PAGE 14 Q-Notes T February 1994
Compiled by David Prybylo
Q-Notes Staff
“If gay promiscuity is an abomination and
open, committed relationships are unthink
able, what would straight society have gays
do?”
—Charles E. Hecker, in a review of Bruce
Bawer’s book A Place At The Table, in the
January 2 issue o/The Charlotte Observer.
“The Reagans parented America in the
’80s. I was on one therapist’s couch, and the
country was on the other. You want someone
to be more loving, you be more loving. You
want someone to be more forgiving, you be
more forgiving.... Nicaragua, that was a les
son in forgiveness.”
—Patti Davis, daughter of Ronald and
Nancy Reagan, at a "Recovering from Dys
functional Families " seminar as reported in
Time magazine.
“Before any leader of the Catholic Church
tells any of us about the virtues of abstinence
they should practice it themselves. One has
to wonder how many of our youth have been
infected by Catholic priests. Not only is the
church responsible for the destroyed lives of
thousands of alter boys, they are responsible
for millions of unwanted pregnancies around
the world as well as countless HIV infec
tions. The Catholic Chmch has no business
debating public health policy.”
—Steve Michael, of ACT UP/Washing-
ton, responding to comments made by Robert
N Lynch of the National Conference of
Catholic Bishops in the Jan. 5 issue of the
New York Times. Lynch condemned the
government's new AIDS education initiative
because it focuses on condom use instead of
abstinence.
“To be able to get to dance with Antonio
[Banderas]—I am the envy of, I understand,
95 percent of the women in the world and
about 22 percent of the men. I was getting
slaps on the back from both sides.”
—Tom Hanks, referring to a particular
scene in Philadelphia in which he dances
with co-star Antonio Banderas, speaking in
the Dec. 31 issue o/Frontiers.
“I’m proud to play a gay character in this
movie. Miguel is full of dignity and honesty,
and it’s always beautiful to play a character
that way. It’s fuimy. Years ago, there was
something of the moral in the reaction from
society when I played a gay character. I truly
cannot understand. In [Law oj] Desire, I
played a gay killer; but nobody complained
or asked me, ‘Are you concerned playing a
killer?’ But kissing another man on the
screen, and it’s ‘Wow, what apolemic! What
a controversial stand! ’”
—Antonio Banderas, from the same arti
cle in Frontiers.
“With reluctance. I’ve stopped putting
dollar bills in the little red kettles, so prom
inent and abundant at this particular season
of the year. I cannot in good conscience help
the Salvation Army feed the hungry with one
hand and bash my people with the other.”
—Amy Adams Squire Stongheart, an open
ly lesbian columnist for the St. Louis Post-
Dispatch, in a guest column in the December
30 issue of Southern Voice in which she
discusses the SalvationArmy’s position state
ment on homosexuality which reads, in part,
“Homosexual behavior, both male and fe
male, promoted and accepted as an alterna
tive lifestyle, is contrary to the teachings of
the Bible and presents a serious threat to the
integrity, quality and solidarity of society as
a whole. ”
“I’ll sit him down, give him a lectine (on
political correemess and the art of contracts)
and here we go.”
—Scott Gorenstein, press agent to MTV’s
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"The Grind” host and calendar boy Eric
Nies, on what he would do ifNies refused to
go on a date with the winner of a win-a-date-
with-Eric contest if the winner is a man.
“That’s a different situation. That’s not
targeting ideology.”
—Virginia Governor L. Douglas Wilder,
rationalizing a jund-raising letter he sent to
black constituents while denigrating a letter
sent to gay/lesbian votersfrom David Mixner
in support of Wilder’s opponent, Charles
Robb. The two were competingfor the Dem
ocratic Snomination for U.S. Senator from
Virginia until Wilder droppedout of the race;
Oliver North is expected to win the Republi
can nomination.
“Son, would your friend Julio like to carve
the turkey?”
—From an advertisement for Out maga
zine currently running on the Comedy Chan
nel.
“Idon^know [ifl’Udate again]—^I haven’t
called the Dionne Warwick Psychic Friends
Hot Line to find out.”
—Harvey Tiers tein in the January issue of
Genre.
Film Series title
on home video
by Jonathan Padget
Special to Q-Notes
The Charlotte Gay and Lesbian Film Se
ries opened its 1994 season on January 21
with a presentation of the short film, P(l)ain
Truth and the feature-length Being At Home
With Claude.
A Finnish Film, Truth assaults the
viewer with a barrage of uimerving music,
graphic human images and a strange combi
nation of text and symbols. There’s no
spoken dialogue, and the filmmaker’s im
plied intent is to comment on the nature of
gender identity crisis.
Being At Home With Claude, now avail
able on home video from Ac^emy, is a
Canadian film set in the French-Canadian
culture of Montreal. Confined mostly to one
indoor setting, Claude tells the tale—in the
French-Canadian vernacular, no less—of a
gay hustler who slits the throat of a client
with whom he has fallen in love. LikeP(l)ain
Truth, Claude also relies on key graphic
images of sexuality and violence; and Claude
also creates an unrelenting tension of sight
and harsh, spoken sound in the angry con
frontation between the hustler, Yves, and a
tough police inspector trying to discover the
motivation for the murder. After a long
period of trying to break into Yves’ psych^
the release finally comes—and it is breath-
takingly amazing.
Played with stunning precision by a stun
ning actor named Roy Dupuis, Yves takes
the film from its releasing clunax to a dis
turbing conclusion as he reveals his motiva
tion for killing his lover, Claude. In Yves’
mind, his murder of Claude was not a violent,
cruel act. Instead, he sees it as a merciful act
of removing Claude, a closeted homosexual,
from a heterosexist society in which he will
never be able to incorporate the ecstatic
happiness experienced only in his clandes
tine encounters with Yves.
The average viewer would hope to be able
to completely dismiss Yves, knowing that a
murder like that could not be justified. But
the impact of Being At Home With Claude
lies in the fact that, through Yves’ portrayal,
an easy dismissal cannot be honestly made'
by many viewers. The film succeeds in
questioning, without a clear judgement, the
moral choices made by Yves and, ultimately,
his society.
The next offerings from the Gay and
Lesbian Film Series are Forbidden Love, a
compelUng and often hilarious portrait of
lesbian sexuality and survival inthe‘50sand
‘60s, and Safe Sex Is Hot iSex,.steamy scenes
of men loving men and women loving wom
en—all safe. The films begin at 8:00 p.m. on
February 17, Spirit Square Center for the
Arts, Charlotte.