful.



God of Carnage
A friend of mine has already seen this one three times. The play is about two sets of parents who meet to discuss an altercation between their childen. The civilized meeting goes haywire and everyone behaves very badly. The couples are film and tv regulars Hope Davis and Jeff Daniels and awards magnets James Gandolfini and Marcia Gay Harden (yay! my love grows)

reasons to be pretty
This is the latest provocation from Neil Labute also from my alma mater BYU in which a boyfriend's offhanded comment about his girlfriend's beauty-deficiency gets back to her sparking much trouble in their social circle. Thematically this is supposed to close an unofficial trilogy which started with The Shape of Things (which was made into a film with its original cast intact: Rachel Weisz, Paul Rudd, Gretchen Mol and Fred Weller) and continued in Fat Pig. LaBute's film career started strong with the vicious In the Company of Men which introduced movie audiences to Aaron Eckhart (another BYU alum) but lately he's been sliding: Lakeview Terrace and Wicker Man? Really... that's what you got?

33 Variations
This is the play that brought Jane Fonda back to Broadway. It's a story of a mother and daughter relationship and also a story about a composer: it spans 200 years from contemporary New York to 19th century Austria... plays aren't as literal as movies, you know.

Fonda is a nominee for Best Actress. Why can't somebody give her another shot at a third Oscar? Streep shouldn't be the only one giving Katharine Hepburn a run for her 4 Oscar record.

<--- Here's a photo from Jane Fonda's blog of 92 year-old Oscar winning supporting actress superstar CELESTE HOLM (!) visiting her backstage. This photo makes me so happy.

B E S T M U S I C A L
Billy Elliott
You've already seen the movie but why not watch it again. I'm still confused about how it makes a stage musical. If everyone is singing and dancing what makes little Billy so special. He's no longer out of place which was sort of the whole emotional point. That said, reviews are strong so maybe they worked magic.

Oh and yes, this will easily be the Slumdog of TONY night. It's up for 15 prizes including a special 3-way nomination for Best Actor

Film to Stage: It takes three boys to fill Jamie Bell's talented shoes

Next to Normal
A family in crisis (the mother is bipolar)... sings. More than 30 original songs. Alice Ripley (Side Show) headlines.

Rock of Ages
This is a head banging musical comedy (lots of famous songs from 80s radio) which unfortunately continues the trend of putting American Idol stars in Broadway roles -- this time it's Constantine Maroulis. Since this is a send up I guess maybe This is Spinal Tap! could be a vaguely connected movie rental choice. Or, go see Anvil! The Story of Anvil in theaters. It's a goodie even if its comedy is less intentional.

Shrek the Musical
I am in the tiny .001 percentile of the population that finds the whole Shrek phenomenon completely overrated and disheartening. I still think it's embarrassing that the movie beat Monsters, Inc to the Oscar . This musical doesn't have a prayer of accomplishing a similar feat, thank goodness. Small comfort because I am tremendously annoyed that my beloved Sutton Foster keeps wasting her bankability and starpower playing roles in mammoth productions that don't need a star of her calibre to sell tickets and for which no one will remember her. If your name alone can generate press and sell tickets why not harness your power for good and support new composers and smaller shows?

Here she is yukking it up at Joe's Pub last year and on Rosie O'Donnell in 2002 when her star first exploded in Thoroughly Modern Millie


(sigh) I love her so. It's so weird to me that she's never made a movie though she has finally done a bit of TV (Flight of the Conchords)

That's it! Whew. I'll talk about the actors and actresses soon (in brief) Have you seen any of these productions? If not, what's the last Broadway or touring show you saw?