Piles Of Gossip! Gossip For Days!
NewNowNext is very excited to be the new home for column of Michael Musto, a writer virtually synonymous with New York City nightlight and queer culture. Musto wrote the long running āLa Dolce Musto" column in the Village Voice and his work has also appeared in The New York Times styles section, Paper, and on Out.com, and he regularly appeared as a recurring panelist on Logo's movie show Cocktails & Classics, as well as being one of the rotating cohosts on Theater Talk. His books including the seminal non fiction guide Downtown and the roman-a-clef Manhattan on the Rocks. His new column, āMusto Unfiltered,ā which launches today, will appear Mondays.
āItās been extremely gay and extremely long and extremely big, which is everything gays like.ā Thatās what RuPaulās Drag Race Season 9 star Jaymes Mansfield told me about RuPaulās DragCon at the Javits Center this weekend, and it was so true. The first ever New York City DragCon was sprawling with drag stars, makeup booths, old friends, baby queens, and lots of zhooshing and tucking.
Hawking Boy Butter lube in the back, NYC drag performer Chaka Khanvict told me sheād had a hallucination for an ad that said, āSeason 37āfeaturing Chaka Khanvict.ā āAnd youāll still be younger than Charlie Hides,ā I replied. (Relax. Charlie makes old jokes himselfāand Iām the first to admit Iām older than Charlie.)
In another booth, Season 8 star Acid Betty greeted me with, āI thought you died! In 1972!ā āAt least I didnāt get kicked off Drag Race,ā I cracked. āAt least I got on,ā she retorted. All this batty badinage made me feel extremely at home amongst the kiki kooks of the nightāthe people I belong with!
What was Bettyās most unusual interaction that day? She looked at the candy colored set around herācomplete with oversized donutsāand deadpanned, āPeople trying to molest me through my wall.ā Security!
But I did have an ego-enhancing moment when a fan gushed to me that heād just bought a photo of me and RuPaul for $30. Iām glad he didnāt add, āThey should have cropped you out and charged $40.ā Anyway, Canadian lensman John Simone, who took that photo, was on a panel I moderated later that day at DragCon, also featuring author James St. James and goddess Amanda Lepore. The topic was the āHerstory of Downtown: Manhattan Nightlife Icons,ā and one of the memorable moments came when James admitted he lost his virginity as a teen to a Judy Garland impersonator. (Yikes. I knew Judy liked āem gay, but I didnāt know she liked āem young.) In another big moment, Amanda differentiated between drag and trans by saying she wants to do everything as a woman, including shower. āAnd how does a woman shower?ā I wondered, sincerely. āWith a vagina,ā she replied, as the crowd went wild. (But to be technical, itās not absolutely necessary.)
He's Just My Bill
I had another chance to shine for my brothers and sisters when other figures from the nightlife came together at the Cutting Room for an LGBT benefit for New York mayor Bill de Blasio. Naturally, I was enlisted to sing a version of āThis Little Light of Mineā with lyrics about the mayorās achievements. (āBillās reduced stop-and-frisk/And Iām gonna let it shineā). They didnāt boo! And there was so much more on that stage.
The nightāhosted by Cynthia Nixon, Alan Cumming, and Taylor Schilling, with talent organized by Nora Burnsāfeatured a mix of award winning actors and downtown personalities, all creating an edgily entertaining vaudeville show. Murray Hill, Claywoman, BETTY, Michael Urie, Mario Cantone, Rosie OāDonnell, Randy Jones, Denis OāHare, Amber Martin, Kevin Aviance, and others, sang, emoted, and stumped for our anti-Trump mayor, who capped off the night with a speech filled with hope and inclusion. Addressing the entertainment that had preceded him, he said that it had come off half avant-garde and half high school show. (I took that latter description as a shoutout to yours truly. Yay! He noticed!)
But de Blasio declared that while he loves Mario Cantone, he disagreed with the comicās remarks criticizing Caitlyn Jennerās Republicanism. The mayor said Caitlyn has been brave and has educated us, and she has the right to her opinions. Well, I was uncomfortable with Mario saying, āFuck her/himā¦I donāt give a fuck. I fuckinā hate him.ā But as for his comments that Caitlyn shouldnāt turn her back on Obamaās legacy, especially since what he accomplished for the T in LGBT helped enable her to come out, Iām totally with him. Yes, we have the right to our opinions too, and mine is that Caitlynās support of Trump is viler than the āMake America Great Againā hat she needs to finally throw out along with her disc of the Village People movie she was in (only so I can grab that marvelous mess out of the trash and watch it again).
Backstage, Denis OāHare told me about the movie he wrote and stars in, The Parting Glass, which is based on the real story of one of OāHareās sisters dying in 2010, which led to OāHare and other family members traveling cross country to clean out her apartment and come to grips with the loss. When he mentioned that Melissa Leo is in it, I told him I loved both he and Melissa in Novitiate, the upcoming 1962-set film in which they play Archbishop McCarthy and a sadistic Reverend Mother, at odds over the Vaticanās changing policies. And believe me, he reads her rosary beads. Meanwhile, Murray Hill told me heās seen the Amazon pilot for Love You More, starring scene favorite Bridget Everett as a cabaret singer whoās a counselor to young adults with Down syndrome. āItās dark,ā said Murray, adding that thatās a good review. Also there, groundbreaking gay singer Ari Gold, whoās been battling a form of blood cancer, told me heās gotten a bone donorānamely his brother, the Grammy winning Steven Gold. āThe guyās finally good for something, right?ā I cracked. āNo, we get along,ā replied Ari, calmly.
Not everyone has gotten along over Paul Alexanderās musical play Trinkets, which is in an extended run at the Gene Frankel Theater. (I caught up with it, and itās a lively real, sweet show put over by a game and talented cast.) Paul was the deadpan MC at the legendary Meat Packing District club Jackie 60 and went on to be in the techno trio the Ones and now to pen this show about trans sex workers in the MPD in the ā90s. In case you thought de Blasio vs. Cantone was the last battle over trans, this show has ignited a little controversy amongst some trans Facebook friends (who didnāt see the show, but had something to say about it). I happen to like all the people involved, despite their weird sense of punctuation, so Iām just passing along their little contretemps. One of the complaints was that āthere were no black men in dressesā selling their bodies in that area, but Alexander disagrees, saying there were all kinds of people. Posted Tiana Reeves: āHoney typical gays stealing lives of trans womenā¦and making it a trainwreck.ā Said Ava DāAbo, who was concerned about the casting: āAnd nowhere was Paul never saw that queen where was he hiding under a cab maricone where were you so I can understand how your ass wrote a play because you my friend were never there.ā Replied Paul: āIf you were too drunk and or high to remember me being around in the ā90s you would do best to keep that to yourself. Write your own fucking story. You are saying that no black drag queens worked the MPD? Ever? Never? Really? Okay, write your own story.ā
In a way less noble moment, Paul snarled, āAnd don't refer to me out of my name maricona fake pussy bitch.ā More sensibly, Paul laid out the casting thusly: āThere are three trans women in the play, playing trans women. There are two drag roles, they are played by men in dresses, with padding. There is also a cross dresser character played by a man in a dress...I know the difference in drag and trans, and I am not using men to play trans women, although thereās no reason why they canāt, itās acting, itās pretend. Ava also said I wasnāt out there. True, I was never a hooker, but I know enough of them and their stories and a few of them have seen Trinkets and felt I did them justice in telling a story so many of them shareā¦.ā
We need Judge Judy to step in here and pound a glittery gavel.
Beach Blanket Bingo
Robert Sandy Beach certainly has his own story. The longtime Philly-based performer says that he knew George Maharisāintimately. (Maharis is a good-looking Greek-American actor best known from the 1960s TV show Route 66). āSandyā met George back in the day, when Maharis was in a production of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, in which he played the sheriff. āHe did have a big gun,ā reports āSandy.ā I know. He posed naked for Playgirl in 1973.
Hereās some more nutty nostalgia: I just met a musician-producer-mixer who worked on Cyndi Lauperās first album in the early ā80s, when Madonna had just started her ascent. At the time, he had never heard of Cyndi, but was told, āSheās a Madonna wannabeābut she can sing.ā Itās all so amusing. Just passing it along.
Female Trouble is a new book by Chris Holmlund based on John Watersā 1974 cult classic, in which Divine is facially scarred and doing a backflip on a trampoline. Itās the first title in the Queer Film Classic series, edited by Thomas Waugh and Matthew Hays, and itās worth flipping for.
Let me serve you something up to the minute and just as titillating: Which cast member from that popular reality show that you all know is going to do a gang bang video with porn star Owen Hawk? Iām not tellingāright nowāsince Iām hoping youāll all gang up and demand it from me.
You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan
As for more legit entertainment: The upcoming Carousel revival on Broadway will star Jesse Mueller (Beautiful, Waitress) and Joshua Henry (Shuffle Along). Iām counting on a controversy over the fact that theyāve cast a black man to play an abusive carousel barker. And I wonāt be fully behind the uproar. Yes, Iām against furthering stereotypes, but I feel the landscape is changingāDenee Benton did well as the female lead in Natasha, Pierre, to name just one exampleāso people of color should be able to play all sorts of things, including flawed characters. (August Wilson certainly wrote some.) Of course if Henry ever leaves the show and is replaced by a white man, you can expect a whole other furor of the type that happened when Natasha producers were going to replace Okieriete āOakā Onaodowan with Mandy Patinkin, leading to an avalanche of twitter twits calling it racist. (It wasnātāit was just desperate.) No problemāIāll be there to remind them, āBut the role is an abuser, remember?ā And can I tell you that when Audra McDonald played Carrie Pipperidge in the 1994 Carousel revival, one critic was up in arms that a black person was prancing around that stage, even in a lovely role? I give up. Iām deadāand not in a good way. Iām off to take a shower with a penis. Itās extremely gay and extremely longā¦.